Burma- a Nation at the Crossroads

by Benedict Rogers

  As I have travelled around Burma, I have become increasingly convinced of the need to see Burma as a whole. There is certainly a place for specialisation, for those who choose to devote their energy and resources to one particular ethnic group or theme. However, there is also a need to put all the pieces of the patchwork quilt into place and see not just one or two parts, but the entire picture, or as much of it as possible. For all the peoples of Burma have been oppressed by the same regime and all are fighting for the same principles of freedom, democracy, justice, peace and basic human rights. The tactics of the regime towards each group may vary, the experiences and opinions of each individual group may not be completely identical, but ultimately all have a common enemy: a brutal military regime that has sought to maintain power and deny them freedom at all costs. Furthermore, that regime’s most favoured tactic is divide and rule. It loves to sow division within ethnic and political groups, to divide and subdivide its opponents. The more the people of Burma can unite, and outside observers can see and understand Burma holistically, the better equipped they will be to secure freedom for Burma.

  This is the main reason for writing this book. Much of the available literature tends to be one-dimensional. Books often concentrate either on various aspects of the regime, Aung San Suu Kyi, the democracy movement and life within urban Burma, or the ethnic nationalities. Many of these books provide a valuable contribution to the study of Burma, but few approach Burma holistically.

  I have therefore sought, within the constraints of time and resources, to weave together as comprehensive, holistic and accessible a picture as possible, to tell the story of the peoples of Burma, both Burman and non-Burman, their struggle for democracy and human rights, and the contribution of others in the international community to that struggle. The book is about them, but it is to a large extent informed by my own experiences and by the people I have had the privilege of meeting. Naturally, as an activist, my allegiance is clear and I am not a neutral observer. But as I have already declared in my previous books, I am not biased in favour of one or other ethnic, religious or political group, but rather in favour of the basic values of freedom and human rights. I have a moral framework, informed by my own personal faith and humanity, which tells me that rape, torture, forced labour, the conscription of child soldiers and the use of human minesweepers are wrong, and that we are all entitled to express our political or religious beliefs freely, without hindrance, and without fear of discrimination, detention or death. It is those values which inform this book.

  In following Burma, there are two key dangers, both of which I have sought to avoid. On the one hand, there is the risk of over-simplification. It is very easy to paint the regime as the bad guys, and Aung San Suu Kyi, the democracy movement and the ethnic resistance groups as the good guys. It is my profound belief that the balance of evil does indeed weigh heavily on the regime’s side of the equation. Their record of brutality, corruption and inhumanity far outstrips that of anyone else in Burma. Whereas the people struggling for democracy and human rights, from all ethnicities, have in my experience shown truly extraordinary courage, dignity, sacrifice and goodness. The values for which they struggle are good, and in that sense it is indeed a struggle between right and wrong. Yet they are all human beings, and as Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn said, the line between good and evil passes through every human heart. The democracy and ethnic movements have made mistakes. Sometimes they have treated some of their own people badly, and allowed unnecessary divisions to grow, giving the regime opportunity to widen the divide. And there are indeed tensions between the Burmans and the non-Burmans which go beyond the regime. As Christina Fink has observed, ‘Some ethnic nationalist leaders worry that a democratic government would not safeguard minority rights. At the same time, some Burman pro-democracy activists are uncomfortable with the ethnic nationalists’ demands for autonomy, which they perceive as potentially leading to the break-up of the country. In recent years, many of the opposition groups have come to see the creation of a federal, democratic union as the best solution for all, but the regime’s divide-and-rule tactics have made it difficult for them to work together.’3 Burma is complex, not least in the multiplicity of ethnic groups, political groups and rivalries. The democracy movement, moreover, has formed an alphabet soup of coalitions and umbrella groups, which will become apparent throughout this book. Simply learning the various abbreviations and acronyms illustrates the fact that Burma is not simple.

  On the other hand, there are some within the worlds of academia and diplomacy who appear to make a virtue out of over-complicating the situation. They get lost in a fog of Burma’s complexity, and lose sight of the truth. Complexity is no excuse for inaction against the regime’s crimes. As I have argued above, there are such concepts as right and wrong, and we should not forget them.

  In this book, therefore, I hope to offer an up-to-date, comprehensive, holistic account of Burma’s struggle for freedom. It is intended to be a resource both for the beginner, as an introduction to Burma, and for those who are already well acquainted with these issues, as a contribution to furthering the debate about the future of the country. It will provide some brief, basic historical background, in order to put the current situation in context, but will focus primarily on the current situation, and draw largely on the human stories of suffering and courage that are the reality of Burma today. Like my previous work, it is more an activist’s text than an anthropologist’s study, but I have sought to make it academically and intellectually credible. It is supported primarily by first-hand evidence, or by information provided by reliable sources. It is my hope that it will not be an abstract piece of literature that only provokes interest and discussion, but also a book that will motivate action, whether in support or aid. While writing it, the words of a young Shan boy I met in 2002 continue to ring in my ears. He described to me how he had seen his father shot dead in front of him as he worked in his paddy field. The boy waited until the soldiers had left, and then took his father’s body back for burial. Just two weeks later, the Tatmadaw struck again, this time killing most villagers including his mother, and burning down the entire village. He was taken as a porter and ordered to carry heavy loads of supplies and ammunition for three days, walking long distances and denied food and water. At the end of three days he collapsed with exhaustion, and the soldiers beat him for half an hour, until he fell unconscious. When he regained consciousness, he found the troops had moved on and he was able to make his escape. For two weeks he walked through the jungle, surviving on tree bark and banana pulp, before reaching a camp for internally displaced people near the Thai border. As he told his story, he looked into my eyes and said words that are ingrained in my mind: ‘Please tell the world to put pressure on the military regime to stop killing its people. Tell the world not to forget us.’ In writing this book, I hope I have at least partially responded to his request.

  When I met Aung San Suu Kyi in January 2012, I told her about this book. I also told her that I had changed the title. Originally, the book was to be called Burma: A Captive Nation. She responded by commending the new title, saying that Burma truly is at a crossroads and people must shed their status as captives. She went on to say that in her view, in the debate over Burma’s future, there are three types of people: those who are unquestioningly euphoric and enthusiastic about the process of change; those who are supportive of her decision to engage with the regime and in the political process, but are cautious, sceptical and weighing the evidence; and those who, for whatever agenda of their own, simply do not even want the process to be tried. It is the second category that she values, and she made it clear that she does not understand and has no time for the first or the third.

  I returned from Rangoon in 2012 with a sense of cautious optimism, with equal emphasis on both words. This could be a moment of breakthrough for Burma, the first opportunity in decades for genuine change to develop, but we must test the evidence and ensure that the atmospheric changes occurring at the moment l
ead to a process that is more substantial, rooted in the institutional, legislative and constitutional reforms needed to make change truly irreversible. The process is fragile, much is riding on the shoulders of two individuals, President Thein Sein and Aung San Suu Kyi, and it is not certain that Thein Sein is strong enough to neutralise the hardliners within the regime and secure wider support within the military for his reforms. Genuine peace and true political reform have yet to come, and there is a long way to go. Nevertheless, the change in atmosphere is an important first step, and as Chinese philosopher Lao-tzu said, a journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step. For perhaps the first time in decades, the question is not whether Burma is changing, but how deep, how substantial and how long-lasting the changes are. Burma is at a crossroads, and the world is watching to see in which direction it will go and how far down the road to change the Generals are willing to travel.

  1

  From Rice Bowl to Basket Case

  ‘This is Burma and it will be quite unlike any land you know.’

  Rudyard Kipling, ‘Letters from the East’ (1898)

  AT 4.20 A.M. on 4 January 1948 Burma regained its independence. Following just over a century of British colonial rule, and several years of Japanese occupation, the country had finally shed its shackles and won its freedom. ‘This early hour was selected by Burmese astrologers as the most propitious for the country’s new beginning,’ writes Christina Fink.1

  Only a few days prior to this event, when people should have been celebrating their impending liberty, a well-educated, middle-class Burmese family near Mandalay gathered outside for drinks. A guest, who was also educated, was agitated. ‘He was adamant that the wrong date had been chosen for independence,’ recalls one of those present. ‘He predicted that because of this date and time, there would be nothing but bloodshed and fighting among ourselves, and that we would not be able to do anything to change this. He had done all the astrological calculations.’

  Astrology is taken extremely seriously among many Burmese people, as are other forms of spirituality and superstition, including numerology, and a belief in nats or spirits. Yet whether or not the astrological dangers of the date chosen for Burma’s independence mean anything, other factors contributed to a fragile birth. Just six months prior to independence, on 19 July 1947, the man who had led Burma’s struggle against colonial rule, General Aung San, was assassinated, along with half his cabinet. ‘Burma’s most competent leaders, who had been preparing to take over from the British, were dead before the country had even become independent,’ writes Kin Oung in his book Who Killed Aung San?2 Sir Nicholas Fenn, who served in Rangoon in the early 1960s and again as Ambassador twenty years later, says that the assassination of Aung San and half his cabinet meant that Burma came into being as an independent nation ‘with a second-eleven cabinet’.

  Interestingly, Aung San predicted his own death when he met the British Governor Sir Reginald Dorman-Smith in 1946. ‘How long do national heroes last?’ Aung San reportedly asked. He then answered his own question, saying: ‘Not long in this country; they have too many enemies. Three years is the most they can hope to survive. I do not give myself more than another eighteen months of life.’3 Aung San is respected to this day in Burma as the father of the nation and the founder of Burma’s army; he was also the father of Burma’s current democracy leader, Nobel Peace Prize-winner Aung San Suu Kyi. In 1998, she wrote an article about him for Asiaweek, describing her father’s greatest strengths as ‘the largeness of his spirit and an immense capacity to learn from his experiences. He recognized his faults and worked hard to remedy them.’ His vision for the army he founded, she concludes, was very different from the one today’s Burma Army pursues. ‘My father made it abundantly clear that the army was meant to serve the people, that it should abide by principles of justice and honour, and that unless it could win and keep the trust and respect of the people, its purpose would be vitiated,’ she wrote. ‘He never intended the army to meddle in government. A liberal and a democrat, he saw from the fascist Japanese army the dangers of military absolutism.’4

  Aung San was perhaps the one Burman capable of uniting the country’s different ethnic peoples, despite having fought against them during the Second World War when he sided with the Japanese. In February 1947, Aung San attended a conference at Panglong, Shan State, to seek a constitutional way forward that would be based on equal rights for all the ethnic nationalities of Burma. In a speech in Jubilee Hall in Rangoon a few months later, Aung San explained the vision of Panglong: ‘When we build our new Burma, shall we build it as a Union or as a Unitary State? In my opinion it will not be feasible to set up a Unitary State. We must set up a Union with properly regulated provisions to safeguard the rights of the national minorities.’5

  Although the Karen people boycotted the process, the Arakanese and Mon were not invited, and the Nagas, Was and other ethnic groups were excluded, the Panglong Agreement was signed on 12 February 1947 by the Shan, Kachin, Chin and Karenni, with the promise that ‘full autonomy in internal administration for the Frontier Areas is accepted in principle’.6 In addition, the Shan and Karenni, who had been largely independent during the pre-colonial and colonial periods, secured the right of secession after ten years. The status of the Karen was left to be resolved after independence.

  The Panglong Agreement was part of a rapid process towards independence, from the defeat of the Japanese and Britain’s restoration of colonial rule in Burma in 1945 to British Prime Minister Clement Attlee’s agreement with Aung San on 27 January 1947 to grant Burma independence ‘as soon as possible’.7 Burma had been gradually occupied by the British in the nineteenth century through three Anglo-Burmese wars – 1824–1826, 1852 and 1885 – ultimately leading to the overthrow of the Burmese King Thibaw. During the early twentieth century, an active Burman nationalist movement developed in protest at the colonial occupation, beginning with the formation of the Young Men’s Buddhist Association (YMBA) by students in 1906. The YMBA is regarded as Burma’s first modern political organisation. An armed rebellion against the British led by a traditional medicine man known as Saya San began in 1930, and lasted two years. Saya San, who had been commissioned by the YMBA’s successor organisation, the General Council of Burmese Associations (GCBA), to carry out an investigation into the conditions of farmers in rural Burma, declared himself King and urged people to refuse to pay tax to the British. His army, which numbered 3,000 by the time it was crushed two years later, led what Thant Myint-U describes as ‘a passionate, desperate revolt’.8 It took the British seven battalions and more than 8,000 soldiers to defeat Saya San, who was then hanged for treason.9 His defeat, however, did not diminish the determination of Burman nationalists, who found fresh impetus in the movement established by Aung San in 1938, known as the Dohbama Asiayone or ‘We Burmese Association’.10

  Aung San and his fellow student leaders each adopted the title of thakin or ‘master’, and continued to agitate for change. In 1941, as a Japanese invasion of Burma appeared likely, he joined twenty-nine other nationalist activists on a journey to China, to receive military training from the Japanese. Known as the ‘Thirty Comrades’, they formed the Burma Independence Army (BIA) and paved the way for the Japanese invasion of Burma. On 8 December 1941 Japan declared war on Britain, and with BIA forces providing vital military and intelligence support, overran Burma during the following three years.

  Some of the seeds of today’s tensions between the Burman and non-Burman ethnic groups were sown during this period. The non-Burman ethnic nationalities, particularly the Karen, Karenni, Chin and Kachin, and the Rohingyas, not only sided with the British and American allies against the Japanese, but actively fought alongside them. Even prior to the Second World War, some of these ethnic groups had been favoured by the British over the Burman majority, and were perceived to be stooges of the colonialists. The BIA showed little restraint in attacking them, committing many atrocities and several massacres of the Karen. The fact that
many of these ethnic groups were not Buddhists added to the Burman feeling that they were traitors. Many Karen Christian congregations were particularly targeted.

  Japan granted Burma, under Aung San’s BIA, independence, but that soon proved no more than nominal. By 1944, frustrated that their expectations of liberation under the Japanese had not borne fruit, and recognising that the tide had turned and the Allies were advancing, Aung San decided to switch sides. Taking his soldiers from their base at Pyinmana, the site of the SPDC’s new capital sixty years later, Aung San established the Anti-Fascist People’s Freedom League (AFPFL), and ensured that word reached the Allied commanders Generals William Slim and ‘Vinegar’ Joe Stilwell that he wanted to help eject the Japanese from Burma. Slim then met Aung San, and accused him of only turning to the British because they were winning. He was amused when Aung San swiftly retorted that it would not be much good to come to him if they were losing. ‘I was impressed by Aung San,’ Slim wrote. ‘He was not the ambitious, unscrupulous guerrilla leader I had expected. He was certainly ambitious … but I judged him to be a genuine patriot and a well-balanced realist … The greatest impression he made on me was one of honesty … I had the idea that if he agreed to do something he would keep his word. I could do business with Aung San.’11 Slim saw the value of having Aung San and his troops on side. ‘If they were not with us, as well as against the Japanese, we should end up by having to fight them too,’ he recalled. ‘I, therefore, recommended we should help Aung San, with arms and supplies, and try to get some tactical control of his forces to make them fit into the general plan.’12 On 27 March 1945 Aung San’s troops rebelled against the Japanese, and seven months later Japan formally surrendered.