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The Bridge Over The River Kwai (novel)
''The Bridge over the River Kwai'' (french: Le Pont de la rivière Kwaï) is a novel by the French novelist Pierre Boulle, published in French in 1952 and English translation by Xan Fielding in 1954. The story is fictional but uses the construction of the Burma Railway, in 1942–1943, as its historical setting, and is partly based on Pierre Boulle's own life experience working in Malaysia rubber plantations and later working for allied forces in Singapore and Indochina during World War II. The novel deals with the plight of World War II British prisoners of war forced by the Imperial Japanese Army to build a bridge for the "Death Railway", so named because of the large number of prisoners and conscripts who died during its construction. The novel won France's ''Prix Sainte-Beuve'' in 1952. Historical context The largely fictitious plot is based on the building in 1942 of one of the railway bridges over the Mae Klong river—renamed Khwae Yai in the 1960s—at a place calle ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
WikiProject Novels
A WikiProject, or Wikiproject, is a Wikimedia movement affinity group for contributors with shared goals. WikiProjects are prevalent within the largest wiki, Wikipedia, and exist to varying degrees within sister projects such as Wiktionary, Wikiquote, Wikidata, and Wikisource. They also exist in different languages, and translation of articles is a form of their collaboration. During the COVID-19 pandemic, CBS News noted the role of Wikipedia's WikiProject Medicine in maintaining the accuracy of articles related to the disease. Another WikiProject that has drawn attention is WikiProject Women Scientists, which was profiled by '' Smithsonian'' for its efforts to improve coverage of women scientists which the profile noted had "helped increase the number of female scientists on Wikipedia from around 1,600 to over 5,000". On Wikipedia Some Wikipedia WikiProjects are substantial enough to engage in cooperative activities with outside organizations relevant to the field at issue. F ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Imperial Japanese Army
The was the official ground-based armed force of the Empire of Japan from 1868 to 1945. It was controlled by the Imperial Japanese Army General Staff Office and the Ministry of the Army, both of which were nominally subordinate to the Emperor of Japan as supreme commander of the army and the Imperial Japanese Navy. Later an Inspectorate General of Aviation became the third agency with oversight of the army. During wartime or national emergencies, the nominal command functions of the emperor would be centralized in an Imperial General Headquarters (IGHQ), an ad hoc body consisting of the chief and vice chief of the Army General Staff, the Minister of the Army, the chief and vice chief of the Naval General Staff, the Inspector General of Aviation, and the Inspector General of Military Training. History Origins (1868–1871) In the mid-19th century, Japan had no unified national army and the country was made up of feudal domains (''han'') with the Tokugawa shogunate (''bakufu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Malay Peninsula
The Malay Peninsula ( Malay: ''Semenanjung Tanah Melayu'') is a peninsula in Mainland Southeast Asia. The landmass runs approximately north–south, and at its terminus, it is the southernmost point of the Asian continental mainland. The area contains Peninsular Malaysia, Southern Thailand, and the southernmost tip of Myanmar (Kawthaung). The island country of Singapore also has historical and cultural ties with the region. The indigenous people of the peninsula are the Malays, an Austronesian people. The Titiwangsa Mountains are part of the Tenasserim Hills system and form the backbone of the peninsula and the southernmost section of the central cordillera, which runs from Tibet through the Kra Isthmus, the peninsula's narrowest point, into the Malay Peninsula. The Strait of Malacca separates the Malay Peninsula from the Indonesian island of Sumatra, and the south coast is separated from the island of Singapore by the Straits of Johor. Etymology The Malay term ' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Forced Labour
Forced labour, or unfree labour, is any work relation, especially in modern or early modern history, in which people are employed against their will with the threat of destitution, detention, violence including death, or other forms of extreme hardship to either themselves or members of their families. Unfree labour includes all forms of slavery, penal labour and the corresponding institutions, such as debt slavery, serfdom, corvée and labour camps. Definition Many forms of unfree labour are also covered by the term forced labour, which is defined by the International Labour Organization (ILO) as all involuntary work or service exacted under the menace of a penalty. However, under the ILO Forced Labour Convention of 1930, the term forced or compulsory labour does not include: *"any work or service exacted in virtue of compulsory military service laws for work of a purely military character;" *"any work or service which forms part of the normal civic obligations of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Military History Of The United States During World War II
The military history of the United States during World War II covers the victorious Allied war against the Axis Powers, starting with the 7 December 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor and ending with the 2 September 1945 surrender of Japan. During the first two years of World War II, the United States had maintained formal neutrality which was made official in the Quarantine Speech which was delivered by US President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1937, while it was supplying Britain, the Soviet Union, and China with war materiel through the Lend-Lease Act which was signed into law on 11 March 1941, as well as deploying the US military to replace the British forces stationed in Iceland. Following the " Greer incident" Roosevelt publicly confirmed the "shoot on sight" order on 11 September 1941, effectively declaring naval war on Germany and Italy in the Battle of the Atlantic. In the Pacific Theater, there was unofficial early US combat activity such as the Flying Tigers. During t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Netherlands In World War II
Despite Dutch neutrality, Nazi Germany invaded the Netherlands on 10 May 1940 as part of Fall Gelb (Case Yellow). On 15 May 1940, one day after the bombing of Rotterdam, the Dutch forces surrendered. The Dutch government and the royal family relocated to London. Princess Juliana and her children sought refuge in Ottawa, Canada until after the war. The invaders placed the Netherlands under German occupation, which lasted in some areas until the German surrender in May 1945. Active resistance, at first carried out by a minority, grew in the course of the occupation. The occupiers deported the majority of the country's Jews to Nazi concentration camps. Due to the high variation in the survival rate of Jewish inhabitants among local regions in the Netherlands, scholars have questioned the validity of a single explanation at the national level. In part due to the well-organized population registers, about 70% of the country's Jewish population were killed in the course of World ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
British Empire In World War II
When the United Kingdom declared war on Nazi Germany in September 1939 at the start of World War II, the UK controlled to varying degrees numerous crown colonies, protectorates and the India. It also maintained unique political ties to four of the five independent Dominions—Australia, Canada, South Africa, and New ZealandIreland was technically a dominion but operated largely as an independent republic and remained neutral during the war. Newfoundland, though still called a "Dominion", had ceased self-governing functions and was governed as a colony.—as co-members (with the UK) of the then "British Commonwealth". In 1939 the British Empire and the Commonwealth together comprised a global power, with direct or ''de facto'' political and economic control of 25% of the world's population, and of 30% of its land mass. The contribution of the British Empire and Commonwealth in terms of manpower and materiel was critical to the Allied war-effort. From September 1939 to mid-1942, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Burma-Siam Railway
The Burma Railway, also known as the Siam–Burma Railway, Thai–Burma Railway and similar names, or as the Death Railway, is a railway between Ban Pong, Thailand and Thanbyuzayat, Burma (now called Myanmar). It was built from 1940 to 1943 by civilian labourers impressed or recruited by the Japanese and prisoners of war taken by the Japanese, to supply troops and weapons in the Burma campaign of World War II. It completed the rail link between Bangkok, Thailand, and Rangoon, Burma. The name used by the Japanese Government is ''Tai–Men Rensetsu Tetsudō'' (), which means Thailand-Burma-Link-Railway. Between 180,000 and 250,000 Southeast Asian civilians and over 60,000 Allied prisoners of war were subjected to forced labour during its construction. Around 90,000 of the civilians died, as did more than 12,000 Allied prisoners. Most of the railway was dismantled shortly after the war. Only the first of the line in Thailand remained, with trains still running as far nor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Commonwealth War Graves Commission
The Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) is an intergovernmental organisation of six independent member states whose principal function is to mark, record and maintain the graves and places of commemoration of Commonwealth of Nations military service members who died in the two World Wars. The commission is also responsible for commemorating Commonwealth civilians who died as a result of enemy action during the Second World War. The commission was founded by Sir Fabian Ware and constituted through Royal Charter in 1917 as the Imperial War Graves Commission. The change to the present name took place in 1960. The commission, as part of its mandate, is responsible for commemorating all Commonwealth war dead individually and equally. To this end, the war dead are commemorated by a name on a headstone, at an identified site of a burial, or on a memorial. War dead are commemorated uniformly and equally, irrespective of military or civil rank, race or creed. The commission i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kanchanaburi
Kanchanaburi ( th, กาญจนบุรี, ) is a town municipality (''thesaban mueang'') in the west of Thailand and part of Kanchanaburi Province. In 2006 it had a population of 31,327. That number was reduced to 25,651 in 2017. The town covers ''tambons'' Ban Nuea and Ban Tai and parts of Pak Phraek and Tha Makham, all of Mueang Kanchanaburi District, and parts of ''tambon'' Tha Lo of Tha Muang District. Kanchanaburi lies 123 km west of Bangkok. History In the late-18th century, Kanchanaburi was established by King Rama I as a defensive outpost against possible Burmese attacks in what is now Lat Ya Sub-district. In 1833, the town was moved about 16 km to the southeast along the river to its present site during the reign of King Rama III. From the Ayutthaya period to the Thonburi and Rattanakosin period, Kanchanaburi was an important outpost to defend against Burmese invasions. The old town was located at Tambon Lat Ya (Khao Chon Kai in the present). In 1 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Thailand
Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is bordered to the north by Myanmar and Laos, to the east by Laos and Cambodia, to the south by the Gulf of Thailand and Malaysia, and to the west by the Andaman Sea and the extremity of Myanmar. Thailand also shares maritime borders with Vietnam to the southeast, and Indonesia and India to the southwest. Bangkok is the nation's capital and largest city. Tai peoples migrated from southwestern China to mainland Southeast Asia from the 11th century. Indianised kingdoms such as the Mon, Khmer Empire and Malay states ruled the region, competing with Thai states such as the Kingdoms of Ngoenyang, Sukhothai, Lan Na and Ayutthaya, which also rivalled each other. European contact began in 1511 with a Portuguese diplomatic mission to Ayuttha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Khwae Yai River
The Khwae Yai River ( th, แม่น้ำแควใหญ่, , ), also known as the Si Sawat ( ), is a river in western Thailand. It has its source in the Tenasserim Hills and flows for about through Sangkhla Buri, Si Sawat, and Mueang Districts of Kanchanaburi Province, where it merges with the Khwae Noi to form the Mae Klong River at Pak Phraek. History This river used to be the upper section (before the confluence with the Khwae Noi River) of the Mae Klong River, however, in the 1960s, this river was named the Khwae Yai River, meaning 'Big River.' In 1980, the Srinagarind Dam (Thai: เขื่อนศรีนครินทร์; rtgs: Khuean Sinakharin) on the Khwae Yai was completed in Si Sawat District of Kanchanaburi Province. It is an embankment dam for river regulation and hydroelectric power generation. Bridge The famous bridge of the Burma Railway crosses the river at Tha Makham Subdistrict of the Mueang District. However, this is not the sa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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