The Malayan Communist Party as Recorded in the Comintern Files

Preface
This study of some aspects of the early history of the Malayan Communist Party (MCP) departs
from most research on the MCP by drawing primarily on MCP-related documents and files of the
Communist International (Comintern) that became accessible to researchers when the Soviet state
archives located in Moscow were opened after the break-up of the Soviet Union (USSR). The
Comintern documents used here are valuable as a new source of information that supplements and
may be tested against other sources, including official documents kept by the governments of
colonial and independent Malaya/Malaysia, the MCP’s own publications, and various writings that
have been published by former MCP members. It is the objective of this study to use this new
material to further current understanding of several important issues related to the MCP’s early
history. Those issues include the party’s organizational antecedent and establishment, its official
relationship with the Comintern, and its internal disputes during the pre-Pacific War period.
At the outset, I should explain how I came to be able to consult the Comintern files related to the
MCP. Around 1992 Professor Kurihara Hirohide and his group of Tokyo University of Foreign
Studies researchers had gained access to the voluminous documents kept in the Russian State
Archive for Socio-Political History (RSASPH, or, in Russian, Российский государственный
архив социально- политической истории). 1 They studiously copied a large batch of documents
by hand. Among the files that they obtained on various communist parties of Southeast Asia were a
substantial number of documents relating to the MCP. Professor Kurihara very generously gave me
a set of copies of those documents which totaled about 170 pages. I wish to record my deep
appreciation of Professor Kurihara’s kindness in making these precious historical documents
available to me, an old retired historian. Thus I have been motivated by my fortunate gain of a new
archive to conduct what may be my final research project on the MCP.
The Comintern files consist of documents in five languages. The majority of the documents were
written in Russian, followed by English, Chinese, German and French. I cannot read Russian,
German or French. Luckily for me, my eldest brother, Mr Hara Happo, can read Russian and
German, and my second, elder brother, Mr Hara Motoo, can read French. Between them, my
brothers did me the great service of translating relevant documents into Japanese. I have used their
able translations and made summaries in English from them for this article. I am indebted to my
elder brothers for their great help.
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