A Journey Into Rebel-Held Myanmar

LOIKAW, Myanmar — I had trained for a month for what I imagined would be a grueling journey by foot over the border from Thailand into Myanmar, an illegal crossing that would not only be arduous but potentially dangerous, if the Myanmar military were to catch us. All seemed good and under control until I started to climb the steep flank of the first mountain in the early hours of a January morning. That’s when I realized I was no longer so young.

I was making the trek into Myanmar to get a sense of how communities were organizing themselves in the vacuum created by the retreating Tatmadaw (the name for the country’s armed forces). Contacts from my days as the U.N. representative and subsequently facilitating ceasefire processes had told me that in the maw of renewed conflict, novel and participatory forms of local governance were emerging.

This was of particular interest to me because I have long been arguing that humanitarian responses amid conflicts or after disasters (or both) in places where the governing authority was considered illegitimate by the international community were, by definition, severely restricted in their ability to reach the most vulnerable populations. So here might be a way to reshape how international assistance gets to people suffering under difficult conditions.

The restrictions placed by Western governments on engaging with pariah regimes limit the ability to negotiate access to communities and peoples in desperate need of assistance. The essence of any negotiation with a pariah regime is to cede some ground (tacit recognition, acknowledgement of authority) in return for something greater (access to populations, suspension of attacks, freeing of civilians), a process of give and take made exceptionally difficult if you find yourself unable to give.

Thus, as I have been arguing within the U.N. and without, a new form of international engagement needs to be found that complements existing humanitarian approaches to reaching populations caught up in civil wars or living under oppressive military regimes. For however dramatic and intense the conditions ordinary people confront in such contexts, their community structures continue to function. It is on such local governance structures that any international effort in contested political settings should be built.

So, the purpose of my mission was to explore how such local governance structures worked: their degree of formalization, their relationships to the population, their links with armed groups and the structures and channels of support they received. I also wanted to gauge the level of political risk for Western governments that supporting such non-state structures would involve.

What I discovered in the course of the five-week trip was a country in the midst of a profound transformation. The struggle against the Tatmadaw has morphed from a fight by ethnic groups to control territory into the emergence of a new form of participatory governance. This governance model has been created organically by a new generation of activists. While this process started in Karenni or Kayah State — the region I traveled in — it is being observed and, in some cases, copied in other areas and by other armed groups like the Karen National Union (KNU), the Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) in northern Shan State and some of the Chin militias.

A New Revolution

Myanmar has been under some form of military rule for most of the time since its independence from British rule in 1948. In that time, the leadership of the military has been dominated by the majority ethnic group, the Bamar, which to varying degrees oppressed the country’s numerous other ethnic groups, making Myanmar the setting for one of the longest-sustained ethnic insurgencies on the planet. For much of this time, especially under the regime of General Ne Win, from 1962 to 1988, the military isolated the country through decades of self-imposed seclusion. This was followed by some 20 years of ostracization by much of the international community as a response to the violent repressions of the 1988 and early 1990s protests.

Everything changed when a new generation of military leaders took over in 2010. Daw Aung San Suu Kyi was released from prison and her party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), was allowed to participate in national elections. The military for the most part stood aside. Committed to completing the mission of her father, General Aung San, who had been assassinated in 1947, Suu Kyi set out to unify the country under a form of federalism that ensured Bamar dominance. But many of the armed groups rejected her vision. At the end of 2020, confronting an overwhelming NLD victory at the polls and concerned that it would lose its grip on power completely, the Tatmadaw prepared to stage a coup.

What Senior General Min Aung Hlaing had not counted on when he launched the coup on Feb. 1, 2021, was the fact that Myanmar had become a fundamentally different country following a decade of growing openness to the international community. Young people and civil society in general mobilized against him and the military in a manner unseen before; administrative officials, public civil servants and many workers took to the streets to protest. In the first months after the coup, the military killed thousands of people.  

The mobilization in the streets sparked the emergence of a new political dynamic, one that transcended previous generational, ethnic and cultural divides. In the past, the ethnic armed insurgencies had been little concerned by the Bamar majority’s fight for democracy, which had been waged under Suu Kyi’s leadership against the military. In return, the Bamar majority had paid little attention to the grievances underlying the historic insurgencies that had been underway since independence along the border areas of the country. With the coup, Min Aung Hlaing achieved what until then seemed almost impossible: uniting all the people of Myanmar. Unfortunately for him, it was against the military.

Underlying this newfound solidarity was the experience of young people who had tasted previously forbidden freedoms and were not ready to give them back; between 2011 and 2021, they had been interacting across ethnic lines and been connected to the outside world, including to other youth-led movements, such as the Milk Tea Alliance. They became a generation with its own music, traditions, values and habits. But most importantly, they didn’t inherit the same fear of authority that was so ingrained in their parents.

Much like the movements that sprang up before them in Algeria, Belarus, Bolivia, Chile, Egypt, France, Georgia, Haiti, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Iraq, Lebanon, Sudan, Thailand, Ukraine and even the U.S., the youth in Myanmar have used social media to mobilize and sustain their resistance. I would argue that what we are seeing in Myanmar is the first successfully sustained rebellion against an oppressive regime since the Arab Spring. Deep in the Karenni jungle, a young doctor said to me: “This is more than just a civil war; it is a revolution.”

Being in their 20s and early 30s, these young and for the most part urban activists have introduced new technologies and ways of thinking to an old fight. Most evenings, they can be found in west Demoso, debating and strategizing in makeshift coffee shops, tattoo parlors and Starlink-connected internet cafes and guesthouses. They run these venues — as well as small enterprises like petrol stations, money changers, car-repair workshops, rice and wood sawmills, and furniture makers — to generate funds to support displaced populations and the frontline troops.

Myanmar is such a traditional society that I wondered if this clash of cultures between young and old was creating tensions and difficulties. One of the founders of an activist radio station called Federal FM Radio, which transmits news, music and updates on the revolution to all parts of Karenni from deep in the jungle, told me that, initially, local communities viewed the arrival of the young activists with distrust. But by respecting local traditions, remaining polite and, over time, being seen to provide services that had not previously existed in the region, they gained acceptance.

The significant number of hospitals and clinics young medical professionals set up in Karenni surely helped. And they don’t just work in these facilities — they rebuild them after they have been bombed. I met one group of activists called Spring Hope that, after each bombing run or mortar attack that destroyed one of their hospitals, they metaphorically and physically shook the dust off their clothes, collected the patients who had survived and went further into the jungle to build a new one. When I met them, they were on their fourth.

About two-thirds of the country is now reportedly gripped by conflict, of which an estimated 60% of the affected areas is no longer under Tatmadaw control. For the most part, the Tatmadaw only move from one point to another with heavy protection. Incapable of maintaining control on the the ground, the military instead conducts indiscriminate airstrikes and mortar attacks on civilians and their schools, churches, markets and of course hospitals. I found myself in the middle of three such attacks. People fled to shelters upon the sound of the approaching jets, but it was visible on their faces how much the violence was actually further fueling a hatred toward the military. There was no question of them being cowed into submission.

Young activists have also joined the rebel fighting forces. The Karenni Nationalities Defence Force (KNDF), launched by activists, was officially stood up on May 31, 2021. As a fighting force, it operates alongside the preexisting Karenni Army, the armed wing of the Karenni National Progressive Party, and has been involved in hundreds of clashes with the Tatmadaw, recently taking control of parts of the large towns of Loikaw and Demoso. One of its key leaders, 31-year-old Deputy Commander Marwi, was an organic farmer prior to the coup.

While I was in Karenni, the KNDF took the strategic stronghold of Shadaw. The Tatmadaw resisted against long odds — no food or water for more than a month, no resupplies. I asked some of the KNDF fighters why these soldiers didn’t surrender. Fear of the rebels, some said; fear of their hierarchy, said others. From what I know of the Tatmadaw, the Myanmar military is a very closely-knit organization where the needs of the families of soldiers are typically fully taken care of (health, education, income). For a soldier to surrender would most likely have immediate repercussions for his family — they would likely not only be ostracized but probably left destitute in the best of cases, imprisoned in the worst. One KNDF commander told me that deserting soldiers beg the armed groups receiving them to report that they have been killed.

Marwi is muscular and has an engaging smile. When I talked to him, he situated the current conflict in Myanmar’s broader historical struggle. In his view, this fight is an all-or-nothing war that had to lead to a resolution of the underlying political problems that had plagued the country since independence. He emphasized that the international community should not seek a quick end: Myanmar’s disparate peoples had suffered too much since independence, and the current confrontation was the opportunity to bring to a definitive end the struggle for equality between all ethnic groups.

Listening to Marwi, I realized that the KNDF was more of a revolutionary movement than a military force. In its manifesto, the organization commits to respecting human rights and renounces any role in politics; after the defeat of the Tatmadaw, the KNDF plans to surrender itself to an established civilian authority. I learned that the general population had become nervous about how strong the KNDF had become, causing the movement’s leadership to initiate a campaign to make people aware that after the revolution had ended, a much-reduced KNDF fighting force would be fully integrated into the existing Karenni State Army. Leaving me, Marwi offered parting words: “When you give a soldier a gun to fight, you need to tell him that he needs to know that he will have to give it back.”

A New State

Over the following days, I came to realize that I was seeing a new form of community-based activism. While the KNDF was more of a revolutionary movement than a structured military force, a new type of civil society was also emerging; a civilian soldiery involved in military operations as well as providing assistance to vulnerable communities, all with noncombatant support from the general population.

For example: An organization called KA-Zero was formed by a small group of activists, including four businessmen, a social worker and farmers. KA-Zero rapidly grew in the months after the coup, evolving its raison d’être from helping people flee the fighting to taking up arms to defend villages. Soon, they joined the newly formed 5th battalion of the KNDF.

Today, KA-Zero has a network of volunteers assisting its projects, which focus on supporting the 5th battalion, including fighting and providing food and logistical assistance, but also taking care of displaced civilians. When I mentioned to Arkar Min Tun, one of the founding members of the group, that in order to receive international support it could be in the organization’s interest to clearly separate the military and civil components of KA-Zero’s activities, he told me it was not possible for as long as the fighting continued. The country was in the midst of an all-encompassing revolution; any separation of activities would be artificial and would undermine the legitimacy of the movement in the eyes of the population and the diaspora, who were its main backers.

Other organizations have similar dual functions. As the person leading the Ka Nyar Maw Foundation, a group similar to KA-Zero, explained to me, 80% of the private donors to the foundation’s operations wanted their funds to be directed toward supporting the frontline troops.

Sometimes this creates challenges. Marwi explained to me that many of his backers exhort him not to take prisoners. Such was the suffering caused by the Tatmadaw that many in the population told him that they did not want their money going to feed the few hundred prisoners and deserters from the Myanmar military under the watch of the KNDF.

The more I encountered these young civil society activists and understood their logic, the more I wondered if this blurring of roles was inherent to any popular resistance against the all-out tactics of an oppressive regime. I contacted a few friends working in other conflicts — Ukraine, Syria, Libya — and heard that they had come across a similar phenomenon.

In Karenni, revolutionary fervor has been conjoined with new local governance structures that were put in place almost immediately after the coup. Saya Khun, a former civil society leader and current deputy head of the emerging interior affairs department, told me that, “for the first time in Myanmar’s history, the people are being given a voice.”

It seemed to me a fascinating experiment in participatory democracy: Young activists had joined key Karenni civil society leaders to create the Karenni State Consultative Council (KSCC), founded on principles of inclusivity, dignity, unity and commitment to the revolution and made up of various civil society, youth and women organizations, Karenni parliamentarians and professionals from a variety of disciplines. Its membership has not been fully finalized, with seats left vacant to receive representatives from political and armed groups that haven’t, as of yet, been convinced to join.

The KSCC’s executive arm is the Interim Executive Council (IEC). It has taken on the responsibilities of a de-facto state government, but its members consider it only a caretaker entity overseeing administration at all levels: village, village tract, township, district and state. Efforts have been made to ensure the council is representative of the different forces active in Karenni: political, military, Popular Defense Forces (PDFs) and civil society (with a particular focus on the participation of women). Here again, the council’s seventh seat has been left vacant to welcome the future participation of an incoming group. The IEC works closely with the KNDF; its deputy chair is a KNDF senior officer. As the IEC grows, the plan is for it to take on all the security responsibilities of the state. So far, it oversees prisons and policing.

But how much of an impact does the IEC have? I humped over the same range of mountains back to Thailand, where for a few weeks I attempted to understand what other armed groups operating in Myanmar thought about the IEC and what was happening in Karenni. I heard that many of them, including the KNU, the TNLA and some of the Chin ethnic armed groups, were observing how it functioned, and some had even replicated its structure. They saw the Karenni experiment as an introduction of a new style of governance in areas where armed groups had, in the past, only been fighting and delivering basic services, not trying to establish functioning administrative structures. Now that many of these groups were moving into areas where they had previously not had an established presence, they saw the IEC’s structure as a way to gain levels of local acceptance through the involvement of different ethnic groups in their administration.

I am not sure the extent to which this paradigm shift is understood outside Myanmar. There is an opportunity here to help shape the future of Myanmar. Of course, the international donor community is afraid that acknowledging and working with the emerging governance structures will contribute to breaking apart the country. This is a false concern, however — it is important to remember that the current fragmentation is not only a result of the loss of effective control of the Myanmar military over many parts of the country, but also the emergence of alternative forms of local governance in the spaces created. None of the resistance or ethnic groups are openly seeking independence. What they ask for instead is a form of federalism that guarantees the rights of different ethnic groups and supports their ability to work together.

While the war progresses, for international aid organizations to engage with these new local governance structures, they must be willing to accommodate new forms of collaboration. They need to be patient and accept approaches that support open-ended processes (supporting and financing consultations at all levels, building the capacity of local administrations) rather than well-defined outcomes (schools, hospitals and food distribution), which in turn necessitates multiyear commitments rather than short-term funding cycles. More structural forms of intervention will need to be considered, such as supporting credit schemes and using non-traditional financial networks to facilitate cash transfers.

I represented the U.N. for more than 20 years during some of the worst conflicts in recent history: Sudan, Somalia, Rwanda, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Gaza and the West Bank, and Afghanistan. This time in Myanmar, I heard nothing good about the U.N.’s work there. I was repeatedly told that the U.N. had failed the people of Myanmar.

When I first started my mission into Karenni, I tried to explain the constraints the organization operates in, its delicate balancing of engagement with the military government, its attempts to access vulnerable areas the Tatmadaw did not control — the latter of which, I had to acknowledge, was half-hearted at best. But the more I saw of what has happening in Karenni, the more I realized the U.N.’s absence was inexcusable. Toward the end of my stay, I found myself repeatedly apologizing for the U.N.’s betrayal of the people it had been created to serve.

The U.N.’s failure in Myanmar is more of a problem for the organization than the people of Myanmar, who have learned to expect very little of it. So, it is no longer a question of if the U.N. is doing harm, but rather whether it’s relevant at all. What I found in Karenni is an opportunity for the U.N. to become relevant. Were it to find the courage to assume a leadership role among the international community, there exists on the ground a real network of effective civil leaders and organizations with which to collaborate that would make a disproportionately positive impact on the country’s future.