ABSTRACT
This chapter, in contrast, provides a critique of this interpretation, and, rather, argues that the Malayan Communist Party (MCP) threat, at least until 1948, was not the only factor that prompted the reaction of the British colonial administration in declaring the Emergency of 1948. In comparison to the communist movement, which received litte support from the people, the present study argues that the left-leaning Malay nationalist and religious movement had played a much more significant and challenging role against the British colonial administration. Apart from banning a few anti-colonial movements, an Emergency was declared to quell the threat of the nationalist movement by making the MCP a ‘scapegoat’. Most historians explained that the declaration of Emergency was prompted by the MCP’s planned revolt and the Cold War threat. This was a plan engineered by the Soviet Union against the British in Malaya.
