Opium War in Golden Triangle
Before
I continued on to write about my personal involvements in the 1978 army
operations against opium–trafficking ethnic insurgent armies in Shan
State I would like to explain a bit about the long history of opium.
Opium (Bain in Myanmar)
originally was not the product of Myanmar nor the infamous word a Myanmar
word. Opium reached Myanmar via sea routes across India and also land
routes across China from the Europe and the Mediterranean regions and
the Asia Minor.
Opium was originally called Ee-Phon in its native regions and E-pha-na in Pali language the ancient and the religious language of Indian Sub-continent. Later in India it is called Ah-Phain or Phain and it became Bain in Mon-Myanmar language.
Thousands
of years ago Indians and Chinese didn’t even know the existence of
Opium let alone use it and become addicts. Opium propagated from Greece
and Mesopotamia towards Asia. Opium was widely used in Asia Minor since
the pre-historic ages.
In
the stone-ages opium naturally grew on the hills around the
Mediterranean Sea and there were written records of opium usage as a
medicine by the European physicians a thousand years before Jesus
Christ. Greeks and Romans also widely used opium as a common medicine.
Within
a thousand years after Jesus Christ the opium spread into East India
and China. It was said that from the neighboring Yunan Province of China
the opium eventually reached the Golden Triangle region of our Myanmar.
Opium’s Arrival in Asia from the West
Since the Mongol-dominated era in 13th and 14th centuries the traders and merchants from all over the world started coming to China because of her globally famous wealth. At the beginning the trade was done through land routes the famous Silk Road. But by the end of 15th Century most merchandise from China were transported by the sailing ships.
Due
to the basic fact that compared with the enormous size and massive
population of China most European countries are much smaller and thus
their trading with China in the popular merchandises like silk, cotton,
sugar, and various spices were extremely profitable to the Europeans.
Portuguese
were the top merchants back then and their main interest solely was
trading but their rivals English were interested in both trading and the
colonization of new territories.
Both
Portugal and England then had a worsening problem of massive trade
deficit with China as Chinese didn’t really need European products as
much as the European desires for Chinese goods and so the Europeans had
to use their precious gold and silver to pay for the goods from China.
Wicked
English merchants soon noticed the hidden problem of opium addiction in
China and started giving them chests of opium as payments for Chinese
goods. As the demand for Opium grew in China many folds the British East
India Company started establishing poppy plantations in Bengal in 1773
by introducing the European poppy seeds and European agricultural
technology into India.
Within
a few years India was producing commercial quantity of opium since the
country had a vast amount of suitable land for poppy plantations and
cheap labor for profitable high-yield production of opium. But it also
escalated the already devastating opium addiction problem among the
Chinese.
In
1729 Chinese Emperor Yung Cheng (1723-1735) tried to prohibit opium in
China and again in 1796 Emperor Chia Ching prohibited opium in China.
Despite the official prohibition the massive amount of British opium
from India was still smuggled into China.
Early
in 1729 the opium imports into China was only just over 200 Chests. But
the imports grew five folds to over 1,000 Chests in 1767 and in 1820 it
grew another ten folds to over 10,000 Chests. By 1838 over 40,000
Chests of opium was imported into China illegally despite the
prohibition.
Major
exporters of opium into China then were America, England, France,
Portugal, and Dutch. Those western nations took unfair advantage over
the hapless Chinese by taking their tea, silk, and other valuable
commodities out of China in return for socially devastating opium
cheaply produced in India.
The results were the infamous Opium Wars between China and England in the years 1839 and 1842. The Second Opium War known as the Arrow War broke out in 1856 and 1860 between China on one side and France and England on the other side.
China
lost all those opium wars and the victors ruthlessly raised the yearly
opium imports to China up to massive 60,000 Chests. Realizing the
military and economic benefits of opium the colonial powers even
expanded opium productions into the Mexico, Peru, and Ecuador in South
America during the period between the First World War and the Second
World War.
Opium’s Arrival inMyanmar
According to the historical records opium was brought into and distributed in Myanmar since 16th Century by the Dutch and Italian traders. In 1515 during the Taungoo Reign many Portuguese came to Myanmar and permanently settled in Martaban (Moat-ta-ma) and they brought opium along.
There
were written records describing the visit of an Italian Venetian named
Ceaser Fredrick who also bought and sold opium in then the seaport town
of Bago in Myanmar.
According
to the 1613 records of a Dutch trading company 200 pounds of opium was
purchased in Malacca and transported to Bago in Myanmar through Siam
(Thailand) and sold there at a huge profit.
In
1824 British colonial administration started legally permitting
licensed-opium-dens in Arakan and Tenasserim divisions they had captured
from the Kingdom of Myanmar after First English-Myanmar War.
Because
of widespread use of opium in Colonial Myanmar the opium production
rooted in the remote border region and the devastating effects of opium
would be bitterly felt by the whole country for more than 100 years
since. But the worst had come with America’s War in Vietnam and the
notorious CIA (Central Intelligence Agency).
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This
was what Tin Maung Yin (MA) described of America’s involvement in opium
and heroin trade from the Golden Triangle of Myanmar in his translation
of Alfred W. Macoy’s “Heroin Politics in South east Asia”.
“American
foreign policy had basically encouraged a large scale opium growing and
massive heroin production in South East Asia. Since 1950s America had
supported KMT exile forces in Myanmar.
But militarily-incompetent and
cowardice KMT white-Chinese had rather wanted to run a very profitable
heroin operation than fighting the superior red-Chinese communist forces
inside China.
So
KMT put all their efforts into expanding the opium growing in the Shan
State, which was a virtually-lawless land back then, and attaining the
almost monopoly of opium and heroin trade in the Golden Triangle. KMT
even helped the CIA in recruiting the opium-smuggling war lords of Laos
to form mercenary armies against the Communists rivals in Lao.
CIA
had also supported the massive heroin-smuggling syndicates comprising
the Ministers and senior Government officials from the right-wing
Governments of South Vietnam and Laos and Thailand.
CIA
also heavily relied on the Shan Insurgents in their clandestine
operations against China in the neighboring Yunan Province while blindly
ignoring Shan’s opium smuggling activities or even encouraging the
Shans.
Shan
insurgents sent their opium to the CIA-supported Laotian Army officers
on the border and received the CIA guns from corrupt Laotians. And the
Laotian Army converted the Shan opium into pure heroin for the GI market
in South Vietnam and then the whole world.
One damaging result for our
country from the opium and heroin trade had been the prolonging of Shan
insurgency in Myanmar while CIA personnel had frequently entered Shan
State for their spy operations in Yunan. The insurgency and the
lawlessness in turn had increased the opium growing and heroin
production many folds in the Shan State.
By
1969 not just the poppy fields but also the heroin labs were
mushrooming in the so-called Golden Triangle region where Myanmar and Laos
and Thailand meets. Limitless production of heroin had begun.
CIA
also supported corrupt South Vietnamese and Laotian and Thai officials
deeply involving in the international heroin smuggling operations by
providing them with airplanes for heroin transportation.
CIA cold war strategy was thus mainly responsible for the spread of heroin menace in S.E. Asia especially our Burma.”
Above was my short explanation of how the opium fields in Burma grew massively during those 20 years between 1950 and 1970.
Thus
in our country the military operations against opium were mainly done
in the Shan State. Almost every year the opium offensives have been
launched by our army in the Lashio region and Eastern-Kengtung region of
Northern Shan State.
Most
poppy fields are in the Northern Shan State while the opium routes to
Laos and Thailand are in the Eastern and Southern Shan State. The
Kengtung area basically has common borders with China, Laos, and
Thailand.
Centering
on the course of Mekong River originated from China the Golden Triangle
of Burma and Thailand and Laos once produced more than 10,000 tons of
opium every year. That amounted to about 70% of world’s total illegal
opium production.
But
nowadays the biggest opium producer is said to be Afghanistan. The
Taliban insurgents there grew opium large scale and smuggled heroin to
America and Europe. They used the money from the heroin trade to buy the
weapons used in attacking the American and her allies now occupying
Afghanistan.
Now the notorious country producing about 70% of world illegal opium is Afghanistan.
Almost
all the opium in this world comes from nearly 4,500 mile long
mountainous strip of hilly lands from the Turkish-Anatolia Plateau in
the West to Northern Laos in the East. People from the eight countries
in that strip produce about 14,000 tons opium every year and supplied
raw opium and heroin both legally and illegally to the consumers
worldwide.
Only
few tons of opium is supplied to the pharmaceutical manufacturers in
Turkey, Iran, Pakistan, and India for producing legal opiate-based
medicines while the majority is converted into heroin and smuggled all
over the world.
Poppy Plants to Opium to Heroin
Every year in September and October the opium growers all over the world carefully spread poppy seeds on the prepared-land. The mature plant can grow up to 3 to 4 foot tall. In about three months the poppy plants bear beautiful flowers white or purple colored. Egg-shaped poppy fruit emerged once the petals are shed and inside the fruit is full of white latex.
And
that milky latex sap is opium. Poppy farmers collect the sap by
slitting the pods with specially curved knife and then scraping off the
sap slowly oozing out of the slits. Once out of the pods the white latex
sap transform into a brownish gum-like substance and it is raw opium.
Normally
the opium traffickers refine their raw opium into morphine base first
for the transportation as compact morphine bricks are much easier to
handle than smelly and bulky opium bundles. Usually the rickety morphine
refineries can be found near the poppy fields. Morphine refining method
is the same for all the producers from both S.E. Asia and Middle-East
even though they are separated by thousands of miles.
First
step is boiling the sufficiently clean water in a cut-down oil-drum by
firewood or charcoal fire. Once water is boiled raw opium is dropped
into the boiling water and stirred continuously till the opium is
dissolved. Then a sufficient quantity of lime is poured into the boiling
opium solution.
A
precipitate of wastes then sinks to the bottom and a white band of
opium concentrate forms on the surface. The opium concentrate is drawn
off and filtered through a piece of flannel cloth. The concentrate is
heated again in another cut-down drum and Ammonia is added and stirred
till dissolved. After a short period morphine crystallized and settled
at the bottom.
Then
the morphine solution is poured and squeezed though another piece of
flannel cloth and the white and nearly solid morphine paste is left on
the cloth. Once cooled down and dried the original 10 kilo of raw opium
would become one kilo of morphine base. Morphine base is then sent to
advance heroin laboratories to refine further into Number-4 heroin.
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There are five steps in refining the morphine base to fluffy-white heroin powder.
First Step:
To produce 10 kilo heroin ten kilo of morphine base and ten kilo Acetic
Anhydrite are mixed in either a glass or ceramic container and heated.
After six hours of heating at 185 deg Fahrenheit the morphine and the
acetic combine and produce Diacetyl Morphine or impure heroin compound.
(Most clandestine heroin lab in Burma can produce only 10 kilo of heroin
a day.)
Second Step:
Water and chloroform are added to the solution to precipitate the
impurities. The solution after a draining is high grade Diacetyl
Morphine.
Third Step: After adding Sodium Carbonate to the solution and rigorous stirring the heroin compounds solidify and sink to the bottom.
Fourth Step:
Heroin compound is filtered out of the Sodium Carbonate solution and
then mixed with pure alcohol and heated by charcoal fire. Once the
alcohol is evaporated only the small solid pieces of heroin are left in
the container.
Fifth Step:
This step is the final step to produce the fluffy white heroin powder
the traffickers and the addicts all over the world highly value as the
number-4 heroin. In this step heroin pieces are dissolved in pure
alcohol in glass containers. The solution is then mixed with Ether and
Hydrochloric Acid. The resulting chemical reaction produces crystallized
heroin compound. The crystals are filtered out and chemically dried to
become the fluffy white powder of 80% to 90% pure heroin. (This step
also requires not just a skillful but also absolutely-careful chemist as
the volatile Ether gas can ignite and produce a violent explosion that
can demolish a clandestine heroin lab.)
(Colonel Thet Oo's "My Opium Operations")
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