The selection was not made without trouble however. Damkhohau refused to recognize the leadership of Hrangnawl, as he thought a Burmese should lead the movement., He named a former MP from Kalemyo and suggested that they send a delegation to Kale to ask the Burman MP to lead the movement. Many of the Zo nationalists were very agitated by this proposal because overthrow of the military government was not their only objective, and because they thought that a Zo movement should never be lead by a Burman. Participation of Burmans in the movement was not desirable from their point of view.
Lt. Col. Sonkhopau arrived in Champhai camp from the Naga National Council headquarters in the latter part of 1964. He was in a filthy condition with his clothes torn from walking through the jungles. There in Champhai he met Tunkhopum, leader of the underground Pake National Council. Tunkhopum belonged to the. Baite clan of the Yo tribe. He had wanted to be a contestant in the Manipur elections but his candidacy was rejected by the returning officer, as Baite was not listed as a Scheduled tribe: Since he was unable to be a contestant he went underground and traveled to Pakistan to request aid. ThePakistanis recognized him as the leader of the Zo nationalist movement and promised him. they would train Zo guerilla fighters.
Although meeting for the first time Lt. Col Sonkhopau and Tunkhopum became very good friends. With the approval of Hrangnawl and other leaders they decided to go to Pakistan to train some thirty guerilla fighters. Twenty men were sent with Sonkhopau and Tunkhopum, and they were to recruit more men on their way to Pakistan. Sonkhopau, as a former guerilla fighter during the Second World War, had no difficulty in recruiting Zo youths.
At that time the resistance fighters happily learned that international” arms smugglers were ready to accept Burmese currency in exchange for arms.
On their way to Pakistan Sonkhopau and Tunkhopum formed a United Chin Government. Tunkhopum was made Prime Minister and Sonkhopau minister for defense. Hrangnawl was given the portfolio for foreign affairs, but he did not know this as he was not consulted.
After three months of training in Pakistan thirty Zo nationalist were ready for action. The Pakistanis informed the leaders of the movement at Champhai that the trained uuerillas were about to depart from East Pakistan, and that the party would have to pass through a part of Arakan and the Chin Hills, where they would have to pass Burma Army outposts.
The leaders of the movement at Champhai had to make a move to avoid the’party from Pakistan walking into a Burma Army ambush. It was decided that the Champhai group would attack Falam, Haka and Tedim to : (1) Obtain money from the treasuries for buying arms and ammunition, and (2) Distract the police and army from the border areas where the party from Pakistan would have to pass.
The leaders then split up in two parties to attack Falam, Haka and Tedim simultaneously. Hrangnawl led the party attacking Haka. Although the party was only twenty men strong, they easily took the border town of Rih which was held by a platoon of the Burma Army. They did not take Haka however because word of the impending attack was leaked to authorities two hours ahead of their arrival. When they reached Haka the police were in defensive positions and the nationalists were driven back. In the cross fire a treasury clerk was killed.
The party to attack Tedim was 700 men strong and was led by General Thualzen, commander-in-chief of the movement. This group was equipped with only a few light arms, but even so it would have been easy to take Tedim. Instead of attacking Tedim however Thualzen.and his lieutenants met Colonel Vankulh, Commander of the Burma Army Northwest command, and Thawngcinthang, the commissioner of the Chin Special Division. Vankulh and Thawngcinthang, themselves Zo, reasoned with the nationalists that the uprising would only cause hardship for Zo people. Indeed the cruelty of the Burma Army was known to every Zo soldier who had served in it. Army pensioners-had told of the Burmese Army burning alive a Karen church congregation, and of Burma soldiers eating fried liver taken from killed Karens! In Kachinland innocent women and children were killed, which was simply a revival of Burmese cruelty against the Thais or Assamese in earlier wars. Vankulh and Thawngcinthang also promised ammnesty to the nationalist group if they would lay down their arms.
Thualzen and his assistants therefore agreed to return to their villages. Contrary to the promise given them however the Burmese government ordered the arrest of all persons taking part in the anti-government movement. Thus Thualzen and his lieutenants went underground. The Burma Army then rounded up the majority of nationalists like a flock of chickens and put them in jail in Monywa. There they spent some eight years in confinement.
The Burma Army also attacked the camp at Tuisan and took all the cooks to prison.
Had Thualzen fought he would have received assistance from the villagers. The messengers he sent had been well received, and the villagers had decided to support the nationalists since in 1964 army pensioners were not happy with the military government, as their daily life was made extremely difficult by the nationalization of shops. Once again the leaders of the movement met together in Champai. Sonkhopau and Tunkhopum with thirty trained people were there, having returned from Pakistan without any difficulties. In Champhai Lt: CoL Sonkhopau was accused of sabotaging the movement by forming the “Chin Government”. Hrangnawl made him understand that he and his followers were being disarmed because of that.
Sonkhopau was then sent with two armed men to see the leaders of the Naga National Council; but he was arrested by the Assam Rifles on his way to Nagaland. Sonkhopau did not reveal his true identity and gave his name as Thuantak. He was put in prison in Imphal, (and Damkhohau later revealed his true identity to the Indian authorities.
ျမန္မာလိုေရးရင္ ေကာင္းမွာပါ။ ေက်းဇူးတင္ပါသည္ ေစာင့္ေမွ်ာ္လ်က္။