News filtering out of Myanmar presents a chaotic picture of the ground situation with ethnic armies and alliance partners taking on the junta’s forces all over the country. The junta has lost a string of bases and camps with some of its men being forced to flee across the border into India.
Reports suggest there is no threat yet to the junta-held capital of Nay Pyi Taw in south-central Myanmar, although reports suggest incremental moves towards surrounding the city and besieging it. This would take time, not to mention coordinating the movement of rebel groups and marshalling men, materiel and equipment. It appears junta forces in the capital are increasingly dependent, for supplies of food and fuel, on the goodwill of people outside the city.
The understanding is the city may not fall without a fight, but if and when it does, it would be historic, spelling the end of the military’s half-century domination of this country.
Myanmar burgeoning community of anti-junta activists and journalists, have little doubt that morale among junta soldiers is low. So much is apparent from the defection of 10,000 soldiers and police over the last year. That number does not include those who have surrendered. The junta has ordered forced conscription of young men in an effort to make up the shortfall but how committed these young men are to a deeply unpopular junta is hard to say.
There is a view that the army does not like what the junta chief Gen Min Aung Hlaing is doing, but there does not seem any consensus on what to do about it. This view also holds that the general himself is looking for an exit.
A cross-section of scholars from India and Myanmar were of the view that the army, unlike in the past, no longer has the ethnic Bamar population behind them. This is seen as a major setback. The Bamar make up nearly 70% of the population of 35 million and gradually turned against the junta in the wake of Gen Hlaing’s Feb 2021 coup.
They now appear ready to join hands with the other ethnic groups to free the country from the junta. The general sentiment at this point seems to favour a federal polity, “something on the lines of what India has,” an activist supporting the National Unity Government (NUG) told Stratnewsglobal. “We are promoting federalism, we are not communists, we are democrats, are aligned with the West and are ethnically diverse.”
He suspects some element of “balkanisation” may have set in given the speed with which the central authority represented by the junta, has collapsed. A case in point is Rakhine state where the Arakan Army appears firmly in charge. A journalist-activist was of the view that “Rakhine is going to be stronger, self-governing”, and while he noticed shortages of essential items during recent travels there, shops and clinics were also open and busy.
He underscored the general view that the Arakan Army is pro-China but says they want to engage with India too. In fact, India’s federal system comprising a strong centre and states is a frequent topic of discussion. He says India must talk to Myanmar’s ethnic groups including the NUG, which has a representative office in Delhi. There is opposition to the idea of India fencing the Myanmar border, the argument being that “A soft border will ensure Myanmar doesn’t get pushed towards China, nobody wants to go in that direction.”
The key question is what happens to the Rohingya minority in Rakhine state? For that matter, is there any consensus among the other ethnic groups about the Rohingya? Do they have a future in Myanmar? It’s not clear. The NUG, activists say, has no policy on giving citizenship to the Rohingya.
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