Beijing, Not Yunnan, Has Always Driven Chinese Support for Myanmar Insurgents

Some Chinese historians and foreign scholars whose views are close to those of the leadership in Beijing are busy rewriting history. China’s support for the Communist Party of Burma (CPB) was driven by local dynamics in Yunnan rather than being part of the then Chinese leadership’s overall policy of exporting revolution to the region and beyond. That version of the nature of cross-border interactions makes the central government seem less guilty of interference in Myanmar’s civil wars—and it is, needless to say, far from the realities that prevailed during the reign of Chairman Mao Zedong.