We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 November 2008
To most Australians, Burma is still associated with the Second World War, and in particular the infamous ‘death railway’ from Thailand. In May 1942 some 3,000 Australian prisoners of war (POWs) were sent from Singapore, to provide labour for the construction of an airfield at Tavoy. They were subsequently joined by another 1,800 or so Australians from Java, making a total in southern Burma of 4,851 men. Together with other Allied prisoners and Burmese levies they were later put to work building a railway line over Three Pagodas Pass, to link Burma with the Siam-Malaya railway system. Before the project was completed in November 1943, 771 Australian POWs (nearly 16 per cent of those on the Burma side of the border) had died from disease, malnutrition and the brutality of their Japanese captors. Casualties among the POWs working on the railway in Thailand were even higher.
1 This article was first published as a Working Paper by the Australian National University's Strategic and Defence Studies Centre. It draws from research being conducted in collaboration with Garry Woodard on Australia's bilateral relations with Burma since 1945. The article reflects the author's own views, and draws entirely on public sources. It has no official status or endorsement.
2 File ‘Report on A Force’, Australian War Memorial AWM 54, 554/2/4.Google Scholar See also Wigmore, Lionel, The Japanese Thrust (Australian War Memorial, Canberra, 1968), pp. 541–61.Google Scholar
3 See Slim, William, Defeat Into Victory (Cassell, London, 1956).Google Scholar
4 See Allen, Louis, Burma: The Longest War, 1941–1945 (Dent and Sons, London, 1984).Google Scholar
5 Ashton, William, ‘Burma–still struggling for peace and stability’, Pacific Defence Reporter 16:3 (09 1989), 18. These cemeteries are at Thanbyuzayat (south of Moulmein), Htaukkyan (north of Rangoon) and in Rangoon itself.Google Scholar
6 See, for example, Thompson, Robert, Revolutionary War in World Strategy, 1945–1969 (Secker and Warburg, London, 1970), 62–3Google Scholar; and Booker, Malcolm, The Last Domino: Aspects of Australia's Foreign Relations (Collins, Sydney, 1976), 189.Google Scholar
7 ‘Australian Foreign Policy’, Statement by the Minister for External Affairs, Spender, P. C., 9 March 1950, Current Notes on International Affairs 21:2 (02 1950), 158.Google Scholar
8 With independence, the new Burmese government inherited two rebellions, one by the Trotskyist Communist Party (Burma) (known as the ‘Red Flags’), and another by the (Muslim) Mujahids in the Arakan region. It also faced growing problems with the People's Volunteer Organization (later the People's Comrades Party), made up of disaffected remnants of Burma's wartime independence army. The most serious challenge to government authority, however, came from the Karen National Defence Organization (KNDO). These groups were later joined by the Maoist Burma Communist Party (‘White Flags’), the Kachin Independence Army and Mon National Defence Organization (among others). Almost every ethnic group in Burma has taken up arms against the central government at some time.Google Scholar
9 ‘Australian Foreign Policy’, Statement by the Minister for External Affairs, P. C. Spender, 9 March 1950.Google Scholar
10 Millar, T. B. (ed.), Australian Foreign Minister: The Diaries of R. G. Casey, 1951–1960 (Collins, London, 1972), 36. Between 1946 and 1949, Thailand (then Siam) produced 26.6 per cent of the world's rice.Google Scholar While well below pre-war levels, Burma provided 30.4 per cent. See Tinker, Hugh, The Union of Burma: A Study of the First Years of Independence (Oxford University Press, London, 1967), p. 256.Google Scholar
11 Millar, , Australian Foreign Minister, 37–8.Google Scholar
12 The Anzam nations were Australia, New Zealand and Malaya.Google Scholar
13 Report by Joint Planning Committee 40/1953, 17 July 1953. File: ‘Supply of Military Equipment to Burma’, Australian Archives A5799, 147/1953.Google Scholar
14 Ibid.
15 Booker, , The Last Domino, 183.Google Scholar
16 Spender, Percy, Exercises in Diplomacy: The ANZUS Treaty and the Colombo Plan (Sydney University Press, Sydney, 1969), 206–7.Google Scholar
17 Millar, , Australian Foreign Minister, 37.Google Scholar
18 Ne Win was appointed Chief of Staff in 1949.Google Scholar
19 Millar, , Australian Foreign Minister, 37.Google Scholar
20 This date has been cited incorrectly as 4 January 1951 in some official Australian publications. See, for example, ‘Burma,’ Current Notes on International Affairs 26:8 (1955), 555–6.Google Scholar
21 Ibid.
22 ‘Status of Australian Mission’, Statement by the Minister for External Affairs, Casey, R. G., 17 April 1956, Current Notes on International Affairs 27:4 (04 1956), 244–5.Google Scholar
23 File: ‘Service Attache at Rangoon’, Australian Archives A5954/1, Box 93/14.Google Scholar
24 Ibid., and File: ‘Appointment of Australian Service Attaches to Thailand and Burma’, Australian Archives A5954/1, Box 93/14.
25 Millar, T.B., Australia's Foreign Policy (Angus and Robertson, Sydney, 1968), 107.Google Scholar
26 In 1953 and 1954 Australia strongly supported Burmese demands in the United Nations for these KMT remnants to be removed, even to the point of criticizing the United States, from whom they received covert military assistance.Google Scholar
27 UK High Commission to the Secretary, Prime Minister's Department, 18 April 1952. File: ‘War and Defence—Miscellaneous, Facilities for Members of the Burma Armed Forces in Australia Training Establishments’, Australian Archives A462, 439/4/13.Google Scholar
28 Lawrence McIntyre to Secretary, Prime Minister's Department, 5 May 1952, ibid.
29 This officer was Kyi Win, who rose to become a Colonel in the Burma Army.Google Scholar
30 Harry, Ralph to Secretary, Department of the Army. 6 November 1952, File: ‘War and Defence—Miscellaneous, Facilities for Members of the Burma Armed Forces in Australia Training Establishments’.Google Scholar
31 The Australian Government later stated in public, however, that the offer was made through the Australian Legation in Rangoon. See ‘Training of Burmese Army Officers in Australia’, Statement by the Minister for External Affairs, Casey, R. G., 2 December 1952, Current Notes on International Affairs 23:12 (12 1952).Google Scholar
32 Tinker, , The Union of Burma, 332.Google Scholar
33 Serong to the author, 26 April 1990. Serong also maintained a personal correspondence with Colonel Maung Maung from that date.Google Scholar
34 ‘Burmese Officers Training in Australia’, Statement by the Minister for the Army, Francis, J., 13 August 1954, Current Notes on International Affairs 25:8 (08 1954), 583–4.Google Scholar
35 Secretary, Department of External Affairs to Secretary, Department of Air, 25 May 1955. File: ‘Training of Burmese Air Force Personnel in Australia’, Australian Archives A705/1, 208/1/2555. See also Tinker, , The Union of Burma, 332.Google Scholar
36 Salisbury to the Minister, Australian Embassy, Rangoon, 28 June 1955. File: ‘Training of Burmese Air Force Personnel in Australia’.Google Scholar
37 Millar, , Australian Foreign Minister, 220.Google Scholar
38 ‘Burma’, Current Notes on International Affairs 28:5 (05 1957), 395.Google Scholar
39 File: ‘Proposed Appointment of Burmese Military Attache in Australia’, Australian Archives A5954/1, Box 93.Google Scholar
40 Ibid.
41 Writing later about Serong's part in the Vietnam War, the Australian journalist Denis Warner described him as ‘brave, brilliant, patronizing and well informed, with a matching ego’. See Warner, Denis, Certain Victory: How Hanoi Won The War (Sheed Andrews and McMeel, Kansas, 1978), 13.Google Scholar
42 During the Vietnam War, many competent Americans came to consider Serong ‘the greatest counter-insurgent expert in the world’, Geoffrey Fairbairn, ‘ Two Faces of Courage’, Bulletin, 8 January 1966. See also Serong, F. P., An Australian View of Revolutionary War, Conflict Studies 16 (Institute for the Study of Conflict, London, 1971).Google Scholar
43 Moodie, C. T. to the Department of External Affairs, Canberra, 18 February 1957. File: ‘Burmese Request for Senior Australian Army Officer to Lecture on Jungle Warfare’, Australian Archives A816, 44/301/29.Google Scholar
44 Australian Embassy in Rangoon to the Department of External Affairs, 11 February 1957, ibid.
45 Secretary, Department of External Affairs, to the Secretary, Department of the Army, 18 February 1957. See also Secretary, Department of Defence, to the Minister for Defence, 4 March 1957, ibid.
46 F. P. Serong, ‘Report on Visit to Burma, June–August 1957’ File: ‘Burma, 1957–59’, Australian Archives A4311/1, Box 579/10. After prolonged negotiations, a border agreement with China was signed in January 1960. See The Sino-Burmese Border Question (Research Backgrounder, Hong Kong, 1960).Google Scholar
47 The lessons of the Korean War and the French experience in Indochina were standard material in Australian infantry and military intelligence training courses at the time. Serong was under instructions, however, not to reveal information with a security classification higher than Confidential, the level accorded Burmese trainees in Australia.Google Scholar
48 Serong, , ‘Report on Visit to Burma, June-August 1957’.Google Scholar
49 Ibid.
50 Australian Embassy, Rangoon, to the Department of External Affairs, 28 October 1959. File: ‘Request for Services of an Australian Army Officer (Col. Serong) by Burma Army’, Australian Archives A1945/1, 248/2/4.Google Scholar
51 Col Maung Maung, Director of Military Training, to Australian Embassy, Rangoon, 26 October 1959, ibid.
52 Serong has repeatedly described himself as a ‘strategic adviser’ during this period a title also used by Fogarty, Michael in his biographical article ‘Ted Serong: An Army Career’, Australian Defence Force Journal 56 (01/02 1986), 8. The official citation for Serong's OBE in 1962, however, accords with the Burmese description of him as a ‘Tactical Adviser’.Google Scholar
53 Serong to the author, 26 April 1990.Google Scholar
54 Maung Maung was Burma's ambassador to Australia from May 1972 to August 1975. In between these appointments he was Burmese Ambassador to Yugoslavia and Indonesia.Google Scholar
55 Serong, F. P., Allies (film transcript) 1983, roll 108 p. 1., and roll 109 p. 4. See also Serong to author, 26 April 1990.Google Scholar
56 Fogarty, , ‘Ted Scrong’, 8.Google Scholar
57 The British provided the Burmese with a wide range of military equipment, including aircraft, artillery and small arms.Google Scholar
58 File: ‘Trade with Burma’, Australian Archives A461, C323/1/3.Google Scholar
59 File: ‘Burma: Top Secret Documents Relating to British Commonwealth Discussions on Burma Situation’, Australian Archives A6537/T2, SEATS 4/1Google Scholar
60 On 28 June 1950, in its decision on ‘Export of Arms and Warlike Stores from Australia in Time of Peace’, Cabinet laid down the conditions under which such sales might be made.Google Scholar
61 File: ‘Supply of Military Equipment to Burma’.Google Scholar
62 Launched in May 1944, the UBS Mayu was the former HMS Fal.Google Scholar
63 ‘1952 Policy Statement by US on Goals in Southeast Asia’, Key Document No. 2, The Pentagon Papers (Bantam Books, Toronto, 1971), 28.Google Scholar See also McCoy, A. W., The Politics of Heroin in Southeast Asia (Harper Colophon, New York. 1972), 126–35.Google Scholar
64 Ashton, , ‘Burma’ (see n. 5), 18.Google Scholar
65 Toohey, Brian and Pinwill, William, Oyster: The Story of the Australian Secret Intelligence Service (William Heinemann, Melbourne, 1989), 114–15.Google Scholar
66 Ibid., 115–16.
67 Ibid.
68 Ibid., 116.
69 Jeffrey Richelson and Des Ball have claimed that an ASIS station in Rangoon was closed down in 1974.Google Scholar See Richelson, J. T. and Ball, Desmond, The Ties That Bind; Intelligence Cooperation between the UKUSA Countries—the United Kingdon, the United States of America, Canada, Australia and New Zealand (Allen and Unwin, Boston, 1985), 44–5.Google Scholar
70 Ibid., and Oyster, 117.
71 Australian Department of Foreign Affairs, Annual Report 1975 (Australian Government Printing Service, Canberra, 1976), 49.Google Scholar
