How far did the Japanese Occupation change the lives of the people in Southeast Asia?

by deathfalcon (student)

The lives of the people were changed to a large extent. It gave the general populace hope for independence as the Japanese Occupation destroyed the myth of Western superiority. It also gave the natives resolve to fight for independence and be free from external control instead of working under harsh conditions. However, the Japanese Occupation did little to change existing tensions between different racial and regional groups.

Firstly, before the Japanese Occupation, the locals were resigned to being subjected to colonial rule. This was clearly seen by the difficulties nationalist leaders faced to recruit the support of the masses. However, the humiliating British defeat and French concession dispelled the myth of Western superiority. The British were overconfident of their abilities and severely underestimated the Japanese, even citing their poor eyesight as a reason to why they could not be good fighter pilots. With their resources spilt between protecting their colonies in Southeast Asia and their homeland in Europe, they quickly lost Malaya to the Japanese within three months. Although the French were not defeated outright, the French administration in Vietnam was controlled by the Japanese in that they were allowed to use French Indochina territory for Japanese purposes. As a result, the nationalist leaders were able to garner mass support through the shared suffering and in doing so negotiate independence, hence changing the lives of the people. Local resistance movements that went beyond ideological differences were formed during the Japanese Occupation, such as the MPAJA in Malaya and the Vietminh in Vietnam, which appealed to communists and non-communists alike, and made the fight for freedom a greater reality for the vast majority of the local population who had been previously politically apathetic towards anti-colonialist struggles.

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Secondly, the Japanese Occupation changed the lives for the worse- due to forced labour and severe shortage of food- conditions that were even more severe than under European rule, and thus instilled a greater desire for independence which was absent during the earlier colonial period. Before the Japanese Occupation, the locals worked under unforgiving conditions at the hands of their colonial masters. For example, in Indonesia, the Dutch strictly disallowed freedom of speech and association (among others). Also, in Vietnam, despite the crippling effects of the Great Depression on the locals, the French did not reduce taxes. However, despite the harsh treatment, what was more surprising was that this did not spur the majority on to fight for independence. After the successful Japanese invasion, the locals felt that the colonial powers had done little to defend them. In Indonesia, the Dutch was quickly defeated in the Battle of the Java Sea. The British lost Malaya is less than 3 months. These showed the locals that measures were not taken to protect their colonies against invasion and that they needed to assert their own independence in order to protect themselves in future. Furthermore, they continued to be treated harshly by the Japanese. The Vietnamese faced a shortage of basic necessities and inflation was rampant due to worthless Japanese military currency. The Indonesians were subjected to forced recruitment of civilian labour to build infrastructure and railways to further help the Japanese war effort. Many were sent to build the infamous “Death Railway” in Thailand. In Malaya, the Japanese lacked sensitivity for Islamic customs and punished the Chinese population severely through carrying out Operation Sook Ching where any suspected hostile elements among the Chinese in Singapore were massacred. The continued suppression of the people caused them to change their mindset and began to demand independence. Although the people had suffered much under colonial rule, the situation was not as dire as it was under war-time conditions, brought about by the Japanese Occupation. This extreme depravation and suffering helped to crystallise the resolve in the hearts and minds of the locals to expel the invaders and to bring about peace and prosperity through self-rule.

Thirdly, Japanese Occupation did not change, but merely aggravated existing tensions between the various groups in society due to Japanese policy and divide and rule. Before the Japanese Occupation, tensions between ethnic groups were already present in Malaya. It was deeply divided society of Malays, Chinese and Indians. The Malay society itself was further divided as it was based on individual loyalty to a ruler. In Indonesia, they were divided according to regions and were very separated. This posed a large problem for Indonesian nationalist leaders. The Japanese Occupation served to aggravate these existing tensions. In Malaya, Japanese policy of divide and rule aggravated race relations by manipulating the existing tensions between the races. While they favoured the Malays, they treated the Chinese very harshly and even made them pay fifty million Straits dollars towards the Japanese war fund in 1942 through the Overseas Chinese Association (OCA).[1] This worsened the relationship between the Chinese and Malays. In Indonesia, the Japanese split up “Indonesia” into three separate administrative units, Sumatra was together with Singapore and the Malay Peninsula under the 25th Army, Java was under the 16th Army and the Eastern islands of the East Indies under the Japanese Navy. The segregation aggravated the lack of unity among the various regions. As such, the pre-existing tensions were merely elevated and as such did not really change the people’s lives.

In conclusion, the lives of the people were changed to a large extent. They were more motivated to work towards independence as they realised that the colonial powers and the Japanese were exploitative and only did things that furthered their own national interest, hence being unreliable to help protect them. However, there was little change shown in the aspect of relations between the different groups in society and the Japanese Occupation served mainly to aggravate existing tensions rather than change the nature of the relationship. Furthermore, the Japanese Occupation also helped the locals to desire independence, hence changing the mindset of the masses in a crucial way that made the subsequent reimposition of colonial rule extremely challenging.

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