construct a serious communications, education, and transportation infrastructure for national integration.50 In addition, as was already evident with the Kuomintang invasion in the early 1950s, Burma’s location and the porosity of its
borders rendered effective enforcement of national sovereignty especially difficult
China sponsoring the Burmese Communist Party’s armed insurgency until the late 1980s and Thailand abetting Karen and Shan
independence struggles, and with the international narcotics trade in the
“Golden Triangle” providing additional fiscal bases for effective autonomy if
not independence from Rangoon, stalemate persisted for decades