India and Southeast Asia
In the period leading up to the outbreak of the European war in 1914, India’s social and political landscape was largely under British rule. The British government exercised control over India through a viceroy in Calcutta and the Secretariat of India in London. With a population of approximately 255 million, India’s cotton and jute plantations generated significant income for the British metropolis. Additionally, British-manufactured goods flooded Indian markets, distributed through a network of railways, ports, and roads constructed by the British for this purpose. Following the traumatic sepoy revolt in 1857, the British government implemented measures to prevent similar uprisings in the future. The Indian army, composed of soldiers and officers from both India and the metropolis, became one of the most formidable forces, comparable to professional European armies.
HSIT 2005 Week 5 Revolution and Depression Set the Stage for Another War
When Great Britain declared war on Germany in 1914, all British dominions and colonies automatically joined the imperial war effort. The leaders of the Indian National Congress, including Gandhi and Nehru, supported Britain in the hope of achieving greater political autonomy while not challenging the permanence of the British Empire. At the war’s outset, India was not an industrialized country, largely due to the metropolis’ economic policies that aimed to maintain India as a consumer of British manufactured goods. However, the exigencies of the war led the British government to permit India and other colonies to engage in the production of ammunition, artillery, and motor vehicles. Despite their contributions, the Indian demands were ignored by the British government at the war’s end, culminating in one of the most shameful incidents of British imperialism—the Amritsar massacre. As a result, calls for independence grew louder, overshadowing any path of reform drowned in bloodshed.
HSIT 2005 Week 5 Revolution and Depression Set the Stage for Another War
In Southeast Asia, the early stirrings of nationalism emerged in the Philippines (Lockard, 2009). Although Southeast Asia specialized in the export of primary commodities, its weak industrialization hindered the local production of essential goods, including cloth and thread, during the Great War. Many Vietnamese viewed revolution as the only solution to colonial exploitation and repression (Lockard, 2009). During the 1930 rebellions, groups allied with the Indochinese Communist Party, primarily composed of desperate peasants affected by the Great Depression, successfully held off the French military for months, seizing control of several provinces (Lockard, 2009). The major movements and the influence of figures like Ho Chi Minh and the Viet Minh played fundamental roles. In Southeast Asia, where the various states and colonies had limited impact on determining the war’s outcome, the Great War shaped political, economic, and social developments not only during the conflict but also in its aftermath (Streets-Salter, 2017). This period presented Southeast Asian nationalists with an opportunity to capitalize on the power structures’ transformations, the chaos and crisis of rule engendered by the war, and establish their independence movements.
HSIT 2005 Week 5 Revolution and Depression Set the Stage for Another War
In 1939, India found itself connected to the various powers that entered another war, as its financial, industrial, and military resources were vital to the British. The Indian Army was one of the largest forces during World War II. Similarly, Southeast Asia in 1939 faced numerous challenges from the Japanese, who promised them independence from Western colonial and imperial rule. Southeast Asians had to rely on their nationalism to resist the Japanese occupation. Southeast Asia, like the different powers that once again engaged in war in 1939, endured the effects of the Great Depression, including severe shortages of food and goods that affected the region’s population (Lockard, 2009).
Reference
Lockard, C. (2009). Southeast Asia in World History.
Streets-Salter, H. (2017). Introduction. In World War One in Southeast Asia: Colonialism and Anticolonialism in an Era of Global Conflict (pp. 1-16). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/9781316471487.002
