I don’t think you talk about the blood splashing or the Chula hospital seach.
What puzzled me the most is that the red has been using the hospital’s toilets for the whole month for the incident. The red were literally use the hospital as their bath room then suddenly they make an issue of it. Chula Hospital record of playing politic is nothing short or extraordinary, they were the first to refuse (although change later on) to treat the injured polices during the 2008 crash.
Like most young Burmese of my time, I admired Thein Phe Myint and also was greatly influenced by him.
Now looking back, I slowly realized that was the direct result of the nationalist leftists’ campaign to brainwash or social engineer (to borrow from AKS’s comment) the young minds of Burma.
We were forced to study many of Thein Phe Myint’s works as our matriculation text for Burmese literature, and his books and articles and the works of other similar left-leaning writers were the only readings available.
Every other right wing or Communist literature were banned or they just simply disappeared mysteriously from the libraries and the circulation.
I can declare here with great confidence that he was the genious partly responsible for our sufferings under Ne Win’s thugs as he had given his blessings and thus the intellectual justification to that fake Socialist government and happily supported them all the way till he died.
P.S. You should read his book “Kyaw Nyein” as it basically bares his tortured leftist soul. He always tried to look every aspect of our society from only red-colored class point of view.
It seems to me doubtful to suggest that for Mainland SEAsia over the last one thousand years, people were either within the state (oppressed) or without (free). Scott’s book hopefully triggers a serious reexamination of what we (can) know about the area. Official records usually don’t describe the many dealings there were into the highlands, it was (most likely) an embarrasment to state scribes to admit their extensive involvemment with those defined as beyond the pale. Scott takes the signs of a forest curtain for a fact, and leaves us with the image that the authentic (free) highlands came to an end by 1950 the latest. Old-style tribal ethnography used to conjure up culture-loss as the outcome of engagements with the state (or markets), as if people had somehow been only real in their assumed-isolation. Scott’s book offers us the image of lost freedom (for lost culture). Either way, such definitions indicate that there is nothing interesting in the highlands for 60 years now. If people believe that, then no one is going to bother to check if there was anything to this notion of bipolar history and society in the region.
You and I were born and raised in Myanmar. Knowing the history culture and the love of a heritage of our unique civilization is what we always base our advocacy on.
Those that show a complete lack of knowledge and regards for the mentioned uniqueness using standards that appear reasonable yet absolutely irrelevant are having the loudest say without having their credibility challenge.
This has gone on 3 decades and have been accepted as the norm.
However this norm is destroying what we truly love slowly yet completely.
It is refreshing to see here in New Mandala pertinent hx of Myanmar from expert like yourself.
Passionately written but not in an over the top manner .
Truthful yet very relevant to those who truly seek to understand the ongoing events as a continuum of useless careless interferences.
Countless hours of individual effort on the ground offering “patched work” solutions to problems the citizenry is facing from SPDC policy and the idiocies that shaped SPDC to present form, I come up with a simple qualifying query to every pertinent “things” concerning Myanmar.
“DOES THIS LESSEN THE SUFFERING OF THE MOST VULNERABLE IN MYANMAR AND NOTHING ELSE?”
A reasonable Humanitarian based standard.
Your present article is above this very standard.
How so?
Smply Stating the truth.
You be the judge on how many if any policy or anything to do with Myanmar so far, come close to this simple standard.
The Red Shirts have made many very bad decisions, but the government has done so as well.
It looked like the Government side and the Security forces got nothing right during April and their mistakes were obvious.
Starting with repeatedly getting affected by their own clumsy teargas handling, the April 10 disaster, Arisaman abseiling, and as you mentioned killing their own man on the highway.
So could you please elaborate a little on the “bad decisions” by the Red leaders in your opinion. I don’t think you talk about the blood splashing or the Chula hospital seach.
Watching their live transmission on stage it looked like they were well organized and hat things under control until close to the end.
It is noticeable that hardly any of the criticisms of Robert Amsterdam deal with the substance of what he has to say but nearly all simply attack him personally and bemoan his status as Thaksin’s paid advocate, as does “Simon” here (#1). I fail to understand why being “in the employ” of Thaksin somehow invalidates Amsterdam’s contribution. For a start he makes no bones about it. He is not, as has been alleged, some kind of shill, but a straightforward open and transparent advocate. Nor do I see why being paid for his services (no doubt very well) is relevant either. Presenting one’s case in the modern world can be a difficult business fraught with complications, particularly if you are continually subjected to the sort of attacks that Thaksin and his allies have endured. Governments themselves employ (and pay handsomely) hundreds of very well qualified people to make their cases for them. The Thai government is no exception and their case against Thaksin is central to their self-image and indeed to the whole rationale for their existence. Much of this consists of doing everything in their power to present Thaksin as the epitome of evil. At their disposal are all the advantages of government not to mention, some of us suspect, a pliant judiciary as well.
There is an old legal saying that someone who represents himself in court has a novice for an advocate and a fool for a client. The same goes for public advocacy. One of the advantages of employing someone to make your case for you is that they can argue that case much more objectively than you can easily do yourself. And in a media world dominated by fast-changing technology it is as well to have someone who is thoroughly clued up on the latest developments and with contacts in the right quarters. This of course may be exactly why the Thai government gives the appearance of being just a little queasy of recent comments.
what Amsterdam has done is simply to draw all the strands together to present a cogent and compelling case both for Thaksin and for the red-shirt protesters. It is a case that deserves to be met directly, though I doubt that it will be. In Thailand where the rule of law is hazy at best and where fact is regularly obcsured by rumour and innuendo, I doubt that it will be.
Incidentally I don’t know if “Simon” is StanG rebranded or not. But if he is I can see why he might have done it. StanG claimed never to have read Amsterdam’s writings and said that he never would. “Simon” is under no such self-imposed handicap.
Simon: “At the same time, the government has won some praise from the press for allowing journalists access to the political unrest, including the military’s armed suppression of the protests, while the emergency decree was in effect. “The Thai government must be credited for not blocking the way of journalists covering recent events,” said Marawan (sic-s.) Macan-Markar, president of the Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand. “There were no limits on embedding, no policies, and no efforts to stop you from reporting.”
-That’s from a Committee to Protect Journalists report by Shawn Crispin, who is certainly not a Red Shirt sympathizer. (http://cpj.org/reports/2010/07/in-thailand-unrest-journalists-under-fire.php)
A major report by Reporters Without Borders has this, from an interview with Masaru Goto, who was near Polenghi when he was shot:
“Do you think Fabio was targeted as a journalist?
A rumour had been circulating since mid-May that an unidentified sniper, perhaps an army sniper or a UDD one, was going to kill a journalist. Some people might have had an interest in exacerbating the crisis. By killing a journalist, you would increase the level of disorder. But I have no evidence that this rumour was based on any facts. The Thai Journalists Association had recommended not going to certain places that were considered too dangerous.” (http://www.rsf.org/IMG/pdf/REPORT_RSF_THAILAND_Eng.pdf
So, we have two named sources from reports specifically concerned with this issue, neither of which supports the assertion that there were “repeated and unambiguous warnings to leave.” What you have offered is known as hearsay .
As far as I know there is another ‘Thu Wa Na Bu Mi’
in today Indonesia where Hindu-Buddhist kingdoms
once flourished.
It is more likely that ThuWaNa Bumi in early days
of Buddhism is in today Indonesia as it was the old.
First two who were converted to Buddhism, two
brothers ‘Tha Phote Tha’ and ‘Balika’ came from
north of Iran, north east of India’s Hindu Kash
ranges where Greek Buddhist kingdoms flourished
built by Greek soldiers of Alexander the great. In
those days, Persia, today Iran, was where Zorostan
and Janism religions were originated.
@ Bangkok Dan, Simon, et other enfranchised expats living off the Thai sap, I quote Maureen Dowd’s quote in the NYT regarding the nervous breakdown in the herd mentality: As Daniel Patrick Moynihan said, “Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts.”
I just read the article below written by Ko Hla Oo. It came
into my mind what might have motivated Gen. Aung San to
execute that village chief. I think it was a deliberate act of
leadership, to start the baptism of fire, to christen his new
reborn Burmese army. A social engineering effort, act to
reshape the mind of a peasant army to rekindle new spirit.
It is understandable, Burmese army would fight alongside
Japanese army – samurai inspired officers with of the spirit
of Bushido. The old Samurai way of helping a disgraced
enemy whom they have conquered, whom they respected
is help chopping head. In that way who’d commit harakiri
will be dead fast without long suffering. To raise fighting
(fighting is killing) spirit of men is – who as a race oppressed
for decades, who were denied from sacrificing for, serving
their colonial master’s army till WWI – to lead by example.
That village chief had to executed and the executioner is
no other but the leader of new army. The mold was cast,
the stage was set. If he did not do that, BIA would not have
a chance to reconnect with ancient warrior history of Burma.
Japanese imperial army did not keep POW and BIA, and
being a new rag tug army, Japanese officers and NCOs
attached to BIA units and Burmese officers would ask
new recruits dirty job of executing POWs, ritualistic acts,
training, christening of new recruits. Wars were to destroy
enemy, annihilate them, subdue them, afterall BIA was
not formed as peace corps to show mercy. Also Burmese
might be proud themselves of martian race (they have even
dreamt of conquering India) but Buddhism have softened
their hearts. Inevitably, a short cut for them to teach how
to kill another man was to assign them executing POWs.
Or BIA men will be ridiculed by Japanese soldiers and
officers alike.
I think Gen. Aung San have had no choice but he had to
take that disciplinary action, made an example of killing
that village chief who happened to be from another race
– Imperialist British’s divide and conquer rule for subjects.
The legitimacy (even if that verdict was reached in military
tribunal or you can accuse as kangaroo courts) was there
everyone except British will think that man rise to that petty
position of power by suckering British bosses, terrorizing
killing Burmese. British had left no choice for those young
men and their leaders who might have wanted to pursue
literature or law instead.
I think Gen Aung San did the right thing by executing victim,
although the accused might not have received a fair trial. But
they were at war. British did not act fair towards Saya San or
followers by cutting their heads and putting servered heads
on spikes to scare of others. Just to share some thought….
This nice, detailed piece reminded me that years ago, some of the Khmer statuary in the National Museum in Bangkok was identified as “Thai art, Khmer period”.
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Who killed Italian photographer Fabio Polenghi?
Tukkae – 54
I don’t think you talk about the blood splashing or the Chula hospital seach.
What puzzled me the most is that the red has been using the hospital’s toilets for the whole month for the incident. The red were literally use the hospital as their bath room then suddenly they make an issue of it. Chula Hospital record of playing politic is nothing short or extraordinary, they were the first to refuse (although change later on) to treat the injured polices during the 2008 crash.
Burma in Limbo, Part 2
Stephen,
Like most young Burmese of my time, I admired Thein Phe Myint and also was greatly influenced by him.
Now looking back, I slowly realized that was the direct result of the nationalist leftists’ campaign to brainwash or social engineer (to borrow from AKS’s comment) the young minds of Burma.
We were forced to study many of Thein Phe Myint’s works as our matriculation text for Burmese literature, and his books and articles and the works of other similar left-leaning writers were the only readings available.
Every other right wing or Communist literature were banned or they just simply disappeared mysteriously from the libraries and the circulation.
I can declare here with great confidence that he was the genious partly responsible for our sufferings under Ne Win’s thugs as he had given his blessings and thus the intellectual justification to that fake Socialist government and happily supported them all the way till he died.
P.S. You should read his book “Kyaw Nyein” as it basically bares his tortured leftist soul. He always tried to look every aspect of our society from only red-colored class point of view.
Cambodia is not a province of Thailand
Fascinating to see other locals laying claim to this creation myth in the comments section. No sense of irony required.
Much like Britains adaptation of Arthurian myths in the middle ages and 19th C for expansionist reasons.
….”and did those feet in ancient time walk upon Englands pastures green?” I think we should be told…
Review of The Art of Not Being Governed
It seems to me doubtful to suggest that for Mainland SEAsia over the last one thousand years, people were either within the state (oppressed) or without (free). Scott’s book hopefully triggers a serious reexamination of what we (can) know about the area. Official records usually don’t describe the many dealings there were into the highlands, it was (most likely) an embarrasment to state scribes to admit their extensive involvemment with those defined as beyond the pale. Scott takes the signs of a forest curtain for a fact, and leaves us with the image that the authentic (free) highlands came to an end by 1950 the latest. Old-style tribal ethnography used to conjure up culture-loss as the outcome of engagements with the state (or markets), as if people had somehow been only real in their assumed-isolation. Scott’s book offers us the image of lost freedom (for lost culture). Either way, such definitions indicate that there is nothing interesting in the highlands for 60 years now. If people believe that, then no one is going to bother to check if there was anything to this notion of bipolar history and society in the region.
Burma in Limbo, Part 2
Ko Hla Oo
You and I were born and raised in Myanmar. Knowing the history culture and the love of a heritage of our unique civilization is what we always base our advocacy on.
Those that show a complete lack of knowledge and regards for the mentioned uniqueness using standards that appear reasonable yet absolutely irrelevant are having the loudest say without having their credibility challenge.
This has gone on 3 decades and have been accepted as the norm.
However this norm is destroying what we truly love slowly yet completely.
It is refreshing to see here in New Mandala pertinent hx of Myanmar from expert like yourself.
Passionately written but not in an over the top manner .
Truthful yet very relevant to those who truly seek to understand the ongoing events as a continuum of useless careless interferences.
Countless hours of individual effort on the ground offering “patched work” solutions to problems the citizenry is facing from SPDC policy and the idiocies that shaped SPDC to present form, I come up with a simple qualifying query to every pertinent “things” concerning Myanmar.
“DOES THIS LESSEN THE SUFFERING OF THE MOST VULNERABLE IN MYANMAR AND NOTHING ELSE?”
A reasonable Humanitarian based standard.
Your present article is above this very standard.
How so?
Smply Stating the truth.
You be the judge on how many if any policy or anything to do with Myanmar so far, come close to this simple standard.
Who killed Italian photographer Fabio Polenghi?
@ Nick Nostitz
The Red Shirts have made many very bad decisions, but the government has done so as well.
It looked like the Government side and the Security forces got nothing right during April and their mistakes were obvious.
Starting with repeatedly getting affected by their own clumsy teargas handling, the April 10 disaster, Arisaman abseiling, and as you mentioned killing their own man on the highway.
So could you please elaborate a little on the “bad decisions” by the Red leaders in your opinion. I don’t think you talk about the blood splashing or the Chula hospital seach.
Watching their live transmission on stage it looked like they were well organized and hat things under control until close to the end.
Letter from Sirikit to Napas Na Pombejra about CNN?
Chris: Came across these photos from
http://www.mythailandblog.com/2010/08/the-thai-queens-birthday/
Note the guy in the second pic who appears to be wearing a red starred hat that were sold at the red shirt protests.
Thailand-Cambodia agreement!
Perhaps Mrs Damage should consider sending her son to work for a bank in the USA. Brilliant salaries there guaranteed by the goovernment.
More on the “strategy of tension”
It is noticeable that hardly any of the criticisms of Robert Amsterdam deal with the substance of what he has to say but nearly all simply attack him personally and bemoan his status as Thaksin’s paid advocate, as does “Simon” here (#1). I fail to understand why being “in the employ” of Thaksin somehow invalidates Amsterdam’s contribution. For a start he makes no bones about it. He is not, as has been alleged, some kind of shill, but a straightforward open and transparent advocate. Nor do I see why being paid for his services (no doubt very well) is relevant either. Presenting one’s case in the modern world can be a difficult business fraught with complications, particularly if you are continually subjected to the sort of attacks that Thaksin and his allies have endured. Governments themselves employ (and pay handsomely) hundreds of very well qualified people to make their cases for them. The Thai government is no exception and their case against Thaksin is central to their self-image and indeed to the whole rationale for their existence. Much of this consists of doing everything in their power to present Thaksin as the epitome of evil. At their disposal are all the advantages of government not to mention, some of us suspect, a pliant judiciary as well.
There is an old legal saying that someone who represents himself in court has a novice for an advocate and a fool for a client. The same goes for public advocacy. One of the advantages of employing someone to make your case for you is that they can argue that case much more objectively than you can easily do yourself. And in a media world dominated by fast-changing technology it is as well to have someone who is thoroughly clued up on the latest developments and with contacts in the right quarters. This of course may be exactly why the Thai government gives the appearance of being just a little queasy of recent comments.
what Amsterdam has done is simply to draw all the strands together to present a cogent and compelling case both for Thaksin and for the red-shirt protesters. It is a case that deserves to be met directly, though I doubt that it will be. In Thailand where the rule of law is hazy at best and where fact is regularly obcsured by rumour and innuendo, I doubt that it will be.
Incidentally I don’t know if “Simon” is StanG rebranded or not. But if he is I can see why he might have done it. StanG claimed never to have read Amsterdam’s writings and said that he never would. “Simon” is under no such self-imposed handicap.
More on the “strategy of tension”
^
It’s truly sad when you talk such rubbish in such volumes that nobody even takes what you write seriously.
So then you have to find another nom-de-plume and the whole fiasco starts again.
As chequered as Robert Amsterdam and his client may be, their credibility is as far above StanG’s as Sirius is above the Earth.
Who killed Italian photographer Fabio Polenghi?
And me idiot thought it’s mainly about inequality.
Who killed Italian photographer Fabio Polenghi?
Simon: “At the same time, the government has won some praise from the press for allowing journalists access to the political unrest, including the military’s armed suppression of the protests, while the emergency decree was in effect. “The Thai government must be credited for not blocking the way of journalists covering recent events,” said Marawan (sic-s.) Macan-Markar, president of the Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand. “There were no limits on embedding, no policies, and no efforts to stop you from reporting.”
-That’s from a Committee to Protect Journalists report by Shawn Crispin, who is certainly not a Red Shirt sympathizer. (http://cpj.org/reports/2010/07/in-thailand-unrest-journalists-under-fire.php)
A major report by Reporters Without Borders has this, from an interview with Masaru Goto, who was near Polenghi when he was shot:
“Do you think Fabio was targeted as a journalist?
A rumour had been circulating since mid-May that an unidentified sniper, perhaps an army sniper or a UDD one, was going to kill a journalist. Some people might have had an interest in exacerbating the crisis. By killing a journalist, you would increase the level of disorder. But I have no evidence that this rumour was based on any facts. The Thai Journalists Association had recommended not going to certain places that were considered too dangerous.” (http://www.rsf.org/IMG/pdf/REPORT_RSF_THAILAND_Eng.pdf
So, we have two named sources from reports specifically concerned with this issue, neither of which supports the assertion that there were “repeated and unambiguous warnings to leave.” What you have offered is known as hearsay .
Cambodia is not a province of Thailand
As far as I know there is another ‘Thu Wa Na Bu Mi’
in today Indonesia where Hindu-Buddhist kingdoms
once flourished.
It is more likely that ThuWaNa Bumi in early days
of Buddhism is in today Indonesia as it was the old.
First two who were converted to Buddhism, two
brothers ‘Tha Phote Tha’ and ‘Balika’ came from
north of Iran, north east of India’s Hindu Kash
ranges where Greek Buddhist kingdoms flourished
built by Greek soldiers of Alexander the great. In
those days, Persia, today Iran, was where Zorostan
and Janism religions were originated.
Who killed Italian photographer Fabio Polenghi?
@ Bangkok Dan, Simon, et other enfranchised expats living off the Thai sap, I quote Maureen Dowd’s quote in the NYT regarding the nervous breakdown in the herd mentality: As Daniel Patrick Moynihan said, “Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts.”
Burma in Limbo, Part 2
Thanks! Your article made me respect Gen. Aung San
more as a pragmatic leader who did not swallow own
hot air.
Burma in Limbo, Part 1
I just read the article below written by Ko Hla Oo. It came
into my mind what might have motivated Gen. Aung San to
execute that village chief. I think it was a deliberate act of
leadership, to start the baptism of fire, to christen his new
reborn Burmese army. A social engineering effort, act to
reshape the mind of a peasant army to rekindle new spirit.
It is understandable, Burmese army would fight alongside
Japanese army – samurai inspired officers with of the spirit
of Bushido. The old Samurai way of helping a disgraced
enemy whom they have conquered, whom they respected
is help chopping head. In that way who’d commit harakiri
will be dead fast without long suffering. To raise fighting
(fighting is killing) spirit of men is – who as a race oppressed
for decades, who were denied from sacrificing for, serving
their colonial master’s army till WWI – to lead by example.
That village chief had to executed and the executioner is
no other but the leader of new army. The mold was cast,
the stage was set. If he did not do that, BIA would not have
a chance to reconnect with ancient warrior history of Burma.
Japanese imperial army did not keep POW and BIA, and
being a new rag tug army, Japanese officers and NCOs
attached to BIA units and Burmese officers would ask
new recruits dirty job of executing POWs, ritualistic acts,
training, christening of new recruits. Wars were to destroy
enemy, annihilate them, subdue them, afterall BIA was
not formed as peace corps to show mercy. Also Burmese
might be proud themselves of martian race (they have even
dreamt of conquering India) but Buddhism have softened
their hearts. Inevitably, a short cut for them to teach how
to kill another man was to assign them executing POWs.
Or BIA men will be ridiculed by Japanese soldiers and
officers alike.
I think Gen. Aung San have had no choice but he had to
take that disciplinary action, made an example of killing
that village chief who happened to be from another race
– Imperialist British’s divide and conquer rule for subjects.
The legitimacy (even if that verdict was reached in military
tribunal or you can accuse as kangaroo courts) was there
everyone except British will think that man rise to that petty
position of power by suckering British bosses, terrorizing
killing Burmese. British had left no choice for those young
men and their leaders who might have wanted to pursue
literature or law instead.
I think Gen Aung San did the right thing by executing victim,
although the accused might not have received a fair trial. But
they were at war. British did not act fair towards Saya San or
followers by cutting their heads and putting servered heads
on spikes to scare of others. Just to share some thought….
Good deeds and parliament
Simon – 4
Culture change among voters?? such as?
More on the “strategy of tension”
As I understand it, Simon is StanG’s new moniker and his comments should be taken in context…………
Cambodia is not a province of Thailand
This nice, detailed piece reminded me that years ago, some of the Khmer statuary in the National Museum in Bangkok was identified as “Thai art, Khmer period”.
More on the “strategy of tension”
Robert Amsterdam is a PR hack in the employ of Thaksin Shinawatra. We should take his views seriously? Please…credibility zero.
Instructive and entertaining: This Al Jazeera interview with Mr Amsterdam:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dn0rDxgssfY