The Calcutta Conference and the Southeast Asia Uprising

Abstract

The Calcutta Conference of February 1948, has been the subject of a great deal of conjecture and very little scholarship. A number of writers, on the basis of the rather meagre knowledge available to them concerning the Conference, have drawn important conclusions, and these have often served as a significant part of the foundation for substantial theoretical edifices concerning the nature of Asian Communist movements and their relationships with Moscow. While in some cases their conclusions may well be correct, it is perhaps doubtful whether some of these writers have commanded sufficient reliable data to warrant the apparent assurance with which they have presented them.