Myanmar - The Khun Sa Gang (formerly the Shan United Army, or Mong Tai)

The Mong Tai army was the private plaything of ruthless druglord turned hotel mogul Chang Chi Fu, also known by the thespian title Khun Sa (the Prince of Death; see below). It broke up into factions in June 1995, charging their leader with spending too much time tinkering with his dope business and not enough fighting for freedom. (Khun Sa theatrically claimed the defections occurred because he is half Chinese.) And government troops seized the drug warlord's mountain stronghold at Ho Mong in January 1996. The cagey guerrilla commander cut a deal with SLORC in which he turned over his territory and what was left of his army to the government in exchange for amnesty. Problem is, it seems he didn't tell his guerrillas. One Mong Tai army officer who made it into Thailand shortly before SLORC took the base said, "We were told our commanders were negotiating with SLORC for a cease-fire-but it turned out they were allowing the Burmese troops to take over our bases." Oh, well. Khun Sa has maintained all along that he was never an opium trader but a freedom fighter, and that he taxed drug runners moving through his territory to help fund the Shan liberation cause. An unknown number of the former soldiers remain loyal to Khun Sa and have been tasked with building and operating at least a dozen methamphetamine factories in the jungle along Myanmar's borders with Thailand and Laos.