Essay Title: British Strategy During The Indonesian Confrontation (1963-66)
Introduction. From January 1963 to August 1966, Great Britain, assisted by her Commonwealth Allies, fought an undeclared war with Indonesia to preserve the territorial integrity and independence of the fledgling Malaysian state. Most observers considered this little known campaign as a victory for Britain. For instance, historian Michael Carver claimed that British confrontation in Borneo was successful in all respects. Denis Healey, British Secretary of State for Defence in 1964-70, described the Confrontation as 'a textbook demonstration of how to apply economy of force, under political guidance for political ends.' Such glowing tributes prompted this author to review British success in the light of recently available primary sources in the Public Records Office. This paper analyses the success of the Confrontation from the British perspective and the extent to which British strategy had contributed to this success. In so doing, a comparison will be made with the role played by other factors. Finally, an attempt will be made to examine critically the flaws of British strategy which were masked by its apparent success.
Comments: The above was a good introduction as firstly, the two key subjects of the topic (British strategy and Indonesian Confrontation-highlighted in red) were introduced, and secondly, the reason why this topic was selected was indicated. Thirdly, it attempted to arouse readers' interest in two ways. One way was to highlight originality of the work which was based on recently available primary sources (British Foreign Office records in the 1960s). The second way was to hint that British strategy was not as good as commonly believed and that the shortcomings of this strategy would be exposed. Fourthly, the introduction provided a good idea of the essay scope.
