'A splendid, exciting book' Daily Mirror 'The story of the first all-out struggle in Asia between Communism and the West, vividly told in an exciting and engrossing book' Sunday Express Only three short years after the end of the Japanese occupation, war came again to Malaya. The Chinese-backed guerrillas called it the War of the Running Dogs - their contemptuous term for those in Malaya who remained loyal to the British. The British Government referred to this bloody and costly struggle as the 'Malayan Emergency'. Yet it was a war that lasted twelve years and cost thousands of lives. By the time it was over Malaya had obtained its independence - but on British, not on Chinese or Communist terms. Here is the war as it was. Here are the planters and their wives on their remote rubber estates, the policemen, the generals and the soldiers, the Malays, Chinese and Indians of a polyglot country, all fighting an astute, ruthless, and well organized enemy.

When the world held its breath It is 25 years since the end of the Cold War, now a generation old. It began over 75 years ago, in 1944long before the last shots of the Second World War had echoed across the wastelands of Eastern Europewith the brutal Greek Civil War. The battle lines are no longer drawn, but they linger on, unwittingly or not, in conflict zones such as Iraq, Somalia and Ukraine. In an era of mass-produced AK-47s and ICBMs, one such flashpoint was Malaya By the time of the 1942 Japanese occupation of the Malay Peninsula and Singapore, the Malayan Communist Party (MCP) had already been fomenting merdeka independence from Britain. The Japanese conquerors, however, were also the loathsome enemies of the MCPs ideological brothers in China. An alliance of convenience with the British was the outcome. Britain armed and trained the MCPs military wing, the Malayan Peoples Anti-Japanese Army (MPAJA), to essentially wage jungle guerrilla warfare against Japanese occupying forces. With the cessation of hostilities, anti-Japanese became anti-British, and, using the same weapons and training fortuitously provided by the British army during the war, the MCP launched a guerrilla war of insurgency.Malaya was of significant strategic and economic importance to Britain. In the face of an emerging communist regime in China, a British presence in Southeast Asia was imperative. Equally, rubber and tin, largely produced in Malaya by British expatriates, were important inputs for British industry. Typically, the insurgents, dubbed Communist Terrorists, or simply CTs, went about attacking soft targets in remote areas: the rubber plantations and tin mines. In conjunction with this, was the implementation of Maos dictate of subverting the rural, largely peasant, population to the cause. Twelve years of counterinsurgency operations ensued, as a wide range of British forces were joined in the conflict by ground, air and sea units from Australia, New Zealand, Southern and Northern Rhodesia, Fiji and Nyasaland.

A manual for the great global rip-off

While in a war zone, a military working dog (MWD) and its handler live together, eat together, play together, sleep together, and risk their lives for each other every day. The dogs work with handlers in every branch of the US military. They guard military bases, sniff out concealed explosives and other weapons, and alert their handlers to hidden enemies. Learn how the military selects these special dogs and trains them for the many tasks they perform while on duty. Meet Rex, Clipper, Maci, Iva, Ikar, and other MWDs who have served the US military in conflicts around the world.

"In the twenty-first century, military marine mammals detect lost equipment and underwater mines. Large rats are trained to find land mines in more than 80 countries. Military working dogs search for explosive devices and other weapons and are trained to take down enemy combatants. In earlier centuries, military fighters rode horses into battle, relied on elephants to haul supplies, and trained pigeons to carry messages. Even cats, goats, and chickens have served in wartime--as mascots! Learn about the history of animals in warfare, the functions they serve and how they are trained, as well as the psychology that makes animals such good partners in warfare."--Publisher's description.