Birmania


 * This country is being applied to Altverse.

Birmania, officially the Union of Birmania, is a country in Southeast Asia. Birmania is bordered by Bangladesh and India to the West, China to the North, and Thailand and Laos to the West. One-third of Birmania’s total perimeter of 1,930 km (1,200 miles) forms an uninterrupted coastline along the Bay of Bengal and the Andaman Sea. The country’s 2014 census recorded a population of 91 million. Mainland Birmania is 698,905 square kilometres (269,849 sq mi) in size, and the total land area of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands is approximately 8,073 square kilometres (3,117 sq mi). Its capital city is Naypyidaw and its largest city is Yangon (Rangoon).

Early civilisations in Birmania included the Tibeto-Birmanese-speaking Pyu city-states in Upper Birmania and the Mon kingdoms in Lower Birmania. In the 9th century, the Bamar people entered the upper Irrawaddy valley and, following the establishment of the Pagan Kingdom in the 1050s, the Birmanese language, culture, and Theravada Buddhism slowly became dominant in the country. The Pagan Kingdom fell due to the Mongol invasions and several warring states emerged. In the 16th century, reunified by the Taungoo Dynasty, the country was for a brief period the largest empire in the history of Southeast Asia. The early 19th century Konbaung Dynasty ruled over an area that included modern Birmania and briefly controlled Assam and Nagaland as well. The British conquered the Konbaung Dynasty after three Anglo-Birmanese Wars in the 19th century and the country became a British colony. Birmania became an independent nation in 1946, and adopted a parliamentary federal republic government, the Union of Birmania, with a parliamentary socialist agenda.

For most of its independent years until 1992, the country has been engrossed in rampant ethnic strife and Birmania’s myriad ethnic groups as well as ideological groups have been involved in one of the world’s longest-running ongoing civil wars for independence. During this time, the United Nations and several other organisations have reported consistent and systematic human rights violations in the country. In 1968, former Minister of Defense U Maung was brought into power by the Bamar Nationalist Party which gained power among the vast majority of anti-seccesionists loyal to the government. U Maung brought an official end to these civil wars through a series of brutal military campaigns all over Birmania for about seven years. U Maung blamed the Birmanese parliament allowing the wars to go on for too long, and for the fact that some seccesionist leaders were former parliament members; because of this, in 1976, U Maung abolished the parliamentary system in favor of a semi-presidential system in which the Birmanese people has kept him in power until his retirement in 2000. In 2000, Thakin Aung Khaing of the Bamar Nationalist Party succeeded U Maung, and since then has focused on eliminating trade sanctions placed on the country, privatizing state-owned industry, nationalizing the country’s public education, shortening the wealth gap, and revitalizing Birmania’s tourism industry.

Birmania is a country rich in jade and gems, oil, natural gas and other mineral resources. In 2012, Birmania's nominal GDP reached US$138 billion, with a nominal GDP per capita of $1,527, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF). According to a 2008 forecast by PricewaterhouseCoopers, Birmania may be the fastest-growing of the world’s emerging economies by 2025, with a potential growth rate of almost 10% per annum in real dollar terms. In recent years, the income gap in Birmania has expanded rather quickly, but overall nearly all levels of income status has risen. As of 2013, according to the Human Development Index (HDI), Birmania had a low level of human development, ranking 150 out of 187 countries, but this is primarily due to drastically disproportional standards of living in different regions of the country, particularly provinces once under the state of rebellion known as the Red Districts. According to a 2010 study, by eliminating these provinces out of the calculation of Human Development Index Average, the HDI significantly increases from a low 0.620 to 0.712, and overall it is increasing by 0.005 each year at the current rate.

In 2012, Birmania's nominal GDP reached US$138 billion, with a nominal GDP per capita of $1,527, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF). According to a December 2005 forecast by Goldman Sachs, the Birmanese economy will become the world's 21st-largest by 2025, with an estimated nominal GDP of $436 billion and a nominal GDP per capita of $4,357. According to a 2008 forecast by PricewaterhouseCoopers, Birmania may be the fastest-growing of the world's emerging economies by 2025, with a potential growth rate of almost 10% per annum in real dollar terms. In 2012, HSBC predicted that Birmania’s total GDP would surpass those of Norway, Singapore and Portugal by 2050.

Birmania is a founding member of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). It is also a member of the United Nations, the Non-Aligned Movement, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), the East Asia Summit, and the Commonwealth of Nations.

Etymology
WIP

Prehistory
Archaeological evidence shows that Homo erectus lived in the region now known as Birmania as early as 400,000 years ago. The first evidence of Homo sapiens is dated to about 11,000 BC, in a Stone Age culture called the Anyathian with discoveries of stone tools in central Birmania. Evidence of neolithic age domestication of plants and animals and the use of polished stone tools dating to sometime between 10,000 and 6,000 BC has been discovered in the form of cave paintings near the city of Taunggyi.

The Bronze Age arrived circa 1500 BC when people in the region were turning copper into bronze, growing rice and domesticating poultry and pigs; they were among the first people in the world to do so. The Iron Age began around 500 BC with the emergence of iron-working settlements in an area south of present-day Mandalay. Evidence also shows the presence of rice-growing settlements of large villages and small towns that traded with their surroundings as far as China between 500 BC and 200 AD. Iron Age Birmanese cultures also had influences from outside sources such as India and Thailand, as seen in their funerary practices concerning child burials. This indicates some form of communication between groups in Birmania and other places, possibly through trade.

Early City-states
Around the second century BC the first-known city-states emerged in central Birmania. The city-states were founded as part of the southward migration by the Tibeto-Birmanese-speaking Pyu city-states, the earliest inhabitants of Birmania of whom records are extant, from present-day Chinese Yunnan. The Pyu culture was heavily influenced by trade with India, importing Buddhism as well as other cultural, architectural and political concepts which would have an enduring influence on later Birmanese culture and political organisation.

By the 9th century, several city-states had sprouted across the land: the Pyu in the central dry zone, Mon along the southern coastline and Arakanese along the western littoral. The balance was upset when the Pyu came under repeated attacks from Nanzhao between the 750s and the 830s. In the mid-to-late 9th century the Bamar people founded a small settlement at Bagan. It was one of several competing city-states until the late 10th century when it grew in authority and grandeur.

Imperial Birmania
Pagan gradually grew to absorb its surrounding states until the 1050s–1060s when Anawrahta founded the Pagan Kingdom, the first ever unification of the Irrawaddy valley and its periphery. In the 12th and 13th centuries, the Pagan Empire and the Khmer Empire were two main powers in mainland Southeast Asia. The Birmanese language and culture gradually became dominant in the upper Irrawaddy valley, eclipsing the Pyu, Mon and Pali norms by the late 12th century.[52]

Theravada Buddhism slowly began to spread to the village level, although Tantric, Mahayana, Hinduism, and folk religion remained heavily entrenched. Pagan's rulers and wealthy built over 10,000 Buddhist temples in the Pagan capital zone alone. Repeated Mongol invasions (1277–1301) toppled the four-century-old kingdom in 1287.

Pagan's collapse was followed by 250 years of political fragmentation that lasted well into the 16th century. Like the Birmanese four centuries earlier, Shan migrants who arrived with the Mongol invasions stayed behind. Several competing Shan States came to dominate the entire northwestern to eastern arc surrounding the Irrawaddy valley. The valley too was beset with petty states until the late 14th century when two sizeable powers, Ava Kingdom and Hanthawaddy Kingdom, emerged. In the west, a politically fragmented Arakan was under competing influences of its stronger neighbours until the Kingdom of Mrauk U unified the Arakan coastline for the first time in 1437.

Early on, Ava fought wars of unification (1385–1424) but could never quite reassemble the lost empire. Having held off Ava, Hanthawaddy entered its golden age, and Arakan went on to become a power in its own right for the next 350 years. In contrast, constant warfare left Ava greatly weakened, and it slowly disintegrated from 1481 onward. In 1527, the Confederation of Shan States conquered Ava itself, and ruled Upper Birmania until 1555.

Like the Pagan Empire, Ava, Hanthawaddy and the Shan states were all multi-ethnic polities. Despite the wars, cultural synchronisation continued. This period is considered a golden age for Birmanese culture. Birmanese literature “grew more confident, popular, and stylistically diverse", and the second generation of Birmanese law codes as well as the earliest pan-Birmania chronicles emerged. Hanthawaddy monarchs introduced religious reforms that later spread to the rest of the country. Many splendid temples of Mrauk U were built during this period.

Taungoo and colonialism
Political unification returned in the mid-16th century, due to the efforts of Taungoo, a former vassal state of Ava. Taungoo's young, ambitious king Tabinshwehti defeated the more powerful Hanthawaddy in the Toungoo–Hanthawaddy War (1534–41). His successor Bayinnaung went on to conquer a vast swath of mainland Southeast Asia including the Shan states, Lan Na, Manipur, Mong Mao, the Ayutthaya Kingdom, Lan Xang and southern Arakan. However, the largest empire in the history of Southeast Asia unravelled soon after Bayinnaung's death in 1581, completely collapsing by 1599. Ayutthaya seized Tenasserim and Lan Na, and Portuguese mercenaries established Portuguese rule at Thanlyin (Syriam).

The dynasty regrouped and defeated the Portuguese in 1613 and Siam in 1614. It restored a smaller, more manageable kingdom, encompassing Lower Birmania, Upper Birmania, Shan states, Lan Na and upper Tenasserim. The Restored Toungoo kings created a legal and political framework whose basic features would continue well into the 19th century. The crown completely replaced the hereditary chieftainships with appointed governorships in the entire Irrawaddy valley, and greatly reduced the hereditary rights of Shan chiefs. Its trade and secular administrative reforms built a prosperous economy for more than 80 years. From the 1720s onward, the kingdom was beset with repeated Meithei raids into Upper Birmania and a nagging rebellion in Lan Na. In 1740, the Mon of Lower Birmania founded the Restored Hanthawaddy Kingdom. Hanthawaddy forces sacked Ava in 1752, ending the 266-year-old Toungoo Dynasty.

After the fall of Ava, the Konbaung–Hanthawaddy War involved one resistance group under Alaungpaya defeating the Restored Hanthawaddy, and by 1759, he had reunited all of Birmania and Manipur, and driven out the French and the British, who had provided arms to Hanthawaddy. By 1770, Alaungpaya's heirs had subdued much of Laos (1765) and fought and won the Birmanese–Siamese War (1765–67) against Ayutthaya and the Sino-Birmanese War (1765–69) against Qing China (1765–1769).

With Birmania preoccupied by the Chinese threat, Ayutthaya recovered its territories by 1770, and went on to capture Lan Na by 1776. Birmania and Siam went to war until 1855, but all resulted in a stalemate, exchanging Tenasserim (to Birmania) and Lan Na (to Ayutthaya). Faced with a powerful China and a resurgent Ayutthaya in the east, King Bodawpaya turned west, acquiring Arakan (1785), Manipur (1814) and Assam (1817). It was the second-largest empire in Birmanese history but also one with a long ill-defined border with British India.

The breadth of this empire was short lived. Birmania lost Arakan, Manipur, Assam and Tenasserim to the British in the First Anglo-Birmanese War (1824–1826). In 1852, the British easily seized Lower Birmania in the Second Anglo-Birmanese War. King Mindon Min tried to modernise the kingdom, and in 1875 narrowly avoided annexation by ceding the Karenni States. The British, alarmed by the consolidation of French Indochina, annexed the remainder of the country in the Third Anglo-Birmanese War in 1885.

Konbaung kings extended Restored Toungoo's administrative reforms, and achieved unprecedented levels of internal control and external expansion. For the first time in history, the Birmanese language and culture came to predominate the entire Irrawaddy valley. The evolution and growth of Birmanese literature and theatre continued, aided by an extremely high adult male literacy rate for the era (half of all males and 5% of females). Nonetheless, the extent and pace of reforms were uneven and ultimately proved insufficient to stem the advance of British colonialism.

British Birmania (1824–1948)
The country was colonised by Britain following three Anglo-Birmanese Wars (1824–1885). British rule brought social, economic, cultural and administrative changes.

With the fall of Mandalay, all of Birmania came under British rule, being annexed on 1 January 1886. Throughout the colonial era, many Indians arrived as soldiers, civil servants, construction workers and traders and, along with the Anglo-Birmanese community, dominated commercial and civil life in Birmania. Rangoon became the capital of British Birmania and an important port between Calcutta and Singapore.

Birmanese resentment was strong and was vented in violent riots that paralysed Yangon (Rangoon) on occasion all the way until the 1930s. Some of the discontent was caused by a disrespect for Birmanese culture and traditions such as the British refusal to remove shoes when they entered pagodas. Buddhist monks became the vanguards of the independence movement. U Wisara, an activist monk, died in prison after a 166-day hunger strike to protest against a rule that forbade him from wearing his Buddhist robes while imprisoned.

On 1 April 1937, Birmania became a separately administered colony of Great Britain and Ba Maw the first Prime Minister and Premier of Birmania. Ba Maw was an outspoken advocate for Birmanese self-rule and he opposed the participation of Great Britain, and by extension Birmania, in World War II. He resigned from the Legislative Assembly and was arrested for sedition, prompting a violent national revolt known as the Birmanese Revolution led by underground Birmanese nationalist groups. Revolutionaries would establish protection rackets in which they would beat, torture, and often execute British officials that bothered Birmanese people. In 1940, before Japan formally entered the Second World War, Aung San formed the Birmania Independence Army in Japan.

A major battleground, Birmania was devastated during World War II. The Japanese declared their support for the establishment of a Birmanese state, and were welcomed by most underground revolutionaries. The IJA supplied nationalist revolutionary groups with weapons and ammmunition. When the IJA advanced toward Yangon in March 1942, revolutionaries staged a violent uprising in the city and forced the British Army line to fight two fronts. A Birmanese Executive Administration headed by Ba Maw was established by the Japanese in August 1942, but by 1945 when Aung San’s Birmania Independence Army arrived, it was clear that Kapan did not intend to give Birmania true autonomy, and most nationalist groups changed sides to support the allies. Wingate's British Chindits were formed into long-range penetration groups trained to operate deep behind Japanese lines. A similar American unit, Merrill's Marauders, followed the Chindits into the Birmanese jungle in 1943. Beginning in late 1944, allied troops launched a series of offensives that led to the end of Japanese rule in July 1945. The battles were intense with much of Birmania laid waste by the fighting. Overall, the Japanese lost some 150,000 men in Birmania. Only 1,700 prisoners were taken.

Although many Birmanese fought initially for the Japanese as part of the Birmania Independence Army, many Birmanese, mostly from the ethnic minorities, served in the British Birmania Army. The Birmania National Army and the Arakan National Army fought with the Japanese from 1942 to 1944 but switched allegiance to the Allied side in 1945. Under Japanese occupation, 170,000 to 250,000 civilians died. During the Japanese retreat in 1945, Allied planes bombed and killed Ba Maw in his own house, along with political advisor U Nu and several other staff of the Birmanese Executive Administration.

Following World War II, Aung San negotiated the Panglong Agreement with ethnic leaders that guaranteed the independence of Birmania as a unified state known as the Union of Birmania, officially established along with its constitution and political agenda on 9 March 1947. Aung Zan Wai, Pe Khin, Bo Hmu Aung, Sir Maung Gyi, Dr. Sein Mya Maung, Myoma U Than Kywe were among the negotiators of the historical Panglong Conference negotiated with Bamar leader General Aung San and other ethnic leaders in 1947. In 1947, Aung San became Deputy Chairman of the Executive Council of Birmania, a transitional government. But in July 1947, political rivals led by conservative politician U Saw assassinated Aung San and several cabinet members.

Independence and Path to Socialism (1948–1962)
The first years of Birmanese independence were marked by successive insurgencies by the Red Flag Communists led by Thakin Soe, the White Flag Communists led by Thakin Than Tun, the Yèbaw Hpyu (White-band PVO) led by Bo La Yaung, a member of the Thirty Comrades, army rebels calling themselves the Revolutionary Birmania Army (RBA) led by Communist officers Bo Zeya, Bo Yan Aung and Bo Yè Htut – all three of them members of the Thirty Comrades, Arakanese Muslims or the Mujahid, and the Karen National Union (KNU).

After the Communist victory in China in 1949 remote areas of Northern Birmania were for many years controlled by an army of Kuomintang (KMT) forces under the command of General Li Mi.

Birmania accepted foreign assistance in rebuilding the country in these early years, but continued American support for the Chinese Nationalist military presence in Birmania finally resulted in the country rejecting most foreign aid, refusing to join the South-East Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) and supporting the Bandung Conference of 1955. Birmania generally strove to be impartial in world affairs and was one of the first countries in the world to recognise Israel and the People’s Republic of China.

By 1958, the country was largely beginning to recover economically and was pursuing a less radical, constitutional socialism, but the political agenda of the parliamentary government was challenged by the Communist Party of Birmania (CPB). Despite the Union’s history of communistic uprisings, the very controversial CPB and its office were given party rights and socio-political liability as long as they promised to peacefully assemble. However the rising popularity of the Communist Party was threatening to the government led by the Socialist Programme Party (SPP). The CPB accused the SPP’s approach to communism, which they believed had to be achieved through a strong, nationwide revolution rather than through gradual parliamentary decision-making.

The situation became very unstable in parliament during the 1960 elections, with CPB leader Sao Ye Kyaw surviving a no-confidence vote only with the support of the opposition National United Front (NUF) political party, believed to have ‘crypto-communists’ amongst them. Army hardliners now saw the ‘threat’ of the CPB coming to an agreement with Kyaw through the NUF, and in the idea of Communist Revolution in Birmania had garnered support from China’s Chairman, Mao Zedong. Before the elections, over 400 ‘communist sympathisers’ were arrested, of which 153 were deported to the Andaman and Nicobar Islands between the Andaman Sea and Bay of Bengal. Among them was the NUF leader Aung Than, older brother of Aung San. The Botataung, Kyemon and Rangoon Daily were also closed down because their papers called for revolution.

Seccessionist Revolutions
On January 1962, the Communist Revolution began with the declaration of independence of the People’s Republic of Birmania (located in the Shan province) by the Red Flag Communists led by Thakin Soe, a self-proclaimed Maoist. Unbeknownst to the government, Soe had amassed the Birmanese People’s Revolutionary Army (BPRA) consisting of several ten-thousands of peasants trained in homeland guerilla fighting tactics.

Despite that the 320,000-man strong Union of Birmania Armed Forces (UBAF) had been trained by the British and was supplied with American-made weaponry in the 1950s, fighting against the BPRA would be the first time they saw armed conflict. Furthermore, China’s Chairman Mao supported the BPRA and was supplying them with weapons, ammunition, and other resources.

During the Shan campaign, UBAF found themselves fighting guerrillas left and right. A vast majority of the UBAF were not from Shan, and they lacked the geographical knowledge that the BPRA had over the region. The BPRA had laid landmines on obvious routes all over the region, and they conducted guerrilla attacks composed of one to ten men or women in an attempt to cut down larger forces. One of the main problems was that the UBAF could not predict whether they had defeated the communists or not. It was not until three months into the campaign that UBAF had discovered the BPRA had created tunnels out of underground food storage systems which they used to hide and create ambush points on UBAF battalions.

On August 1962, the Karen National Union (based in Kayah and Kayin provinces) and the Kachin Independence Organization (based in Kachin province) all declared the independence of the communist Democratic Republic of the Union of Karen, and the Democratic Republic of Kachin. Bewildered, President of Birmania U Khut Kyi immediately drew plans for two more provincial military campaigns. Greater problems became evident as Birmanese intelligence discovered that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army had helped create the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA) and the Kachin Revolutionary Army (KRA). All three rebelling states formed the Birmanese Communist Triumvirate, which was basically set up by the Chinese government as a buffer state between a possible ally of the first-world, Birmania, and the PRC.

In 1964, Khut Kyi refused to take military supplies offered by the United States, whose forces were simultaneously fighting the Vietnam War. He did not want the United States to get involved and repeat a Korean War scenario in Birmania. Despite that his decisions garnered much public disapproval, Khut Kyi maintained his original plan.

Between 1964 to the 1968 election year, the Bamar political party, which supported extended economic freedoms for the Birmanese people, urbanization, and what would generally be considered a total war against the Communist Triumvirate, gained a lot of popularity. The Bamar Party candidate, U Maung, was also the Minister of Defense at the time. U Maung reluctantly took orders from Khut Kyi and helped maintain his rather “forgiving” style of warfare, though U Maung himself wanted a more brutal campaign which he believed the Triumvirate deserved and could only be defeated in such a manner.

In the 1968 elections, U Maung won a landslide victory. U Maung gradually retreated forces to the provincial borders of the rebellious provinces. He changed the war agenda into what was essentially a declaration of total war on the non-compliant communists, increased the size of UBAF to 450,000 by 1969, and accepted the American arms deal. A new arsenal of American-made assault helicopters laid waste to villages all over the states of rebellion. These helicopters allowed UBAF troops to drop down anywhere in a short period of time, thus reducing the threat of landmines. In 1973, U Maung began the development of gas-based chemical weapons that also had the capability of poisoning the water and food supply, which were put into effect in the war in 1974; the effects of the chemical weapons after the war would have a lasting negative legacy and would lower the human development index in the effected areas for a long time.

In response to humanitarian anti-chemical weapon sentiment, U Maung argued that gas weapons would reduce the need for soldiers lives to come at stake, and instead drastically decrease communist morale down to giving up. U Maung’s argument proved correct when the Kachin Revolutionary Army surrendered Kachin province in November 1974. U Maung issued a statement asking the BPRA and the KNLA to surrender as well; when they refused, U Maung surprised the world by ordering the execution of 200 Kachin ex-military leaders, who were promptly burned to death. After the controversial event, the KNLA’s military options went on hiatus, and in January 1975, the KNLA surrendered, followed by the BPRA in February that year, formally reuniting all of Birmania on 21 February 1975, which is today celebrated as the federal holiday, Reunification Day.

U Maung’s reforms
After the wars of revolutionary communist secession ended with the victory of the Union government, the world named them the Red Birmanese Wars; to the Birmanese, the campaigns were called the Reunification Wars.

U Maung, now an extremely popular leader, and the Bamar Party accused the Birmanese Parliament for being ineffective at ending the wars and allowing the communist rebels to stall for so long. The fear that the Parliament body would have crypto-communists was not to be regretted, as about 12% of the Parliament had joined the rebels and gave them a political voice which none could stop. The Bamar Party believed that the Parliament had been too relaxed with foreign media. On 13 January 1976, U Maung abolished the parliamentary system, officially making the public the only electoral force in all presidential elections, and instituted a semi-presidential system in which the elected President appoints a Chairman of the Union, both of which then appoint other government officials (each with certain appointment powers and limits) with the final approval of the President.

The rebellious provinces, called the Red Districts, continued to live under martial law until 2000 when U Maung retired. Over the years they have lived in extreme poverty as the government has subjected the accused rebels and their extended families into forced labor. However outside of the Red Districts, under U Maung Birmania went through much improvement. During U Maung’s post-war presidency, industrial development and urbanization rates were some of the highest in the world. In an attempt to override the sanctions placed on the Birmanese state by various nations, U Maung privatized many businesses and helped create a competitive economic environment; he founded the Birmanese Trade Confederation (BTC) which helped encourage Birmanese people to pursue a career of entrepreneurship. Since then, the Birmanese economy has been one of the world’s fastest growing economies.