Major-General Mahmud Sulaiman (c. 1928 – 26 August 2020) was a

Malaysia Malaysia is a country in Southeast Asia. Featuring the Tanjung Piai, southernmost point of continental Eurasia, it is a federation, federal constitutional monarchy consisting of States and federal territories of Malaysia, 13 states and thre ...

general officer A general officer is an Officer (armed forces), officer of high rank in the army, armies, and in some nations' air force, air and space forces, marines or naval infantry. In some usages, the term "general officer" refers to a rank above colone ...

. He has been credited for the Malaysian military's success in purging the remnants of the

Malayan Communist Party The Malayan Communist Party (MCP), officially the Communist Party of Malaya (CPM), was a Marxist–Leninist and anti-imperialist communist party which was active in British Malaya and later, the modern states of Malaysia and Singapore f ...

guerrilla Guerrilla warfare is a form of unconventional warfare in which small groups of irregular military, such as rebels, Partisan (military), partisans, paramilitary personnel or armed civilians, which may include Children in the military, recruite ...

s in the 1970s, at the height of the Communist insurgency in Malaysia (1968–89). Mahmud's leadership style reportedly focused on constant evaluation of his subordinates; evaluation reports were commonly disregarded by other Malaysian military leaders. His military career took off when Mahmud was personally selected by then

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. * British national identity, the characteristics of British people and culture ...

High Commissioner to Malaya Gerald Templer to study in Sandhurst in the 1950s.Musa, p. 214. Mahmud's strategy in prosecuting the Insurgency War was to reduce the number of insurgents through peaceful means by, in the words of one commentator, giving them "every chance to surrender and escape from being killed". Mahmud reportedly "saw immense propaganda value in former terrorists who were now alive, repentant, and leading full productive lives", he analogised the war to exterminating rats. Poisoning and killing them would not work as long as they reproduced; instead by attacking the root causes such as the habitat, the rats could be extinguished. His strategy was approved of by civilian superiors such as the later

Prime Minister A prime minister or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. A prime minister is not the head of state, but r ...

Mahathir Mohamad Mahathir bin Mohamad (; ; born 10 July 1925) is a Malaysian politician, author and doctor who was respectively the fourth and seventh Prime Minister of Malaysia, prime minister of Malaysia from 1981 to 2003 and from 2018 to 2020. He was the ...

. Mahmud was born in Batu Pahat. He died in

Kuala Lumpur Kuala Lumpur (KL), officially the Federal Territory of Kuala Lumpur, is the capital city and a Federal Territories of Malaysia, federal territory of Malaysia. It is the largest city in the country, covering an area of with a census population ...

on 26 August 2020 at the age of 92.

Notes and references

Malaysian military personnel Graduates of the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst Year of birth uncertain 2020 deaths Malaysian people of Malay descent Malaysian Muslims {{Malaysia-mil-bio-stub