Word: burma
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...Communists were not the only ones who could wage successful rebellion in Asia. Last week Karen tribesmen, mostly Baptist, held much of Burma's richest land. They had taken Mandalay, and were in control of the Irrawaddy valley; their guns ringed the capital, Rangoon. Two months ago whole regiments of Karens rose in open rebellion against the government. The tough hill tribesmen, led by a handsome ex-Rangoon lawyer, Saw Ba U Gyi, had grown tired of waiting for the infant Burma Union to grant their demand for a separate state. They planned their attack for a propitious time...
...Karens number only 1,500,000 of Burma's 17 million, but their hard-hitting troops terrify the Burmans. Trained by the British as anti-Japanese guerrilla units, the Karens are the best-equipped, best-officered group in the battle royal which has been raging for control of Burma (see map). The Karens' rivals include: 1) the government, which holds a few beleaguered cities and some areas in the far north and south; 2) the Red Flag (Trotskyite) Communists; 3) the White Flag (Stalinist) Communists; and 4) the White Band (People's Volunteer Organization), followers of assassinated...
Even wholehearted P.V.O. assistance may be too late for Burma's tottering government. A recent government amnesty offer has brought in only a handful of Karens. Said one dour Burman official, "It looks as if the Karens want all Burma for their separate state...
Karen control of the Irrawaddy had cut off rice shipments from Rangoon.
The bankrupt government hoped anxiously for a ?25 million British loan
($100 million). In London, talk revived that Burma, after 15 months of
chaotic independence, would apply for readmission to the British
Commonwealth. In Rangoon, Premier Thakin Nu had moved into a thatched
hut behind his house, and taken a vow of chastity (he has eight
children). Thakin Nu's friends said that he was devoting himself to
becoming a Buddha 999 worlds from now. Recently, Thakin Nu and
thousands of other residents
...Karens have always been a separate people; their conversion to Christianity intensified their division from the Buddhist Burmans. The first Karen convert was Ko Tha Byu, a Karen bandit bought out of slavery by Dr. Adoniram Judson, a Baptist missionary from Maiden, Mass, who had arrived in Burma in 1813. Ko Tha Byu learned to read the Scriptures, was baptized, and set out to convert his fellow tribesmen. Karens, who had a myth that one day their "lost white brother" would return over the great waters with a "lost book," made willing listeners. When bands of Karens began to arrive...