The military coup in Myanmar is a tragedy for that long-suffering nation, but it is also a strategic reversal for Australia and engages our interests, as well as our values, heavily.
Aung San Suu Kyi and her National League for Democracy overwhelmingly won democratic elections last November and should rightfully be forming the Myanmar government.
For most of its modern independent history Myanmar, formerly Burma, has been ruled by its military, the Tatmadaw. The country has a long history of coups and military rule. It endured decades of near total isolation. It was for long periods subject to wide-ranging Western sanctions. But its rulers quite enjoyed isolation. It has a tradition of illegal drug production and military domination of those parts of the economy that are profitable. The leaders lived well through the sanctions period while the people suffered grinding poverty.
Suu Kyi became the symbol of democratic opposition to the military. She endured many years of house arrest. Her father, Aung San, was the independence hero of Burma and, naturally enough, though the founder of Burma’s modern military, was assassinated by soldiers whose ultimate purpose remains unclear to this day. This ancestry gave the Lady, as Suu Kyi is often known, automatic standing, and her grace and quiet dignity cemented her status.
The military didn’t kill her and didn’t expel her. I always thought they were a little afraid of her, but it may be their calculations resembled those of the apartheid South African government that kept Nelson Mandela around in case they needed an interlocutor with credibility in civil society.
A decade ago the Myanmar military finally accepted that it would be better to end its isolation and allow free elections. Having boycotted the first such elections Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy won the next office in 2015. However, the military kept much power. It had 25 per cent of seats in parliament. It kept control of security ministries and internal military appointments.
It contrived to prevent Suu Kyi becoming president but her government installed her as state counsellor and therefore head of government. She did not have complete power but neither was she completely powerless. Myanmar society and the economy opened up under her leadership and this was intensely beneficial to her people and also, incidentally, in Australia’s strategic interests. She was all about modernising and equipping her society.
I met her not long after her election and she only wanted to talk about one thing — could I come to Myanmar to help train its journalists, or could I get someone else to do it.
The biggest criticism of Suu Kyi is that she did not condemn her military’s violent crackdown on the Rohingya minority in 2017.
The military behaved appallingly and there were terrible human rights abuses. Suu Kyi had never evinced sympathy for the Rohingyas. Although they had been in Myanmar for generations, most of the population saw them as Bangladeshis. Nothing justifies the military’s behaviour but there was an Islamist insurgency among the Rohingyas.
It is also the case, as the recent coup demonstrates, that Suu Kyi was always walking a tight rope with the military.
Australia had a deep interest in Myanmar opening up. Before then it had been a completely dependent strategic client of Beijing’s. Already, Beijing effectively controls the strategic policy of Cambodia and Laos. Add Myanmar and Beijing has de facto veto control over three of ASEAN’s 10 states.
Myanmar, which shares a land border with China, is never going to become an ally of the West or even of democratic Asian states. But because of the opening up, its people are now significantly more prosperous and in recent years have enjoyed much greater personal freedom. At the same time, it has become strategically more pluralistic. There is now recognisable American, Japanese and Indian influence in Myanmar.
Australia gives aid and maintains a defence co-operation program. We have a military attache in Myanmar. This is entirely sensible and productive. It gives us access to Myanmar’s most powerful institution. The Morrison government is right to take a cautious, slow approach in responding to this coup. Naturally we must condemn it politically but we should not rush to sanctions or immediate cessation of contacts that have taken decades to build.
That is exactly what New Zealand did this week and as usual Wellington is an infallible guide to bad policy. Strategically, it always does the wrong thing for the wrong reasons. Wellington’s international policies are a deeply unappetising mixture of moral posturing, moral cowardice and operational incompetence. It will never say boo about human rights in China because it makes money out of China, and it will delight in making Canberra’s life more difficult with Beijing by contrasting its pre-emptive appeasement with our alleged lack of sweetness. But then with Myanmar, where it has nothing to lose because it takes no strategic responsibility for anything, it will preen and posture. Thank goodness no one takes New Zealand seriously.
ASEAN itself put enormous effort into getting Myanmar to open up. In one of his last interviews as president, Indonesia’s Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono told me of the long effort he and other senior Indonesians put into trying to convince the Myanmar military to act something like the old Indonesian military in the “dwifungsi”, or dual function, days, before Indonesia’s comprehensive democratic modernisation. By all means maintain political influence, the Indonesians effectively suggested, and even perhaps maintain the military’s business interests, but engage in the deepest possible consultation with your own civil society, develop civil society and allow the democratic space for meaningful electoral contests.
The Thai military also has a long history of mastering this kind of dualism. Some democracy, some civil rights and some pluralism are much better than no democracy, no civil rights and no pluralism. The Myanmar military is not going to restore democracy overnight, no matter what democracies say about it internationally. Every responsible regional actor should be urging the Myanmar military to try to limit the conflict, commit to a timetable for new elections and govern with as much consent as possible.
If Western nations impose massive sanctions this will push Myanmar into Beijing’s arms. Myanmar is a difficult country, with a wide range of ethnic insurgencies, drug smuggling, illegal immigration and many other difficulties. Driving it into isolation would hurt the Myanmar people and give Beijing another completely strategically dependent client state. Myanmar remains an ASEAN project. Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore should take a lead here. We should co-ordinate our policy with ASEAN and, as far as we can, tread softly.
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