Burma- a Nation at the Crossroads

by Benedict Rogers

  Aung San, however, had not joined the British simply in order to welcome them back to Burma. When the Supreme Allied Commander in South East Asia, Lord Mountbatten, decided to accept Aung San’s support against the Japanese, he knew that such support was not unconditional. Mountbatten, according to historian Martin Smith, ‘recognized the rising tide of Asian nationalism and the inevitability of independence … He recognized it was only a question of time before the British would have to give way.’13 Sure enough, as soon as the war was over, Aung San made it abundantly clear that he wanted independence, and threatened strikes and an armed uprising if there was no progress towards achieving it. His ambitions coincided conveniently with the defeat of Winston Churchill in a general election in Britain in 1945, and the election of the Labour Party under Clement Attlee. The new government was in a hurry to withdraw from its colonies and disband the British Empire.

  Aung San’s assassination in 1947, when his daughter Aung San Suu Kyi was just two years old, deprived him of the opportunity to see his dreams fulfilled and his country of an exceptionally able, wise young leader. He was just thirty-two. In 1948, U Nu was sworn in as Burma’s first Prime Minister in his place, and served for just over a decade. Britain’s Ambassador to Burma from 1953–1956, Lord Gore-Booth, recalls that U Nu was ‘somewhat older than most of his Government, and this and his devout Buddhism made him sound like a solemn character. This was by no means so.’ U Nu, writes Gore-Booth, ‘had a unique smile compounded of saintliness and gaiety; he also had a certain political shrewdness which he used in day-to-day business and which made him for that period the undisputed leader of his country’.14

  ‘Undisputed’ may be too strong a term, for Burma’s first decade of independence was one of fragile, turbulent parliamentary democracy. On the eve of independence, with the scars of the war still fresh, a civil war that would last decades broke out on several fronts. The communists rose up, and almost at the same time the Karen rebelled, after centuries of oppression at the hands of the Burmans. The spirit of Panglong, which promised a multi-ethnic federal democracy, was strained to breaking point. Despite having a Shan, Sao Shwe Thaike, as President, and a Karen, General Smith Dun, as head of the military, ethnic tensions boiled over. On Christmas Eve, 1948 eighty Karen Christians were massacred in Mergui, southern Tenasserim Division, and this was followed by mass killings of Karen civilians over the following weeks. On 31 January 1949 the armed wing of the Karen National Union (KNU), known at the time as the Karen National Defence Organisation (KNDO), took control of Insein Township, a suburb of Rangoon, to defend Karen communities against further attacks. Karen soldiers in the Tatmadaw defected en masse to join the uprising, and Smith Dun, although loyal to the national government, was replaced by Ne Win.15 According to someone who was close to Ne Win and served in his regime, Ne Win orchestrated Smith Dun’s removal, in part because of the Karen defections and in part because of an altogether more trivial grudge. Apparently, Ne Win had earlier tried to join a Masonic Lodge, but had been blackballed by the lodge master, a Karen called General Kya Doe. With Ne Win’s promotion, Burma’s decades-long nightmare began.

  For the next nine years, what Sir Nicholas Fenn describes as Burma’s ‘charmingly inefficient parliamentary democracy’ teetered on the brink of collapse as communists, Karens and other armed insurgents captured large parts of the country. While Patricia Gore-Booth, widow of the former British Ambassador, recalled a comfortable existence for diplomats, with ‘cocktail parties which were free, easy and charming,’ she noted that they were unable to drive out of the city, because it was surrounded by insurgents. And while Ne Win played golf, gambled and went to the races each weekend, it was clear, she said, that he had been ‘very jealous of Aung San’.

  Although U Saw, one of Aung San’s principal political rivals, was found guilty of masterminding his assassination, with extensive evidence against him, there are lingering questions about what role, if any, Ne Win may have played. An extensive arms dump was found in the lake behind U Saw’s home, and U Saw clearly expected to become Prime Minister. ‘U Saw and his henchmen had enough military hardware to stage a revolution in Rangoon – which indeed may have been the plan. What were U Saw and his men actually up to?’ asks Kin Oung, whose father, Major General Tun Hla Oung and father-in-law, Justice Thaung Sein, played key roles in bringing Aung San’s assassins to justice.16 However, in 1986 a bulletin published by the Karen National Union (KNU) carried an article which asked whether U Saw had been framed. ‘Is there any truth to persisting rumours that General Ne Win, Prime Minister U Nu and others may have been involved?’17

  It was no secret that Aung San and Ne Win had not been close. According to Martin Smith, one of the Thirty Comrades, Kyaw Zaw, has claimed that Aung San once seriously considered removing Ne Win from his position because ‘his behaviour under the Japanese had led them to believe he had “fascist” tendencies’. Ne Win, described by Kyaw Zaw as ‘double-faced’ and a ‘power-mad and evil king’, only survived because of his ‘cunning’.18 Aung San and Ne Win often quarrelled, and Aung San’s main objection to Ne Win was his ‘immoral character … He was a gambler and a womanizer, which the strict moralist Aung San – and the rest of us as well – despised.’19

  It is interesting that, according to Kin Oung, the first detailed telegram from the governor’s office in Rangoon to London about the assassination noted that the gunmen were members of Ne Win’s 4th Burma Rifles.20 It is also interesting that an apparent attempt on U Saw’s life had been made just ten months before Aung San’s assassination. Kin Oung suggests that one theory is that ‘Ne Win, with the mind of a race-goer, plotted that an attempt would be made on U Saw without taking his life. U Saw would then retaliate by taking revenge on Aung San – the two gunmen in the car that day wore the uniforms of Aung San’s “private army” – by being convinced that he was behind the assassination attempt.’21

  Whether or not Ne Win had any involvement in the assassination of Aung San, his jealousy of Burma’s assassinated leader culminated in Ne Win seizing power in 1958. Although U Nu claimed he had invited the military to take charge, as a caretaker government to restore order, with the benefit of hindsight we can conclude that he had little choice.22 Many believe Ne Win’s first government did much to restore order to the chaos that was sweeping the country, and was a relatively benign dictatorship. Martin Morland, who served in the British Embassy in Rangoon from 1957 to 1960 and played tennis with Ne Win, says that Ne Win reversed U Nu’s ban on beef (which U Nu had imposed, for religious reasons) and dealt with the ‘pye-dogs’ which were running wild, two policies which ‘pleased diplomats’. Gore-Booth claims that Ne Win ‘played a somewhat elusive part in Burmese public life, alternating between bursts of energy and an enjoyment of golf, racing and family life’.23

  However, even if he restored order, there were early indications of what was to come. ‘The caretaker government was sensitive to criticism and imprisoned numerous journalists for daring to critique its actions,’ writes Fink. ‘And much to civil servants’ annoyance, battlefield commanders were brought in to replace or work alongside bureaucrats.’24 Although originally intended to govern for just six months, Ne Win twice extended his term, but then ‘pressure increased for an election to restore democracy’.25 Ne Win complied, and fresh elections were held in February 1960. He hoped to influence the ballot and achieve a popular mandate for his continued rule, but instead the people overwhelmingly re-elected U Nu.

  ‘It was democracy’s last chance for some time to come,’ writes Gore-Booth. ‘But sadly, it was not taken.’ U Nu’s devout Buddhism consumed his attention, and the political turmoil escalated. ‘Instead of reading accurately the lessons of what had happened and pursuing a stabilizing policy, U Nu set about fulfilling his conscientious dream of making Buddhism the state religion of the country. This effort, superfluous in a country in which Buddhism was the official religion in all but name, caused much disturbance and uncertainty.’26 The predominantly Christian Kachins to
ok up arms in revolt against the government, in part out of protest at the idea of Buddhism being imposed as the state religion.

  Two years into the new U Nu government, Ne Win launched a coup d’état which set Burma on the course of military rule that has lasted to this day. The previous evening he had attended a ballet performance. He was seen congratulating the leading ballerina, and nothing seemed untoward. Yet at 8.50 a.m. on 2 March 1962 he announced on the radio that the military had taken power.27

  Susan Fenn, wife of Sir Nicholas, was one of the first foreigners to become aware of the coup. In a nursing home having just given birth, she woke at 3 a.m. on 2 March to feed the baby. Hearing a low, rumbling sound through the open window, she looked out and saw an army jeep under the porch and guns in the bushes. The doorbell rang, and when she and the nurse opened it, they found ‘a dozen rifles poking through the security grill’. The troops had come to arrest one of the other patients, Sao Sai Long, known as ‘Shorty’, the Shan sawbwa or saopha (local royal ruler, or ‘king’) of Kengtung. ‘On an impulse, I offered the men the baby to hold,’ recalls Susan Fenn. ‘Immediately the guns were stacked against the wall and all attention focused on the smiling infant.’ This deflected the tension for a while, but the soldiers had orders to carry out, and Shorty was carried down the stairs on a sedan chair. ‘I asked if there was anything I could do for him, and he gave a regal wave, saying: “No thank you, my dear, this is just one of those things.” And he was borne off into the night. At 9 a.m. his family came to the nursing home to settle the bill.’ He was jailed for seven years.

  When the telephone lines, which had been cut, were restored Susan Fenn called her husband. ‘He was still asleep, but when he looked out of the window and saw the tanks, he was all attention. He rang the ambassador, and that is how the British embassy was the first embassy in Rangoon to report the coup,’ she recalls.

  U Nu had convened a meeting with ethnic leaders to discuss federalism and ethnic rights on 2 March 1962, and that provided the pretext for Ne Win’s coup. ‘Ne Win wanted to prevent what he feared was going to happen the next day. It was a pre-emptive move,’ says Fenn. ‘Ne Win believed U Nu was breaking up the union, and that he would allow that to happen “over my dead body”. He was also undoubtedly impatient with the charming inefficiencies of U Nu’s regime.’ On the morning of the coup, Ne Win was quoted as saying: ‘federalism is impossible – it will destroy the Union’, and his chief spokesman cited federalism as the main reason for the coup.28 U Nu, many members of his government, and ethnic leaders including Burma’s first President, Sao Shwe Thaike were arrested and jailed. One of Sao Shwe Thaike’s sons was killed, and he himself died in prison eight months later.

  Burmese historian Aung Saw Oo believes Ne Win had been planning a coup for a long time. In 1956, Aung Saw Oo claims, Ne Win called the top generals together and told them that one day, the army would run the country. Two years later, that became a reality, but after losing the 1960 election his taste for power was not satisfied, and he wanted more.

  President Sao Shwe Thaike’s youngest son, Harn Yawnghwe, recalls the night of the coup vividly. He was fourteen at the time. ‘The first thing I remember is bullets flying all over the place. Soldiers surrounded the house and opened fire. The shooting went on a long time. The walls of our house were eighteen inches thick. The upstairs was wood, the downstairs was brick. The bullets didn’t hit us.’

  Harn Yawnghwe was sharing a room with his seventeen-year-old brother, who was killed. ‘My brother rolled out of bed when he heard shooting. He found the front door open, so he shut it. But then we couldn’t find him. We heard shots, and then we found he had been killed. The military claimed we were resisting. The only thing I can think is that my brother had a spear, and that he must have gone out into the garden with it – and there they shot him, in the head and leg. We do not know why he was shot.’ An officer ordered his troops to collect all the spent cartridges, but the next morning, at least one hundred cartridges were still lying around.

  ‘The soldiers then shouted “Shan girls come out.” In the house, it was just the family and our maids, but in the compound our ex-bodyguards had settled. They were all arrested. Then they shouted “This is the army.” They searched the house, thinking that we had guns. My father and two brothers went out, and they took my father away. The soldiers pointed their guns at us, ordered us to put our hands up and told us to sit in a line on the front lawn.’

  For the whole family, and especially for a fourteen-year-old, such scenes were ‘traumatic,’ says Harn Yawnghwe. ‘Before that moment, you’re somebody. Then, with the shooting and guns pointed at you, you become nothing. After the coup, people were afraid to be associated with us.’ Today, the family home in Nyaung Shwe, Inle Lake, is a museum. In 2010 it was closed, shuttered, deserted and decaying. Even its status as a museum has been manipulated by the regime for political purposes, changing its focus from Shan culture, as it was initially set up, to a museum of Buddhism, stripped of ethnic associations.

  Sao Shwe Thaike embodied the spirit of multi-ethnic Burma, and in jail he was placed in solitary confinement for refusing to retract his support for federalism. ‘My father was a signatory of the Panglong Agreement. He was respected by everyone. He was not just a Shan, and he tried to maintain that role. He was more Shan during the Second World War – after the war he worked with Kachins and others and founded the Supreme Council of United Hill People. One of his bodyguards was a Burman and his private secretary was a Burman.’

  Harn Yawnghwe’s mother was also politically active, and the military wanted to arrest her too. Fortunately, she was in Britain at the time of the coup. Elected a Member of Parliament in 1960, her son describes her as ‘very much Shan, and hated by the Burman army’. A year after the coup, when Ne Win called for peace talks with the Shan, the family fled to Thailand and have been in exile ever since. ‘The Shan State Independence Army sent my brother to the dialogue. We left, because we didn’t want to be held hostage.’

  Another Shan family torn apart by the coup was that of Sao Kya Seng, the saopha of Hsipaw. Married to an Austrian woman, Inge Eberhard, whom he met when they were both students in the United States, Sao Kya Seng had attended Parliament in Rangoon the day before the coup, and had flown to Taunggyi to visit his dying sister. From Taunggyi he set out to return to Hsipaw, unaware of the events in Rangoon, but was stopped at a military roadblock. He was last seen being taken away by armed soldiers. His wife Inge was placed under house arrest, her bodyguards and drivers beaten with rifle butts and taken away. Now Inge Sargent, she recounts in her book Twilight over Burma: My Life as a Shan Princess her efforts to meet Ne Win to plead for information about her husband, and describes her eventual escape from Burma. Although she had Austrian citizenship, she required an exit permit to leave the country. Given her status as the wife of a prominent Shan leader and political prisoner, obtaining that was no easy task. To make life even harder, her children had been born in Burma and as such were regarded under Burmese law as Burmese citizens. They could only leave the country if she was able to convince Austria to give them citizenship. After considerable struggle she obtained all the necessary documents, and fled the country. Prior to her departure, she was informed by a source with high-level connections that her husband had been executed soon after his arrest.29 Now based in Colorado, she continues to support the people of Burma almost half a century later. In 2008 she spoke enthusiastically about her charity, Burma Lifeline, and the work of the Burma Relief Centre that she supports.

  A hallmark of Ne Win’s rule was an ingrained hostility to foreigners, and to non-Burman ethnic nationalities. But his racism was contradictory. He was himself part-Chinese, and yet fiercely anti-Chinese. He got round this by claiming to have royal blood. In a similar contradiction, he often travelled abroad, sometimes for months at a time. He made state visits to the United States, Australia, Japan, China and the Soviet Union, among other places. His visits to Switzerland to consult psychiatrists, and to Britain
to enjoy the races at Ascot and tea with the Queen, were legendary – and yet, according to Gore-Booth, Ne Win lacked Aung San’s ‘self-confidence’ and was ‘naturally suspicious of foreigners’.30

  Ne Win would visit Britain regularly, but even these visits were tinged with nationalism. In contrast to normal protocol, he would simply inform the British embassy that he would be visiting, and offers of assistance were bluntly refused. Sir Nicholas Fenn recalls one visit, a year after the coup, when Ne Win met the Foreign Secretary, Patrick Gordon Walker, to receive a collection of Burmese royal regalia which the British had taken in 1885. Fenn, who had left Rangoon to become the Foreign Secretary’s assistant private secretary, was responsible for handing over the collection. The Foreign Secretary presented Ne Win with a ceremonial dagger, champagne was served, and then the General left, evidently delighted. ‘In his mind, they were his regalia, and he brought them back to Rangoon in triumph,’ says Fenn.

  The hostility to foreigners and non-Burman ethnic minorities within Burma was abundantly clear. However, Ne Win was, according to Fenn, ‘a contradictory and strange character’, and as such his known xenophobia did not stop him pursuing non-Burman women. One of his several wives was June Rose Bellamy, daughter of an Australian bookmaker who had married a descendant of Burmese King Tharrawaddy, and he is rumoured to have tried to pursue former Miss Burma film star Louisa Benson, a Karen whose father was Portuguese. Nevertheless, a Burmese woman who cannot be named but whose father knew Ne Win recalls the period immediately after the coup: ‘The atmosphere was terrible. We were the only family in our area who accepted foreign visitors. If you were visited by a foreigner, you had to give an account of what was said … We lived on rumour. We did not know who had disappeared.’

  Soon, Ne Win’s xenophobia took a new policy turn. Foreign business people, journalists and missionaries were expelled from the country, along with educational organisations such as the Ford, Fulbright and Asia Foundations, mission schools and hospitals were nationalised and the teaching of English was restricted. ‘It was a mentality that wanted foreigners and foreign-ness to be banished,’ says Fenn.