Khun Sa
After his release Khun Sa went underground, and in 1976 rejoined and reformed his forces in Ban Hin Taek, in northern Thailand, close to the border with Burma. Soon after he began to reform his forces he adopted the Shan name "Khun Sa" (literally "Prince Prosperous") for the first time. He renamed his group the Shan United Army, began to claim that he was fighting for Shan autonomy against the Burmese government, and told international reporters that his people only grew drugs to pay for clothes and food. In 1977 he offered to take his territory's entire opium crop off the black market by selling it to the American government, but his offer was rejected.