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"A harrowing history of the conflicts that swept Asia during the decade following World War II-and determined the fate of the continent. The end of World War II led to the United States' emergence as a global superpower. For war-ravaged Western Europe it marked the beginning of decades of unprecedented cooperation and prosperity that one historian has labeled "the long peace." Yet half a world away, in China, Indonesia, Vietnam, Korea, and Malaya-the fighting never really stopped, as these regions sought to completely sever the yoke of imperialism and colonialism with all-too-violent consequences. East and Southeast Asia quickly became the most turbulent regions of the globe. Within weeks of the famous surrender ceremony aboard the U.S.S. Missouri, civil war, communal clashes, and insurgency engulfed the continent, from Southeast Asia to the Soviet border. By early 1947, full-scale wars were raging in China, Indonesia, and Vietnam, with growing guerrilla conflicts in Korea and Malaya. Within a decade after the Japanese surrender, almost all of the countries of South, East, and Southeast Asia that had formerly been conquests of the Japanese or colonies of the European powers experienced wars and upheavals that resulted in the deaths of at least 2.5 million combatants and millions of civilians. With A Continent Erupts, acclaimed military historian Ronald H. Spector draws on letters, diaries, and international archives to provide, for the first time, a comprehensive military history and analysis of these little-known but decisive events. Far from being simply offshoots of the Cold War, as they have often been portrayed, these shockingly violent conflicts forever changed the shape of Asia, and the world as we know it today"--

Spector follows up on Eagle Against the Sun, his account of the American struggle against the Japanese in World War II, with a chronicle of the aftermath of this crucial conflict. He tells the fascinating story of the deadly confrontations that broke out--or merely continued--in Asia after peace was proclaimed. Under occupation by the victorious Allies, this part of the world was plunged into new power struggles, or back into old feuds, that in some ways were worse than the war itself. International suspicions were still strong; die-hard Japanese officers plotted to prevent surrender; in Manchuria, Russian "liberators" looted, raped, and killed innocent civilians; in China a fratricidal rivalry continued between Chiang Kai-shek's regime and Mao's revolutionaries; and Southeast Asia and Korea became powderkegs, with Communists only one of several competing anticolonial factions.--From publisher description

The wars of postcolonial Asia, although often viewed by U.S. officials as struggles between Communist and non-Communist forces or between colonial powers and independence movements, were in fact far more complex and ambiguous in nature. The conflicts displayed some of the characteristics of civil war, brigandage, and ethnic, regional, and religious warfare. This article exams the experience of Phat Diem, a predominantly Catholic enclave in northern Vietnam, during the First IndochinaWar, to highlight the dynamics of these cross-currents of regionalism, nationalism, and religion. Ultimately Phat Diem's attempts to steer a middle course between Communism and French colonialism ended disastrously, but its story highlights several important but little recognized aspects of the war in Indochina and the nature of Asia's wars in the first decade after the end of World War II.

The wars of postcolonial Asia, although often viewed by U.S. officials as struggles between Communist and non-Communist forces or between colonial powers and independence movements, were in fact far more complex and ambiguous in nature. The conflicts displayed some of the characteristics of civil war, brigandage, and ethnic, regional, and religious warfare. This article exams the experience of Phat Diem, a predominantly Catholic enclave in northern Vietnam, during the First Indochina War, to highlight the dynamics of these cross-currents of regionalism, nationalism, and religion. Ultimately Phat Diem's attempts to steer a middle course between Communism and French colonialism ended disastrously, but its story highlights several important but little recognized aspects of the war in Indochina and the nature of Asia's wars in the first decade after the end of World War II. Adapted from the source document.

The United States and its allies were almost completely unprepared for the enormous occupation responsibilities they faced in the Far East beginning in 1945. The author reviews Chinese, American, and British occupation decisions in immediate postwar China, Korea, and Southeast Asia and the role of the forces of recently defeated Japan. Allied occupiers came into the area for the nonpolitical task of disarming and removing the Japanese, but they quickly found themselves in the middle of insurgencies or civil wars, because the basic political future of these countries remained undecided. By 1948 all the states of the former Japanese empire were involved in conflicts. The ultimate fate of the occupied nations seemed to depend more on internal forces than on the techniques or plans of the occupiers. Consequently, the lessons of this period for the recent Iraq occupation are ambiguous at best, and they suggest that nation-building with guns will have no more certain outcome.

Rezension von: Krepinevich, Andrew F. (jr.): The army and Vietnam. - Baltimore/Md. : The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986