British Military Administration (Malaya)
The British Military Administration (BMA) was the interim administrator of British Malaya from August 1945, the end of World War II, to the establishment of the Malayan Union in April 1946. The BMA was under the direct command of the Supreme Allied Commander South East Asia, Lord Louis Mountbatten. The administration had the dual function of maintaining basic subsistence during the period of reoccupation, and also of imposing the state structure upon which post-war imperial power would rest.
The Empire of Japan surrendered to the British Empire in Kuala Lumpur in 1945.
A ten dollar Japanese government-issued note used in Malaya and Borneo
Royal Marines in Georgetown
Cabinet white paper of 29 August 1945 proposing Malayan Union
The term "British Malaya" loosely describes a set of states on the Malay Peninsula and the island of Singapore that were brought under British hegemony or control between the late 18th and the mid-20th century. Unlike the term "British India", which excludes the Indian princely states, British Malaya is often used to refer to the Federated and the Unfederated Malay States, which were British protectorates with their own local rulers, as well as the Straits Settlements, which were under the sovereignty and direct rule of the British Crown, after a period of control by the East India Company.
George Town, the capital of Penang. Across the North Channel seen is Butterworth, on the mainland known as Seberang Perai, formerly Province Wellesley.
Postage stamp of the Straits Settlements from 1883
Raja Abdullah, later Sultan of Perak
Kuala Lumpur circa 1884. Founded in 1859, the mining settlement would grow to succeed Klang town as the capital of Selangor in 1880, and would later be designated as the capitals of the Federated Malay States, the Federation of Malaya and Malaysia.