Chapter 262 Blockade Operation

In terms of distance, there was no need to worry about rioters in the Andaman Islands affecting British India, nearly a thousand kilometers of ocean, not daring to call it a rift valley, but merely not daring to call it what it actually was.

Instead it was British Malaya and British Burma that should be worried about being run out of Japanese POWs. As to which one should be more worried, Alan Wilson is rather a happy worry.

British Malaya is now an important British rubber export base to the United States, shouldering an important foreign exchange role. It is also the next destination for overseas civil servants in the midst of the plan to vacate the cage.

As for British Burma, the situation is a bit more delicate, there are also Japanese prisoners of war laboring in Burma, also on the scale of around 10,000 people.

These POWs were of course not contributing their sweat to the future Burma, but were purely contributing to Alan Wilson’s Emerald House program.

So in the face of civil service interests and personal interests, Alan Wilson decisively abandoned Malaya and liaised with Burgess, the Commissioner of British Burma, a member of the Cambridge Five, and now on probation as a colonial commissioner.

It was hoped that Burgess, like the Malayan side, would keep a close watch on movements in the direction of the Andaman Islands, and that New Delhi would not conceal the insurrection in the islands, after having been mentioned by Sir Barron.

Rather, after wrapping it up in words, it informed the London side, only emphasizing that there was no loss of British expatriates, that it was impossible to let the prisoners of war inside the Andaman Islands, which were hanging alone overseas, out, and that the problem would be solved within a few days.

After this avoidance, Allen Wilson can then liaise with other colonies near the Andaman Islands to deal with this unexpected event.

This is very much a test of political savvy, and he can’t just say that the most he would like to see is to just starve the island to death, and when the internecine fighting is almost over, the landing force will just come to the island and collect the bodies.

Rangoon, the capital of British Burma, Burgess then received the embellished telegram, this British Burma Commissioner is very high in prestige in all walks of life in Burma, and very popular, the most important reason is that in the British India Commissioner Assistant to the Burma Commissioner of the recommendations were implemented.

This piece of advice was to drive the Rohingya of Rakhine back to British India, and while British India was suffering from drought, this policy was practiced.

The Rohingya are mainly a mixed race formed by the fusion of South Asians who migrated to Burma in the nineteenth century as part of the British colonial government’s effort to “fight barbarians with barbarians” after the British took control of the country, and then by the integration of Bangladeshi refugees who fled into Burma after the Third Indo-Pakistani War.

The Burmese people’s understanding of the Rohingya people is this, so for the commissioner after Burgess to set things right, very popular, only busy Bengal administrator Andrew, Andrew in the fight against drought, but also to find time to resettle these Rohingya people.

This matter, whether Burgess or Andrews, not as accomplished as Alan Wilson himself. Burgess set things right just for fun, and the person who really set things right was himself.

This exorcism is good for everyone, especially for the Rohingya.

The Burmese Buddhists that the Rohingyas are facing are not the Buddhism that has been tamed by the Sambuyi clan; Burmese Buddhism is about as peaceful in nature as the Peace Cult, and if they weren’t all modernized, it would be possible for the Rohingyas to be wiped out en masse.

Once Burma becomes independent, the Rohingya will be expelled from Burma, and the rest of them will be doomed to a life worse than death.

Since this is the case, Allen Wilson in the spirit of humanitarian considerations, while British India is still in the time, to solve this problem, for all parties are good.

I don’t know how many lives were saved by this one suggestion alone, it doesn’t matter if the Rohingya don’t understand now, they will later.

The second piece of advice to Burgess was that the Chinese were not too poor compared to many of the native peoples of the colonies, and that if British Burma was to take on the responsibility of bleeding the British Empire, it would have to make good use of the Chinese as a group.

So the core of the proposal to help Burgess get on his feet was to identify the ethnic groups in Burma. To take some of the ethnic groups under his wing.

To be honest Burma had not received the effects of the current year’s drought and food production was maintained at the usual year’s output.

But the affairs of British Burma had nothing to do with British India, and as British India had already identified a spirit of self-improvement, it was only natural that food from British Burma was shipped to the more needy homeland.

Allen Wilson, who had made an important contribution to Burgess’s establishment in British Burma, was only asking for Burgess’s help in keeping a close watch along the coast to prevent leakages, a request which was not at all excessive.

In the telegram, Allen Wilson also mentioned that if he had not been active in British India, would it have been so easy to expel one million Rohingya? The Rohingya population occupies nearly one-tenth of the current population of Burma, which is only 12 million people, plus the Rohingya people of various Indian descent is close to one million.

Without him taking over the reins in British India, would Burgess, the Burma Commissioner, have had the opportunity to establish his authority and show his vigor? The mountainous regions of Burma were mostly ruled by feudal hereditary ethnic upper class toffs, and the Rakhine region was very backward in terms of economic development.

The British developed a lot of wasteland in this area, and the demand for labor for the land increased greatly, and the Bengalis in the Chittagong area then moved into the Rakhine State of Burma as seasonal short-term workers. The “Twelve Towns of Bengal” had a large population and little land, and since the British colonial authorities implemented the land grant system in Rakhine, a large number of Bengalis moved in and settled there.

Although the Rohingya people are annoying, but in this era, Rakhine region is very rich, this is the reason why the Burmese people very much respected Burgess, Rakhine vacant fields and houses, are not all theirs?

Though the essential reason, was that Alan Wilson felt that there was an imbalance of communities in British India, and asked these Pacifists to return to British India to strengthen the Pacifist forces in the Ganges Delta a bit, in preparation for the future partition.

These Rohingyas, who had been expelled once, because of a similar experience, would certainly be the vanguard of resistance to the Hindus when the time came for partition.

Occupying one more piece of land was also contributing to the future balance of the subcontinent, in saying that they were originally Bengalis, and there was nothing wrong with returning to the land of their ancestors.

Although it hurt some people, the advice given by Allen Wilson was very useful, and the praise Burgess received in Burma was not false, so he received Allen Wilson’s telegram, and after some consideration called back to express his willingness to pay attention to this problem.

The Malayan fleet also departed at this time, heading for the Andaman Islands on a blockade mission, while the local British army also issued orders to prevent the appearance of unidentified persons along the coastline.

Coastal communities then received warnings from the British garrison, ordering them to make sure they report any sightings of suspicious people immediately.

“What has come up?” No sooner had the colonial officials left than the community immediately began to talk amongst themselves.

“Maybe something happened on the island where the Japanese were exiled.”

A middle-aged man took a drag on his cigarette, if Alan Wilson was here, he would have been pleasantly surprised, I didn’t think that a small British Malaya would have a master of keystone politics, what a loss of respect.

Unfortunately, he was sending a telegram to thank Burgess for his help and said that he would definitely go to Rangoon to visit each other when he had some free time.

So there is no 100% in the world, so what about the Cambridge Five, as long as they play a role in the right place, they can contribute to the British Empire just the same, it all depends on how they are used?

Maclean served justice as the Ceylon Commissioner, pulling the trigger on the liquidation of Hinduism in Ceylon. But now very popular with the Ceylonese Buddhists, Burgess, deeply moved by the hostility of the native Burmese community to people of Indian origin, ordered the expulsion while the drought had British India’s hands full, again with the gratitude of the Burmese.

Who says the Cambridge Five couldn’t have been the cornerstone of the British Empire? The problem was that they were also very popular with the native peoples, a win-win situation.

In the wake of the Andaman riots, the Viceroyalty of New Delhi reacted quickly, cobbling together a fleet of Indian and Malayan destroyers, Burmese gunboats, and counting the numbers, the tonnage was pretty shabby, to blockade the Andaman Islands for a period of one month.

Any floating object out of the Andaman Islands, whether it be any suggested raft or a log, that floated, this motley fleet among motley fleets, could be fired upon directly.

This military order was to be strictly enforced in order that matters in the Andaman Islands should not affect the stability of the neighboring British colonies.

Telegrams of the departure of the fleet came one after another, the viceroy’s office up and down all breathed a sigh of relief, this crisis seems to have passed without any danger, and the news of the Andaman Islands riot, at present limited to a small part of the British Indian high level people know.

As for the Indians being completely kept in the dark, this result can be said to be quite perfect, and for the time being it is not fit for the Indians to know anything about the future of British India.

The seas of the Andaman were as calm as ever, and the storm on the island did not affect the rest of the country. For the British Indian civil servants involved it was a good result.

“Sir, when are we going to inform those Nehru people?” Ender also breathed a sigh of relief, as if relieved, “After all, there are quite a few Indian soldiers up there.”

“There are probably no more Indian soldiers up there now.” Alan Wilson took the words over and said, “Personally, I don’t think there’s a need for those Nehru people to know about this yet, it’s better to focus on the drought. The toughest times are over, but the food crunch may continue for a while.”

What this means is that the peak of deaths because of the famine should be over, but it doesn’t mean that the famine will stop, it only means that the real proletarians have been wiped out, and the destitute groups are still struggling to stay alive.

There will still be starvation deaths for some time to come, just not as many as in recent months, forcing everyone to cover their asses.