Very young Chin Peng in uniform

Many people have read Alias Chin Peng: My Side of History (Singapore, Media Masters, 2003). The first eight chapters of his memoirs were essentially about Britain's disastrous 70-day Malayan Campaign and Chin Peng's own involvement in the 1941-1945 Resist-Japan-Defend Malaya War of Resistance.

This was most probably how Chin Peng looked like during the Occupation when he fought the invaders in the jungles and hills in Perak. This rare close-up photograph of the very young Chin Peng in uniform appears in Mr. Tan Chong Tee's Story of a WWII Resistance Fighter - Force 136 (Singapore, Asiapac Books, 2001). It is not known exactly when and where the photograph was taken.

Chin Peng, now 82, joined the Communist Party of Malaya in Ipoh in January, 1940 as a 15-year old schoolboy. During the Occupation, he was a leader of the Party's 5th Independent Regiment of the Malayan People's Anti-Japanese Army (MPAJA) operating in Perak. Perak's Kinta Valley and my hometown Ipoh were a critical centre of political and armed resistance to Japanese occupation.

The once famous and still legendary building of Tong Ah Hotel where Force 136 secret agent Mr. Tan Chong Tee was arrested by the Japanese during the Occupation is located directly opposite to my grandparents' coffeeshop at No. 24, Clare Street. It is also not far away from the clinic of Sybil Kathigasu's husband at No. 141, Brewster Road.