The security situation developing in Myanmar holds long-term geo-strategic consequences for the integrity of India’s northeastern region. A scenario like in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan is quite possibly in the making. Analogies are never perfect fits, but they can help draw attention to key features and conceptual boundaries of an emergent situation being learned and probably make it easier for decision-makers to navigate their way in the highly complex matrix in Myanmar.
No one is asking the obvious question: are the developments in Myanmar taking place in a strategic vacuum? Framed differently, who stands to gain? Myanmar is an ethnic mosaic-like Afghanistan or India and has had a long history of insurgencies. But this time around, the mosaic is showing signs of fault lines breaking up under the weight of external intervention.
What has helped Myanmar survive ethnic strife so far is that the insurgent groups could never coalesce into a united front and outside intervention was virtually non-existent. The reason for this was that the Burmans, the Sino-Tibetan ethnic group who constitute Myanmar’s largest ethnic group, accounted for an estimated 70 percent of the country’s population—comparable to the ‘critical mass’ of the Hindu population in India—whereas the insurgent groups were drawn from the non-Burman groups in the country, many of which had converted to Christianity. And there are over 135 indigenous ethnic groups in Myanmar.
However, there has been a phenomenal shift in the recent past. In a little over a year, these ethnic insurgent groups have been encouraged by external forces to join hands with the armed civilian groups called People’s Defence Forces, the military wing of the country’s self-declared National Unity Government (NUG) in exile opposing military rule. Simply put, what distinguishes the current situation is an unprecedented level of coordination between disparate non-Burman ethnic groups and the Burman-dominated NUG in exile. Suffice to say, western intelligence has done a masterly job to manage this transition.
Significantly, even as the anti-government militant surge by the NUG has led to wild speculations that a regime change in Myanmar is around the corner, in a brilliant piece of ‘psy war’, the curtain has been lifted on the NUG in exile. Last week, the New York Times disclosed that “the American headquarters” of the NUG is located in Washington DC, in a building just three blocks from the White House.
NUG officials routinely testify before Congress. Last December, President Joe Biden signed the so-called Burma Act, which calls for sanctions on those who quashed Myanmar’s reforms and gave “non-lethal aid” to pro-democracy forces. Traditionally, Myanmar was never a foreign policy priority for the US but that has changed against the backdrop of the Biden administration’s dual containment strategy against China and Russia. The same thing is happening vis-à-vis Bangladesh.
There have been reports that western intelligence agencies mastermind the regime change agenda in Myanmar from their base camp in Thailand—training the militants, coordinating with the ethnic militia groups and fine-tuning the broad strategy or the big picture. Last week, a report in the prominent Russian daily Izvestia titled, ‘The Burmese Triangle: How the US is fuelling the conflict in Myanmar’, highlighted the strategic implications for China and India. The article acknowledged that “the military administration that came to power [in Myanmar] has not faced a greater threat than it is now. Interim President Myint Shwe said that the country would be on the verge of collapse if the military could not suppress the resistance”.
The report added, “The current situation is turning against Beijing itself. Instability on the border may hinder Chinese investments in the region and even ambitions to create a global economic corridor. For China, Myanmar is important as a country that plays a vital role in the implementation of the Belt and Road Initiative. A transport corridor to the deep-water port of Kyaukpyu, which is being built by the Chinese, should pass through it, as well as oil and gas pipelines built in 2013-2017 that are of strategic importance to the PRC.”
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Importantly, however, the daily brushed aside the feverish talk of any “impending collapse” of Myanmar and alluded to “negotiations between Moscow and Naypyidaw about the possible deployment of a Russian naval base and sending a ‘limited contingent’ to help the ‘friendly regime’,” quoting expert opinion. Evidently, not all ethnic minorities are fighting Naypyidaw because they lack resources. The point is, there are about 66 armed formations in the territory of Myanmar, their strength varying between several hundreds and 2,000–3,000 militants. But there have been reports about Washington stepping up arms supplies to the militant wing of the opposition. The rebels are not only supplied with lethal weapons but are also trained in subversive activities.
On the other hand, the Myanmar military has remained the only force keeping the country from chaos through the past five decades, and the destruction of the army will actually mean catastrophe for Burmese statehood. This can undermine the stability and relative prosperity of the entire Southeast Asian region in general. The spectre that haunts Myanmar is that the country may fall victim to the fratricidal strife fuelled by the West for geopolitical purposes and descend into chaos, as has happened to Afghanistan.
A think-tanker at the Centre for Policy Research in Delhi was recently quoted as saying, “It is high time that New Delhi looks beyond its narrow relationship with the junta and starts seriously engaging… with the NUG.” This recommendation must be music to American ears. But it is a dangerous thought process, as Pakistan’s tragic experience shows—projecting power into next-door Afghanistan at the behest of Washington. Pakistan’s downhill slide began when Zia ul Haq blithely allowed his country’s remote borderlands to be the hunting ground of the Central Intelligence Agency to wage the Afghan Jihad.
M K Bhadrakumar
Former diplomat
(Views are personal.)