As Ronald H. Spector tells us in 'A Continent Erupts,' the end of World War II marked not a new era of peace in Asia but the point at which wars began afresh...Violent anticolonial conflict broke out in Indonesia and Vietnam—against the Dutch and the French, respectively...And the civil war in China—put on hold from 1937 to 1945, during Japanese occupation—resumed with fratricidal gusto...There was a communist insurgency in British-ruled Malaya and, most salient of all, the invasion of South Korea by a ruthless army from the North...There is engrossing color in Mr. Spector’s accounts of the Chinese Nationalist descent on Taiwan, whose natives reacted to Gen. Chiang Kai-shek’s defeated army with contempt...In his own words, Mr. Spector’s book is 'primarily, though not entirely, a military history'...Among the gory details he doesn’t spare us are the death counts from the wars in Asia that were fought in 1945-55.
Historian Spector examines in this authoritative and often enthralling account how East and Southeast Asia became 'by far the most violent region of the globe' in the decade after WWII...Spector provides comprehensive and captivating accounts of clashes less familiar to American readers...This sweeping survey of the bloody wages of decolonization astounds.
How a decade of violence in Asia laid the foundation for eventual stability...In this meticulously researched and carefully rendered study of the region in the period between 1945 and 1955, military historian Spector examines the conflicts that engulfed nearly every country, resulting in untold deaths and misery...An excellent starting point for anyone who wants to understand modern Asian history.
