American Policy in the Burmese Context

American Policy in the Burmese ContextKanbawza Win
What the former Soviet Union did for the cause of Socialism, --- is this what America is doing for the cause of democracy? This will be the first question asked of the current US administration. It seems that a high-profile "Democracy Promotion" agenda has provided repressive regimes, especially the Burmese Junta and its apologists with an excuse to label any popular pro-democracy movement that challenges them as foreign agents, even when led by independent grassroots nonviolent activists in Burma. Recently, the peaceful Buddhists monks demonstrations--which is clearly a popular nonviolent civil struggle--is the kind that toppled the corrupt and autocratic regimes in Serbia, Georgia and Ukraine and today, are claimed to be somehow part of an effort by the American administration and its allies to instigate "soft coups" against governments deemed hostile to American interests and replace them by more compliant regimes. This is not only confined to Burma but also extends to Belarus and Iran, Zimbabwe and others.The U.S. government has undeniably provided small amounts of money to various opposition groups and political parties through the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), the International Republican Institute (IRI) and other organs. Such funding has at times helped a number of opposition groups cover some of the costs of their operations, better enabling them to afford computers, Internet access, fax machines, printing costs, office space and other materials. Assistance from foreign governments has also helped provide for poll watchers and other logistical support to help insure free and fair elections. In addition, the United States, through the NED, the IRI and other U.S.-funded projects, has also provided seminars and other training for opposition leaders in campaign strategies. What is controversial about these endeavors is that they have been directed primarily at helping conservative, pro-Western parties with a free-market orientation and generally are not available to parties of the democratic left. Many opposition Burmese groups as well as groups in other countries have welcomed US assistance while others have rejected such aid on principle. There is no evidence, however, to suggest--even in cases where this kind of limited US support for opposition organizations has taken place--the U.S. government or any US-funded entity has ever provided training, advice, or strategic assistance for the kind of mass popular nonviolent action campaigns and has toppled governments or threatened the survival of incumbent regimes. Even the limited small aid requested which the All Ethnic International Open University, the only Burmese University in Diaspora that endeavors to sustain democracy through education was politely refused all these decades, proves beyond doubt that the American policy has utterly failed in Burma. Since the administration of President Ronald Reagan (1981-89), promoting democracy and freedom in the world has been a staple in U.S. political rhetoric has now become a laughing stock. The rhetoric has ratcheted up significantly during the administration of President George W. Bush. In his second inaugural address, Bush said, “It is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world,” seems hollow with today’s scenario In any case, true democratic change comes from within, as Professor Josef Silverstein (Professors Emeritus of Rutgers University) has repeatedly pointed to our students this semester. Recent years have witnessed the emergence of a series of broadly based nonviolent social movements that have succeeded in toppling dictatorships and forcing democratic reforms in such diverse countries as the Philippines, Chile, Bolivia, Madagascar, Nepal, Czechoslovakia, Indonesia, Serbia, Mali, and Ukraine. Even the relatively conservative Washington-based Freedom House, after examining the 67 countries that have moved from authoritarianism to varying degrees of democratic governance over the past few decades, published a study concluding that these transitions did not come as a result of foreign intervention and only rarely through armed revolt or voluntary elite-driven reforms. In the overwhelming majority of cases, according to this report, change came through democratic civil society organizations engaging in massive nonviolent demonstrations and other forms of civil resistance, such as strikes, boycotts, tax refusal, occupations of public space, and other forms of non-cooperation. In reality, the limited amount of financial support provided to opposition groups by the United States and other Western governments in recent years cannot cause a nonviolent liberal democratic revolution to take place any more than the limited Soviet financial and material support for leftist movements in previous decades could cause an armed socialist revolution to take place. Those who are familiar with popular movements have long recognized, revolutions are the result of certain objective conditions. Indeed, no amount of money could force hundreds of thousands of people to leave their jobs, homes, schools, and families to face down heavily armed police and tanks and put their bodies on the line unless they had a sincere motivation to do so. Whenever governments are challenged by their own people, they tend to claim that those struggling for freedom and justice are traitors to the nation and agents of foreign enemies and this is exactly what the Burmese government did and very lately has barred Daw Aung San Suu Kyi from standing in elections.A number of regimes facing popular opposition have gone so far as to claim that certain small independent non-profit organizations and supporters of nonviolent action from Europe and the United States who have provided seminars and workshops for opposition activists on the history and dynamics of nonviolent resistance are somehow working as agents of the Western governments. Some Western bloggers and other writers critical of the American administration and understandably concerned about U.S. intervention in the name of “democracy,” have reinforced the claims by these governments. These in turn been picked up by some progressive websites and periodicals and even by some in the mainstream press, which then repeat them as fact. Virtually all of these seminars and workshops, however, come at the direct request of opposition organizers themselves. Many of them have been on behalf of pro-democracy activists struggling against dictatorships. American and European groups that share generic information on the history and dynamics of strategic nonviolence with civil society organizations in foreign countries are not unlike the Western private voluntary organizations that share environmentally sustainable technologies and agricultural techniques to farmers in developing nations. Both offer useful tools that, if applied consistently and effectively, could improve the quality of life for millions of people. There is nothing “imperialistic” about it and lamentably it was not applied to Burma.If sustainable agricultural technologies and methods are effective tools in meeting human needs and preserving the planet than the conventional development strategies promoted by Western governments, nonviolent action has been shown to be more effective in advancing democratic change than threats of foreign military intervention, backing coup plotters, imposing punitive sanctions, supporting armed rebel groups, and other methods traditionally instigated by the United States and its allies. And just as the application of appropriate technologies can also be a means of countering the damage caused by unsustainable neo-liberal economic models pushed by Western governments and international financial institutions, the use of massive nonviolent action can counter some of the damage resulting from the arms trade, military intervention, and other harmful manifestations of Western militarism. Development based on Western models usually means that multinational corporations and the governments of wealthy capitalist countries end up exerting a large degree of control over these societies, whereas appropriate technologies allowing for genuine independence and self-sufficiency is quite limited. And this is what the Burmese people are afraid of. Similarly, unlike fomenting the young Turks for a military coup which relies on asserting control over the population and potential political opponents – successful nonviolent civil insurrections are necessarily based on a broad coalition of popular movements and are therefore impossible for an outside power to control. This seems to be the way the people of Burma wants. Another difference between these people-to-people educational efforts and U.S. intervention is that, unlike the NED and other government-backed “pro-democracy” efforts, which often focus on developing conventional political initiatives led by pro-Western elites, these workshops on strategic nonviolence are primarily designed for grassroots activists unaffiliated with established political parties who seek to make change from below. The government like the Burmese Junta, accustomed to projecting political power through military force or elite diplomatic channels have little understanding or appreciation of nonviolent action or any other kind of mass popular struggle. Somewhat similar to the CIA that would know little about nonviolence, much less grassroots organizing? In short, not only is it naïve to assume than an external power could provoke a revolution of any kind, especially in a country like Burma. All these years it has become apparent that the U.S. government does not know the first thing about fomenting a nonviolent civil insurrection. As a result, the dilemma for U.S. policy-makers – and the hope for all of us who support democracy as a matter of principle and not political expediency – is that the most realistic way to overthrow the world’s remaining autocratic regimes like Burma is through a process the U.S. government cannot control. There is no denying that the American government has historically promoted regime change through military invasions, coup d’etat, and other kinds of violent seizures of power that install an undemocratic minority. One of the biggest examples is Iraq Nonviolent “people power” movements; by contrast, make regime change possible through empowering pro-democratic majorities. As a result, the best hope for advancing freedom and democracy in the world’s remaining autocratic states comes from civil society, not the U.S. government, which deserves neither the credit nor the blame for the growing phenomenon of nonviolent democratic revolutions. It is also ironic that so many on Americans after years of romanticizing armed struggle as the only way to defeat dictatorships, disparaging the potential of nonviolent action to overthrow repressive governments, and dismissing the notion of a nonviolent revolution -- are now expressing their alarm at how successful popular nonviolent insurrections can be, even to the point of naively thinking that it is so easy to pull off that it could somehow be organized from foreign capitals. It is really lamentable that they could not comprehend that every successful popular nonviolent insurrection has been a home grown movement rooted in the realization by the masses that their rulers were illegitimate and the current political system was incapable of redressing injustice. “Leftist” critics of nonviolent pro-democracy movements parallel right-wing supporters of U.S. intervention in that both denigrate the power of individuals to take their destiny into their own hands and overthrow oppressive leaders and institutions. Instead, both appear to believe that people are passive victims and that social and political change can only come through the manipulation of foreign powers. That the United States is somehow a major force behind contemporary popular movements against dictatorships in Burma, Iran, Zimbabwe, and Belarus or that the United States was somehow responsible for the successes of previous movements in Serbia, Georgia or Ukraine are just ludicrous. Contemporary history has shown that the vast majority of successful nonviolent civil insurrections have not been against dictatorships opposed by the U.S. government, but dictatorships supported by the U.S. government. Right-wing autocrats toppled by such “people power” movements have included Marcos in the Philippines, Suharto in Indonesia, the Shah of Iran, Duvalier in Haiti, Pinochet in Chile, Chun Doo Wan in South Korea, and Numeiry in Sudan, to name only a few. Even during the early days of Ne Win, Burma was clearly supported by the US claiming that he was anti communist until one of the American gift helicopters was short down by the KNU.Another problem is that when nonviolent civil insurrections do succeed in bringing democrats to power in countries previously under anti-American dictatorships, the new often-inexperienced leaders are faced with plaudits from the American right and suspicion from the European and North American left. This could lead them to wonder who their friends really are and reinforce the myth that those of the right, rather than the left, are the real champions of freedom. The conspiratorial thinking and denigration of genuine popular movements appearing increasingly in some leftist circles serves to strengthen the hand of repressive regimes, weaken democratic forces, and bolster the argument of American neo-conservatives that only U.S. militarism and intervention – and not nonviolent struggle by oppressed peoples themselves – is capable of freeing those suffering under repressive rule. Successful nonviolent revolutions, like successful armed revolutions, often take years or decades to develop as part of an organic process within the body politic of a given country. Daw Aung San Suu Kyi herself has said that, “By voting NO in the coming referendum we may face hardship for a decade or more but by voting Yes, we and generations to come will be under the military boots forever.” There is no standardized formula for success that a foreign government or a foreign non-governmental organization could put together, since the history, culture and political alignments of each country are unique. No foreign government or NGO can recruit or mobilize the large numbers of ordinary civilians necessary to build a movement capable of effectively challenging the established political leadership, much less of toppling a government. In reality, a regime will lose power only if it tries to forcibly maintain a system that the people oppose, not because a foreign workshop leader described to a small group of opposition activists certain tactics that had been used successfully in another country at another time. In maintaining our position and exposing the hypocrisy and double-standards of the current administration’s rhetoric in support of democracy, we must also challenge those who denigrate popular indigenous movements as creations of Washington or slander reputable non-profit groups that share their generic knowledge of nonviolent strategies and tactics with like-minded organizations overseas.For too many years, such calls for action in Burma have been heard and politely ignored. Eric John, the US State Department's Deputy Assistant secretary for East Asia, said "The Burmese regime remains exceptionally repressive and is becoming even harsher in its treatment of its people and we are working with our partners to support efforts to place Myanmar on this month's Security Council agenda. Myanmar's junta must take steps ... to bring its deplorable human rights practices into conformity with international standards," Such kind of talks are common since Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice named Burma as one of the world's "outposts of tyranny" when she took office. The Burmese intelligentsia like any other democracy loving people will meet the U S initiative with skeptics after so many years of international inertia. The very fact why it was push in the Security Council for Mr. Gambari to go to Burma when it was an impossible task? Is it just to put Burma in the agenda of the Security Council just be vetoed by the two giants? A tentative move by the United States to have a new UN Security Council presidential statement on the Burmese constitutional referendum was met with opposition by the Russian ambassador to the UN, Vitally Churkin. The Russian ambassador indicated that his country, which has the power of veto in the Security Council, would oppose any proposal to issue a new presidential statement in regard to the referendum on a draft constitution in Burma in May. “We are the Security Council; we are dealing with issues of threats to international peace and security,” he said. Even if China will not veto because of the Olympic Games and the Tibetan affairs, Russia will. Is this the American ploy to prove that Vladimir Putin, the new Tsar of Russia, is just a bad guy in the world? Or if the US succeeds in winning Security Council backing, a new resolution could deem Burma a threat to international peace and security will include the immediate release of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and other political prisoners, free access for the UN's envoys and aid agencies, and genuine, UN-facilitated moves by the Junta towards the restoration of democracy -- on pain of international sanctions and other, unspecified collective UN action? The Burmese are no so naïve to fall to this approach. With the American foreign policy painting China and Russia a bad guy at the cost of entire of people of Burma question the very sincere ness of America? American actions will speak louder than words.Dr. B T Win, former Secretary of Foreign Affairs of the Prime Minister of Burma has served as a Distinguished Visiting Professor at the Menno Simons College of University of Winnipeg and later as a Senior Research Fellow at the European Institute of Asian Studies, Brussels is now the incumbent Dean of the Students of the AEIOU Programme, Chiangmai University Thailand and an Adjunct Professor of the School of International Studies, Simon Fraser University, of British Columbia, Canada. Can be reached at profwin@gmail.com