Myanmar ; the fallacy of “Freedom fighters” versus Junta - The issue of Legitimacy of Junta
The issue of Legitimacy of Junta
Typical Western liberal approach
states the requirements of “observable behavior” in order to claim any
legitimacy of Junta, such as Mass surrenders, grass root peace
movements, decline in the recruitment of the PDF.
” Mass Surrenders" are invalid metrics for the determination of
legitimacy. In a multi-ethnic state with a history of brutal
counter-insurgency, “the absence of public surrender” cannot be considered as a
proof of support. It is, more related to the “rational risk assessment” on the
part of people. Surrender requires trust in the victor's mercy. Neither the
Tatmadaw's historical record, nor the EAOs record particularly in ethnic areas,
cannot inspire this trust. Fear of reprisal, disappearances, or being used as
porters/human shields is a far more powerful deterrent than any ideological
commitment.
Grassroots Peace Movements" as a Western Liberal Expectation such as that of a Ghandian or "Color Revolution" style are “culturally and politically specific template.” In a context where the state has monopolized violent coercion for generations and civil society is fractured along ethnic and class lines, the primary "grassroots" response is not public protest but “survival strategies” like flight, paying bribes, silent compliance, or joining the armed group that claims to defend one's specific community. The desire for peace in the masses is real, but it manifests as exhaustion and localized coping, not as a unified political movement with clear terms.
Stable or increase in PDF Recruitment is not a pure indicator of
ideological support. It is a “function of labor economics and social pressure.”
If PDFs or EAOs offer wages, food, and status that surpass the meager or
non-existent alternatives in a collapsed rural economy, recruitment will
continue. This doesn't mean every recruit is a fervent revolutionary; it means
“war has become a rational livelihood choice.” A decline in
recruitment would signal a change in the cost-benefit analysis (e.g.,
increased risk of death, better economic alternatives elsewhere), not a
sudden surge of junta loyalty. As
opposed to decrease, the border-based "intellectual" and NGO
ecosystem creates a “political economy of resistance,” where certain
narratives and activities are funded and sustained by external capital flows.
This does not invalidate resistance, but it complicates any simple reading of "popular
support." It creates a class of diaspora/ border-based actors whose
material interests are aligned with the continuation of a certain type of
opposition politics.
The Dominant Material Fact in
Myanmar case is the war economy and suffering. The central, unifying experience
for most of the population is “displacement, inflation, loss, and fear.” This
is a crushing material weight. The desire for peace, to "go back to their
villages" is the most powerful political sentiment, one that no current
actor—junta, NUG, or major EAO—can fulfill.
Overall the support is
fragmented, conditional, and non-ideological. For a peasant in Sagaing,
"support" for a PDF may mean "this group protects our village
from SAC troops today." For a shopkeeper in Yangon, "support"
for the junta may mean "they patrol the street and I can open my shop, for
now." This is “transactional, temporal, and local”—not
ideological or national. There is no single "popular will"
in Myanmar, only a shattered populace navigating a landscape of competing armed
claims, where the primary demand is simply for the war to stop. Whoever can claim to fulfill that demand will
be the ultimate, tragic test of power.
Thus, a simplified, morally
charged narrative "Terrorist Junta versus Democratic Revolution" is
propagated to mobilize international resources and opinion. This “overwrites a
more ambiguous, tragic, and locally specific reality” of proxy conflict,
economic interests, and the brutal calculus of survival. The narrative becomes
a weapon in the wider geopolitical war (US vs. China/Russia).
From a materialist perspective,
the Myanmar military (Tatmadaw) does not represent a revolutionary
vanguard seizing power from a feudal or bourgeois class. It is, and has
been for decades, the “central institution of the existing Bamar-dominated
ruling class and its political economy. The coup in 2021 was not a
revolution but a consequence of intra-power struggle between two factions to
acquire and preserve hegemony against a perceived threat from the US proxy
NLD's uneasy coalition with ethnic political parties. It is the “visible
eruption of the internal contradictions” of that state apparatus itself between
two dominant Bamar factions. The NUG is fighting for “state power” against the
Junta with its own historic oppression
of ethnic nations, its exclusionary nationalism. Functional legitimacy" of
either one is measured solely within the segment of the population and the
capitalist class whose interests align with continued dominance of Bamar elite.
A serious number of EAOs, however, are challenging the very class character
and structure of that state.
The question of “the
legitimacy” of Elections
The boycotting EAOs control or
contest significant portions of the country, especially in border regions.
Their ban directly led to the cancellation of voting in at least 65 townships,
as previously mentioned.
As distinct from the NLD/PDF
position, while the exiled National Unity Government (NUG) and its
People's Defence Force (PDF) units also called for a boycott, the EAOs'
stance was rooted in their own long-standing political agendas for ethnic
self-determination, operating from a position of independent territorial
control. In essence, the election was not only rejected by the NLD-aligned
resistance but also by the major ethnic political entities that have been key
players in Myanmar's conflict for decades. Based on the observed patterns of
election boycotts and territorial control, the major Ethnic Armed
Organizations (EAOs) primarily focused their electoral opposition within their
core ethnic territories or areas of influence. This reflects their
foundational goal of ethnic self-determination and administrative control over
their homelands.
Unlike the ethnically-based EAOs,
the People's Defence Force (PDF) networks are ideologically (pro-NLD/US) and
nationally oriented. They are more diffuse, with units operating in
Bamar-majority regions like Sagaing, Magway, and Bago Yoma where central military
control is weak. Their "financial control" is support from the exiled
National Unity Government (NUG) from the US through NED and other such US-West
sources.
NUG-PDF groups, and some EAOs like the KNU declared the election
illegitimate and called for a complete boycott. They framed participation as
collaboration with the junta. They publicly claimed responsibility
for thousands of attacks on polling stations, electoral officials, and
candidates they deemed pro-junta. The intent was to render the election
non-viable through violence and intimidation. Therefore, the "Condition of
Participation" for a voter was dual-faceted:, the decision to participate
occurred in a context of competing threats: Potential retaliation from local
PDF or EAO groups for "collaborating", Potential scrutiny or negative
consequences from the junta's administrative apparatus for non-participation.
In many areas, defying the armed resistance required significant personal courage
for the 13+ million who voted. The intent may be various as a vote for the
junta's pathway, a pragmatic act to maintain access to services and avoid
junta-side administrative trouble, a
genuine desire for any form of civilian-led stability, however limited,
a rejection of the resistance's tactics of disrupting civic processes.
Regardless of the underlying intent, 13+ million vote fundamentally complicates
the legitimacy calculus and debunks any simplistic "voted at
gunpoint by the junta" narrative carried out by the Western media and
their proxies. The concrete reality of
the total participation is that the junta's election cannot be dismissed
merely as a sham conducted solely through fear of the military. It was also
a battleground, where participation was an act of defiance against
another armed faction.
If a pro-Western military held this exact same election—with 13 million
votes, multi-ethnic candidates, under a military-drafted constitution—Western
media would frame it as a "step toward democracy," a
"complex but hopeful transition," or a "return to
stability." Returning to a civil
government is a big step for the junta—it's a strategic move to shed its
pariah status, divide its opposition, and create a new political
class loyal to its system. It seeks to trade international illegitimacy for
domestic functionality.
The "legitimacy" is
often a geopolitical verdict, not a purely analytical one. The people of
Myanmar are not deciding based on these foreign narratives. They are making
brutal daily calculations: whether the path offered by the junta's new system
or the path offered by the revolution is more likely to bring security,
justice, or mere survival. The 13 million votes are one data point in that
calculation.
The ultimate judgment will not come from the Western Media and its
local proxies or from the UN. It will
come from the people of Myanmar. If this new civil government can actually
end the war, improve livelihoods, and gain tacit acceptance from a majority weary
of fighting, it will, over time, generate its own form of legitimacy—the
legitimacy of delivering a peace that the revolution could not achieve. If
it cannot, and the war grinds on, it will be seen as a hollow facade,
regardless of how many voted .
The Western double standard
narrative is that the more accurate framing of an election is not about the quality of the election day,
but about the nature of the regime. However, the “nature of regime”, its
“legitimacy” is determined by the people of that country, not by the
“Western (double) standard”.
Next; Election and the results
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