After decades of strained bilateral relations, Australia’s defence ties with Myanmar are gradually being restored.
The office of the Defence Attache (DA) in the Australian embassy in Yangon (formerly Rangoon), which closed in 1979, was reopened in 2014. This coincided with a port visit by HMAS Childers, the first by a Royal Australian Navy vessel since the frigate HMAS Quiberon called in 1959. With the inauguration of Aung San Suu Kyi’s semi-civilian government in early 2016, defence engagement has been given a higher priority. The inaugural meeting of the Australia-Myanmar Strategic Dialogue was held in Yangon in March 2017.
These developments are well documented, but over the years there have been others that are not as well known. One in particular springs to mind.
In 1994, an incident occurred at Three Pagodas Pass on the Thailand-Myanmar border, west of Bangkok. While minor in itself, it had the potential to complicate the diplomatic relationship between Australia and Myanmar, at a difficult time. Known only to a few people at the time, when the history of Australia’s relations with Myanmar is finally written it deserves at least a footnote.
In September that year, Major General John Hartley, Director of Australia’s Defence Intelligence Organisation (DIO) from 1992 to 1995, was invited to Thailand as the guest of his Thai counterpart, Royal Thai Army (RTA) Major General Teerawat Patumanonda. General Hartley was accompanied on his visit by two DIO analysts, one an army lieutenant colonel and the other a civilian. While in Thailand, he was escorted by the Australian DA in Bangkok, an army colonel.
As part of a familiarisation tour, General Hartley was taken by UH-1H helicopter from the RTA Ninth Infantry Division’s Camp Surasri in Kanchanaburi Province to Three Pagodas Pass. Located in the First Army Region, the Ninth Infantry Division was the RTA unit responsible for border affairs in Kanchanaburi. A special task force within the Division was charged with coordinating security and refugee affairs at the local level, including around the pass.
Three Pagodas Pass is of considerable historical importance. For centuries, it was one of the main land routes between Burma (as Myanmar was known before 1989) and Siam (as Thailand was known before 1939). During the Second World War, it was where the infamous ‘death railway’ from Ban Pong to Thanbyuzayat crossed the border. For years, an old Japanese C56 locomotive was preserved there as a monument to the 13,000 Allied prisoners of war and 80,000 Asian labourers who died working on the railway.
Please click here to read the full “Incident at Three Pagodas Pass” article in the Lowy Interpreter by Griffith Asia Institute Adjunct Associate Professor, Dr Andrew Selth.
