colonial rule in southeast asia

• pre-1800s, european countries were content with imperialism only being trading posts and missionaries
• new imperialism: wanted complete control over their territories instead of just settling   * new imperialism motivation: money/economic reasons, prestige, advantage over rivals, and racism (white man’s privilege, social darwinism, christianization, etc)
• singapore: british colony which soon became a major stopping point on the way to china.
• burma: (modern myanmar) british colony taken to protect their possession of india.
• union of french indochina: vietnam, cambodia, annam, tonkin, and laos. made to protect french interests while britain kept grabbing up territories. (1850s-1880s)
• thailand (then called siam): was the only free south asian country. leaders promoted western learning and britain and france agreed to leave them as a buffer between their possessions (1896)
• philippines: taken by the us from spain in the spanish-american war. us took it to keep it from the hands of japan. despite filipino revolts, us kept the territory.
• didn’t want colonists to develop their own industries, so the colonial policy put an emphasis on the export of raw materials. so, lots of plantations with very low wages and terrible conditions. lots of people died. effects of exporting: lots of modern african countries have issues with retaining enough resources.
• leaders of rebellion: western educated nationalists. started by demanding reform, by the 1930s were demanding independence.

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