What Path Forward?

[Above photo: An apt diorama for our current situation.]

14 March 2021

Every day here is different and yet the same. Saturday an estimated 18 were killed, mostly in Mandalay. Thursday there were between 8 and 12 murdered by the military across the country. The evening before 1000 protesters in Sanchaung Township (Yangon) were surrounded by Tatmadaw at twilight and no one could enter or leave, thus forcing everyone to violate the curfew and risk arrest. Tension was high and envoys from the US and other embassies rushed over to try to diffuse the situation. It ended without deaths, I believe. Numerous high level NLD officials have been taken from their homes and tortured and beaten to death, their inert corpses returned to their families for burial. My students, experienced psychiatrists from 34yo-45yo, and their families are all in hiding, some having had terrifying experiences of nearly being caught by the military. If they have lived in government housing on their hospital compounds, they are now evicted for participating in the CDM. I assume the military leaders are sociopaths.  Those who carry out their orders may also be, they may be traumatized from fighting and killing for years, or, like many Germans in WW2, they may simply be imbedded in that culture and have had the latent cruelty that rests in all of us awakened. The race of man is a savage one.

My exit flight was cancelled so I have rescheduled for a day earlier than I anticipated. It is rather expensive for me to go to Thailand for 6 -8 weeks, because I must extend my international health insurance and quarantine in a hotel for 15 days in Bangkok before the vacation even begins. Still, I am in the vicinity, have only explored Chaing Mai, and would like covid in California to settle for another 6 weeks before I arrive. Also, two friends I plan to stay with are having surgery—a hip, a low back—in late March and I suspect it will be easier for each of them if I let them heal for 2 months before I visit.

I have no idea if and when I can return to Myanmar. I know enough about the needs and the players here that I can have a lasting impact if I stay 2 or 3 more years. I’m not sure I have a desire to work that hard in my 80’s yet I don’t want to sit around and read books or build boats and feel useless. Living comfortably with uncertainty is a valuable skill, just as is living well in adversity. And settling comfortably into change as the norm. We often pay a lot to avoid those three conditions, I think, gathering money, avoiding risk and discomfort, and eschewing deep relationships. Still, I can hardly contain my excitement to start a fire in the Jotul in my cabin on Beach Island and tuck into a meal with friends and family to catch up. I’ll be there in 3 months, with luck.

Since Kelly works at the dining room table I am privy to a lot of his conversations. The International NGO lingo includes phrases such as “trigger points”, “evacuation order”, “in country”, and “on the ground”, not dissimilar to military-speak. Not so far from psychobabble, I think, with our “object constancy”, “developmental interference”, ”anaclitic depression”, and “inner working model”. I miss chopping it up with my own tribe, of which there are really none here “in country”.

A coup-related struggle for the NGOs is reflected in a petition that Kelly’s senior management submitted to him yesterday. They unanimously want his organization to publicly recognize the CRPH (the elected but usurped government, now in hiding), to refuse to have any dealings with the military authority, to make a strong statement condemning the coup, and to not pay taxes, water or electric bills or use the Central (government) Bank. The problem is that without an MOU with the military, the organization cannot work here. Without using the Central Bank, no one can get paid. (It is very difficult, at present, for anyone to get money into the country.) If you don’t pay taxes, the head of your organization may be put in prison for tax evasion. Without water or electricity, it is difficult to function and presents a health hazard.  

The problem is the same, I think, as having an argument with an ever-Trumper.  Kelly’s staff are operating off of strong emotions, while he is working logically with facts. There are always the snakes, like Congressmen/women who are only about expediency, what works in their best interest. But facts and reason will rarely triumph over deeply-felt emotion, at least in the moment.  Reason is truly the flea on the back of the elephant, Emotion.

Aung San Suu Kyi was initially arrested for illegally importing 6 walkie talkies for her staff. Next, she was charged with violating covid sanctions by not wearing a mask at a campaign rally where she was speaking before the November election. Today she was formally charged with accepting $600,000 in cash and $450,000 in gold from one of her government ministers. All of these are so patently ridiculous. She has never been interested in money. She wants to rescue the country from the military, establish a democracy, gather glory to the memory of her assassinated father, Bogyoke Aung San, and unite the various ethnic factions in Myanmar, albeit with a Bamar-Buddhist majority.

We talk endlessly among ourselves and with others about possible trajectories for the crisis here. Perhaps the Tatmadaw will increase their depredations until the populace gives up, slumping into an anxious, vigilant, defeated state of depression. Or the ethnic armies, excepting the Arakan Army which has sided with the Tatmadaw, and youth fight back and a smoldering guerilla war develops throughout the country. The military now has facial recognition capacity, surveillance drones, and advanced weapon systems purchased from or donated by the Chinese. It is like any battle of liberation. Neither side will step back voluntarily.

I recall watching the film, “The Battle of Algiers” at a special showing in Berkeley in the late ’60’s. Two rows of the theatre were filled with Black Panthers in their leather jackets. The Panthers was a social welfare (health and breakfast programs) and defense organization which was provoked to armed struggle by J. Edgar Hoover. Understandably, their posturing and rhetoric terrified white people; however, the police had been capriciously terrorizing, arresting, and killing in the black community from time immemorial. We can all escalate easily if frightened.

The situation here feels pretty hopeless to me right now. My exit to Thailand, California, and Maine are looking better and better for me. Until I think about my students, my professor, the Rector, and all the kind and generous people I’ve encountered here. Then I am deeply saddened.