Southeast Asia: Transition among the Nagas - Dragons and Tigers: A Geography of South, East and Southeast Asia - page 399

individuals, such as Sukarno of Indonesia, Aung San of
Burma, and Ho Chi Minh of Vietnam, spearheaded inde-
pendence movements. New ideologies were framed in
the context of the Boxer Rebellion in China (1899), the
Chinese Revolution of 1911, and the rise of Japan and its
defeat of Russia in 1905, events that proved that the
Western powers were not invincible.
After the Japanese invasion of 1941, Japan promoted
“Asia for the Asians.” It also encouraged emerging na-
tionalist movements and even transferred some powers
to local leaders such as the sultans of the Malay States.
Although the Japanese occupation proved to be no better
than that of the former colonial powers, the period be-
tween 1941 and 1945 was important in laying the
groundwork for subsequent independence.
After the defeat of Japan in World War II, the colo-
nial powers returned to discover they had to negotiate
with well-organized and informed nationalists with
popular support. Not all efforts were peaceful, with
much acrimony between the negotiating parties. The
Philippines gained independence in 1946, Indonesia in
1949, and Malaya, along with British North Borneo and
Sarawak (today' s Malaysia), in 1957. The process in
some of the other states was prolonged. For example,
Singapore did not gain independence until 1963 and
Brunei in 1984. (Figure 1-14). Whatever the case, the
colonial period left what Rigg (1991) calls “an institu-
tional and ideological legacy” of Westernization that
became superimposed on or integrated with former
modes of governance.

supported non-Communist government of South
Vietnam waged battle against the Communist
forces of North Vietnam. After years of terrible
conflict, loss of life, and increasing corruption in
South Vietnam, public opinion in America forced
U.S. withdrawal in 1973. The war finally ended in
1975. Divided Vietnam was then unified by the
Communists.
The Vietnam/American war was a human and
environmental tragedy . More than 4.5 million died
in Indochina, including more than 58,000 Ameri-
cans. Bombs, napalm, and chemical defoliants de-
stroyed millions of acres of forests and cropland as
well as people' s health. Thousands have been killed
or maimed by unexploded ordnance throughout
Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos. As you will see in
the next chapter, the ramifications of this war were
severe, widespread, and ongoing.

Changing Urban and Rural Worlds

Although there were a number of very large cities in
1900, most of mainland and insular Southeast Asia re-
mained sparsely populated. However, the twentieth and
twenty-first centuries witnessed unprecedented popula-
tion growth in concert with economic, social, and politi-
cal transformation (Figure 14-13).
Historically , settlement patterns were geared to
coasts and rivers and based on seaborne interchange.
Inland transportation was difficult until the road and
railroad building of the 1800s.
Settlement has been tied to rice cultivation, which
has, with Green Revolution improvements, supported
ever-larger populations. Centralized policies, in Angkor
and the Red River Delta, were required to command and
control the expansion of rice production. Given the frac-
tured terrain, for most of history , small societies and local
economies dominated the Southeast Asian world. This
situation changed in the late nineteenth century as the
tentacles of European imperialism reached beyond port
cities into the interior. Large-scale plantations, mines,
and administrative cities were constructed in any poten-
tially profitable niche.
With the growth of colonial enterprises, urban centers
including traditional entrepôts and new colonial cities ex-
hibited spurts of growth. By 1910, there were eleven South-
east Asian cities of more than 100,000 people: Mandalay ,
Rangoon (Yangon), Bangkok, Hanoi, Saigon, Georgetown

A Bitter Battle: French
Indochina

French Indochina—Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam—
became nominally independent in 1949,
although political and economic power was
retained by France. V arious nationalistic leaders
including Ho Chi Minh resisted the French with
aid from Communist China and the Soviet Union.
A guerrilla war ensued in Vietnam, and the
French were finally defeated at the Battle of Dien
Bien Phu in 1954.
The United States, panicked over the further
spread of communism, stepped into what became
known in America as the “Vietnam War” and in
Vietnam as the “American War.” The American-