Border Guard Forces
Shoulder sleeve insignia of the Border Guard Forces
FoundedApril 2009 (2009-04)
Country Myanmar
Branch Myanmar Army
TypeBorder guard
Light infantry
RoleBorder control
Counterinsurgency
Counterintelligence
Forward observer
Guerrilla warfare
HUMINT
Indirect fire
Internal security
Irregular warfare
Jungle warfare
Mountain Warfare
Patrolling
Raiding
Reconnaissance
Screening
Tracking
Size8,000 (Karenic Kayin BGF)
4,000 (Karenic Kayan BGF)
5,000 (Karenic Pa oh BGF)
2,000 (Kachin KDA+NKA)
1,000 (Kokang BGF)
= 18,998 (total)
Part ofTatmadaw
Nickname(s)BGF
Commanders
Minister of DefenceGeneral Mya Tun Oo
Commander-in-Chief of Myanmar Armed ForcesSr. General Min Aung Hlaing
Regional commandersSeveral generals, including Saw Chit Thu
Insignia
Flag of Myanmar Border Guard Forces

Border Guard Forces (Burmese: နယ်ခြားစောင့်တပ်; abbreviated BGF) are subdivisions of the Tatmadaw (Myanmar Armed Forces) consisting of former insurgent groups in Myanmar under the instruction of Regional Military Commands. The government announced its plan to create Border Guard Forces in April 2009, in the hopes of ending hostilities between the government and insurgent groups leading up to the 2010 general election.

History

In 2008 the new constitution made it mandatory for insurgent groups to transition into a BGF before the government would agree to engage in peace talks.[1] Following the government announcement on BGFs, the government set a deadline for all insurgent groups to transition into BGFs, and that all ceasefire agreements prior to the deadline would become "null and void". The deadline was originally set to be June 2009, but was delayed five times until September 2010.[2][3]

In April 2009, Lieutenant General Ye Myint led a government entourage to meet with Kokang, Shan and Wa insurgent groups, to discuss plans to create "collective security" formed by insurgent groups and under the command of the Tatmadaw, which would eventually lead to the creation of the Border Guard Forces.[4] In 2009, four of the insurgent groups, the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army, the Kachin Defence Army (4th Brigade of the KIA), the New Democratic Army - Kachin (NDA-K) and the Pa-O National Organisation/Army (PNO/A), accepted the transition plan's terms and transformed into BGF groups.[5]

On 20 August 2009, Tatmadaw soldiers and recently transitioned BGF groups gathered outside the town of Laukkai, Kokang, in preparation for an attempt to recapture the town from the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA), after they refused to transform into a BGF.[6][7]

The government changed its aggressive stance towards BGFs and ceasefires on 18 August 2011, when then President of Myanmar Thein Sein pledged to "make the ethnic issue a national priority" by offering open dialogue between the government and all insurgent groups, without the BGF requirement.[2]

In 2010, a powerful commander of DKBA Saw Chit Thu accepted the Burma government’s demands to transform itself into the Border Guard Force, under the command of the Tatmadaw and serving as the leader.[8]

Structure

There are no official government guidelines regarding BGFs, but there are lines in the Burmese constitution that reference them. The following are de facto rules set by the Tatmadaw upon creation of the Border Guard Forces:[2][4]

  • BGFs may only operate in the area they are assigned by the government
  • All members of a BGF are to be paid the same salary as a regular soldier in the Tatmadaw
  • Each BGF is to have exactly 326 personnel, 30 of whom are to be regular Tatmadaw soldiers
  • Important administrative positions are to be held only by Tatmadaw soldiers

Ranks

Rank group General / flag officers Senior officers Junior officers Officer cadet
Border Guard Forces
ဗိုလ်မှူးကြီး
bohmu:gyi:		 ဒုတိယ ဗိုလ်မှူးကြီး
du.ti.ya. bohmu:gyi:		 ဗိုလ်မှူး
bohmu:		 ဗိုလ်ကြီး
bogyi:		 ဗိုလ်
bo		 ဒုတိယ ဗိုလ်
du.ti.ya. bo
Rank group Senior NCOs Junior NCOs Enlisted
Border Guard Forces No insignia
အရာခံဗိုလ်
ăyaganbo		 ဒုအရာခံဗိုလ်
du.ăyaganbo		 တပ်ခွဲတပ်ကြပ်ကြီး
tathkwè:tatkyatkyi:		 တပ်ကြပ်ကြီး
tatkyatkyi:		 တပ်ကြပ်
tatkyat		 ဒုတပ်ကြပ်
du.tatkyatkyi:		 တပ်သား
tattha:

References

  1. ↑ "Border guard plan could fuel ethnic conflict". IRIN. 29 November 2010. Archived from the original on 3 March 2016. Retrieved 8 May 2016.
  2. 1 2 3 "Border Guard Force Scheme". www.mmpeacemonitor.org. Myanmar Peace Monitor. 11 January 2013. Archived from the original on 15 May 2016. Retrieved 8 May 2016.
  3. ↑ McCartan, Brian (30 April 2010). "Myanmar ceasefires on a tripwire". Asia Times. Archived from the original on 1 May 2010. Retrieved 21 March 2012.
  4. 1 2 Wai Moe (31 August 2009). "Border Guard Force Plan Leads to End of Ceasefire". The Irrawaddy. Archived from the original on 2 March 2011. Retrieved 21 March 2012.
  5. ↑ "NDF Report on Ceasefire Groups Resisting SPDC's Pressure and Instability" (PDF). National Democratic Front (Burma). Mae Sot, Thailand. 7 March 2010. Archived (PDF) from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 21 March 2012.
  6. ↑ "Tension sparks people to flee into China". Shan Herald. 24 August 2009. Archived from the original on 2 September 2009. Retrieved 29 August 2009.
  7. ↑ Dittmer, Lowell (30 September 2010). Burma Or Myanmar? the Struggle for National Identity. World Scientific. ISBN 9789814313643.
  8. ↑ "Kayin State BGF officers and others collectively resign". Eleven Media Group. 16 January 2021. Archived from the original on 29 September 2022. Retrieved 12 September 2023.
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