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COMMENT: There has been a great deal of com­men­tary on the recent coup in Myan­mar. What has received lit­tle scruti­ny, how­ev­er, is the pos­si­ble rela­tion­ship between the coup and the ongo­ing full court press against Chi­na.

Not only do the two coun­tries share a long bor­der, but the recent­ly deposed gov­ern­ment had ini­ti­at­ed deep­er rela­tions with Chi­na.

One of the key con­sid­er­a­tions to be weighed is a Chi­nese land trans­porta­tion project which would cir­cum­vent the eas­i­ly-block­ad­ed straits of Malac­ca. Amer­i­ca’s con­sum­mate naval pow­er could block that key pas­sage with ease.

The pro­posed “New Bur­ma Road” would give Chi­na a land pas­sage through which to ship vital raw mate­ri­als.

Sev­er­al key ques­tions sug­gest them­selves:

• How will the new mil­i­tary jun­ta imple­ment rela­tions with Chi­na?
• IF the jun­ta main­tains good rela­tions with Chi­na, how will the U.S. react?
• Might the U.S. have been involved in the coup?

” . . . . it has proven impos­si­ble to roll back Bei­jing’s influ­ence in Naypyi­daw. In Sep­tem­ber 2018, rep­re­sen­ta­tives from Chi­na and Myan­mar signed a mem­o­ran­dum of under­stand­ing on the con­struc­tion of the Chi­na-Myan­mar Eco­nom­ic Cor­ri­dor (CMEC), a trans­porta­tion cor­ri­dor con­nect­ing Man­dalay, Myan­mar’s sec­ond largest metrop­o­lis in the cen­ter of the coun­try, with Kun­ming, the metrop­o­lis in the south­west Chi­nese Yun­nan Province. The CMEC will become a link in Chi­na’s new Silk Road (Belt and Road Ini­tia­tive — BRI). Experts are say­ing that Aung San Suu Kyi [above, right–D.E.] is the main force behind fur­ther rein­force­ment of coop­er­a­tion with Chi­na, as a means of pro­mot­ing Myan­mar’s quick­est pos­si­ble development.[6] The gen­er­als, on the oth­er hand, are said to wor­ry about Bei­jing gain­ing too much influ­ence. . . .”

“Coup in Myan­mar;” german-foreign-policy.com; 2/03/2021.

The West con­sid­ers sanc­tions fol­low­ing coup in Myan­mar. Pow­er strug­gle against Chi­na smol­der­ing in back­ground.

Fol­low­ing Mon­day’s coup in Myan­mar, the EU and the USA are con­sid­er­ing impos­ing new sanc­tions on that coun­try. Already on Mon­day, US Pres­i­dent Joe Biden declared that he would imme­di­ate­ly review the rein­tro­duc­tion of coer­cive mea­sures. The EU announced yes­ter­day that it will “con­sid­er all options at its dis­pos­al to ensure that democ­ra­cy pre­vails.” For a long time dur­ing the Cold War, the Fed­er­al Repub­lic of Ger­many had coop­er­at­ed close­ly with the Myan­mar mil­i­tary regime for geostrate­gic rea­sons, includ­ing arms exports. Ger­many, like the West as a whole, had been dis­en­gag­ing from the coun­try since 1990, again seek­ing bet­ter rela­tions only after Chi­na began ini­ti­at­ing impor­tant geostrate­gic projects — such as the con­struc­tion of a trans­port cor­ri­dor from the Indi­an Ocean to south­west Chi­na to bypass the Straits of Malac­ca that Wash­ing­ton can eas­i­ly block. The West­’s attempt to out­ma­neu­ver Bei­jing in Naypyi­daw has failed. Aung San Suu Kyi, the de-fac­to head of gov­ern­ment oust­ed by the mil­i­tary yes­ter­day, had recent­ly inten­si­fied coop­er­a­tion with Chi­na.

Bonn and the Generals

The rela­tions between the Fed­er­al Repub­lic of Ger­many and Myan­mar’s mil­i­tary had var­ied over the years. Dur­ing the Cold War, the FRG had main­tained good ties to the gen­er­als, who had seized pow­er in 1962. Their coun­try had been an impor­tant ally in the con­fronta­tion of sys­tems. At times, the FRG had been the coun­try’s most impor­tant non-Asian trad­ing part­ner and donor of devel­op­ment aid. Accord­ing to an expert on Myan­mar, Andrew Selth, the FRG had been “the major source for arms tech­nol­o­gy and a key play­er in the devel­op­ment of the coun­try’s domes­tic arms industry.”[1] The mil­i­tary regime was also licensed to man­u­fac­ture the Heck­ler & Koch G3 assault rifle. The rela­tions changed, when the con­fronta­tion of the sys­tems end­ed. Myan­mar lost its for­mer geostrate­gic sig­nif­i­cance with the fun­da­men­tal trans­for­ma­tions tak­ing place from 1989 to 1991. The regime, which had mas­sa­cred thou­sands of its oppo­nents and ignored the out­come of the 1990 par­lia­men­tary elec­tions, was used by the West as an exam­ple to legit­imize sanc­tions with human rights. Over the years, the West has imposed all sorts of coer­cive mea­sures on Myanmar.[2]

The Burma Road

The inter­ests again shift­ed in the new mil­len­ni­um. In 2003, Chi­na began sys­tem­at­i­cal­ly seek­ing alter­na­tive trans­port routes for its imports of raw mate­ri­als from Africa and the Mid­dle East. To a large part, they had to be trans­port­ed by ship through the Straits of Malac­ca between Aceh in Indone­sia and Malaysia respec­tive­ly Sin­ga­pore. Because in case of con­flict, the Straits can eas­i­ly be blocked by the USA, Bei­jing also devel­oped plans for a trans­port route direct­ly from the Indi­an Ocean through Myan­mar to the south­west Chi­na’s Yun­nan province. The “Bur­ma Road” served as a his­tor­i­cal blue­print. Con­struct­ed between 1937 and 1939, it was lead­ing from Bur­ma, a British colony at the time, to Chi­na to sup­ply the coun­try dur­ing the war against Japan. After sev­er­al years of plan­ning and con­struc­tion, a gas pipeline was com­mis­sioned in 2013, fol­lowed by an oil pipeline in 2017 lead­ing from Myan­mar’s coast to Chi­na. The com­ple­men­tary con­struc­tion of a rail­way line for high-speed trains is also under con­sid­er­a­tion. Myan­mar’s strate­gic sig­nif­i­cance for Chi­na, which over the years has become the coun­try’s most impor­tant eco­nom­ic part­ner, has renewed the inter­est of the west­ern states in their pow­er strug­gle with the Peo­ple’s Repub­lic, since the new mil­len­ni­um.

The Deal with the West

Accord­ing­ly, Wash­ing­ton began hold­ing talks with Myan­mar’s mil­i­tary regime — at first secret­ly under cov­er of the human­i­tar­i­an aid in the wake of the 2008 Nar­gis Cyclone — then also offi­cial­ly begin­ning at the end of 2009. The nego­ti­a­tions ulti­mate­ly led to a deal, which, on the one hand, pro­vid­ed for a degree of the coun­try’s over­ture for west­ern com­merce and polit­i­cal con­tact, and on the oth­er, the coun­try’s cau­tious democ­ra­ti­za­tion. Myan­mar’s gen­er­als have always insured their polit­i­cal con­trol of the process. There­fore, the mil­i­tary has con­sti­tu­tion­al­ly insured that one-fourth of the seats in par­lia­ment as well as the min­istries of the inte­ri­or, of defense and of bor­der issues are reserved for the mil­i­tary. At the same time, they have enor­mous eco­nom­ic influ­ence with cor­po­rate con­glom­er­ates such as the Myan­mar Eco­nom­ic Hold­ing Lim­it­ed (MEHL).[3] The lead­ing fig­ure for the coun­try’s cau­tious democ­ra­ti­za­tion was — and still is — Aung San Suu Kyi, who dur­ing the mil­i­tary dic­ta­tor­ship had been held under house arrest for a total of 15 years, to then become the de fac­to head of the gov­ern­ment as “State Coun­selor,” fol­low­ing the for­mal end of the mil­i­tary dic­ta­tor­ship. The major­i­ty of Myan­mar’s pop­u­la­tion still regards Suu Kyi as a pop­u­lar leader.

“Not Reform Oriented”

From the west­ern per­spec­tive, the aspired break­through in its pow­er strug­gle against Chi­na has, until now, remained unsuc­cess­ful in Myan­mar. In spite of strong ini­tial interest,[4] Ger­man com­merce with and com­pa­nies’ invest­ments in that coun­try have remained mod­est. In the spring of last year, Ger­many’s Min­is­ter for Devel­op­ment decid­ed to end the coop­er­a­tion with Myan­mar that had been reini­ti­at­ed in the sum­mer of 2012. The rea­son giv­en was insuf­fi­cient “reform ori­en­ta­tion,” in Ger­many’s view.[5] And polit­i­cal­ly, as well, it has proven impos­si­ble to roll back Bei­jing’s influ­ence in Naypyi­daw. In Sep­tem­ber 2018, rep­re­sen­ta­tives from Chi­na and Myan­mar signed a mem­o­ran­dum of under­stand­ing on the con­struc­tion of the Chi­na-Myan­mar Eco­nom­ic Cor­ri­dor (CMEC), a trans­porta­tion cor­ri­dor con­nect­ing Man­dalay, Myan­mar’s sec­ond largest metrop­o­lis in the cen­ter of the coun­try, with Kun­ming, the metrop­o­lis in the south­west Chi­nese Yun­nan Province. The CMEC will become a link in Chi­na’s new Silk Road (Belt and Road Ini­tia­tive — BRI). Experts are say­ing that Aung San Suu Kyi is the main force behind fur­ther rein­force­ment of coop­er­a­tion with Chi­na, as a means of pro­mot­ing Myan­mar’s quick­est pos­si­ble development.[6] The gen­er­als, on the oth­er hand, are said to wor­ry about Bei­jing gain­ing too much influ­ence.

The Next Round in the Battle for Influence

With their putsch, ear­ly Mon­day morn­ing, Myan­mar’s gen­er­als have retak­en full pow­er in Naypyi­daw. Suu Kyi and numer­ous politi­cians of the Nation­al League for Democ­ra­cy (NDL), along with oth­er adver­saries of the mil­i­tary have been arrest­ed or placed under house arrest. The west­ern pow­ers have protest­ed against the coup. Ger­many’s For­eign Min­is­ter Heiko Maas, for exam­ple, declared on Mon­day that he “strong­ly con­demns the seizure of pow­er and the accom­pa­ny­ing arrests by the mil­i­tary in Myanmar.”[7] US Pres­i­dent Joe Biden has, mean­while, men­tioned a new round of sanc­tions against Myan­mar. In Ger­many, the FDP for­eign pol­i­cy mak­er, Alexan­der Graf Lamb­s­dorff demand­ed that eco­nom­ic coer­cive mea­sures be tak­en against that country.[8] The EU, in turn, declared yes­ter­day that it will “con­sid­er all options at its dis­pos­al to ensure that democ­ra­cy prevails.”[9] Sanc­tions against the armed forces’ cor­po­rate con­glom­er­ate are also in dis­cus­sion. At the same time, how­ev­er, they are care­ful not to dri­ve Myan­mar “tighter into Chi­na’s embrace.”[10] The ques­tion of sanc­tions is, thus dom­i­nat­ed — as usu­al — by strate­gic con­sid­er­a­tions.

 

[1] See also Ein alter Part­ner der Mil­itärs.

[2] See also Erfol­glose Sank­tio­nen.

[3] Michael Peel: Myan­mar: the mil­i­tary-com­mer­cial com­plex. ft.com 01.02.2017.

[4] See also In Chi­nas Ein­flusszone (II) and Der Deal der Mil­itärs mit dem West­en.

[5] Rodi­on Ebbighausen: Deutsch­land zieht sich aus Myan­mar zurück. dw.com 14.05.2020.

[6] Hunter Marston: Has the US Lost Myan­mar to Chi­na? thediplomat.com 20.01.2020.

[7] Außen­min­is­ter Maas zur Machtüber­nahme durch das Mil­itär in Myan­mar. Pressemit­teilung des Auswär­ti­gen Amts. Berlin, 01.02.2021.

[8] Putsch in Myan­mar: Lamb­s­dorff fordert Sank­tio­nen. presse-augsburg.de 01.02.2021.

[9] EU dro­ht nach Mil­itär­putsch in Myan­mar mit weit­eren Sank­tio­nen. sueddeutsche.de 01.02.2021.

[10] Till Fäh­n­ders: Wie ist Myan­mars Mil­itär­regime beizukom­men? faz.net 02.02.2021.