Myanmar ruling junta facing existential crisis as it fails to deal with insurgency
Myanmar’s ruling military was facing an “existential crisis”, an analyst told Reuters Thursday (November 16) as anti-junta insurgents mounted the biggest challenge to the army in years.
A junta spokesperson on Thursday said the military was facing "heavy assaults from a significant number of armed rebel soldiers" in Shan State in the northeast, Kayah State in the east and Rakhine State in the west.
Some military positions had been evacuated and the insurgents had been using drones to drop hundreds of bombs on military posts, said the spokesperson, while local media reported a call for those with military experience to prepare to serve.
“Things are no longer sustainable for the Myanmar army,” said Jason Tower, country director for the Burma program at the U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP). “The Myanmar military, I think, is facing an existential crisis at this point.”
In the capital, Naypyidaw, government staff have been ordered to form units to respond to "emergency" situations, said Tin Maung Swe, secretary of the Naypyidaw Council, who denied the order was being given in response to the security situation, and said the capital was calm.
Myanmar's military has battled ethnic minority and other insurgencies for decades but a 2021 coup has united pro-democracy activists in towns and cities with ethnic minority forces fighting for self-determination in hinterlands.
The groundswell of opposition has led to clashes that recently sent refugees into all of Myanmar's neighbours, including thousands who fled into India in recent days from fighting in Chin State in the northwest.
