The Albatross File Unredacted

Historian Thum Ping Tjin re-examines newly declassified documents on Singapore's 1965 separation from Malaysia, challenging the official narrative told by the government's Albatross File exhibition. He argues that Lee Kuan Yew was not merely swept along by events but actively helped push Singapore towards separation. The result is a fuller, more human portrait of Lee as a brilliant and forceful political actor whose choices shaped the birth of an independent nation.