The Japanese Occupation of Malaya: 1941-1945.(Review)

Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, September, 1998 by Frei, Henry

By PAUL H. KRATOSKA. London: Hurst and Company, 1998. Pp. xxi, 404. Maps, Tables, Illustrations, Bibliography, Index.

Many books recount the fall of Singapore, but what the Japanese then did with their prize has somehow always eluded a careful history. Too often the attempt remained in the shadow of narrating the enormity of the fall and the immediate Japanese dissipation of victory in infamous purges of the Malayan Chinese population. This is the first truly comprehensive social and economic history that details in a scholarly and analytical way the Japanese occupation of Malaya 1941-45.

With great patience the author has pieced together a lucid history rendered difficult by two factors: Britain's destruction of files as part of her scorched earth...

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