The Piano Tuner by Daniel Mason

structures that are
important to consider because they play a great role in our current situation.
Shan principalities (of which there were forty-one by the 1870s) were the
highest order of political organization in a highly hierarchical system of
local rule. Such principalities, termed
muang
by the Shan, were ruled
by a
sawbwa
(Burmese transliteration, which I will adopt in the
remainder of this report). Immediately below the
sawbwa
were other
divisions, from districts to groups of villages to individual hamlets, each
ultimately subservient to the rule of the
sawbwa.
This fragmentation
of rule resulted in frequent internecine wars on the Shan Plateau and a failure
to unite to throw off the yoke of Burman rule. Here the analogy of the
shattered vase grows useful: just as fragments of porcelain cannot hold water,
the fragments of governments could do little to control a growing anarchy. As a
result, much of the Shan countryside is plagued by bands of
dacoits
(a
Hindustani word meaning bandits), a great challenge to the administration of
this region, although distinct from the organized resistance known as the
Limbin Confederacy, which is the subject of the remainder of this report.
    II.  The Limbin Confederacy, Twet Nga Lu, and the Current
Situation
    In 1880, an organized Shan movement against Burmese rule
emerged, which still persists today. (Note that at this time, England only
controlled Lower Burma. Upper Burma and Mandalay were still ruled by the
Burmese king.) In that year, the
sawbwas
of the states of Mongnai,
Lawksawk, Mongpawn, and Mongnawng refused to appear before the Burmese king
Thibaw in an annual act of New Year’s obeisance. A column sent by Thibaw
failed to capture the upstart
sawbwas.
Then, in 1882, this defiance
became violent. In that year, the
sawbwa
of Kengtung attacked and
killed the Burmese resident in Kengtung. Inspired by the boldness of the
Kengtung
sawbwa,
the
sawbwa
of Mongnai and his allies broke
into open revolt. In November 1883, they attacked the Burmese garrison at
Mongnai, killing four hundred. But their success was short-lived. The Burmese
counterattacked, forcing the rebellious Shan chiefs to flee to Kengtung, across
the Salween River, whose steep defiles and dense jungles gave them shelter
against further incursions.
    Although the rebellion was directed
against the Burmese government, the goal of the resistance was not Shan
independence, a fact of history that is frequently misunderstood. Indeed, the
Shan
sawbwas
recognized that without a strong central power, the Shan
States would always be plagued by war. Their chief goal was the overthrow of
Thibaw, and the crowning of a suzerain who would repeal the
thathameda
tax, a land tax they deemed unjust. Thus, as their candidate they selected
a Burman known as the Limbin Prince, a disenfranchised member of the house of
Alaungpaya, the ruling dynasty. This rebellion became known as the Limbin
Confederacy. In December 1885, the Limbin Prince arrived in Kengtung. Although
the movement carries his name, evidence suggests he is only a figurehead, with
the true power wielded by the Shan
sawbwas.
    Meanwhile, as
the Limbin Prince followed the lonely trails into the highlands, war had broken
out once again between Upper Burma and Britain: the third and final
Anglo-Burmese war. The defeat of the Burmese at Mandalay by our forces was
completed two weeks before the Limbin Prince arrived in Kengtung, but because
of the vast and difficult terrain separating Kengtung from Mandalay, the news
failed to reach the Confederacy until after he arrived. While we had hoped that
the Limbin Confederacy would drop its resistance and submit to our rule,
instead it switched its original aims and declared war on the British Crown in
the name of Shan independence.
    It is said that nature abhors a
vacuum and this can also be said of politics. Indeed, the retreat of the Limbin
Confederacy to Kengtung in 1883 had left vacant thrones in many of the powerful
Shan
muang,
thrones