(Basing on staff posts from The JUSTICE FOR TRUTH on 15 July 2026.)
What
exactly happened to the famous MDY-PDF, the Mandalay-PDF, which together with
the mighty Palaung ARMY (TNLA) basically kicked the collective arse of Myanmar
Generals and their raping-robbing-murdering-burning army during the 1027
operations in late-2023. And then in early 2024 as the following SHAN-MAN
Operations, they liberated major regions of Mandalay Administrative Division
and nearly captured Mandalay City itself?
But
then they had suddenly lost all their captured territories in mid-2025 and utterly
disappeared! I was horribly wondering what happened to the MDY-PDF and trying
to find out the reasons for their sudden collapse. And finally, I did manage to
connect the hidden dots and dashes and then figure out the following dramatic
story.
Apparently, there was a violent internal coup by two medical doctors-turned-revolutionary- politicians (Dr Tayza-Soe and Dr So-Thura-Zaw) to take over the rich organization from the two main military leaders (Bo Mone-Dai and Bo Naing-Gyi) responsible for the earlier success that brought along military power and enormous wealth in the form of gold and precious gemstones from the naturally-rich Shan-Man region.
Who Are Bo-Mone-Dai and Bo-Naing-Gyi?
Bo
Mone-Dai (alias) Ywar-Thar was an ethnic Burmese born in Zagaing Division on 24
June 1994. He was the Founder of MDY-PDF. And the Military Operation Commander
and Organizational Controller till he was illegally and violently toppled on 15
November 2025 by the armed units of NUG (NLD’s Exile National Unity Government)
in the Mogoke Town.
At
the young age of 20 in 2014 he moved to Mandalay City from the Zagaing Town and
started involving in the student politics as a student leader. He was linked to
veteran student activists from the 8-8-1988 Uprising and actively participated
in their political and civil-society activities.
He also took part in the young leadership programs delivered by US-Embassy’s Jefferson Centre Mandalay. In 2015 Myanmar General Elections he was part of the US-Embassy-supervised Elections Monitors at Kokogyun Electorate in Rangoon Division.
From
being an extraordinary political activist, he eventually transformed himself
into an extremely capable military commander while establishing the MDY-PDF and
growing it into an excellent rebel army within a few years.
Bo-Naing-Gyi
(alias) Gyin-Gyi was also an ethnic Burmese. He was born in Mandalay on 30
April 1993. During 2019 Covid Crisis he actively volunteered at various COVID
Centres in Mandalay. Since the 2021 establishment of MDY-PDF and till 2025,
when he was illegally and violently detained on 15 November 2025, he was part
of General Staff Council and the Quartermaster-General of MDY-PDF.
Establishment of Mandalay PDF (MDY-PDF)
Myanmar
Army staged the Coup on 01 February 2021 and arrested the democratically
elected leaders including Aung San Suu Kyi and President Win Myint on that day.
Within the very first week of that February the people from Mandalay and
surrounding townships came out onto the streets and staged massive but peaceful
protests against the illegal military coup.
But
the foolish Myanmar Army ordered by that crazy-motherfucker General Min Aung
Hlaing violently responded by brutally killing hundreds and hundreds of their
own people on the streets and their own homes.
By
the last week of that February the people of Mandalay had decided that the only
way to respond the brutish-and-foolish Myanmar Army was the armed response and
started sending their eager youths to the EAOs (Ethnic Armed Organizations) in
both South and North regions of Myanmar to receive military trainings and weaponry
assistances. TNLA (The Palaung Army) was one of those allied EAOs.
By
early May 2021, with the help from TNLA, up to three military training batches,
each one a thousand strong, were successfully completed and they became the
armed nucleus of MDY-PDF. By first week of July 2021 MDY-PDF was officially
formed with at least 4,000 young men and young women fully armed and equipped and
ready for the war coming.
Their
troops were mainly armed and financed by TNLA and also still in the
TNLA-controlled territory, but they were ready for the coming fights against
the universally hated Myanmar Army. Battles would be bloodied intense as it was
also a very first time ethnic Burmese would be facing each other again since
the CPB (Communist Party of Burma) collapsed in the 1980s.
Series of Battles between MDY-PDF and Myanmar Army
After
more than a year of preparation, recruitment, training, and arming of nearly
10,000 strong youths, very first operation of MDY-PDF was the devastating raid and
occupation of Gway-Bin Village Army Camp and Police Station situated at the
strategic position on Mandalay-Mogoke Vehicualr Road in mid-February 2022.
War-Zo
Operation in September 2022 was the very first organization wide attacks on
Myanmar Army camps in Mandalay Division and adjacent territories. In 2023, the
Operation Yar-Za-Naing in March, the Operation Tha-Byay-Nyo in April, and the
Operation Ka-Naung in July were successfully implemented.
The
result was the complete domination and control of territories between Moe-goke
and Pyin-oo-lwin Towns and ability to threaten Mandalay City itself. Mard-da-yar,
Sint-gu, and Tha-beik-kyin townships adjacent to the Mandalay Township were
captured in 2023-24 operations. Plans were already being drawn to capture
Pyin-oo-lwin Garrison Town and then the Divisional Capital of Mandalay.
Despite theoretically being under the centralised-organizational-control of NUG-MOD (NUG’s Ministry of Defence) the MDY-PDF was basically self-financed and self-armed and nearly 100% independently operating from the NUG-MOD. Later capturing famous Rubyland, Moe-goke, and almost all the gold-mining sites on Chindwin River basically made MDY-PDF famously rich too.
By
then MDY-PDF became so rich, all the massive loans for arms and ammunitions
from TNLA during the founding and training periods were repaid back to the TNLA
and they even supplied ammunitions and arms back to the TNLA whenever needed.
Their wealth and power and independence, at the same time, were unsettling their
supposed bosses from NUG-MOD.
The Two jealous Doctors Taking Over MDY-PDF forcefully later from the two founders are Dr. Soe Thura Zaw, a dentist, and Dr. Tayzar San, a general physician, both have been actively revolting against the Myanmar Army since the 2012 Coup.
Dr Soe Thura Zaw
Following
the 2021 Myanmar coup, Soe Thura Zaw became an active participant in the Civil
Disobedience Movement (CDM) against military rule. He was among the doctors who
had their medical licenses revoked by the military junta.
He
later joined the Mandalay PDF, which operates in Myanmar's second-largest city,
and became the leader of its drone unit. The Mandalay PDF drone unit was
founded by two engineering students and has since grown to include more than 50
members. He was later promoted to a commander of the Mandalay PDF and
participated in Operation 1027 alongside other allied rebel forces. After the
revolutionary forces successfully recaptured his hometown of Mogok, he had the
opportunity to return home.
On
10 September 2025, he was appointed Deputy Chief of Staff of the People's Defence
Force Military Command by the National Unity Government (NUG).
Dr Tayzar San
Tayzar
San (born 1989) is a Burmese physician, politician and pro-democracy activist. He
is a leading figure in the Spring Revolution in Myanmar. San served as chairman
of the Mandalay District All Burma Federation of Student Unions.
A
physician by training, San attended University of Medicine Mandalay. After
graduation, he worked as a librarian and NGO worker with a focus on public
health and political education. In 2010, he founded the Beautiful Mind
Foundation, which provides free health care services to the poor. He became the
executive director of the Yone Kyi Yar Knowledge Propagation Society, a local
research and parliamentary monitoring group.
A
few days after the 2021 Myanmar coup d'état, while other activists in the
country were still deliberating, he organized the first ever protest against
the junta. Following that first protest in Mandalay, anti-regime rallies
blossomed across the country.
On
19 April 2021, Myanmar authorities issued an arrest warrant and charged San
with defamation of the state under section 505 (a) of the penal code. They
announced a 10 million kyat (U.S. $7,000) reward for information leading to his
arrest.
On
10 June 2021, he received the Park Jong-cheol Human Rights Award. He is also a
member of Anti-junta Forces Coordination Committee-Mandalay that is a member
organization of NUCC.
Frictions between MDY-PDF and NUG-MOD
After
more than a year totally controlling a vast region comprising Mattaya and Singu
and Thabeikkyin townships MDY-PDF was forced into a difficult situation by
their ethnic allied the Palaung Army (TNLA) in mid-2025.
Under
China’s enormous political and financial pressures, the TNLA was forced into a
series of peace talks with Myanmar Army and forced to surrender their captured
towns, Mogoke The Ruby-land and Momeik.
Without
backing from the TNLA and under overwhelming counter attacks from Myanmar Army
the MDY-PDF was ordered by NUG-MOD to withdraw to the neighbouring Da-Gaung
Region as NUG-MOD’s own forces were withdrawing to Da-Gaung also. But Bo Mon-Dai
had stubbornly refused to obey that order.
He believed that some of MDY-PDF troops should be left in the captured townships to fight a guerrilla war against Myanmar Army. The disagreements started that way and eventually reached the ugly peak in early November 2025.
The
main reason was the sordid desire of NUG-MOD to control the MDY-PDF absolutely.
To achieve that Bo-Mon-Dai and Bo-Naing-Gyi were to be removed and replaced by
the faction of two doctors loyal to the NUG-MOD Minister Yi Mon.
First
they accused Bo-Mon-Dai and Bo-Niang-Gyi of misappropriating a large amount of
gold and other financial resources from MDY-PDF and charged them with thievery.
Then they sent in at least two heavily armed battalions into the town of Mogoke
to block all the access roads.
Back then MDY-PDF temporary Command HQ was in Mogoke Town and by capturing and interrogating some key personnels from HQ staff they found out exactly where Bo-Mon-Dai and Bo-Naing-Gyi and the treasury were.
Finally
on the early morning of November 25, 2025, the forces from NUG-MOD raided
MDY-PDF HQ in Mogoke Town and detained violently Bo-Mon-Dai and Bo-Naing-Gyi. They
both were brutally beaten up, hog-tied, Blind-folded, gaged, and taken away in
the back of Toyota Hilux Dual cabs pickup trucks.
Since
that day the two founding leaders of MDY-PDF have been illegally detained at
some undisclosed prison camp in Upper Burma. They were not allowed to see or
even contact their families.
And
the MDY-PDF was basically dismantled, and all her armed troops have been
reorganized as a Special Mobile Division under the NUG’s Ministry of Defense on
its fifth anniversary. And where are the two doctors? Both are now promoted by
the NUG-MOD Minister Yi-Mon to high-ranking military positions in the NUG-MOD. Dr.
Soe Thura Zaw now is the
Deputy-Chief-of-Staff.
The
juicy outcome of that internal coup is tons and tons of gold and extremely rare
gemstones worthed millions and millions of US$ patiently gathered over the
years by MDY-PDF, rumoured to be enough to rearm all the nationwide PDF troops
under the NUG-MOD, were greedily taken into the NUG-MOD treasury.
