Further to yesterday’s post about the Burmese generals and their reputed lack of intelligence I would like to introduce another slightly contrarian perspective. Thanks to everyone who has already weighed in with their comments.
I have sometimes wondered out loud whether the exceptionalism that underpins many analyses of the Burmese generals is built on another slight mis-reading of their capacities. When we look to the Burmese generals it is all too easy to see them as unique, special and, therefore, difficult to fathom. “Why are they so evil?”, some ask. Others barge through with “Why would they ever do that?”, “What makes them tick?”, “They are just so…incomprehensible”.
Or are they?
Sometimes I think the best available response to these assertions lies in questioning the types of comparisons that are, perhaps inadvertently, at the heart of words like “thuggish”, “ignorant”, “unsophisticated”, etc.
As such, I am intrigued as to whether there is something in the top-level military cultures of neighbouring countries — and particularly Thailand, Bangladesh and, to some extent, India (and particularly northeast India) — that needs to be integrated into the way the world sees the Burmese generals. Are they, dare I ask, no more “thuggish” or “unsophisticated” than many of their counterpart military commanders in neighbouring countries?
The relationships of the militaries of, say, Thailand and Bangladesh to the civilian political processes of those countries is different, sure. But these relationships are also often strained to breaking point. Is it too much to say that, in many ways, they are not that different? And perhaps by better understanding the comparatively more accessible military cultures of these countries it would be possible to shed new light on what happens in Burma, at the highest levels? What could a comparative study of the various elite military cultures tell us?
Of course I accept that each national “high command” emerges from its own historical, cultural and political context. But are there, all the same, general things about the mindsets of Burmese military commanders that could, under current conditions, be best understood through a wider comparative lens?
What do New Mandala readers think? Is this a possible way forward? Or, at the end of the day, are the Burmese generals (their institutional culture, their personal attributes, their approach to running an army/country, etc) really different (and exceptionally so)?
4 responses so far ↓
1 Hla Oo // Jul 18, 2008 at 6:29 pm
I went to an army high school together with two of younger Burmese Generals in SPDC during late sixties and early seventies. Thuggish and unsophisticated were not the qualities I would assign to both of them. They were as decent as you and I were and as normal and as intelligent as you and I were as normal boys growing up, only to become powerful and hated men later.
One thing Burmese Army and the brutal civil war did to them was turning them into disciplined, brutalized, and traumatized hard men. Do you know that 80% of their colleagues were killed during the height of civil war in late seventies and whole eighties? Any Burmese officer has only two options- either get killed or become wealthy and powerful later as the survivors advanced- as in ancient imperial times. (In Burmese, Thay Yin Myay Gyi, Shi Yin Shwe Htee) Getting killed was a 80% sure way for most of them as they fought the hard battles especially against Chinese supported BCP.
As efficient killing machines as they are, their only logical response to the dissent is use of force and so they did in abandon. The line between thuggery and decency is getting blurred as the glasses they wear to look at the civilian population is getting grayer and grayer as they grow old in absolute power.
Also compared with other armed forces in SE Asia, especially Thailand and Indonesia, Burmese generals have had basically no experience dealing with free market economy and freely evolving business(the main pillars of civil society) as, first, most of their early years were under a socialist system, and later when they reformed the economy into market economy the western democracies have imposed various sanctions and killed off their economic inspirations.
Now they are like threatened fighting-dogs in a very tight corner, just struggling to survive in a very hostile world. Than Shwe basically showed it by his strange reaction to Ban-Ki-Mon’s visit just after Nargis. Like a bewildered child, he just didn’t know how to respond!
2 Nicholas Farrelly // Jul 18, 2008 at 10:08 pm
Thanks, Hla Oo, for your personal reflections on this and other Burma topics. They are very welcome and so please keep them coming.
The transition you outline here – from relatively ordinary student/soldier to battle-hardened power-monger – is one that I think many New Mandala readers would be keen to learn more about.
These lines between “thuggery” and “decency”, between “youth” and “experience”, between boyish “dreams” and adult “reality” are, I feel, a particularly interesting area for further exploration. Understanding more about the ways that particular generals have been educated and indoctrinated is one thing. It is quite another to peel back some of the layers and look at the way that since the 1970s (when most of these men joined the army) the institutional framework and evolution of the tatmadaw has shaped a whole generation of “survivors”.
If you could say something more about the (future SPDC) men you knew, I’m sure many of our readers would find it most illuminating.
Best wishes to all,
Nich
3 Moe Aung // Jul 19, 2008 at 12:03 am
Poor generals, all misunderstood and unloved. Perhaps we should all be praying for them. But then again, karma maintains that as you sow so shall you reap, that’s if they believe in it as true Buddhists.
4 Grasshopper // Jul 19, 2008 at 2:25 am
Thanks Hla Oo. This is a good post and provides much food for thought.
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