"In the late 1940s Communist threats in the Far East posed a serious challenge to Britain's long-term strategy to defend the homeland against the Soviet Union. By 1950 Britain was forced to modify its strategy when the last of its strategic reserve forces was deployed to meet contingencies in Malaya, Hong Kong and Korea. This is one of the reasons some scholars have concluded that poor government decisionmaking had resulted in 'imperial over-extension'.

This book argues that 'imperial over-extension' is both overstated and mis-specified and explains how Britain succeeded at adjusting its defense strategy to meet the communist threat in the Far East from 1947 to 1954.

There Britain deployed imperial, Gurkha and Commonwealth forces only in contingencies that threatened vital British interests, and succeeded in shifting responsibility for key wartime missions to its US and Commonwealth allies, thus preserving Britain's ability to fight in Western Europe."--BOOK JACKET.