The man behind the Myanmar madness
By Richard Ehrlich and Shawn W Crispin
BANGKOK - Myanmar's monk-led struggle for political change has made global
headlines, but the dictator who rules the country with an iron fist, General
Than Shwe, 74, is still obscure, often grimly hidden behind dark sunglasses and
a military uniform decorated with medals. He is widely viewed, both at home and
overseas, as the major stumbling block to national reconciliation and the
restoration of democracy.
The senior general is occasionally seen in local media saluting Myanmar's
powerful armed forces at parades and other state
ceremonies, his jowls framing a plump, sullen face. He is also widely known to
suffer from health problems, for which he frequently seeks medical care in
Singapore, and some analysts wonder whether he still has the mental facilities
and political judgment to manage the current crisis roiling his regime.
Rumors circulating in the Thailand-based Burmese-exile community contend that
the military leader recently sent his close family members to Bangkok in case
the protests spiral out of control. As the hardline junta's top general, Than
Shwe would certainly have reason to fear if the growing protest movement
eventually led to forced regime change.
Rights groups in Thailand have studiously chronicled the military regime's
abuses, including well-documented allegations of forced labor, torture,
systematic rape and the ill-treatment of many of the country's estimated 1,200
political prisoners. For many of those charges, rights groups contend, Than
Shwe could be held directly responsible in an eventual international tribunal.
The introverted and superstitious leader is also known to be the driving force
behind the junta's bizarre decision to move the national capital 400 kilometers
north from Yangon to Naypyidaw in 2005. Some political analysts have speculated
that the new capital was built toward the aim of re-establishing the country's
long-abolished monarchy as part of a broader political transition where Than
Shwe would assume a newly established throne.
Than Shwe, a high-school dropout, does not have particularly aristocratic
roots, however. He was born in 1933, when Myanmar, then known as Burma, was
still under British colonial rule. Those formative years under foreign rule may
explain his regime's still-frequent warnings that Britain and the United States
support subversive elements aimed at stirring unrest inside Myanmar toward the
alleged aim of overthrowing the military government and securing privileged
access to the country's rich bounty of natural resources, including large
unexploited deposits of oil and gas.
Yet his regime's own relentless truth-twisting, severe censorship, endless
sloganeering, and rampant jingoism are often referred to as Orwellian and have
earned Myanmar critical international rebukes, including frequently from the
United Nations. Than Shwe has the credentials for national thought control,
based on his work dating back to the 1950s in the army's Psychological
Operations Department, when he was involved in churning out nationalistic
propaganda.
Later, his well-established shoot-to-kill instincts, particularly in
counterinsurgency campaigns against minority ethnic-Karen guerrillas in the
country's eastern regions, earned him a promotion to captain in 1960. He
quickly ingratiated himself to the military's top brass by helping General Ne
Win seize power in a 1962 military coup, ending the country's short
post-independence experiment with democracy.
Than Shwe steadily climbed the ranks, at crucial junctures favoring bullets
over ballots.
The current uprising led by Buddhist monks, pro-democracy activists and a
growing number of ordinary people echoes a similar, failed popular insurrection
in 1988, which Than Shwe and other military leaders crushed after city streets
swelled with protesters.
An estimated 3,000 people perished in that idealistic attempt to topple the
regime and restore democracy. Many people now fear an equally bloody
confrontation could erupt amid the current clashes, and there have been reports
that Than Shwe favors a heavy-handed response over possible negotiations.
During the military's internal squabbling after 1988, Ne Win was ousted in a
coup and Than Shwe rose to the new hardline military regime's top spot in 1992.
Ne Win died under house arrest in 2002.
It remains to be seen whether another ambitious soldier may use the current
chaos as pretext to eclipse the ailing Than Shwe and seize power for a new
military faction. Than Shwe's all-encompassing official titles include
commander-in-chief of the military and chairman of the junta's ruling body,
which he helped re-brand as the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) from
its harsher-sounding earlier incarnation as the State Law and Order
Restoration Council.
Last year his government suffered a rare paparazzi-style scandal, when he
hosted an unusually lavish wedding for his daughter. A 10-minute video clip,
filmed at the wedding in the old capital Yangon, surfaced on the Internet
purporting to show the bride, Thandar Shwe, swathed in sumptuous jewels -
revealing the utter disparity in wealth between the military elite and the
impoverished general population.
The champagne, five-star comforts and other opulence became a sore point among
exile-based dissidents and the butt of jokes mocking Than Shwe and the junta's
insistence that his military regime is not corrupt. This week, international
corruption watchdog Transparency International ranked Myanmar, along with
Somalia, as the most corrupt country in the world in the group's 180-country
index for 2007.
Perhaps because of that record, Than Shwe has been the isolationist
counter-force to moderates in the military leadership who have favored more
engagement with the outside world and perhaps a more conciliatory approach to
the political opposition. Than Shwe broke off the United Nations-supported
secret dialogue with the political opposition in 2003 and he is known to harbor
a personal grudge toward National League for Democracy and Nobel Peace Prize
winner Aung San Suu Kyi, which has hampered national-reconciliation
initiatives.
He reportedly reluctantly signed off on then-SPDC secretary No 1 Khin Nyunt's
drive to have Myanmar elevated into the Association of Southeast Asian Nations
(ASEAN) in 1997. However, membership failed to deliver the immediate economic
gains the SPDC first envisaged, because of the regional financial crisis, and
has more recently opened his government to more criticism of the SPDC's abysmal
rights record and more neighborly pressure to implement democratic reforms.
Khin Nyunt was removed in an internal 2004 purge and there are now indications
Than Shwe is considering withdrawing Myanmar from the regional grouping.
Reporters Without Borders, a press-freedom group based in France, recently
described Than Shwe as a "notoriously paranoid general" who keeps himself
virtually mummified from his own countrymen in the new capital, Naypyidaw,
which his government built at great expense and moved to in late 2005. News
reports indicate that the reclusive general seldom leaves his personal villa
and rarely personally addresses the SPDC leadership.
Than Shwe "makes very few public appearances, and most Burmese have never heard
him speak", the press-freedom group said in a statement. "His militaristic
speeches, harshly attacking the pro-democracy opposition, are read for him on
the government radio and TV, and are given prominence by all government media."
However, it's likely the local media would revise the tone and substance of
their reports about the aging dictator should he happen to be overthrown by the
popular movement now testing his hold on political power.
Richard S Ehrlich is a Bangkok-based journalist from San Francisco,
California. Shawn W Crispin is Asia Times Online's Southeast Asia
Editor.
Head
Office: Unit B, 16/F, Li Dong Building, No. 9 Li Yuen Street East,
Central, Hong Kong Thailand Bureau:
11/13 Petchkasem Road, Hua Hin, Prachuab Kirikhan, Thailand 77110
