Decolonization of Asia: what it was, causes and characteristics

We explain what the decolonization process in Asia was like, as well as its causes and history.

Decolonization in Asia occurred largely after World War II.

What was decolonization in Asia?

Decolonization in Asia was a process that led to the independence of the former European colonies on the Asian continent. Most of the independences occurred after the Second World War, especially in the late 1940s and during the 1950s and 1960s.

decolonization It was due to the impetus of the nationalist movements of the Asian colonieswhose leaders often received a Western education. These movements were very active after the First World War (1914-1918), and expanded their pressure for independence after the Second World War (1939-1945), when France and Great Britain demonstrated that they were not invincible powers.

The first Asian territories to be emancipated after the Second World War, in 1945, were those that had been occupied by the Japanese between 1941 and 1942, although their consolidation and recognition took some years.

In the Middle East, independence began in 1946 (with the exception of Iraq which obtained it in 1932), and The main British colony (India) became independent in 1947. The other European possessions in Asia gradually gained independence in a process that, In some cases (such as Indochina), it was linked to the conflicts of the Cold War..

Causes of decolonization in Asia

The maintenance of colonial empires with a presence in Asia and Africa (British, French, Dutch, Spanish and Portuguese) began to become unsustainable after the Second World War. European governments should have acceded to the demands of the independence movements for a number of reasons:

• Nationalist movements, generally led by leaders trained in Western ideas of freedom and independence, intensified their demands due to the the discredit that European governments had suffered during the war (like France and the United Kingdom, which depended on the intervention of the United States and the Soviet Union to defeat Nazi Germany)
• The independence demands gained legitimacy due to the Participation of some colonial troops in the Allied armies during the war (such as Indian forces in the British Army).
• The economic weakness that Europe was experiencing After the devastation of the war caused European nations to concentrate their efforts on their own internal reconstruction.
• The two superpowers that emerged from World War II (United States and the Soviet Union) were opposed to the old European colonial order, and the UN (United Nations Organization) encouraged the end of colonialism. This situation generated, on the other hand, that some struggles for independence were linked to the Cold War, that is, that they were waged by movements related to communism (supported by the Soviet Union or communist China) or aligned with Western capitalism. (supported by the United States).

Even so, The negotiations to achieve independence were not free of episodes of violence and sometimes gave rise to bitter wars. However, the process was fairly rapid and by the 1960s most of the colonies had gained independence. Dozens of new states thus joined the international community.

The independence and partition of India

The Indian nationalist movement

Jawāharlāl Nehru agreed to the partition of two states: India (Hindu) and Pakistan (Muslim).

The Indian nationalist movement It was one of the oldest. Starting in 1885 it was organized around the Congress Party and, after the First World War, led by Mahatma Gandhi, a defender of non-violence, who had completed university studies in England.

Together with his disciple and later main political leader of the movement, Jawāharlāl Nehru, Gandhi insistently demanded India’s independence from the British Empireeven before the end of World War II, when he promoted the movement Quit India (Quit India) in 1942, which led to Gandhi, Nehru and other nationalist militants being imprisoned by the British.

The difficult economic situation in Europe after the Second World War and the victory of the Labour Party in the United Kingdom in 1945 (which brought its leader, Clement Attlee, to the post of Prime Minister) facilitated negotiations with Indian nationalists that began that same year. However, two opposing positions emerged: Gandhi and Nehru defended the maintenance of a single multi-religious state, while The leader of the Muslim League, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, proposed the partition of the colony into two states, one Hindu and one Muslim.

After a series of violent riots (1946-1947), Nehru finally accepted partition. The result was the birth, on August 15, 1947, of two independent states: the Union of India (later the Republic of India), with a Hindu majority and led by the Congress Party of Nehru, and Pakistan (later the Islamic Republic of Pakistan), with a Muslim majority.

The transfer of Hindu and Muslim populations across borders during the partition process led to violence that left thousands dead. India and Pakistan subsequently engaged in a conflict that continues into the 21st century.

The Republic of India

After independence, India, the second most populous country on the planet, became “the world’s largest democracy” (that is, the democratic regime with the largest population in the world). The 1950 constitution proclaimed a federal republic with political freedoms and voting rights for the entire adult population.

Furthermore, Nehru was one of the promoters of the Non-Aligned Movement (along with Nasser, of Egypt, and Sukarno, of Indonesia), which sought to defend the interests of the decolonized countries of the Third World in the context of the Cold War.

The Congress Partywhose direction was left in the hands of Nehru and, later, his family, He ruled from independence until the 1990sJawāharlāl Nehru was succeeded as Prime Minister by his daughter Indira Gandhi (1966-1977 and 1980-1984) and, after her assassination, by his grandson Rajiv Gandhi (1984-1989).

Nehru implemented a state-controlled economy, the results of which were growth of around 3% of GDP, which barely offset the powerful population growth.

The situation of economic stagnation and poverty, added to certain acts of corruption attributed to Rajiv Gandhi’s government, caused political alternation in the 1990s, with the electoral defeat of the Congress Party and the implementation of liberalising economic reforms (some of them implemented by the Congress Party itself) that raised growth rates.

Indonesian independence

The Indonesian revolutionary Sukarno proclaimed independence in 1945, although it was only recognized in 1949.

During world war II, The Empire of Japan defeated and evicted the Dutch from their colony in Indonesia (then called the Dutch East Indies) in 1942. Against this background, the nationalist movement led by the Indonesian revolutionary Sukarno, who had been educated at Dutch high schools in the colony and had been sent into exile for his anti-colonial agitation, gained momentum.

With the arrival of Japanese troops in 1942, Sukarno was released from exile. Three years later, when these troops surrendered to the allies, Indonesian nationalists proclaimed the country’s independence on August 17, 1945..

After the end of World War II, The Dutch government twice attempted to regain control of the archipelago by force.in 1947 and 1948. Pressure from the UN and the United States was added to the Indonesian resistance (the US government even threatened to withdraw aid from the Marshall Plan to the Netherlands., a program of assistance for the economic recovery of European countries after the devastation of the war).

This situation led, at the end of 1949, to Indonesia will achieve independence under President Sukarnorecognized by the Dutch government. Indonesia was established as a democratic republic, but during the 1950s it was plagued by political instability, which gave rise to a model of authoritarian government headed by Sukarno under the name of “managed democracy”. In 1967 Sukarno was overthrown and replaced by General Suharto, who ruled Indonesia until 1998.

The Indochina and Korean Wars

The Indochina War ended with the French defeat by the communist guerrillas of Vietnam.

Indochina (Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia) was part of the French Empire from the second half of the 19th century. Korea fell under Japanese control in 1907, officially annexed to the Empire of Japan in 1910. After the end of World War II, The decolonization process in both countries was confused with the conflicts of the Cold War.

The leader of the Viet Minh (Vietnamese nationalist and communist guerrilla group), Ho Chi Minh, proclaimed Vietnam’s independence in September 1945 and this led to a war with the French army between 1946 and 1954. With the support of communist China, the Viet Minh managed to defeat the Frenchwho were definitively defeated in the battle of Dien Bien Phu (1954).

The result of the Indochina War was the signing of the Geneva Accords, which They agreed to the independence of Laos and Cambodia and the partition of Vietnam into two states.: North Vietnam (communist), ruled by Ho Chi Minh, and South Vietnam (pro-Western), which was henceforth supported by the United States.

Since 1955 A new war broke out between the North and the South, in which the United States became increasingly involved.: He first sent advisors and then troops to counter the advance of communism in the region. The result of the Vietnam War was the triumph of the communists in 1975 and the unification of Vietnam under a single socialist government.

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