Since the beginning of the war in 2021, and especially since the big offensive of the united Resistance groups, the junta has been constantly losing territory. However, to understand the progress of the Resistance, as well as the strategy of both the junta and the Resistance groups, we must first look at the ethnic composition, as well as the terrain of this country.
Initial problems for the Junta
We have already talked about the fact that there are numerous ethnic groups within Myanmar. We also said that the borders of Myanmar were drawn by the British colonisers, based on their strategic interests, and not based on the wishes of the people who actually lived in those territories. Today, the junta, like any bourgeois government in crisis, relies on ethnic differences and nationalism to maintain its power.
Due to the great dissatisfaction of the ethnic minorities, who have been waging war against the Myanmar state for decades, already existing conflicts have intensified, while some new ones have started. Immediately after the coup, the junta planned to occupy the entire territory of Myanmar by military force. However, they were soon shown the opposite, when they not only failed to conquer new territories, but also when they began to lose those that were already under their control.
When the Resistance attacked the military junta in a major offensive in October of last year, videos of junta soldiers retreating en masse, while soldiers at the border even fled to other countries, appeared on the Internet. This withdrawal was not unplanned, but it is part of the new strategy of the military junta, which can be understood by looking at the maps of Myanmar’s ethnic composition and terrain.
Change of the strategy of the military government
After the aforementioned Resistance offensive, the military junta soon realised that it would be very difficult to control territories where ethnic minorities are located. The objective reason for this is the huge dissatisfaction of the local clergy towards the junta, which has always committed crimes against minorities and deprived them of their political rights. Another reason is the very terrain on which these minorities are located. The attached maps show that the majority of ethnic minorities live in inaccessible, mountainous terrain. Exactly the kind of terrain that always represented a big problem for those powers that led wars of conquest.
That is why, when the Resistance attacked the army of the junta in the already mentioned big offensive in October last year, most of the soldiers simply retreated and left the military posts. This led to the Resistance liberating a lot of territory and confiscating a large amount of weapons, but also to the junta saving its soldiers for further fighting.
This withdrawal demonstrated a new strategy of the military junta, which has since begun to focus on consolidating urbanized areas, where the ethnic majority – the Burmese – are located. These areas are at the same time in a flat area, which can also be seen in the attached maps. Such terrain favours the junta’s standing army, due to the relatively easy possibility of control. It is this privileged position that the Burmese enjoyed in relation to ethnic minorities, as well as the flatter terrain on which they are located, that led to the fact that the areas where the Burmese live are more developed and urbanized.
Results of the new strategy
The junta’s new strategy has partially succeeded, which can be seen in the fact that although it has lost a lot of territory, it still controls the majority of the population. That is, although the territory over which the Resistance has complete control is greater than the territory over which the junta has complete control (34% vs. 14%), the percentage of people in those territories is on the side of the junta (12% vs. 32%).
Particularly disastrous for the military government were the losses of border towns, which they used as regional centres for the import and export of goods. More precisely, out of 51 border towns, the Resistance controls as many as 30, while the junta, together with its satellite groups, fully controls only 5. The other cities are either majority controlled by the Resistance or are slowly but surely falling under the rule of the Resistance groups.
Relations between the Resistance groups
Of course, in addition to the minorities, the Burmese are also not satisfied with their reactionary, bourgeois government. The Burmese, who are mostly from the ranks of the working class, massively joined the army of the ousted government – the People’s Defence Forces (PDF) – after the coup. The reason for this is that the main issue of the ethnic minorities is the national issue, which has been intensified since the declaration of independence of Myanmar in 1948, while the main issue of the Burmese is a class issue. That class issue became evident when the struggle between factions of the bourgeoisie reached its peak after the 2021 coup.
Although the Resistance groups perform together, there are many contradictions between these groups. The first big contradiction is that, as we have already said, ethnic armed groups have been fighting against the Myanmar state for decades, while the PDF started the fight only after the military coup. These ethnic groups still do not trust the ousted government, because some fought against it while it was still in power, while the rest were in a truce, but still did not cooperate with that government. Because of this, the ethnic armed groups, although cooperating with the PDF, still keep in mind that this unity is most likely only temporary.
In addition, there are tensions between the ethnic armed groups themselves. As the junta withdrew from many areas, the question of dividing those areas between the Resistance groups came up. During this division, there were several incidents where soldiers from different groups shot at each other. In addition, the great offensive of the Resistance groups was not carried out in complete unity, but only some groups cooperated with each other, while others were not even informed about the attacks of the Resistance groups on the junta army.
Other problems of the Resistance
In the past news about Myanmar, we said that the junta is increasingly turning to open terror against the people. Since then, the military government has become even more brutal, continuing to regularly carry out massacres against civilians, as well as targeting civilian facilities (such as hospitals, markets, schools, etc.) in cities that are partially or fully under the control of the Resistance. In addition to the fact that these are desperate – frustrated moves, which come after a series of losses since the 2021 coup, the military government is turning to this strategy in an attempt to make the Resistance lose confidence in the eyes of the people.
The goal of the Junta is to create as big a humanitarian disaster as possible within the territories controlled by the Resistance, targeting the civilian infrastructure within these territories, as well as prohibiting the passage of humanitarian aid to these areas. Also, there is the fact that the majority of the population displaced by the war is located within these territories, which further increases the scale of the humanitarian disaster in these areas.
Progress of the Resistance
Despite all the problems the Resistance is facing, the groups within it are making enormous progress, as we have already reported. Also, in addition to the fact that we said that the junta’s new strategy is to withdraw from certain areas, the junta also lost a lot of territory that it either did not plan to lose or did not plan to lose so quickly. What is particularly astonishing is that the Resistance was able to make so much progress against a technologically superior military, with the help of improvised explosives, 3D printed weapons and modified commercial drones.
Also, although the junta has increased its control over the cities where the majority Burmese population lives, the attacks of the Resistance on and within those cities have not stopped. These attacks include everything from liquidations with personal weapons, to attacks with drones and mortars.
The role of the imperialists in the war
Although most imperialists condemned the military coup, all imperialists financially, and some militarily, support the junta. The imperialists view this conflict, as well as many similar ones in which all parties are bourgeois in character, opportunistically. That is, the imperialists try to support the winning side, the side that will bring them the most profit.
The West was most comfortable with the previous bourgeois-democratic government, but not enough to support it even after the coup, with anything more than empty words of support. Western imperialists have continued to trade with the junta, hoping that by any means they can quickly win the war against the rebel groups and thus bring stability that suits them to continue exploiting the Myanmar people.
However, as the military junta has suffered many losses and lost control of vast territory, including very important border towns, Western imperialists have less and less patience for military government. This can be seen in increasingly loud and frequent calls for greater sanctions against the junta and for sending military aid to rebel groups. In many pictures, you can already see special forces from some of the NATO countries, who are training the rebels.
This does not yet mean that the West has moved militarily to support the rebels on a wider scale, but it shows that if the junta fails to provide favourable conditions for the exploitation of Myanmar’s natural and human resources, and if it continues to cooperate militarily and economically with Russia and China, the West will to help the rebels more and more openly.
The outcome of the war
At the moment, the situation is in favour of the Resistance. Since the coup of 2021, the Resistance has moved from defensive to offensive and the initiative is still on his side. At the time of writing this article, the Resistance continues to occupy cities and military outposts of the junta, which together with the previous victories brings the morale of the Resistance fighters to an extremely high level. From the videos of the fights, one can see the difference between the motivated fighters of the Resistance groups, who fight for the self-determination of their people and against the military dictatorship, and the demoralized fighters of the military government, who mostly fight either for money or are mobilized under coercion.
However, apart from all of the above, the outcome of the war is still unknown and probably won’t be known anytime soon. But what is certain is that this war showed how a much weaker military force, with motivated people and a common goal, can inflict serious losses on a much stronger, more technologically advanced military force. This is what we have seen many times historically and what we are currently seeing in Palestine, India, Kurdistan, the Philippines and many other places.
