Karen 1972 (2)
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Tea With The Colonels
And so here I am in Mae Sam Laep, a small frontier post on the Thai side of the Salween River. It took eight hours to get here from Ban Houei Pho. Mae Sam Laep consists of perhaps a dozen bamboo houses, a coffee shop and a general store. The air is full of the reek of elephant shit, a not unpleasant odour decidedly preferable to carbon monoxide. My purpose in coming here — to meet the leader of the Karen Independence Army, General Bo Mya. Yesterday I met a beautiful and mysterious young lady wearing the red and blue insignia of the KIA. She, I was told, was to leave for General Bo Mya’s camp this morning. Would she take me? She regarded me with obvious suspicion and seemed unwilling. However, at my continued insistence, she capitulated and told me to meet her in the morning. Now, sitting on the rocky eastern bank of the river by the boats, waiting for her to appear, I am filled with a growing conviction that she has dumped me and I will never see her again.
Suddenly a young man wearing a military shirt and sarong appears before me and hands me a piece of paper. There is a printed letterhead in Burmese script, beneath which is written:
Dear Friend,
Why not come up to my place
and wait for the lady who is taking you
to General Mya’s camp.
Friend.
He takes me up to a house perched high on the riverbank. I climb a rickety ladder and step on to the verandah. There is a resounding crack as the bamboo almost gives beneath my weight. There are chuckles from within. It is not an impressive entrance.
Inside the house, perhaps a dozen men lie around in positions of repose. They wear insignia, a gold lion rampant within a white eight-pointed star on a red field. From the corner, one of the men rises and extends his hand.
“Good morning, my good friend,” he says in excellent English. “Let me introduce myself. I am Colonel Jordan of the Patriotic Liberation Army. Would you care to take some tea?”
We drink tea and talk. He tells me about himself and about the liberation armies. The PLA is the military arm of the Parliamentary Democracy Party, outlawed by General Ne Win. Jordan himself was jailed for four years. He used to be the parliamentary representative for Moulmein, Burma’s third largest city. The PLA is led by Generals U Nu and Laya. U Nu was once premier and is handing over leadership to General Laya because, says Jordan, he doesn’t like fighting. He estimates the PLA’s present strength to be almost 10,000 men and women.
I asked him where the arms came from. He remarked that there was much smuggling along the border. General Bo Mya’s army was 15,000 strong, and the combined Shan armies numbered 20,000. All these armies worked in close collaboration with each other.
Where were the PLA troops active? — Mainly in the vicinity of Moulmein. The General HQ was situated 75 miles south-east of Moulmein.
If liberation was achieved, what would be the objectives of the combined liberation forces?
— To form a federal union in which each state would be autonomous and have representation in Rangoon, which would remain the capital of the Union.
We discussed the question of AID. He seemed to find my conception of economic aid as the new imperialism a trifle amusing. Yes, they would accept aid, but only as much as was necessary, and without incurring any political commitment… “and whatnot” (Colonel Jordan liked this phrase, and used it a lot).
What about the present economic situation?
— Formerly, Burma had been one of the largest exporters of rice in the world. Now, its own people were starving because of inflated prices, and whatnot.
What about Bangladesh? — He did not consider Bangladesh to be independent as long as there were Indian troops on her soil.
Colonel Jordan was obviously an intelligent and sensitive man, much more of a politician than a soldier, but too much of an idealist to last. I had the feeling that he would see the inside of a jail again. It turned out that Jordan and one of his fellow colonels had been to England — Sandhurst.
We ate a delicious meal of mutton curry and dried prawn with rice, eating with our fingers in Burmese style. The cook, a short fat fierce-looking man, used to be a film director, Jordan told me. He was now planning his next epic, a documentary of the liberation.
As we were drinking tea (with milk of course), Colonel Gladstone of the KIA arrived with his aide. He was en route to Bangkok to have his kidneys checked. General Bo Mya, he said, had left for Mae Sot that day, so my meeting was not to materialise. Gladstone was just a name out of my school history book, along with Disraeli. I had never before actually met a Gladstone, and I have never met another since. He was a portly gentleman with a round face and beautiful languid eyes, and he seemed filled with a great sadness. I resisted the immediate urge to shake his hand saying “Gladstone, I presume?” It was just one of those flashes.
We parted later that evening with much handshaking. Jordan seemed concerned that I intended to walk back alone the next day. Why not take an elephant? I explained the condition of my backside and he sympathised, saying he hated travelling by elephant too. Then perhaps I would go with one of his friends, a colonel (they were all colonels) of the Kayah Independence Army? Perhaps I would.