Revolution Day should be a time for celebration of turning around and making decisive statements about emancipation.  Instead, the SPDC have hijacked another day to call their own.   Revolution has come to mean both armed struggle for freedom and peaceful transformation to achieve one's objective.  This Revolution Day should be a time to reflect on the process of Revolution that Burma needs to be rid of the SPDC and bring about a government of transformation. 

The Burmese Independence Army declared 27th March 1945 the first ‘Revolution Day’.  Why did they do this?  The BIA had been formed to assist the Japanese invasion of Burma in the belief that Burma would gain independence.  The Thakins had believed that they were fighting to free Burma from foreign domination by throwing out the British.  They were fighting to eradicate the racist bigotry and exploitation of Burma’s peoples by colonialist rule.  When they realised that their best chance of gaining freedom for Burma was by helping the British and their allies to rid the country of brutal fascist oppression and over-bearing foreign military imperialism, they made the determined decision to continue the struggle until Burma gained its independence.  They declared Revolution on foreign oppression.

The twentieth century saw numerous Revolutions; perhaps the most famous being the Russian Revolution of 1917.  The peoples of Russia were sick of the First World War that took so many lives from the poor and suffering masses; while the aristocracy drank champagne, danced and cavorted the night away in St.Petersburg, and still treated the people as their forefathers had done as serfs.  Medieval Russia had achieved freedom from the medieval serfdom in 1861, just 56 years before the Revolution.  The time was right to overthrow the government by military struggle.  Sadly, the communist idealism quickly turned sour with political dogma and political greed - greed for power, and lack of real power to the people that comes from a free and open society. 

Since Independence in 1948, Burma has been pushed backwards into the medieval ages by successive military regimes.  The disgustingly degenerate and Machiavellian Ne Win and his successors have brought about all of the evils that the BIA fought against;

  • The SPDC are guilty of racial bigotry targeted at the Shan and other ethnic groups.
  • The SPDC have exploited the people as slaves or serfs for forced labour.
  • The SPDC have exploited the natural resources of the country for their own benefit.
  • The SPDC have an over-bearing imperialist attitude to government that excludes the people of Burma.
  • The SPDC commit brutal oppression and torture of the people, who can be beaten to death if they don’t pay extortionate bribes to the police or government officials. 

The people of Burma want to get rid of this regime with the same determination with which they wanted to be rid of colonial and fascist rule.  The time is ripe for a Revolution. 

I am not one for advocating armed struggle without long and considered thought given to the potential loss of lives and the years of recovery and reconciliation that are needed to heal the nation.  For some, Revolution is an armed struggle, guerrilla warfare, unconditional and savage civil war that tears families and communities apart.  Although an armed struggle can lead to victory, there are a number of pre-requisites that are necessary and a number of possible consequences to consider.  Supplies (arms, food, water, medicines, etc.), logistics (transportation and supply routes) and numbers (troops and commanders) are needed to start a conflict; international support will be needed to finish the job even if only for recovery and stability.  But what about the consequences?  Every Revolution by military victory has been bought at tremendous cost in lives and infrastructure.  The war in Vietnam from 1945 to 1973 meant the loss of life for probably 2 million Vietnamese people.  Is Burma ready for this?  Hasn’t there been enough bloodletting, hatred, savagery and suffering?

Peaceful Revolution is the right way to achieve our goals.  The generals must realise this and give up.  If they don’t, then they will be faced with violent Revolution.  The Peaceful Revolution will give the peoples of Burma the freedom they so much desire without the bloodshed and anguish.  Let the Peaceful Revolution continue until we have achieved our goal:

  • Revolution by evolution,
  • Revolution by freedom of thought,
  • Revolution by debate,
  • Revolution by unity,
  • Revolution by declaration of intent,
  • Revolution by disclosure of acts committed by the SPDC,
  • Revolution by telling the world loud and clear what we want,
  • Revolution by telling the generals what we want,
  • Revolution now.

So what of ‘Armed Forces day’?  The SPDC Army is poised on the brink of uncertainty.  What will their future be after the Revolution?  No one expects the National Convention to deliver anything.  Only our Revolution will bring lasted peace.  Our Revolution will bring the civilian population together to decide for themselves the future of Burma.  Will it be a Union, a Federation, self-autonomous regions, independent states?  I don’t know.  The people of Shan State and all of Burma will decide.  They will decide without the army being a part of it.  The democratically evolved constitution will decide what role the army has in the future of Burma.  The common soldiers will have to decide whose side they are on.  Are they fighting for the obsolete yesterday’s people – the generals?  Or are they going to understand how they have been deceived and misled by their leaders?  Will they turn on the generals and throw them out, to loud cheers of praise from the rest of the population?  They will have to decide whose side they are on.  And they will have to decide very soon.  Revolution is near at hand.  The people are going to win, as they always do.  Where will the soldiers be on that day?

Revolution happens.  Sometimes it happens because it is planned in secret and executed ruthlessly, sometimes it happens spontaneously as the people just rise up – the planners are still in their shaded meeting rooms whilst the people have taken over the government.  However it happens, it happens because the will of the people eventually overpowers the incumbent rulers.  It happens because it has to, because the people have had enough.  It happens when the conditions are right.  Those conditions have ripened and are long overdue for Burma.  The Revolution in Burma is going to happen.  The SPDC will be gone.  Let us celebrate what the Revolution will be.  Long live the Revolution.  Long live Revolution Day.


Quotes on Revolution

"Those who make peaceful Revolution impossible will make violent Revolution inevitable."
John Fitzgerald Kennedy

"A relentless hatred of the enemy, impelling us over and beyond the natural limitations that man is heir to and transforming him into an effective, violent, selective, and cold killing machine.  Our soldiers must be thus; a people without hatred cannot vanquish a brutal enemy.  We must carry the war into every corner the enemy happens to carry it: to his home, to his centres of entertainment; a total war."
Ernesto Che Guevara

"I am a Revolutionist by birth, reading and principle.  I am always on the side of the Revolutionists because there never was a Revolution unless there were some oppressive and intolerable conditions against which to revolt"
Mark Twain

All 3 from: http://www.unclesham.net/

"Violence is the universal objective law of all thorough national liberation Revolutions."
General Vo Nguyen Giap
http://www.folkandfaith.com/quotes/Revolution.shtml

“The Whig view of the Glorious Revolution is therefore simply that it was a triumph for the purity
of constitutional law over an outrageous attempt at its perversion, a reaffirmation of the liberties
of the English people”.
http://www.parliament.uk/documents/upload/g04.pdf

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