Burma: Act Now!
A U.N. special envoy, Ibrahim Gambari, has held talks with the totalitarian regime in Burma and has also met with Aung San Suu Kyi, Nobel laureate and one of the leaders of the pro-democracy movement in that country:
[Gambari] had waited four days to see Gen Than Shwe before the chairman of Burma’s State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) made himself available.
No details have emerged but Mr Gambari was intending to urge the general “to cease the repression of peaceful protest”, release detainees and embrace democracy and human rights, a UN spokesman said before the talks.
The US called on the UN envoy to press upon the military the need for a “real and serious political dialogue with all relative parties”.
The SPDC — i.e., the totalitarian military junta — has no interest in democracy and human rights. As I and many others have argued before, it will take tough international sanctions and above all the support of China and India, the two major powers propping up the SPDC, for any such pressure to work, that is, to bring about real change.
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And what of the monks? They are being rounded up by the thousands — those who haven’t been murdered — and “sent to prisons in the far north of the country”. Some are trying to flee Rangoon, a city of fear and tension, but may not be getting very far.
Said one Rangoon resident to a BBC correspondent: “I really want change, but they have guns and we don’t, so they’ll always win.”
Sad, but true. For now.
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For an important report on the plight of Burmese nuns, many of whom also seem to have disappeared, see my fellow assistant editor and co-blogger Clarissa Pinkola Estés’s recent post.
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See my recent posts on the situation in Burma here, here, here, and here.
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Now — right now — is the time for all of us to raise our voices in support of Burma’s pro-democracy movement. What can we do, those of us without access to the levers of power? We can keep writing and talking about Burma. And we can support those who are in a position to combine our voices and to send a message to Washington and elsewhere that action must be taken.
Bob Fertik and Democrats.com (and others: see my friend Melissa McEwan, for example) are supporting the admirable effort of Amnesty International to send a petition to the White House asking President Bush “to urge the UN Security Council members, especially the Permanent members like China, to immediately deploy a UN Security Council mission to Myanmar (Burma). This mission should act to resolve the human rights crisis and avert the risk of further violence and bloodshed. The Council should also consider the possibility of imposing an arms embargo and to address the dire human rights situation in Myanmar.”
Please click here and sign the petition. It may not seem like much, it may seem like a small and insignificant thing to do, but at least it’s something.
(Cross-posted from The Reaction.)
19 Responses to “Burma: Act Now!”
Raising our voices, writing and talking, sending UN delegations and thinking of imposing silly and useless sanctions… ah, I can see the Generals quaking in their boots. Nah, they’re laughing at you.
At least you’re consistent in your delusions that expressions of righteous indignation is all that is needed to persuade bad people to change their ways. Let’s see, this has worked exactly when over the years?
Your feeling bad and wanting to help shows your compassion. The methods you advocate shows how clueless you really are.
You want to help the poor people of Burma? You’re going to have to come up with some medicine a whole lot stronger than what you have.
I was initially baffled by the title of the post. Take what action? The U. S. has, essentially, no relationship with the regime in Rangoon. We already have trade sanctions in place. There’s essentially no chance that Burma’s major trading partners (China, India, and Thailand) will do anything, at least not without the threat of dire consequences.
Then I realized that you were talking about meaningless, ineffectual, symbolic actions.
Well then we apply pressue on those neighboring nations as we can even if its just a slim hope they will act to help resolve the issue. We have diplomats in all those nations who I’m sure would be happy to try if the president called and asked them to. Its what the State Dept is for.
The gov’t of Burma has been slaughtering its people for over 15 years nows, many of its enthic minorities have perished with no one taking notice. Now that people finally are I think it can be worked into a solution. But you can’t just throw in the towel without even suiting up.
and what pressure do you propose applying to neighboring countries? specifics, please. should the US cut off all foreign aid to those neighbors if they don’t ‘suit up’? should we impose trade sanctions on those neighbors? impose a blockade of their ports and assassinate their leaders?
and just how do you think those neighboring countries are going to go about resolving this issue? are they supposed to cut off trade with Burma? are they supposed to invade? are they supposed to supply arms to the monks?
Wait a minute, your comments aren’t meant to be taken seriously, you’re auditioning for a staff position with The Onion. sorry for missing that. I should have caught it when you said the state department exists to act on the President’s behalf.
Michael, I understand and share your anguish and frustration, and the infuriating feeling of impotence in the face of a colossal injustice.
But appeals to the United Nations to actually do something about it that will make a difference seem to reflect an inattention to the last 30 years or so of world history. Calls for an embargo on a nation with natural gas resources and energy-hungry neighbors also seems a bit naive in the light of the Oil-for-Food revelations.
And calls to “keep writing and talking about it” seem to suit the childish mentality too common on the left side of things that seems to mistake the speaker’s satisfaction in expression of his outrage for a real solution.
Anyway, good luck getting people to put down their “Bush lied” signs long enough to do anything like that. Though you may get them to say that Bush soaked up so much outrage with his unjust, illegal whatever that there was none left to lavish on Burma, and thus blame Bush for the torture-deaths of monks and nuns.
A slim hope and some effort is better than none Steve. China is hosting the Olympics and very sensitive about doing that well. Boycotts aimed at that are about the only way to get China to do anything. India we have a good relationship with, Thailand I’m not so sure. But these are Burma’s neighbors and embargoes on the oil imports to Burma would encourage any gov’t that imports most of its oil to calm down. Oil among other things. We still have some pull with nations and we should use it.
not to be insensitive, sam, but jeez you’re naive.
let’s see, china hasn’t cleaned up its own act because of the olympics, correctly concluding that no other country cares enough to do anything of consequence, so why should they fear that we or the world is going to pressure them to do something about burma? if we’re not going to boycott the olympics because of the way china treats its own people, you think there’s support for boycotting the olympics because china hasn’t done enough for the poor monks in burma?
‘pull’ is defined as the ability to persuade others to do something they don’t perceive as being in their best interests (if they did such actions were beneficial, they wouldn’t need to be pulled, they would have long ago taken such actions on their own). this ‘pull’ can be exerted in two ways: saying please or by backing it up with threats to act in ways the pullee doesn’t appreciate. perhaps even you can concede that asking nicely here isn’t going to work. therefore, the only way the US can exert pull is to threaten these neighbors with repercussions not to their liking, which leads me back to asking you: just what is it that the US is supposed to say to these countries to get them to do what they haven’t wanted to do on their own?
and I know it bursts your idealistic balloon, but all slim hope and some effort and $3 can get you is a latte at starbucks. you can preach all you want, you can sing from the mountaintops all you want, you can click your heels all you want, but unfortunately, none of that is going to keep the bad guys from doing bad things to nice people. sometimes, you have to be willing to pick up a gun and kill the bad guys to stop them. you’re unwilling to do so here (as am I, but for different reasons than you), which is fine, but it’s sad to see you clinging to the idea that you’re going to accomplish anything with the weak-a** ideas you’ve put forward.
I agree with Dave.
Mr. Stickings is on record supporting dialog and talks with Iran. Perhaps we should do the same with Burma – isn’t this a chance to let diplomacy work?
I’m not being naive, I realize that there is a negligile chance our efforts can really help the people of Burma. But that doesn’t mean we do nothing, not even talk or try to twist some arms. You’re totally correct about the olympics and China, but notheless its not going to hurt to try. This idea of just doing absolutely nothing as opposed to the merely unlikely seems lazy to me.
but Sam, it does hurt to make such a pathetically weak effort. and it’s not being lazy, it’s being properly reflective of our limitations.
Just my .02, you all have passionate points.
I am wondering in listening sincerely to the points of
stevesturm, entropy, callimachus, Dave. There are ways and means always, but most often not instant ones. If you would, can you say how you would handle the situation with Than
Schwe that would bring some releif for the poeple who suffer under his highjacked rule?
I’d would like to think with you, if I could, how you might strategigize in those circusmstances. I agree with Sam, and just finished a short piece on China and the Olympics. There are many ways, many incursions. There is also a mystery about ‘right timing’ it appears…at least it seems so when I look back over all the regimes that have fallen since I’ve been alive. So so many; not often by one great act, but by thousands of small ones til a breaking point, a tipping point, a vice is constrcuted. More later. I’d like to hear what you think. This issue of why we are in the world, is an ages old discussion.
dr.e
I can’t spell very well, and the version of &*#@$ WordPress that I use has no spellchecker; I’ve been blogging for 6 months and you’d think I’d have found it already, but I havent found it yet. I’d appreciate it if you’d guess if you cant make out a word. I have to,
all the time.
Dr. E., thank you for your bold and moving pieces on human rights, especially in south Asia.
Yes, the Olympics are coming in ’08 — and they’ll be over three weeks later. And the Chinese navy will still covet bases in the Indian Ocean when the Olypmics are over. And state-owned Chinese energy companies still will hold exploration rights over the Burmese natural gas fields.
How to chase murderous, thuggish tyrants off their thrones? Well, we know the one thing that worked against Saddam. But I doubt anyone wants to propose that solution here.
Though a multinational protective military force in Rangoon and a limited area around it could provide a cover for the dissidents to work out a platform and the people to organize their own governance while the junta holes up in its inland warren and strangles on its own strangeness.
But that would have to overcome the passion for national sovereignty over any degree of human rights, and the mantra that you can’t bring democracy and guns at the same time, that somehow, in the last five years migrated from being fetishes of the right to being fetishes of the left. (It also would require China’s green light, and some cooperation from the relevant neighboring states.)
And in the current state of world opinion and with al Qaida on the alert for any new front, it probably would have to be done without significant U.S. involvement. But how are you going to do it without U.S. aircraft carriers?
I think a lot of us who had high hopes for Iraq (I’m in that pool; Dave is not) are looking to those of you who insisted there was a better way, and saying, “OK, show us what you’ve got.” Hopefully it will be better than “Write letters to the U.N.”
After all, we have been told often since then in no uncertain terms that our advocacy of that misguided adventure forever disqualified us from ever again contributing to policy-making or being taken seriously in any way. So I’m probably the wrong guy to ask.
Meanwhile, here’s a suggestion for a third way, as fodder.
[...] Burma: Act Now! [...]
Thank you for rich reply callimachus.
Bear with me a sec, while I work sort of backward from your last para. Firstly, in my .02, no soul is disqualified from contributing useful ideas and speculations, what ifs, how comes, and why nots, could we, can we, and how can we… and etc…. to the millions of serious discussions worldwide re how we shall try to live with one another….for myself, I’d add, with least harm and most benefit, most creative life, most wild God.
This is truly just my two cent’s worth, but I find that we all tend to think and sometimes say exclusionary things to one another, in part, at least unconsciously, because we are heartsick… that our brilliant hope that some venture, incursion, event would be good or better and helpful, but instead has come to such disorder, ruin, or has evaporated.
Only this: when people have ideas (and there are many ideas in your post… . You turn things at angles to peer at them, similar to Greene and Mitchell in the thoughtful article you linked to above.) I think there is often a calling that comes with each idea. If the idea is allowed to grow and mature, the subsequent shape it takes can prompt a person to enact it in whatever way they have within their reach.
Regarding your observation about ‘splitting’… how people choose up sides or means…. I don’t know that either/ or is often the solution to most egregious matters. More often, it seems and/and/and, can work most effectively. I think the UN can be part of it. I don’t think Than Schwe is ‘scarable,’ but he does love his luxury and the deference others give him… In that he’s not different that any of the other dirt thugs of the world, and there like every other ‘warlord’ filled with hubris, he is most vulnerable.
We may not be able to march up to one of Than Schwe’s many palaces and make demands, but I think ideas are magical scrolls that when unfurled reveal ‘further instruction’ about how those of us can see afresh and act. Just speaking for myself when facing the enormity of the world as compared to my mouse-sized courage, I find a useful point to remember is that preponderance of the small, is often what makes the great, Great.
These are just my thoughts.
And thank you, callimachus and all of you for reading our articles at TMV and ‘thinking together’ with us all. And thank you Michael, for allowing me to enter your discussion; you’ve been most gracious.
Dr.e
Let me put my cards on the table. Too many people misunderstand the circumstances under which peaceful transition to more democratic regimes has taken place. To the best of my knowledge the voluntary relinquishing of power by military or revolutionary governments is quite rare. Russia, Ukraine, Georgia, and so on were cases of bureaucracies which had lost their revolutionary fervor doing what bureaucracies do and taking the line of least resistance.
That’s obviously not the situation in Burma. The government has demonstrated its willingness to kill its own people to retain power. As long as the Burmese people aren’t able or willing to seize their own freedom, the rest of the world isn’t brave or concerned enough to help them, and Burma’s trading partners are willing to prop up the government as long as the gas and oil (or whatever) keep coming,
Taking steps—demonstrations, letter-writing campaigns, etc.—that don’t address any of these issues is not as good as taking hard, painful actions that do. Outcomes matter.
So, should we invade Burma, bomb China, blockade Thailand? No. I can’t speak for all the critics here but my personal opinion is that there’s no legitimate basis for taking any of those actions.
I think we’ve erred for the last 30 years in treating China as a responsible member of the world community when it clearly wasn’t. But there’s no re-bottling that genii. Brutal tyrannies like Burma and North Korea, supported by a Chinese patron, are the cost of our wishful thinking.
The gov’t of Burma has been slaughtering its people for over 15 years nows
“over 15 years now”=45 years now
How to chase murderous, thuggish tyrants off their thrones?
The mighty forces of righteous indignation and UN posturing and petition signatures aren’t enough to do the trick? I suppose we could stage a protest march in San Francisco or something.
“Tough international sanctions” against a country that has intentionally isolated itself from ther est of the world are likely to be somewhat less than effective.
I have a gloomy, hopeless feeling in the pit of my stomach about this. As long as the regime is propped up by its trading partners, there seems to no viable avenue for bringing change.
I know what should not be done, though, and that is to roll over in our cynical beda and forget about it.
What I fear most is that Burms will slip off news content and will be forgotten.
Opportunity may not come often, but when it does, there needs to be a readiness to seize it. That woin’t happen if the world is asleep when the knock comes.
The world went to sleep on the subject of China when we became enamored with its economic rise. Human rights stories about China were replaced by glowing odes of admiration to its economic prowess.
That was a childish mistake. There is no reason why China’s rise can’t be discussed without dropping the subject of its brutality to its own people and its role as an enabler for terrible regimes. Only lately has there been an effort to balance and flesh out our thinking on the subject of China. I wonder what opportunities were missed while we were asleep.
We should not go to sleep on the subject of Burma.
Even though there may not be anything effective to do right now, we have to stay awake. We have to remember these days of Burna’s equivalent to Tianmen Square. When the knock comes, we have to be ready for it.
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I hope this is not off-topic, but I’d like to mention a ‘process’ not just content here, about what has caught my eye in your comments; bold ideas that can be amplified if you choose, not nec. now, but whenever you might choose:
“There’s no re-bottling that genii. Brutal tyrannies like Burma and North Korea, supported by a Chinese patron, are the cost of our wishful thinking.” Dave
“over 15 years nowâ€=45 years now”….Tully
“Even though there may not be anything effective to do right now, we have to stay awake… When the knock comes, we have to be ready for it.” domajot
“We still have some pull with nations and we should
use it.” Sam
“Properly reflective of our limitations… “Stevesturm
“It also would require China’s green light…”
callimachus
And Entropy has interesting thoughts left at other posts, although a breif comment here.
And Michael Stickings… supporting that people like us ally with those already in the thick of things, is a wise idea that actually often calms the helper as much as helps to calm the world.
…The aggregate of thoughts like all these above, is what interests me. For this reason… what I’d call “amplification of ideas  Your concepts that I pulled out of your comments, can be pushed farther, shaken, to see what other ideas might fall out of them and then, to weigh what useful action might be proposed from those. To me, your thoughts are not static statements but living concepts that have more content than just the words alone… and good ones
To give a small example: I’m struggling to write a piece about a different uprising in another nation long ago, one also brutally wiped out. It’s like running through a narrow street with the buildings falling down, in terms of trying to peer into the issues to see what /who was naïve back then, what/who was too much, and what/who was not enough, etc.
I find a real-time pragmatic and spiritual balance proposed by your aggregate comments about how we might think about “thug regimesâ€. Just trying to meditate on the aggregate, I can see a clearer way through that rubble that comes from trying to speak cogently in the present about a historical time that still has many ‘unlaid ghosts,’ many unsettled arguments all this 51 years later.
Sometimes, and it’s only my .02, I think it’s the aggregate that when culled, teaches the most useful things, has the clearest currents, provides the most sturdy outriggers. In Estésian, that means to say thank you. The sluice gates are working in all of us, consciously or unconsciously and I think that is good too….where I grew up in a small village of 600, sluice gates caught the dead weeds, but let the clear water rush though.
dr.e.