Myanmar is imperilled by immense upheaval, ethnic strife, and fundamentally inept military junta that is struggling command compliance from within its ranks and respect from beyond. Of all external parties with interest in domestic developments, China is most certainly in the best position to broker for peace in the country – should it choose to do so. With that said, critical challenges remain, and require a high level of pragmatic flexibility from all parties.
An unbridled downward spiral
On September 4th, the Myanmar military (Tatmadaw) regime in Naypidaw designated three major ethnic armed militias as “terrorist” groups – including the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance (MDNAA), Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA), and Arakan Army. These three groups comprise the Three Brotherhood Alliance, a military grouping that has posed a significant threat to the military dictatorship. This was but one of the numerous signs that junta lead Senior General Ming Aung Hlaing is becoming increasingly desperate as rebel groups acquire vast swathes of territories across northern and western Myanmar.
Over three years on from the military coup, millions of Burmese citizens have been displaced, with many fleeing their homes as rebel groups and military-aligned factions alike vie for control over the largest country on mainland Southeast Asia. Whilst the opposition has enjoyed considerable recent successes, such as the elimination of pro-regime criminal gangs through Operation 1027 in the Kokang region, as well as the recent capture of Lashio, capital of the China-bordering state of Shan, it remains fundamentally fragmented, incoherent, and disorganised in face of the austere militarised regime. Many in the amorphous resistance remain locked at loggerheads and in acrimonious conflict with one another – save from the purportedly unifying objective of tearing down the junta, few see eye to eye in the sprawling coalition of the unwilling.
Neighbouring countries in ASEAN, of which Myanmar remains nominally a part, and amongst which several have registered their refusal to recognise the military usurpers, are precipitously concerned about the security fall-out and regional instability resulting from the country’s downward spiral. The civil war has compounded long-standing structural issues of regional concern, such as Myanmar’s wanton treatment of the Rohingya people, which has produced a sizeable number of refugees crossing into Thailand and Bangladesh. It has also spurred a significant increase in splinter military groupings that – whilst broadly aligned with the junta – have taken to systemically dismantle policing and judicial institutions, to the point where vast swathes of Myanmar are neither governable nor in fact governed properly.
Beijing’s strategic flexibility and ambiguity
China has a complex set of interests both within and in relation to Myanmar.
Many large state-owned enterprises have significant economic and financial interests in the construction and maintenance of mega-projects such as the China-Myanmar Economic Corridor, and the Sino-Myanmar pipelines conjoining the Kyakphyu deep-water port in the Bay of Bengal with Yunnan’s Kunming. Numerous projects have been postponed or downsized as a result of financing difficulties, but also due to more logistical concerns pertaining to the safety of personnel and tenability of operations. Cross-border trade has plummeted, as China turns to securitising its borders against the horde of illicit criminals and gangsters that have benefited off the laissez-faire approach and tacit accommodation, even, provided by the Tatmadaw.
Beijing’s fundamental foreign policy doctrine of opposing “external interference” both constrains the range of policy options it can publicly and openly pursue, as well as compels it to view the civil war in the country as – in part – a proxy struggle for regional influence between China and the U.S.. Rightly or wrongly, such interpretations have thus spurred the country’s general reticence to take explicit sides in the conflict. Yet this has by no means prevented it from contacting and engaging with both the junta and opposition alike.
Indeed, the Chinese administration is well aware of the duplicity of the ruling regime of Myanmar. Fundamentally, the military remains a highly self-serving and transactional actor – albeit one that struggles to see to the establishment of stability and order that would in fact advance its economic interests. This, in part, explains why the Chinese military, public security, and foreign ministry apparatus have each developed close communicative and day-to-day ties with many of the rebel groups in the country – except for a select few whom it views as far too US- and West-aligned, such as the People’s Defence Force. Such maneuvering has been pivotal in ensuring that the conflict in Myanmar does not spill over into disruptive interruptions or turmoil in the Southwest of China, as well as seeing to it that China can maintain an open passageway connecting it with the Bay of Bengal.
From Beijing’s perspective, such strategic flexibility and ambiguity are, to some extent, understandable. Yet in the eyes of its critics – including many in the conservative military establishment in Naypidaw – Beijing is playing all sides.
Why “all-side” diplomacy is perhaps insufficient for peace.
Mid-August this year, the Director of the Central Committee Foreign Affairs Commission Office and Foreign Minister of China Wang Yi travelled to Myanmar, meeting General Ming Aung Hlaing; he subsequently travelled to Thailand to engage Mekong River states, and hosted UN Special Envoy on Myanmar Julie Bishop on August 20th. China has increasingly taken to positioning itself as a critical mediator for reconciliation, as I have long advocated it ought to do. It has done so thus far by proffering to be an “all-side” negotiator – friendly with all sides, albeit trusted by perhaps few. Indeed, through these recent gestures, Beijing is apparently signalling its determination and keenness for the situation in Myanmar to de-escalate.
Yet such signalling, as welcome as it may be by those invested in China-Myanmar ties as a helpful first step, has proven to fall short of the expectations of many. Offers to assist Myanmar with aid for elections have been criticised by international observers and commentators as lacking in teeth – when it comes to enforcement and ensuring that the Tatmadaw would accept and conduct them fairly. Furthermore, whilst Chinese diplomats have avidly liaised and spoken with the range of stakeholders implicated in the conflict, the worry remains that there is a dearth of follow-up action or ‘bite’ to the outcomes of negotiations. Ultimately, Beijing may strive to be everything to everyone as a core thrust of its Myanmar policy. Between a severe refugee crisis, a looming humanitarian disaster, and an opposition enmeshed in infighting, however, such multi-vectoral diplomacy – on its own – cannot be the prime solution to this Gordian knot.
What can China do to advance its peace mandate?
Theodore Roosevelt once said, “Speak softly and carry a big stick; you will go far.”
The Tatmadaw responds primarily not to reason, but to an exhibition of force. Beijing should thus issue and make clear its demands – especially in private communications – that Naypidaw should be open to constructive dialogue with representatives of the range of disparate rebel groups, with the objectives of brokering an eventual power-sharing agreement in exchange for ceasefire. Whilst mass, open elections remain a lofty goal that is nevertheless vastly unlikely given the rampant violence and non-compliant actors in both the military and the opposition, it is imperative that all sides set clear guardrails in their usage of force – and that no party views the conflict in Myanmar as resolvable through total military victory: neither achievable, nor necessarily a definitively desirable objective.
General Ming Aung Hlaing has managed to cling onto power through a combination of arbitrary arrests, extensive detentions, and powerful surveillance apparatus. Yet his standing remains tenuous at best, given elite defections and growing disillusionment from the Buddhist religious establishment and oligopoly of powerful private businesses that have both propped up and benefited off the military. Within the corridors of establishmentarian power, Beijing should identify and work with voices that are more amenable to pragmatic peace, and seek to reassure them of safe passage and potential refuge in the event of a drastic regime turnover.
Finally, with a newly installed Thai government less likely to take a lead in spearheading or coordinating relief efforts in Myanmar, China must nevertheless work closely with its ASEAN partners in addressing the refugee crisis that has resulted from the ongoing instability. Building up a sustainable medium-term scheme for integrating and assimilating refugees who have fled Myanmar in ASEAN states is vital in preventing the arising of secondary conflicts and tensions between the populations of the Mekong River states and the newcomers into their countries.
The peace mandate is no mean task. It requires more than just strategic dexterity, but pragmatic resolve and swiftness.
