The Myanmar civil war is further destabilizing an already horrid social situation where wars have been constant since the country achieved national independence. Over the course of the conflict there's been peculiar Imperialist maneuvers by China, the national military’s (Tatmadaw) implacable ally. China has given the State Advisory Council (SAC) military government open diplomatic, economic and military support throughout the nearly four year civil war, while keeping a distance from the opposition coalition National Unity Government (NUG) which was formed after the 2021 coup dé'tat. China has long openly aided the Wa Army to reduce the spillover of crime and maintain border stability. They're considered to be the best equipped ethnic army and have remained neutral in the current civil war, however they're reported to be the main supplier of weapons in the region for other armies. China had supported the Brotherhood Alliance in the border Shan state, which is rebelling against the military government to increase their allotted territory but are also allegedly arming and training the NUG. This support has changed however, as fears of the Tatmadaw being potentially overran and suspicions about China’s allied ethnic armies working closely with the NUG opposition and having too much autonomy have increased, especially in terms of suspicions of the Brotherhood Alliance getting too close to the US. Since the failed peace talks between the Brotherhood Alliance and the Tatmadaw in June 2024, China has been putting its full weight behind the Tatmadaw.

China’s alliance with Myanmar is based upon regional security and access to the Bay of Bengal which makes alliances with the government crucial for Chinese imperialism. China and the Tatmadaw are nonetheless suspicious of each other, and Beijing will hedge their relationship and support rebels to force the military to act in their interest. This is despite Myanmar being an integral part of the China-Myanmar Economic Corridor which is slated as a way to bypass the US Navy controlled Strait of Malacca. It’s an important lynchpin for China's Silk Road initiative, the project being a part of China’s imperialist objectives to threaten the rake the US has on international capital through the hegemony of the USD. The initiative has been protested by the US, calling it imperialist or neo- colonial; it's main objective is to increase the circulation of Chinese exports throughout Asia and Europe, allowing these commodities to be purchased with the Yuan as a part of China’s trade and financial offenses in the lead up to imperialist war. To a lesser extent, basic economic considerations such as the country's richness in rare earth minerals, energy resources, infrastructure projects and cheap labor for factories offshoring are also important for Chinese foreign policy.

Throughout the summer and fall of 2023 China urged the Brotherhood Alliance to hold peace accords with the military government to no avail. It was a shock for many observers when China didn't request further negotiations between the Brotherhood Alliance and the military government on the cusp of the ongoing “Operation 1027” in the Shan state. The main objective of the offense was for the Brotherhood Alliance to retake the casino and scam center city, Laukkaing, on China's border, the former crown jewel of the warlord Pheung Daxun, who leads the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army. The scam centers primarily victimize Chinese nationals by trafficking them into captivity through scam job offers and costing billions in thefts from investment fraud. These constitute a huge diplomatic embarrassment for Beijing, which grew impatient with the military government’s handling of the situation. The scam center’s owners are either in the Tatmadaw or are loyal power brokers and serve as a life raft for the sanctioned regime. The growth of scam centers began in the 90s’ when ethnic armies allied with the weakened military government after the 8888 demonstrations. The two groups have been fighting intermittently since 2009 against whatever form the Burmese government took to retake Laukkaing and assert control over the Kokang self- administered zone. The Brotherhood Alliance’s relationship with the military soured when Daxun refused for his army to be absorbed into the Tatmadaw as a border guard unit. In 2009 the military junta negotiated with Daxun’s lieutenant Bai Suocheng to launch a coup dé'tat against him in exchange for controlling the city alongside the Tatmadaw and Mafia families.

The casinos and scam centers were initially more tolerable for both Myanmar and China than narcotics and arms trafficking. After the covid-19 pandemic, the casinos had a decline in cross border tourism and a glut of desperate unemployed workers who became victims of human trafficking. The captives in the scam centers numbering in the tens of thousands were across compounds as the city fell, further exacerbating their horrid living conditions until they could make a break. The Brotherhood Alliance retook the city in November, 2023 causing many workers, including the victims of the centers, to flee the city to China where border guards met them with tear gas. The owners of the scam centers were extradited to China, and Lt. Bai Suocheng deserted, ending up eventually captured by the Tatmadaw and handed over to the PRC to curry favor.

The Brotherhood Alliance's offenses against the SAC is the government's main military threat and has opened the deadliest stage of the current conflict. The ethnic armies’ objectives to gain more allotted territory has resulted in immense reprisals against workers and toilers by the SAC, and the brutality by ethnic armies has been enormous also. The government has implemented a “four cut” approach to starve the armies and the region with scorched earth tactics and indiscriminate bombing campaigns. There are warnings of an impending famine in the areas most affected by war, with a massive internal refugee crisis caused by war and communal violence. In addition, the sanctions have reduced fertilizer and fuel imports for farming, further compounding the possibility of famine. The SAC military government has already implemented a regime of exception due to the deteriorating security situation. Workers and toilers have attempted to resist conscription, the stripping of civil rights, and assaults on their living standards to fuel the war, but these efforts have been met by the state stamping out resistance with brutal repression.

One such example of workers struggling against these oppressions are the wildcat strikes throughout Fall 2024. More than 300 workers at the Wise Unicorn Industrial LTD sculpting company have been on strike over the company withholding bonuses payments on October 22. Workers began by refusing to work overtime and staged sit-ins on October 30. A worker was attacked by the management director, leading to 300 plus workers walking out on November 6, and publishing a list of 17 demands. Many of these demands concerned pay and working conditions, not cutting pay over taking leave, breaks along with on-site medical care. Thirteen workers were fired, leading to their employment being added as a part of the demands, which has resulted in a sit-in outside of the factory where plain clothes police under the guise of negotiations have continued to threaten workers.

In addition, on November 26, 300 workers at the Chinese owned Zhi Yuan Garment Co. Ltd factory refused to work, similarly proclaiming 13 demands; besides wage guarantees, they also include the end of certain repressive management policies, also the termination of a Chinese interpreter who's been reported to be physically and verbally abusive towards workers, breaks for meals, along with clean water provisions at the workplace. The factory management has called in the military, police, and thugs to force workers back to their stations, with some having reported that they've had guns pointed at them. The organizers of the strike have gone into hiding, while workers have returned but are instead sitting without working as a means of protest. In both of these instances the workers have reached out to unions, some with international affiliations, such as the International Labour Organization and nascent unions in Myanmar which are a part of the NUG - The Federation Of General Workers Myanmar for assistance, in addition to launching a campaign to pressure the brand companies or get other factories to join them. However, these unions see nothing to gain in these disputes and won't help to generalize their struggle in the slightest, with the workers showing much greater militancy than these organs whilst remaining regrettably isolated.

The civil war between the SAC and NUG was ignited by the Tatmadaw’s seizure of power in 2021, however there's since been a much greater international dimension. The Tatmadaw calculated that overthrowing the government was the best course of action in January, 2021 when Covid - 19 was deteriorating an already abhorrent social situation. The capitalists in Myanmar feared potential strikes and worker demonstrations, so keeping them on democratic terrain was the safest bet. Within the dimensions of international imperialism, the Tatmadaw was assured in their formal takeover by the precedent set by China’s close relationships with Pakistan and other countries where Beijing already diplomatically and economically supports corrupt governments in exchange for allowing military bases. As a result of these prospects, China and Russia vetoed the US’s proposed resolution for a UN embargo against the regime calling the coup dé'tat a “ministerial reshuffle.” However, China and the US both still recognize the NLD party’s diplomats as Myanmar UN seat holders, which abstained in 2022 from the UN Security Council’s vote to adopt resolution 2669 to condemn the military government. China has also not resisted the ICC’s warrants against leaders in the SAC, only calling for them to be “just and fair.”

Meanwhile, Russia has been following the lead of their major allies China and India on the matter. This comes as no surprise, as the two have become Russia’s life support countering the suffocating sanctions placed on them due to the Russo - Ukrainian war. Consequently, Russia was a major supplier of heavy weapons to Myanmar with the former Russian defense minister Sergey Shoygu overseeing the sale of drones, surface to air missiles, radar and surveillance systems to the Tatmadaw. Meanwhile, India’s prime minister Modi opposed the coup dé'tat but resolutely wants to maintain their relations with the military junta. India’s main concern being of territorial claims, loss of influence and potential spillover of the conflict into India’s long simmering insurgency in the North East and in Bangladesh, or another refugee crisis caused by the brutal wars and genocide; the Rohingya genocide as of now has displaced more than 700,000 people and could spell instability for neighbouring bourgeoisie were it to not be contained.

The US’s push for a more aggressive UN resolution to condemn the coup dé'tat and increase sanctions against the SAC, Tatmadaw officials, and junta owned businesses are a part of the US strategy to keep China boxed in above all else. Myanmar is of great geostrategic importance to the US and their diplomatic actions follow from this logic. Imperialist tension between the US and China has only increased as capitalism’s crisis has been pushing more and more states towards war. This has included the PRC toying with an imminent future invasion of Taiwan, which is of the highest strategic importance due to the country's massive microchip industry, supported in large part by US backing. Despite Myanmar being integral for exerting control over the bay of Bengal, China has had a long history of supporting anti- government forces. This includes the Arakan Army (AA) which is a part of the Brotherhood Alliance, though this runs counter to the normalization between the two states after the 1988, 8888 demonstrations, where China stopped supporting the Communist Party of Burma’s insurgency. In spite of these changes, relations remain rocky. The AA is made up of ethnic groups from the other side of the country, and the militia has taken part in the assaults with the Brotherhood Alliance, winning campaigns in the eastern Rakhine state. China's strategy in the region appears to be changing out of fear that they may lose a chess piece if there's greater political fragmentation.

During the summer of 2024, the Brotherhood Alliance broke a ceasefire brokered by Beijing and opened the second stage of operation 1027. The ethnic armies accounted for the weakness of the Tatmadaw SAC government during this period to seize more territory motivated in part due to their growing distrust towards China. By early August the NDAA captured Lashio city ,which served as the Tatmadaw’s north eastern regional command center. The Brotherhood Alliance’s Ta’ang National Liberation Army and the NUG’s People’s Defense Force are still encroaching towards Myanmar’s seconnd largest city Mandalay in the Bamar heartland. In Northern Myanmar the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) has been able to gain territory on China’s border, rich with rare earth metals, and have threatened Chinese strategic capital in the region while supporting the NUG’s People's Defense Force. As a result, the potential risk for a Tatmadaw defeat is too great, forcing China to reevaluate its balancing act used to keep the military firmly behind China's interests with the threat of supporting ethnic armies to punish it.

China has since renewed pressure on the armies through their special envoy Deng Xijun after the battle for Lashio City and the NUG’s gains on Mandalay. This was a red line for Beijing, since there were clear signs of coordination between the NDAA and NUG in taking the city, in addition to the general belief that their allies had pushed the Tatmadaw too far. China refuses to acknowledge that their allies had control over the city and has punished recalcitrant armies by cutting them off economically, as well as shutting down border crossings, and restricting electricity, food and other supplies into the Shen state and on the northern border with the KIA. China denies sending threatening letters to army commanders, though most communications were purposefully leaked by armies less dependent on China. These armies felt that the weakness of the junta would allow for them to reinforce their territorial gains and would show how little control China had over them. This has been met by live fire drills by China’s People's Liberation Army and statements made stressing the dubious claim that there are western actors operating on the border, though this last action appears to be aimed to reassure the population in China. As of November 19, 2024, China has even accepted the NDAA leader’s, Pheung Daxun, application to seek medical treatment in China’s bordering Yunnan province. The timing is unlikely to be a coincidence, given that the NDAA was always at arms length with China. On December 4 China’s foreign minister stated positively that the NDAA and TNLA announced their readiness to negotiate an unilateral ceasefire with the SAC military government.

China has also met with the SAC’s chairman general Min Aung Hlaing despite their long distrust towards him and their machinations for him to be replaced. Chinese diplomats and chairman Min Aung Hlaing have unveiled a transitional plan for giving the state a democratic shroud again, with plans for 2025 to carry out censuses and elections for better legitimacy and to try and stop the junta’s bleed. It's clear to China, as is to many others, that the military is the only state institution and that the only thing to be possibly won is more allotted territory, favors from China, and maybe alloted ministerial positions in a new government. This has been fortified by renewed commitment for supplying the junta with heavy weaponry and drones. The junta has also strengthened its commitment towards China’s Belt and Road Initiative by greenlighting the Kyaukphyu mega project’s original perimeters. The project of deep sea ports, railroads, highways and oil pipelines the project was originally priced at $10 billion before the war but was stripped down to $1.2 billion, now the original plan is supposed to be underway.

There are no democratic solutions. The only way to end this brutality is by challenging world imperialism with working class solutions. The dead end of supporting democratic solutions is best seen in the foundation of the Union of Burma, with the Tatmadaw becoming the only viable state institution. The country has always been marked by deep crisis, backwards production, poverty, isolation, Imperialist intrigue and wars that's only been exacerbated by the return of the crisis of profitability causing most already faltering state institutions to eventually collapse.The Tatmadaw was founded by general Aung San, the father of Aung San Suu Kyi, just as the new state gained national independence from a weakened British empire after World War Two. The ruling party of the time was the Anti - Fascist People's Freedom League, with most members having collaborated with Japan, which supported the nationalist aspirations of the burgeoning bourgeoisie and nationalist intellectuals. This remained the case until the war was all but lost for Japan, leaving the leading figures needing to curry favor with their old imperialist patrons in order for their nationalist project to succeed.

The AFPFL fell out with the Communist Party of Burma, followed by various ethno- nationalist groups attempting to succeed due to feelings that their old prerogatives were threatened. This marked the earliest phase of the internal wars and the further militarization of society. The Union of Burma was the first state outside of the Eastern Bloc to recognize the PRC; this was done to help modernize the Tatmadaw through cooperating in counterinsurgencies against the KMT. It's not dishonest when Chinese diplomats called the latest coup dé'tat a ministerial reshuffle, since the military was already in control, only allowing for democratic wall paper when it could increase the support for the Tatmadaw. Myanmar’s defense budget is 4% of the GDP, while the military also controls another 10% of it through their holding company. Within the conditions of international imperialism the perennial bloodshed will remain. Myanmar’s allies will continue to support the Tatmadaw, and whatever government they craft or allow. Support for government opposition and ethnic militias has remained mainly in the diplomatic sphere by calling for a UN embargo and sanctions. Any military support will remain murky and at arm's length but as tension increases so will the willingness to cheaply arm organizations and quasi- states to effect Chinese Imperialism.

Myanmar has captivated petit bourgeois democratic activists for decades due to the iconic lady of Yangon, State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi’s bravery. Brave against workers, toilers and refugees but weak against the Tatmadaw who she gave a clean face to, despite the military placing her under house arrest for close to 30 years. The daughter of a general, she stated clearly that she's not a humanitarian - rather she leads the National League for Democracy party, which, like the military, wasn't far removed from Buddhist ultra-nationalist revanchism against the Rohingya. Her party egged on pogromist and ethnic armies to attack them on the ideological basis of past Rohingya collaboration with the British empire, for the ‘crime’ of being illegal Bengali immigrants, or due to the Rohingyas army’s insurgency. As imperialist tension rises there's the pastiche notion of the struggle between democracy and autocracy as a window dressing for imperialist war, it's important to remember that China had a greater preference for Aung San Suu Kyi and her NLD party over the Tatmadaw which Beijing is suspicious of.

It's not unbelievable that the NLD has a very high support rate and swept the last elections in late 2020: the urban petit bourgeois, the big bourgeois not connected to the military, along with workers who've seen the excessive levels of military repression would likely support democratic rule. This is despite the sky high poverty levels, repression and genocide overseen by democratic rule. In fact, this continuation of repression informed the military's decision in January, 2021 to keep the powder keg of class response subdued on democratic terrain. The military junta appears to be on the back foot, being weakened from the war, with defeats on all fronts and sanctions. However, the NUG overthrowing their rule is likely impossible due to the weakness of bourgeois civil society in Myanmar. The Tatmadaw changes its appearance like a chameleon based on what guarantees its survival; it can always fall back on another ministerial reshuffle to change the face and name of the regime, maybe allowing some leaders of the NUG to join their cabinet as a veneer. The ethnic - armies will probably gain more territory and favorable agreements with the military and resume their racketeering. In the end thousands of workers and toilers have been killed and nearly 3 million have been displaced throughout the country and abroad in what's a struggle between state functionaries to enjoy more cabinet seats. It's important to also remember that many organizations supportive of the NUG openly called for demonstrations against the military junta, fearing the loss of control over the situation and the rise of class militancy against these conditions. A glaring example was early in 2021 when the FGWM chairwoman, Moe Sandar Myint, told protestors that they're not obligated by their contracts with companies to prevent negative consequences against protestors. Workers and toilers have played the main part in those demonstrations, but certainly didn't lead them, and can't without a revolutionary party to act as a reference point. Now workers and toilers are sunk into a civil war between a kaleidoscope of capitalist factions and imperialist intrigue.

The march towards Imperialist war is gaining momentum despite what many governments in the consolidating US dominated western bloc might be reporting after a string of setbacks for Russian and Iranian imperialism in the Middle East. Or even those applauding the potential end of the Ukrainian war due to proposed armistice negotiations between Russia and Ukraine, granting Russia concessions such as barring Ukraine from gaining NATO membership for 20 years and establishing a demarcation zone for Russian territorial annexations in Ukraine. Imperialism is a way states are forced to behave since entering the current epoch of wars and revolution, in times of deep crises capitalist must push off their loses onto others and in Imperialism the state is the most predatory dominant capitalist monopoly. Both the Ukrainian and Middle East crises can't be separated and especially not from the set course for a confrontation between the US and China placing Myanmar in the middle of these tensions which can help create future wars.

The Incoming US President Trump, as all politicians on a populist ticket will do everything on their first day in office! Focusing forces mainly against Iran and China instead of Russia, as signified by his appointment of Marco Rubio as secretary of state. But this won't be the case since it'll be impossible to maintain a united response amongst the consolidating western bloc against Iran or China without doing the same against Russia, since Iran and Russia are in the growing Chinese dominated bloc. In February, 2024 during the Munich Defense Conference the consolidating western Imperialist bloc made it clear that China’s the main threat. The PRC is US’s main Imperialist rival and real threat to its hegemony, bleeding Russia out, remains a part of this strategy to box China in. In the middle east the US is completely dependent on Israeli technical expertise in waging war in the region and has no other option besides supporting their 9 front war to create a new order in the middle east, in order to maintain aggression against a weakened but reconfiguring Iran.

The US is also growing more aggressive towards its own allies who have no other options due to their dependency on the US for defense or the NATO framework. Germany and France, the largest economies in Europe which are facing downturns, are in Trump's cross hairs due to not keeping up with increased NATO spending targets despite their trade surpluses with the US. Similarly the US’s allies Canada and Mexico are threatened with tariffs, the slash and burn towards war and consolidation of blocs isn't affected by this increasingly transactional tactic to lay off America's losses. The USD has been in a state of decline where even the Canadian dollar and Swiss Franc are gaining as reserve currencies, the US is especially losing shares against the PRC’s Yuan. Economic decoupling caused by the war in Ukraine and the decline of the US’s economic position has accelerated the growth in the BRICS currency union where transactions can be made without dollars. Russia and China trade now near exclusively without dollars, China and India have one sided contracts with Russia for energy and also Iran for nearly its total energy output. This aggressive turn has been to attempt to make the US pay for China's declining economic activity following the fallout of the international covid - 19 pandemic, China has been facing its own internal crises including an uptick in workers strike activity as a result of stagnant and declining wages and the growing cost for necessities.

The US views the current Syrian crisis as a victory since it appears to set back Russia, Iran and thus China, it has also created a new nexus for potential imperialist confrontations. Assad’s Ba'athist regime crumbled in a similar fashion to the Republic of Afghanistan. Even in the midst of over a decade of civil war the situation was made exponentially worse through economic crises further internally weakening Assad’s regime and Iran. The war in Ukraine has limited Russia's ability to really intervene on behalf of Syria where its small Mediterranean naval fleet is docked. Also there's Israel's airstrikes against Hezbollah and the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Iran; invasion of Lebanon all used as a way to gain distance from Israel’s military collapse on October 7, 2023 and revise the Middle East in Israel's favor have further weakened Assad’s regime. The Turkish backed Islamist military political organization HTS and Syrian Interim Government were able to negotiate with the Syria Arab Army, composed mainly of conscripts, to lay down their arms and surrender in Aleppo, Hama and Damascus.

There's already major hotspots in the current development, there's likely going to be a total collapse in whatever united government, with the islamist, turned pro democracy technocrats who have a broader interest beyond solely Turkish imperialism against those more locked stepped with Turkey. Turkey’s main interests in Syria is to rapidly repatriate millions of refugees, eliminate Kurdish military political organizations on their border, seize Kurdistan and to lock horns with Israel for domestic consumption. Erdogan has publicly called Netanyahu Hitler, is one of the largest financial contributors for Hamas and has one of the most powerful militaries in NATO all of this has been pushed further to paper over years of nearly three digit inflation. Russia and Iran have an opening for a longer term strategy. Russia and Turkey have been in negotiations to recognize legitimate rebels. This isn't to say Russia and Iran didn't empty their guns to prop up Assad as long as possible, Russia eventually pulled out due to the lack of benefit from an already collapsing semi- narco regime. Both of the two are likely to become the new Imperialist defenders of the SDF. Assad, Iran and Russia had an on and off relationship with the Kurdish state and while the US functionally abandoned the quasi state after Turkey’s operation Euphrates shield, but still maintains a presence around Kurdish controlled oil wells. Then there's Israel which is reportedly taking territory along occupied Golan heights in the South West under the guise of creating a buffer zone due to the risk of rebels reopening chemical weapons factories. Syria is proving to be a tar pit for all imperialist actors by their own making, throughout the war there's been over 20 armed groups in Syria. The Turkish- Qatar plans to make an oil pipeline through Kurdistan would place them at odds with the US in Kurdistan. The HTS is spread thin throughout the entire country and a potential collision course between Israeli and Turkish Imperialism can't be ruled out. There's many more festering warfronts and potential flashpoints including the 7 million refugees in Sudan displaced by their own civil war fueled heavily by sanctions against Russia and their need to form a war chest from looted gold in the Sahel, to the growing conflict between Egypt and Turkey against Ethiopia on Africa's Horn and the crown jewel being the confrontation between the US and China over the Pacific.

The precarity of workers and toilers in Myanmar cannot be overstated, and to speak of generalized war might ring on deaf ears due to the constant state of war and militarism. For the nation state, the military is the last assurance for bourgeoisie class rule, in Myanmar this is taken to the extreme, as they're the only state institution. Due to the great importance the region plays in boxing in Chinese imperialism, the Tatmadaw will have to drag the working class and toilers into imperialist world war, causing greater devastation to the population. Even the internal wars will be exacerbated in the process, as there's long been accusations of foreign intrigue. Democracy is complacent in this process by preventing the only subjective social force, the working class, from developing the necessary revolutionary class consciousness to prevent generalized war. The only solution is the complete abolition of the system, which can only be achieved through the self-organization of the working class and internationalist revolution. Communists must lead workers away from democratic, or reformist ideals with instead a class perspective. A revolutionary, internationalist party is necessary to guide the class and protect it from falling into bourgeois mysticism; nevertheless, the working class remains the revolutionary subject that can bring an end to class based society, states and wars. If we cannot achieve this, the march towards world war will continue onwards !