Wang et al. Built Heritage (2021) 5:12 https://doi.org/10.1186/s43238-021-00031-z Built Heritage RESEARCH ARTICLE Open Access Issues in conserving ‘orphan heritage’ in Asia: WWII battlefield conservation in Hong Kong and Malaysia Yi-Wen Wang1* , Jesse DiMeolo2 and Gao Du3 Abstract Wars and conflict have existed since the beginning of time. Most battlefield conservation work is done for battlefields that lie in the borders of the nations that were involved, thus fostering citizens’ personal ties with the site and their national identities. However, some areas of the world suffer from conservation neglect because of the distance and separation between the battlefield’s location and the country to which it is relevant, thus creating a dislocated appreciation of heritage described by Price (J Confl Archaeol 1:181–196, 2005) as ‘orphan heritage’. This paper questions the extent to which post-colonial nations are willing to protect and conserve World War II battlefields on their soil. It examines two battlefields in Asia—the Gin Drinkers’ Line in Hong Kong, China, and the Green Ridge battlefield in Kampar, Malaysia—that have been the subject of campaigns to recognise their transnational heritage value. Both battles involved multinational Allied forces led by the British against Japanese troops. A combination of political and economic factors has influenced how the two battlefields are understood and appreciated by citizens and local governments in the host nations. The paper delineates how these two Asian battlegrounds, which are relatively unknown to the general public, have been brought to the public’s attention and by whom as well as how the local governments have handled the demand to safeguard the battlefields. We argue that the global nature of WWII makes its commemoration geographically challenging and politically contentious. The WWII battlefields in Asia attest to the historical authenticity of past conflicts and thus should be conserved as neutrally as possible. The successful protection of battlefields in Malaysia and Hong Kong thus far can be largely attributed to grassroots initiatives, pressure from stakeholder countries, such as the UK, and academic research whereby the significance of the battleground is made known to people in Hong Kong and Malaysia. With public support, responsible government leadership and a shared understanding of their importance as transnational heritage, WWII battlefields can help calm bitter resentment and promote reconciliation. Keywords: World war II, battlefields, conservation, transnational heritage, post-colonial countries 1 Introduction deaths and the level of atrocity perpetrated by Nazi Writing and historiography regarding the Second World Germany, the major Axis power. However, the great ex- War (WWII) have revolved around the horrors of war in tent to which the two major Allied nations—the US and Europe but provided relatively little information about the UK—have committed themselves to commemorating the Asian theatre of war. Certainly, this sustained atten- war deaths may have been equally decisive in this mat- tion on Europe may stem from the high number of ter. Various groups and individuals, including national and local governments, charitable trusts, non-profit or- * Correspondence: [email protected] ganisations, civil or veteran communities, and families of 1 ’ Department of Urban Planning & Design, Xi an Jiaotong-Liverpool fallen soldiers, have initiated different forms of com- University, 111 Ren’ai Road, Dushu Lake Higher Education Town, Suzhou Industrial Park, Suzhou 215123, Jiangsu Province, China memoration and remembrance (Danilova 2015; Edwards Full list of author information is available at the end of the article © The Author(s). 2021 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. Wang et al. Built Heritage (2021) 5:12 Page 2 of 20 2015). Neither the US nor the UK have experienced oc- battlefields for the country’s common good. The Civil cupation by foreign powers in modern history, nor were War Charitable Trust Fund, a non-profit organisation in major battles conducted on their soil during the two glo- the US, receives donations from citizens and has now bal wars. The sites at which American and British sol- used that money to buy upwards of 50,000 acres of bat- diers fought and died in combat are often thousands of tlefields, promising to preserve all of this land from fu- miles away from the place where their deaths are com- ture development (Campi 2019). These protected areas memorated in the form of memorial plaques, cemeteries include Vicksburg, Chickamauga, Kennesaw Mountain, or ceremonies.1 In contrast, the events of WWII in the New Hope Church, Antietam, Fort Sumter, Second Ma- Asia-Pacific region, which marked the climax of Japan’s nassas and Petersburg Battlefields. In contrast to intra- empire-building, are relatively under-represented in state conflicts, WWII, as a global war, involved more current commemoration and remembrance practices. than 30 countries and 100 million military personnel This is somewhat paradoxical, as military deaths for forming international troops who marched across the Japan and China, for instance, vastly outnumbered those borders of both countries and continents. The commem- for the US and the UK2 (Harrison 1998; Mitter 2013). oration of war deaths is not only geographically challen- The general neglect of the events and repercussions of ging but also politically contentious. Numerous the war in Asia in the historical writing and commemor- battlefields have turned into ‘orphan heritage’ sites due ation of WWII suggests the general reluctance of Asian to the disjunction between the stakeholder groups who countries to remember the war (Saito 2016). ascribe value to a battlefield and those who own or live This paper examines areas of the globe that suffer on the battlefield. from poor battlefield conservation efforts because the This paper aims to advance the understanding of physical separation of the battlefield from its stake- WWII commemoration in Asia, which has been under- holders creates ambiguity in the ‘ownership’ of such represented in the global history of the war. Focusing on heritage. Stakeholders who feel place attachment to a battlefields, it questions the extent to which post- battlefield in a foreign land where their loved ones colonial nations in Asia are willing to protect and con- fought and perished experience a dislocated appreciation serve WWII battlefields on their soil. A combination of of their heritage, which has been described as ‘orphan political and economic factors can affect how ‘orphan heritage’ by Price (2005, 181). Most battlefield conserva- heritage’ battlefields are understood or appreciated by tion work has been carried out in places within national citizens and local governments in host nations. Potential borders where citizens have strong personal ties and col- financial gain from land development and real estate is lectively identity with the battle (Banks and Pollard widely perceived as a threat to the preservation of such 2011; Waterton and Dittmer 2016). For example, driven battlefields. Concurrently, political factors are at play be- by patriotism, the US has large interest groups and char- cause the politics of war commemoration are invariably ities that work together to conserve Civil War multilateral and, consequently, contentious. Drawing on the idea of ‘orphan heritage’ (Price 2005), this paper ex- 1For instance, Britain witnessed a massive wave of public amines two WWII battlefields that have been the subject commemoration in the aftermath the First World War in which tens of campaigns espousing their transnational heritage of thousands of war memorials were erected, almost one in every — ’ single British village, town and city to commemorate those who had value the battlefield of the Gin Drinkers Line in Hong been buried abroad—as a result of the country’s non-repatriation pol- Kong, China, and the Green Ridge battlefield in Kampar, icy—where they had fallen. The Imperial (now Commonwealth) War Malaysia. A close examination of these two cases can Graves Commission also erected a large number of war memorials in yield new insight into how these two Asian battlefields, churchyards and cemeteries in Britain to mark the graves of soldiers of various nationalities who died during the two world wars. These ‘me- which are relatively unknown to the general public have morials at home’ were ‘empty tombs and “became the foci for grief been brought to the public’s attention and by whom as and remembrance’ (Historic England 2017b: 8). This movement of well as how the governments of the two host nations commemoration was sparked by the erection of the cenotaph in have handled the demand to