ABSTRACT
A canon of Malayan historiography that the Emergency of the Malayan Communist Party (MCP), was effectively neutralized by counter measures in the socioeconomic, military, and political spheres. The argument that the resolution of the Emergency essentially required the British and the Malay elites to guarantee Chinese political and constitutional rights in an independent federation is incomplete. This paradigm captures how the educated urban Chinese were won over to the British-Malay plan for an independent Federation of Malaya. Being spliced together with the political Emergency, the operational campaign deserves individualized and deeper analysis on the rural Chinese factor. It can be divided into three phases: the first, from June 1948 to December 1951, the second phase, from January 1952 to June 1955, and the third period, from June 1955 to December 1958. Malaya was made safe for decolonization in two stages: the political Emergency ended on August 31, 1957, the operational campaign ceased with the MCP demobilization policy of December 1958.
