Britain and Southeast Asian Colonies

In the interests of increasing trade between India, southeast Asia, and China, British imperialists moved in the nineteenth century to establish colonies in southeast Asia. By the 1880s they had established colonial authority in Burma, which became a source of teak, ivory, rubies, and jade. In 1824 Thomas Stamford Raffles founded the port of Singapore, which soon became the busiest center of trade in the Strait of Melaka. Besides offering utstanding ports that enabled the British navy to control sea lanes linking the Indian Ocean with the South China Sea, Southeast Asia colonies provided abundant supplies of resources, such as tin and rubber.