HISTORYPOST-COLONIAL BURMA2991857
Mindon Min moves
Upper Burma’s capital
from Inwa to a newly
built city at the foot
of Mandalay Hill, thus
fulfi lling a purported
2400 year-old
prophecy by Buddha.1862
Bahadur Shah
Zafar, the last
emperor of India,
is exiled with his
family to Yangon,
which the British
call Rangoon. He
dies in 1858, and is
buried in secrecy.Aung San & WWII
More famous in the West as Aung San Suu Kyi’s father, Bogyoke (Gen-
eral) Aung San is revered as a national hero by most Myanmar people
and his likeness is seen throughout the country. Aung San Suu Kyi, who
was only two when he died, called him ‘a simple man with a simple aim:
to fi ght for independence’.
Aung San was an active student at Rangoon University; he edited the
newspaper and led the All Burma Students’ Union. At 26 years old, he
and the group called the ‘Thirty Comrades’ looked abroad for support for
their independence movement. Although initially planning to seek an
alliance with China, they ended up negotiating with Japan and receiving
military training there. The ‘Thirty Comrades’ became the fi rst troops
of the Burmese National Army (BNA) and returned to Burma with the
invading Japanese troops in 1941.
By mid-1942 the Japanese had driven retreating British–Indian forc-
es, along with the Chinese Kuomintang (KMT), out of most of Burma.
But the conduct of the Japanese troops was starting to alienate the
Burmese. Aung San complained at Japan’s 15th Army headquarters in
Maymyo (now Pyin Oo Lwin): ‘I went to Japan to save my people who
were struggling like bullocks under the British. But now we are treated
like dogs.’
Aung San and the BNA switched allegiance to the Allied side in March
- Their assistance, along with brave behind-enemy-lines operations
by the 'Chindits', an Allied Special Force, helped the British prevail over
the Japanese in Burma two months later. Aung San and his colleagues
now had a their chance to dictate post-war terms for their country.
Post-Colonial Burma
Towards Independence
In January 1947, Aung San visited London as the colony’s deputy chair-
person of the Governor’s Executive Council. Meeting with the British
Prime Minister Clement Attlee, a pact was agreed, under which Burma
would gain self-rule within a year.
A month later, Aung San met with Shan, Chin and Kachin leaders in
Panglong, in Shan State. They signed the famous Panglong Agreement
in February 1947, guaranteeing ethnic minorities the freedom to choose
their political destiny if dissatisfi ed with the situation after 10 years. The
agreement also broadly covered absent representatives of the Kayin,
Kayah, Mon and Rakhaing.
In the elections for the assembly, Aung San’s Anti-Fascist People’s
Freedom League (AFPFL) won an overwhelming 172 seats out of 225.
The Burmese Communist Party took seven, while the Bamar opposition,
WWII
Sites in
Myanmar» (^) Start of Burma
Rd, Lashio, North-
ern Myanmar
» (^) Taukkyan War
Cemetery, North
of Yangon
» Thanbyuzayat
War Cemetry,
Mon State
» (^) Meiktila, Central
Myanmar
Armed Forces
Day (27 March)
commemorates
the Burmese
soldiers’ resist-
ance against the
Japanese army in
WWII.
JOHN ELK III/LONELY PLANET IMAGES ©
» Kuthodaw Paya (p 210 ); built by Mindon Min in 1857