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On any given day, out of the world’s view, clouds of white smoke journey towards the sky deep in the jungles of Burma. This smoke is evidence of the Burmese military’s forced relocation program, marked by its unceremonious burning of villages.

Innocent villagers inevitably suffer the consequences of Burma’s military junta’s "four cuts" strategy to cut off insurgent groups from food, finance, information, and recruits. Villagers are given anywhere from an hour to three weeks to say goodbye to the land of their ancestors before they are forcibly moved and their homes are turned to ash. Burnt outlines and solitary charred poles are all that remains of homes that once formed generations-old communities.

The burned villages are labeled black areas off limits to everyone but the army. This is a free fire zone where the soldiers shoot first and consider their target's identity later. Despite the risk, many villagers cannot resist the need to return to their villages and their farms. Though the military’s official targets are rebels, the usual victims are hungry, destitute, and recently homeless villagers trying to salvage the little that remains or to harvest the crops that had been planted before the military came and forced them to flee. Those that the military fails to kill directly might be killed by the supplies of rice, not pillaged or consumed in the fires, that the military has poisoned or surrounded with landmines. Even those villagers that survive their somber homecoming are at the risk of being branded “insurgents” and killed later.