Burma/Myanmar: What Everyone Needs to Know Read Online Free PDF

sovereignty, denying to any other institution or group that claim. The regime believes, and have emphasized in their newly written histories, that they are in the direct line of the great Burman kings, military leaders who unified the state. Their larger-than-life statues dominate the parade grounds at their new capital Naypyidaw, their images enshrined in the massive Defense Services Museum in Yangon.

How does Burmese history relate to contemporary events?
     
    Citizens of Burma/Myanmar have ample justification for pride in the history of their country. The three major dynasties that have controlled what we know today as Myanmar have contributed much to world culture through sponsorshipand support of Buddhist activities and knowledge, as well as art and architecture. They have also played important roles as expansionist rulers in the region.
    Administrations around the world use and reinvent their national histories to explain, justify, and/or enhance their contemporary roles—their “imagined communities.” The
tatmadaw
(Burmese armed forces) is no different, although they have to a major degree rarely seen elsewhere invoked the past and in part rewritten it to surround themselves with what they regard as an impermeable nationalistic mantle.
    In the new capital of Naypyidaw (literally, the royal national site), some 240 miles north of Yangon and on the verge of the traditional Burman central region called the dry zone (in contrast to the coastal regions where rainfall is two to three times as heavy), there are three gigantic statues of Burmese warrior kings (each thirty-three feet tall) who unified the state by conquering local kingdoms and expanding Burmese military power to neighboring lands. Anawrahta (r. 1044–1077), Bayinnaung (r. 1551–1581), and Alaungpaya (r. 1752–1760) are the administration’s heroes and by implication the precursors of the present regime, which is the fourth (in their view) protector and unifier of the state. Rumors abound that at least one Burmese general (Saw Maung, chair of the SLORC, 1988–1992) considered himself (or was considered by some of his underlings) the reincarnation of King Kyansittha (r. 1084–1113) and is said to have dressed in royal regalia and performed traditional regal rites.
    The invocation of the past is not simply limited to recorded history. Prehistory has been used for the glorification of both the state and the leaders who have fostered such research and who may believe they have inherited this mantle. Under this administration, a site has been found that the leadership claims contains the world’s oldest humanoid remains. Thus, today Myanmar becomes unique in human history, and indeed, its present leadership politically benefits from archeology and its sponsorship. Other, later prehistoric remains have been foundthat are claimed to indicate that Southeast Asian civilizations emanated from what is now Myanmar. Ironically, North Korea has similarly claimed the predominant role in early Northeast Asia by finding the “tomb” of the legendary founder of the Korean “race” in Pyongyang. Perhaps authoritarian regimes seek legitimacy in this prehistorical manner.
    The return to the aura of the precolonial period is in part not only to overcome the shame of having been colonized but also to provide a direct link from the past and its glories to the present military, whose leadership is Burman. Significantly, one of General Ne Win’s multiple marriages was to a descendant of the last Burmese king. It is also an indirect effort to demonstrate the unifying powers of the Burman majority over some minority groups that had significant kingships. The Mon Kingdom (1287–1757), centered on what is now Pegu (Bego), was Buddhist and had wealth that was noted by early European travelers to the region, until it was conquered by the Burmans. Another coastal region, the Arakan (Rakhine), had kingdoms subject to Indic influences that existed from about the ninth century