RESCUED CHILD SOLDIERS

Introduction & Overview

Throughout Burma (Myanmar), children as young as eleven are being forcibly recruited into Burma's national army, the largest user of child soldiers in the world. Without their parents' knowledge or consent, they are sent to military training camps where they are routinely beaten, and brutally punished if they try to escape. Once deployed, they may be forced to fight and/or carry out human rights abuses against civilians, including other children.

      To sponsor a rescued child soldier in Myanmar– click here

      To invest in building a home for rescued child soldiers in Mynamar – click here

There are said to be over 300,000 in the world.  The Asian Wall Street Journal says possibly 1/4th of these are located in Myanmar (Burma).  Myanmar is roughly 40% tribal ethnics.  Many of these groups are autonomous and at odds with the current military regime that rules Myanmar.  Some of these ethnic groups like the Shan and Wa are also major producers and traffickers of opium and amphetamines.  Within this complex ethnic social structure wars and armed conflicts abound.  Children are at high risk in these conflicts.  Not only are they at risk of losing parents but also are at risk of being conscripted into the armies themselves.  

These are what we call our covert operations.  For the sake of the children and those involved in rescuing them we can not publicize specific details. However we will give you a brief overview. 

It took us eight years to gain the favor to take these children.  In the beginning we were lucky to get close to them.  The first ones we saw were dirty, loud snotty nosed kids.  They were running around in fatigues.  Every one of them was orphaned.  Every one of them was being trained as a soldier.  Some of them were as young as six years old.  Let me tell you, we were ruined.  We had to do something!

That was in 1997.  In the beginning we had no ones trust.  We couldn’t even get pictures of orphans to prove that they were there because the locals thought we were capturing their spirits to film for spiritual power issues.  We developed a strategy of caring for children outside of the target area.  Eventually our work opened up an invitation inside.  There we were allowed to begin a children’s home.  The head of this home was a widow. 

That home is still open and prospering.  We know it is grace.  The children continue to outperform all the other children in the region both in sports and in academics.  The home eventually caught the attention of the local government.  We used this as a platform for church planting and there are several thousand new believers in the area.  We also launched varied indigenous development and education projects in the region. 

Then in 2004 the local government contacted us.  It wanted to give us a tour of some of the child solider programs.  We documented over 1000 of these children at two cities in military camps.  After our tour they requested help.  “Could we help with food, clothing and education?”  “Of course,” we replied, “Not that we have much but we will do what we can!”    We brought some truckloads of rice in and gave shirts away to the kids.  Then we started to send teachers in to one of the locations. 

A year later because of international pressures and local famines we were approached once more.  Would we take some of the child soldiers?  Of course we would.  Well it was a battle of politics.  Not everyone in the government or even neighboring countries wanted us to take these children.  But in May of 2005 we had 35 child soldiers (all with malaria) sleeping with our already crowded children’s home!  In August we finished some cottages and another 40 children joined our first 35 at their new homes.  

Today most of these children know Jesus.  They are the talk of the entire district:  “How could these children have changed so much?  It is amazing!  They are not like the child soldiers we know…”