State of Burma - Background

Background

During the early stages of World War II, the Empire of Japan invaded British Burma primarily to obtain raw materials (which included oil from fields around Yenangyaung, minerals and large surpluses of rice), and to close off the Burma Road, which was a primary link for aid and munitions to the Chinese Nationalist forces of Chiang Kai-Shek which had been fighting the Japanese for several years in the Second Sino-Japanese War.

The Japanese Fifteenth Army under Lieutenant General Shojiro Iida quickly overran Burma from January – May 1942. The Japanese had also assisted formation of the Burma Independence Army (BIA), which aided the Japanese during their invasion. The BIA formed a provisional government in some areas of the country in the spring of 1942, but there were differences within the Japanese leadership over the future of Burma. While Colonel Suzuki encouraged the BIA to form a provisional government, the Japanese military leadership had never formally accepted such a plan and the Japanese government held out only vague promises of independence after the end of the war. However, a Burmese Executive Administration was established in Rangoon on 1 August 1942 with the aim of creating a civil administration to manage day-to-day administrative activities subordinate to the Japanese military administration. The head of the provisional administration was Dr. Ba Maw, a noted lawyer and political prisoner under the British.