The Tatmadaw is falling

On the morning of February 1^st, 2021, Myanmar experienced its third military coup since independence. The already influential military, known as the Tatmadaw (Royal Army) was displeased with its results in the 2020 election and decided to end the fragile democratic system that had been heading the country since 2011.[1] All civilian control of the country was transferred to military officers or their close political allies, placing Myanmar under junta rule. While the prime minister Aung San Suu Kyi was arrested alongside many members of government, a group of politicians from the now suspended parliament created the National Unity Government (NUG) to oppose the junta.[2]

Flag of the Tatmadaw, the military powerful enough to have its own national style flag. Also known as the Sit-Tat (military) or Sit-Kwe (dog soldiers). Image from wikimedia commons.

On the 5^th of May 2021, the NUG formed the first of their People’s Defense Forces (PDF) to be able to contest the junta militarily. On September 7^th, 2021, the NUG declared a “people’s defensive war” and called on all people of Myanmar to fight the military regime.[3] The start date of the “Myanmar civil war” is usually given as either the date of the coup, the date of the creation of the PDFs or the declaration of war by the NUG. These dates, all in 2021, mask the fact that Myanmar has been in civil war since 1948, making it the longest ongoing conflict in the world.

Military situation in Myanmar December 2023. Junta control shown in green. Work by Thomas van Linge.

Myanmar is an ethnically diverse country with an ethnically Burmese majority, and after the end of British colonial rule in 1948 a variety of simultaneous ethnic revolts have been ongoing in various parts of the country. Ethnic minority populations have organized multiple rebel groups called Ethnic Armed Organizations (EAO). Currently there are more than 25 EAOs active in Burma, with their goals ranging from small political concessions to wishes of full independence.[4] The number of EAOs actively opposing the junta has risen since the coup, as the small attempts at reaching peace under Aung San Suu Kyi’s premiership have mostly ended.[5]

The Tatmadaw’s traditional seat of power lies in the central Burmese-speaking and Buddhist lowlands of Myanmar. The regions in that lowland used to be mostly unaffected by war, as fighting mostly happened in the highlands of the country’s periphery. With the coup that changed, and the PDFs loyal to the NUG have made the junta’s seat of power much less secure. This weakening of the Tatmadaw in the central regions also means that it is less capable of projecting power into the outer regions.[6]

Operation 1027

As is the case anywhere else, warfare in Myanmar is shaped by the local climate. From the middle of May until the beginning of October is monsoon season in Myanmar, which covers the country in rain. From October until the middle of February is the cold dry season while the hot dry season lasts from the middle of February until May.[7]

Historically, the two dry seasons have been advantageous for the military while the monsoon season has proven advantageous for the rebels. The rain lessens the impact of the military’s artillery and air power, the largest strength the junta has against their enemies. The rain also destroys roads, making their motorized forces less mobile and cutting off junta outposts from reinforcement and supplies.[8] The dynamic of the military advancing in the dry seasons and receding in the monsoon season held true until the beginning of the latest cold dry season in October of 2023.

October 27^th, 2023, the Brotherhood Alliance launched operation 1027 as a major escalation of the war in northern and western Myanmar. The Brotherhood Alliance is one of the largest opposition alliances in Myanmar and pledges loyalty to the National Unity Government. Throughout the autumn of 2023 most rebel groups in Myanmar followed their example, and within months the military’s control of the country had been greatly weakened.

The rebel offensives have both captured territories and large amounts of weapons and supplies from the military. The Tatmadaw has lost aircraft, armored vehicles, artillery pieces and thousands of soldiers in their failed attempt to maintain control in the outer regions as hundreds of outposts fall to the rebels. [9] The Tatmadaw has continued to lose control of key strategic sites into the new year, as the opposition captures outposts, towns, military bases, and border checkpoints from the military.[10]

In December the junta entered a ceasefire with the Brotherhood Alliance. The ceasefire was never meant to last, but was intended as a breathing room for civilians in the Lunar New Year holiday season. As the world entered the year of the dragon the Brotherhood Alliance made a vow that the junta would be destroyed by the end of the year.[11] This confidence shows that a previously impossible end to the civil war is now on the table. Can the Tatmadaw be outright destroyed?

So, can it?

Even as late as in early 2023 the main opinion in international media was that while the junta is weaker than it has been before, it’s holding on.[12] While the tone is shifting to be more optimistic with the massive increase in news of rebel victories, the fall of the junta is still not certain. For the civil war to end with the destruction of the Tatmadaw the military needs to keep losing strength faster than it can replenish it, and faster than the rebels.

Only a few years ago the military of Myanmar was considered to be a formidable force. The army’s size was estimated at somewhere between 300 000 and 400 000 soldiers, a figure that was never seriously investigated in western sources until recently. Newer estimates put the figure at far below the old number, at 150 000 total soldiers, of which perhaps only as many as 70 000 are frontline combat troops.[13]

A change in estimated strength changes how international observers look at the war, but it does not change the strategic situation on the ground. What does change the situation on the ground is the thousands of soldiers that the Tatmadaw has lost to deaths, wounds, and desertions. These losses are not only in small clashes either, as entire battalions of junta troops have been destroyed in single pitched battles.[14] The losses are made worse by reduced recruitment numbers, which have gotten so bad that Myanmar’s officer’s military academy, in the past a popular option for social advancement, is struggling to meet recruitment goals.[15]

The military is planning to rectify both these issues by enacting a new conscription law, which they will use to force 5000 young Burmese into military service each month.[16] As many young Burmese pledge to fight the junta rather than to join the Tatmadaw and many more have already fled the country to avoid conscription, the conscription may prove ineffective or even counterproductive for the military. The effect of the conscription law may be the deciding factor in whether the military falls or manages to make the war drag on for years.

Myanmar after the Tatmadaw

The people of Myanmar showed the military and the world that they did not want military rule in the 2020 election, which was won in a landslide victory by Aung San Suu Kyi’s NLD party, an outright rejection of the military backed USDP, which won 1/10^th of the seats the NLD did.[17] The population wished for civilian rule and peace back then just as they do now.

The National Unity Government will have a large responsibility to rebuild democracy and ensure that further ethnic conflicts don’t emerge if the junta falls. In this task they will need the trust of the population, and research consistently shows that they have it. Over 90% of ethnically Burmese people trust the NUG, and crucially, so do more than 90% of people of other ethnic backgrounds as well.[18]

If the NUG with their People’s Defense Forces win the war they will have done so with crucial support from their ethnic minority allies. The main push in operation 1027 was made by ethnically Palaung, Kokang Chinese and Rakhine people. The NUG will be in large informal debt to the experienced EAOs that helped them win power. The official stated goal of the NUG is to create a federal state with room for all ethnic minorities. What the NUG considers to be a federal state might differ from the wishes of the EAOs they worked with, and the balancing act between these wishes will be an important issue to work out. Luckily, with a democratic framework, unlike in the old military regimes since 1948, this does not need to mean war.