A brutal civil war has intensified between
government forces and the Kachin Independence Army deep in the wilds of
Myanmar's northern Kachin state. A People & Power team went to Myanmar,
formerly known as Burma, to see why the conflict rages on. Who's Comments
1=The civil war in burma will probably not end in the foreseaable
future...the Kachins and Wa are strong militarilly and will take a major
campaign to wipe them out but the business relationship between the
guerillas and the Burmese gov. is too important and interwined that to
wipe out the guerillas willl heavilly disrupt the money flow to the
Burmese gov. Also China is pressuring both sides to keep things quiet so
as not to endanger their investments. 2=commie China. So the Tatmadaw had
to switch alliances quickly allying with the commie Chinese to fight the
KMT, allying then witht eh KMT and CIA to fight the local and Laotian and
Vietnamese commies. The Tatmadaw has a very complicated love hate
relationship with the local ethnic guerillas. They do business with drugs
together but fight each other from time to time. 3=
The situation is made complicated not only by the abundant gold, jade, and drugs in the war but also various criminal warlords, the Chinese KMT using Burma as a springboard to attack 4=well the war in Burma has always been at its heart a racial war...the majority Bamar vs. everyone else.