Shan State (Burmese: ????????????, pronounced [?a? pjin??]; Shan: ????????? [m??

? t???]) is a state of Burma (Myanmar). Shan State borders China to the north, L
aos to the east, and Thailand to the south, and five administrative divisions of
Burma in the west. Largest of the 14 administrative divisions by land area, Sha
n State covers 155,800 km2, almost a quarter of the total area of Burma. The sta
te gets its name from the Shan people, one of several ethnic groups that inhabit
the area. Shan State is largely rural, with only three cities of significant si
ze: Lashio, Kengtung, and the capital, Taunggyi.[2]
Shan State, with many ethnic groups, is home to several armed ethnic armies. Whi
le the military government has signed ceasefire agreements with most groups, vas
t areas of the state, especially those east of Thanlwin river, remain outside th
e central government's control, and in recent years have come under heavy ethnic
-Chinese economic and political influence, whereas other areas are under the con
trol of military groups such as the Shan State Army.
Shan State is the unitary successor state to the Burmese Shan States, the prince
ly states that were under some degree of control of Irrawaddy valley-based Burme
se kingdoms. (Historical Tai-Shan states extended well beyond the Burmese Shan S
tates, ranging from full fledged kingdoms of Assam in the northwest to Lan Xang
in the east to Lanna and Ayutthaya in the southeast, as well as several petty pr
incely states in between, covering present day northern Chin State, northern Sag
aing Division, Kachin State, Kayah State in Myanmar as well as Laos, Thailand an
d southwestern part of Yunnan. The definition of Burmese Shan States does not in
clude the Ava Kingdom and the Hanthawaddy Kingdom of 13th to 16th centuries alth
ough the founders of these kingdoms were Burmanized Shans and Monized Shans, res
pectively.)
[edit] Early history
The first founding of Shan states inside the present day boundaries of Burma beg
an during period of Pagan Kingdom in the Shan Hills and accelerated after the fa
ll of Pagan Kingdom to the Mongols in 1287. The Shans, who came down with the Mo
ngols, stayed and quickly came to dominate much of northern to eastern arc of Bu
rma?from northwestern Sagaing Division to Kachin Hills to the present day Shan H
ills. The most powerful Shan states were Mong Yang (Mohnyin) and Mong Kawng (Mog
aung) in present-day Kachin State, followed by Hsenwi (Theinni), Hsipaw (Thibaw)
and Mong Mit (Momeik) in present-day northern Shan State.[3] Smaller Shan state
s like Kale in northwestern Sagaing Division, Bhamo in Kachin State, Yawnghwe (N
yaungshwe) and Kengtung (Kyaingtong) in Shan State, and Mong Pai (Mobye) in Kaya
h State played a precarious game of paying allegiance to more powerful states, s
ometimes simultaneously. To be sure, the newly founded Shan States were multi-et
hnic states. Although Burmanized Shans founded the Ava Kingdom that ruled centra
l Burma, other Shan states, Mohnyin in particular, constantly raided Ava territo
ries throughout the years. A Mohnyin-led confederation of Shan states finally co
nquered Ava itself in 1527.[4]

[edit] Taungoo and Konbaung periods (1555?1885)

Shan States after 1557, now inside Bayinnaung's Empire
In 1555, King Bayinnaung dislodged the Shan king from Ava, and by 1557, went on
to conquer all of what would become known as Burmese Shan States under his rule,
from Assamese border in the northwest to those in Kachin Hills and Shan Hills,
including the two most powerful Shan States, Mohnyin and Mogaung.[5] (Bayinnaung
also conquered Lan Na in 1558 but allowed the more established kingdom to retai
n more autonomy.) The Shan states were reduced to the status of governorships bu
t the Saophas were permitted to retain their royal regalia and their feudal righ
ts over their own subjects. Bayinnaung introduced Burmese customary law, and pro
hibited all human and animal sacrifices. He also required the sons of Saophas to
reside in the Burmese king's palace essentially as hostages for good conduct of
 their fathers and to receive valuable training in Burmese court life. This was
a policy followed by Burmese kings right up to the final fall of the kingdom to
the British in 1885.[6] (Northernmost Shan states in Yunnan had already fallen t
o the Ming dynasty of China by the middle of 15th century.[7])
To be sure, the reach of Burmese sovereign waxed and waned along with the abilit
y of each Burmese monarch. Shan states became briefly independent following the
collapse of the first Taungoo dynasty, in 1599. Nonetheless, the Restored Taungo
o dynasty under King Nyaungyan and King Anaukpetlun had recovered the Shan state
s, including the two strongest?Monhyin and Mogaung by 1605 and Lan Na by 1615.[5
] Starting in the late 17th century with the reign of King Minyekyawdin, the rul
e of Burmese monarchs declined gradually, and by the 1730s, Shan States like oth
er areas in the kingdom were de facto independent.
In the middle of the 18th century, the Burmese Konbaung dynasty's reassertion of
easternmost boundaries of Burmese Shan States led to a war with the Qing dynast
y of China, which launched four separate invasions of Burma in 1765, 1766, 1767?
1768 and 1769. For a brief period, after the second invasion, the Burmese occupi
ed eight Chinese Shan states within Yunnan.[8] Although the Burmese would give u
p these Chinese Shan states soon after, but their success in repelling a numeric
ally far superior Chinese force laid the foundation for the present day boundary
between Burma and China. The present-day boundary of southern Shan State vis-a-
vis Thailand was also formed shortly after. In 1776, Burma lost much of Lan Na k
ingdom to a resurgent Bangkok-based Siam,[9] ending a two century plus Burmese s
uzerainty over the region and retaining just Kengtung on the Burmese side. (Siam
would again invade Kengtung in 1804, 1852?1854 and 1942.)
Throughout the Burmese feudal era, Shan states supplied much manpower in the ser
vice of Burmese kings. Without Shan manpower, it would have been difficult, if n
ot impossible, for the Burmans alone to achieve their much vaunted victories in
Lower Burma, Siam, and elsewhere. Shans were a major part of Burmese forces in t
he First Anglo-Burmese War of 1824?1826, and fought valiantly?a fact even the Br
itish commanders acknowledged.[10]
After the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852, the Burmese kingdom was reduced to U
pper Burma alone. The Shan states?especially those east of the Salween, were ess
entially autonomous entities, just paying token tribute to the king. In 1875, Ki
ng Mindon, in order to avoid certain defeat, ceded Karenni states, long part of
Shan states, to the British.[8] When the last king of Burma, King Thibaw--coinci
dentally a half Shan?ascended the throne in 1878, the rule of central government
was so weak that Thibaw had to send thousands of troops to tame a rebellion in
the Shan state of Mongnai and other eastern Shan states for the remainder of his
6 year reign.[11]
[edit] Colonial period (1886?1948)
On 28 November 1885, the British captured Mandalay, officially ending the Third
Anglo-Burmese War in just 11 days. But it was only in 1890 that the British were
able to subdue all of Shan states. Under the British colonial administration, e
stablished in 1887, the Shan states were ruled by their saophas as feudatories o
f the British Crown. The British however placed Kachin Hills inside Mandalay Div
ision and northwestern Shan areas under Sagaing Division. In October 1922, the S
han states, and Karenni states were merged to create the Federated Shan States,[
12] under a commissioner who also administered the Wa State. This arrangement su
rvived the constitutional changes of 1923 and 1937.
During World War II, most of Shan States came under the Japanese occupation. Chi
nese Kuomingtang (KMT) forces came down to northeastern Shan states to face the
Japanese. Thai forces, allied with the Japanese, occupied Kengtung and surroundi
ng areas in 1942.[13]
After the war, the British returned and many Chinese KMT forces stayed inside Bu
rmese Shan states. Negotiations leading to independence at the Panglong Conferen
ce in February 1947 secured a unitary Shan State including former Wa states, but
without the Karenni states.[14] More importantly, Shan State also gained the ri
ght of secession in 10 years from independence.
[edit] Independence (1948?present)
Soon after gaining independence in January 1948, the central government led by U
Nu faced several armed rebellions. The most serious was the Chinese Nationalist
KMT invasion of Shan State in 1950. Driven out by the Chinese Communist forces,
Nationalist KMT armies planned to use the region east of the Salween river as a
base from which to regain their homeland. In March 1953, the KMT forces with US
assistance were on the verge of taking the entire Shan State, and within a day'
s march of the state capital Taunggyi.[15] The Burmese army drove back the invad
ers east across the Salween but much of the KMT army and their progeny would rem
ain in the eastern Shan State under various guises to the present day. The Burme
se army's heavy handedness fueled resentment.[15]
In 1961, Shan saophas led by the first president of Burma and saopha of Yawnghwe
Sao Shwe Thaik proposed a new federal system of government for greater autonomy
even though the Shans had the constitutional right to secede. Though Shan leade
rs promised not to exercise the right, it was seen by the Burmese army led by Ge
n. Ne Win as secessionist.[15] Gen. Ne Win's coup d'etat in 1962 brought an end
to the Burmese experiment with democracy and with it, the call for greater auton
omy for ethnic minorities. The coup fueled the Shan rebellion, started in 1958 b
y a small group called Num Hsuk Han (Young Warriors), now joined by the Shan Sta
te Army (SSA).
By the early 1960s, eastern Shan State, festered with several insurgencies and w
arlords, emerged as a major opium growing area, part of the so-called Golden Tri
angle. Narcotics trafficking became a vital source of revenue for all insurgenci
es. Major forces consisted of the SSA, Communist Party of Burma (CPB) as well as
those of drug lords Khun Sa, and Lo Hsing Han. By the mid-1960s, CPB had begun
receiving open support from China. Thailand also began a decades-long policy of
support for non-Communist Burmese rebels. Families of insurgent leaders were all
owed to live in Thailand, and insurgent armies were free to buy arms, ammunition
, and other supplies.[16]
In the late 1980s and 1990s, the military government signed ceasefire agreements
with 17 groups, including all major players in Shan State. An uneasy truce has
ensued but all forces remain heavily armed. Today, the 20,000 strong United Wa S
tate Army (UWSA) is the largest armed group, and heavily involved narcotics trad
e. In the 2008 Constitution, endorsed by the Burmese junta, certain UWSA control
led areas were given the status of an autonomous region.[17]
In recent decades, Chinese state and ethnic Chinese involvement in Shan State ha
s deepened. Hundreds of thousands of illegal Chinese immigrants have flooded Upp
er Burma since the 1990s.[18][19] Chinese investment in the state has funded eve
rything from hydropower and mining projects to rubber plantations, illegal loggi
ng, and illegal wildlife trafficking.[20] Wa and Kokang regions, led by ethnic C
hinese, openly use the yuan and operate on Chinese Standard Time.
[edit] Geography