The yellow-skinned "British Citizen" Harry-Lee-Kuan-Yew
In 1862, Lee Kuan Yew's great-grandfather, Lee Muwen, and his clansmen traveled from Tai Po County, Meizhou, Guangdong Province to Sin Chew (formerly known as Singapore), where he married Siu Zhaoniang, a local Chinese, and gave birth to a son, Lee Wan Lung. Li Muwen made a fortune in Nanyang, returned to his homeland, donated officials, and built a big mansion, which can be described as "returning to the roots".
Portrait of Lee Kuan Yew's great-grandfather
As the second generation of Straits Chinese, Xiao Zhaoniang took her son and stayed in Nanyang to continue to "take root". Li Yunlong, who "took root", like other Peranakans in the Strait, received English education from an early age and admired British culture. After graduating from Raffles Institution (the equivalent of junior high school), Li Yunlong worked as a dispenser for a while, and a few years later became the chairman of the steamship company. Because he won the trust of Huang Zhonghan, a Chinese millionaire and Javanese sugar king, Li Yunlong quickly prospered. Later, due to the Great Depression, Li Yunlong's financial strength gradually declined.
As Lee Kuan Yew's grandfather, Lee Yunlong was strict with his grandson, and his admiration for Western culture also had a profound influence on Lee Kuan Yew, and even Lee Kuan Yew's name was preceded by an English name, becoming "Harry Lee Kuan Yew".
Black-eyed, black-haired and yellow-skinned, but Lee Kuan Yew was just a yellow-skinned "British citizen" who had been educated in English and proficient in Malay, and only tried to teach himself Chinese at the age of 20 during the Japanese occupation. Before the Japanese entered the Malay Peninsula in 1941, Lee Kuan Yew and other local Chinese in the Straits were at the peak of their worship of the British. In their eyes, the colonial rule of the British Empire could last for 1,000 years.
The way to survive during the Japanese occupation
In 1941, the Malay Peninsula welcomed the most vicious Japanese soldiers. The Japanese soldiers rode their bicycles south to the Malay Peninsula and landed at sea in small boats and sampans. They sank the warships "Prince of Wales" and "Destroyer", and also shattered the British sense of white superiority, and completely shattered people's thousand-year-old faith in the British Empire.
Japanese soldiers rode their bicycles south
During the Japanese occupation, Lee Kuan Yew's faith in the British Empire gradually faded. In response to the situation, he decided to learn Xi Japanese, and later became an editor for the Japanese intelligence service, helping the Japanese news department to handle the telecommunications sent by the Allied News Agency.
In times of war, Lee Kuan Yew demonstrated his ability to survive in the midst of the cracks, doing black market business, producing glue that was scarce in the market, and working with builders to act as an intermediary between large Japanese companies, the military, and local suppliers.
The rule of the Japanese military government had a huge impact on Lee Kuan Yew. Under the harsh rule of the Japanese military, a society with scarce materials could never close its doors at night, and the crime rate was extremely low. This also prompted Lee Kuan Yew to believe that strict punishment and strict law can bring about a good and stable order.
Anti-communists who started with socialism
After the end of World War II, Lee Kuan Yew went to England to continue his studies. During his studies in the UK, Lee Kuan Yew deeply felt the differential treatment of colonial citizens, and the influence of the socialist theory of Harold Laski, a tutor at the London School of Economics, completely awakened the anti-colonial ideology in his heart.
Unlike the way of choosing violence to achieve national independence, Lee Kuan Yew was more in favor of the idea of Fabianism (which led to his disapproval of Fabianism due to the elitist ideology in his later years), that is, to combine the traditional liberal politics of capitalist society with the traditional democratic politics of socialism, so as to promote the path of peaceful constitutionalism and municipal socialism, and to move towards socialism through gradual and moderate reformism, rather than through the class revolution advocated by Leninism, and emphasized the return of power to the hands of the intellectual elite through education. In addition, Lee Kuan Yew also endorsed Marx's theories of surplus value, but scoffed at Leninism.
Lee Kuan Yew's primitive accumulation of political capital has a profound relationship with left-wing ideology. In 1952, Lee Kuan Yew gained fame by negotiating with the government on behalf of the "striking postmen of Singapore", building a mass base in the trade unions. In 1954, Lee Kuan Yew founded the People's Action Party (PAP) with Chinese returning Chinese, Chinese-educated leftist students and trade union leaders, who participated in the first election held the following year and were elected to the Legislative Assembly.
Working with leftists such as the Communist Party of Malaya, Lee Kuan Yew was elected the first Prime Minister of the Government of the Autonomous State of Singapore in 1959. But soon Lee Kuan Yew broke with the pro-communist elements of the PAP. In 1963, the Singapore government launched a large-scale police ensnarment operation (historically known as Operation Cold Storage), in which more than 100 anti-government leftists were arrested or detained.
Lee Kuan Yew's struggle with pro-communist elements lasted for years. In 1970, the Internal Security Service was established in Singapore. The department has the power to detain individuals without trial and is primarily used to monitor and address potential communist threats. In 1987, 22 persons were arrested without trial under the Internal Security Decree, also known as Operation Spectrum.
Mergers and demergers in Singapore
Unlike other Southeast Asian colonial countries that fought for national independence, Singapore's independence went through two stages: merger and separation, and it was a roundabout and passive independence.
In 1959, Singapore attained the status of an autonomous state. In 1963, Singapore joined Malaysia as an independent city-state. Singapore and Malaysia are mainly composed of Malays, Chinese, Indians and other ethnic groups, each with different languages, Xi customs, beliefs and classes, which inevitably leads to ethnic disputes, and ethnic issues have also plagued this place for many years. As a result, Singapore, which has a Chinese population of more than 70 percent, and the ambitious People's Action Party (PAP) and its leaders pose a huge threat to Malay-dominated Malaysia.
On 8 August 1965, the Malaysian Parliament expelled Singapore from the Commonwealth. On August 9, Singapore became independent and the Republic of Singapore was officially established. At the press conference, Lee Kuan Yew couldn't control his feelings of loss and couldn't help but burst into tears.
Why do politicians who oppose colonialism weep after gaining independence? There may be several reasons:
1. Lee Kuan Yew's political ambitions are not limited to Singapore
Lee Kuan Yew does not want to be the leader of a single autonomous state in Singapore, he hopes that the People's Action Party (PAP) will exert influence throughout Malaysia and build a "Malaysia" that belongs to Malaysians, breaking the political pattern of Malays dominating Malaysia.
2. Singapore is under great pressure to lose the hinterland of Malaysia
Singapore is well connected to Malaya by the Straits of Johor and is connected by the Singapore Johor Causeway and the Second Channel. The people of the two places have close contacts and frequent cultural, economic and trade exchanges. If Singapore becomes independent, it means losing its hinterland and independently bearing economic, diplomatic, and military pressures.
Walking on thin ice after independence
After being forced to become independent, Singapore needs to face the threat of Malaysia's big brother, but also face the confrontation of the great power Indonesia, and the original boss Britain must also prepare to withdraw its troops, everything must rely on itself. In the vast Muslim world, small cities dominated by Chinese are just small red dots in the vast map, just like Israel in Southeast Asia.
Coincidentally, Israel also became a mentor to Singapore's army building. In order to avoid the resentment of Muslims in Singapore and Malaysia, the Israelis had to enter under the guise of "Mexicans" and secretly assist Singapore in building up its armed forces.
From the 1960s to the 1990s, the economies of Taiwan, South Korea, Singapore and Hong Kong took off as the "Asian Tigers". There are many differences in the political systems and governance structures of these four economies, but without exception, they all take advantage of the opportunity of transferring labor-intensive industries from developed countries to developing countries, attract large amounts of foreign investment and technology, and fully combine them with local cheap and good labor advantages to achieve local comparative advantages. Such comparisons can also highlight Singapore's true success.
To achieve integration with advanced economies, the right side of the Cold War is a necessary condition. In addition to firmly embracing the big brother of the United States, Singapore should also be cautious in its relations with its powerful neighbors. In Indonesia or Malaysia, every conflict between local Chinese and Muslims is likely to be projected onto Singapore. And the combination of Chinese Juche and communism also poses a threat to Singapore, which follows the United States. All the way, he can be regarded as trembling and walking on thin ice, so that the big brothers can take him to play, and only then can he achieve economic integration and take-off. (To be continued)