September 19, 2024 • 41 mins
James talks to Billy Ford of the USIP about the developments in the conflict in Myanmar, the recent and disastrous flooding, the situation in Rakhine State, and how the Junta is holding onto power despite massive losses.
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
All Zone Media.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Hi everyone, and welcome to it could happen here.
Speaker 3 (00:08):
I'm James and today I am joined by Billy Ford
from the United States Institute Piece.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
A third time podcast guest.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Billy.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
How many?
Speaker 4 (00:16):
I think it's just my second, but thanks for second?
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Okay, Yeah, well I'll give you a bonus one.
Speaker 4 (00:20):
Thanks for the invite.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
Yeah, and we're here to discuss the revolution in Memma
and bring you up to date on conflict stuff and
natural disaster stuff and answer some questions people have asked
me by emailing me. So yeah, thanks for joining us, Biddy.
We're at another crossroads in the conflicts we talked about
before we started recording. Can you pres explain to folks
(00:42):
like what has happened since ten twenty seven?
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Part two?
Speaker 4 (00:47):
Sure?
Speaker 5 (00:47):
Yeah, I mean, I think last time we talked, we
were just kind of in the throes of the initial
ten twenty seven things. I mean, I think zooming out
for a second, the you know, February twenty twenty one, coup,
September seventh, twenty twenty one, defensive wars announced and armed
resistance really kicks off. And then twenty twenty three October
(01:11):
things really escalate. After a few years of steady gains
by the resistance. Then there was a major level change
in the trajectory of the war favoring the resistance forces. Yeah,
I think, as you mentioned, there was a second phase
of ten twenty seven in July in early August that
took things kind of to another level, although it is
(01:33):
kind of just a continuation of a sustained.
Speaker 4 (01:36):
Push by the resistance. I think some have perceived these.
Speaker 5 (01:40):
Moments of October twenty twenty three in August twenty four
adds real watershed moments. But I think we can see
how these are illustrative or broader trends, trends in which
the mem or military is losing its capability to defend
strategic positions, it's inability to counter attack on the resistance side,
(02:02):
much greater coordination among resistance armed stakeholders, growing fighting capability,
better weapons access, all these sorts of factors that have
swung the balance of military power further in the favor
of resistance forces. But essentially what happened in July and
August was, building off of the October advances, the resistance
(02:24):
in northern Shan State, not far from the Chinese border,
pushed further into central miandmar In collaboration. This was essentially
ethnic based armed organizations collaborating with Bamar People's Defense Forces
under the command structure of the National Unity Government, and
they started making advances into central Burma. So whereas the
(02:45):
initial phase of the war and the NUG strategy was
to focus on building relationships between the People's Defense forces
under their command with ethnic based armed organizations and focusing
strategically on the peripheries to build those relationships, to build
ethnic buy into the broader revolution, to get access to weapons,
and to make steady advances. Now we're at a phase
(03:07):
where the resistance is pushing into central Meanmar. Now the
focus is on the city of Mandalay and central Burma,
which is the biggest commercial center of the country. So yeah,
I mean this has sparked another phase of I think
pressure and anxiety within Napida and the capital among the
(03:27):
state Administrative Council, hunta leadership, and yeah, more energy on
the resistance side. And it's kind of it's occurred alongside
advances on multiple other fronts. I mean, in the very
north of the country, Chen State, starting in March, the
Kachin force has pushed the Memori military out of it, it
was two hundred posts within four months. Similarly in Rakine State,
(03:50):
which I think, well, maybe we'll touch on more. The
aur Accon Army has made steady advances, so it's not
just in these subregions. It's happening virtually all over the
country at this point.
Speaker 3 (04:00):
Yeah, it does seem and like clearly the essays the
Hunter is kind of on the back foot, like it
started to forcibly conscript people, which in turn kind of
get people a choice between the resistance or the military,
and seems like more of them a choosing their resistance.
Some of the conscriptions, you know, people can buy out
of them, which obviously causes not great for the morale
(04:22):
of the population. And that's combined with shortages and inflation.
Pretty shit situation for folks living under Hunter.
Speaker 5 (04:29):
Oh yeah, absolutely, I mean I think the memor of military,
I mean, there's a big question here about like the
resilience of this meam or military. I mean, frankly in
militaries in other countries have collapsed and are much less pressure.
So there's a question here about like what is holding
this all together, particularly given that its primary resilience factors
(04:50):
are heavily degraded. I mean things like its ideological value.
I mean it's historically been about what we hold the
country together. We manage the diversity of this complex country.
We defend the Bamar and the Buddhist populations. These factors
are no longer credible. I think it's more than one
hundred thousand homes in central Burma have been burnt to
(05:11):
the grounds. Most of those are Bamar Buddhists. And you know,
someone in the Sanga have risen up. The Buddhist Songa
have risen up in protests, including a recent killing of
a senior monk. So I think that ideological foundation is
totally degraded. The other factors, which are economic, the economic
benefits of being in this institution are also withering, as
like the entire economy is collapsing as your reference. And
(05:34):
then the third component is like the social status that
want to cheese through. Being a member of this institution
used to be a place where you could get economic
benefits and social benefits, and now it's really neither.
Speaker 4 (05:45):
I mean you're reviled or a target.
Speaker 5 (05:48):
For resistance assassination if you're affiliated with the institution.
Speaker 4 (05:53):
So I think the question remains as.
Speaker 5 (05:54):
To like what are the key factors keeping it in
place given all of these pressures that it's facing, And
you know, happy to go into that, but I think
there's there. It's an interesting case study in institutional resilience
and the challenges faced by a resistance movement that has
major resource constraints and you're fighting up against a military
institution that has learned how to orchestrate and sustain authoritarian
(06:20):
governance structures for decades.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
So yeah, yeah, yeah, I think we can maybe circle
back to that. One thing I did want to talk
about before we move on to talking about what's happening
in recind State is I wanted to talk about the
recent flooding that people will have probably seen if they
have these friends on social media or keep keep an
eye on publications in a region. Can you explain a
(06:42):
little bit about like the scale of the flooding and
the absolutely bungled if any response from NAPYDAL.
Speaker 4 (06:48):
Sure.
Speaker 5 (06:49):
Yeah, I think the latest figures that I've seen were
one hundred and sixty thousand displaced, six hundred and thirty
affected by the floods, two one hundred and thirty dead,
and seventy missing.
Speaker 4 (07:00):
I think that's what I saw this morning.
Speaker 5 (07:02):
But yeah, I mean I think that gives you a
sense that this is another humanitarian catastrophe on top of
a I think what is now rated the second most
intense violent conflict in the world by Accolade.
Speaker 4 (07:15):
So this is just one crisis on top of another.
Speaker 5 (07:18):
And yeah, as you kind of alluded to, the Memora
military is incapable and in unwilling to kind of address
the needs here of the population.
Speaker 4 (07:28):
I mean, the one factor is that they.
Speaker 5 (07:30):
Don't have territorial control to move resources if they had
the political will to provide assistance. But of course they're
doing the exact opposite. In some of the most flood
affected parts of the country, they are continuing to conduct
air strikes on civilian populations. I mean, it's it's just
kind of a level of brutality that's kind of hard
(07:50):
to have them.
Speaker 4 (07:51):
But yeah, I mean there's all these other kind of
ancillary effects of this.
Speaker 5 (07:54):
I think there's signs of a cholera outbreak and yen Gon.
The economic conditions, as you mentioned a little bit earlier,
are horrendous. I mean, like the economy's lost thirty percent
of its value, and it's not a rich country to
begin with. Inflation is I think thirty two percent year
on year, with the memoar Chat having lost two hundred
percent of its value, I mean.
Speaker 4 (08:16):
Yeah, it's two hundred percent less value than it was. Yeah.
So this is like, you know, it's just.
Speaker 5 (08:22):
One catastrophe on top of another, and it's really testing
the Memur public's capacity to kind of support one another,
which is that's really been the incredible story here, and
it's not the first time that the MEMMR military, the
governing stakeholder, has failed to meet the needs and that
moment of crisis. Of course, psychloanargus one of the worst
(08:45):
natural disasters in the region's history was another instance in
which the Memmur military refused international assistance and kind of
instrumentalized humanitarian catastrophe for political aims.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (08:59):
Yeah, I think people it's worth reading up on that
if you're interested in like the sort of longer term
history of the conflict and of sort of the military
in Miamma. Maybe now it's a good time to take
a break and we'll come back and discuss a little
bit about Racine state.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
And we're back. Okay.
Speaker 3 (09:25):
So I think if people follow the conflict, they will
have probably seen like a series of conflicting and confusing
articles and messages about what's going on in Rakine State,
and some of that is because there's not a great
deal of reporting in the English language, a great deal
of sources in the English language. And even if there
(09:46):
is that, none of us can really make it to
Racine State right now. Going through Bangladesh would be quite
quite a challenging thing to do with that at this time.
And so I guess we should start breaking down if
people aren't aware the people who live and have lived
for a long time in Rakine State and the conflicts
have fixed it between them and the Burmese state.
Speaker 4 (10:05):
Sure, yeah, I.
Speaker 5 (10:06):
Mean Rakine State borders Bangladesh on the western side of
the Arts along coastal border as well, and the site
of some of the largest extractive oil and gas projects,
including the terminal for a major gas pipeline that feeds
fourteen percent of u Non Province's GP, So it has
huge strategic value. It's also China's aiming to kind of
(10:29):
access the Indian Ocean and circumvent the Strait of Malacca
by going directly to this kind of region of the country,
So it's highly strategically important. But it's also I think
it's the second poorest state in the entire country and
arguably the most conflict affected.
Speaker 4 (10:48):
At least since twenty twelve ish.
Speaker 5 (10:51):
So the population of Rakind state is highly diverse, kind
of the last to have the broader country's demographics. Woods
of Bamar population, which is the dominant ethnic group at
the national level, the ethnic majority is kind. There's I mean,
historically a very large Muslim population of Rahinja Muslims primarily,
(11:13):
but also other Muslim minority groups including Kahman Muslims, and
then a number of other smaller ethnic minority groups Murmaji,
Kami and others, as well as a small Hindu population.
So you can kind of get the sense that this
is a highly diverse space. I mean, many of the
listeners will have heard twenty sixteen twenty seventeen, Go was
(11:34):
the site of a massive clearance operation and the genocide
of Rhinja Muslims, about seven hundred and fifty thousand of
whom were pushed into Bangladesh and almost all of them
are still there inhabiting the largest refugee camp in the world. Yeah,
I mean, overall conditions for the Rhinja it's hard to
imagine a more difficult set of conditions. The Bangladesh government
(12:00):
is quite impatient have hosted many hundreds of thousands of Rahinja,
some for seven years but others for actually for much
longer than that, as twenty sixteen twenty seventeen was a
moment in a genocide, but there have been instances of
memoir military atrocities against the Hindu population dating back to
the nineteen seventies as well.
Speaker 4 (12:21):
So this is a long term kind of situation in
which the Bungadesh have been coasting Rehinja.
Speaker 5 (12:27):
And yeah, I mean I think conditions in those camps
are really really challenging. The major issue now is the
arising and security in the camps, as some Rhinja militia
groups have gained ascendency in the camps, most of which
have very little public support, and when the Renja population
should be noted, the major dynamic that that's happened recently,
(12:48):
I mean the Arakan Army, which is almost entirely of
Kine ethnic groups and has broad public support among the
Rakine population of Rakind State, has made massive advances across
Hine State and now controls virtually all of northern Rakine
State and is pushing south. It took the city of
Tondue and the airport, which is the first time a
(13:09):
resistance group had taken an airport. It recently took a
naval base, the first time that has ever happened in
the history of the Memory military, and now it's pushing
its forest south as guas potentially threatening to control the
entire state. So as this has occurred, the MR military
is in a state of complete panic, and as it
(13:30):
is losing forces on this front, but also on numerous
other fronts, it has attempted to kind of buttress its
forces through force conscription and in the most potentially the
most horrifying move imaginable, it is forcibly conscripted the Rowhinja
into the MR military. They conducted genocide against the Rhinda
(13:51):
population and now they are forcing them to wear the
uniform of their genocider. It's kind of a level of horror.
It's hard to understand.
Speaker 4 (14:00):
And one way.
Speaker 5 (14:01):
In which they've undertaken this effort is by collaborating with
Rehindra militia forces including ARSA, the Salvation Army and the
Rhindra Saldarity Organization ARSO, which have presence in the camps
and have been facilitating recruitment from the camps. So the
primary aim here as a military one, but a secondary aim,
(14:21):
which is really critical, is undermining interching cohesion in rekind
state because ultimately, like the BMW or military operates through coercion,
force and violence, but also through fragmentation so that it
doesn't face a unified resistance. And in this case they
want to incite instability by creating hatred between the Rhindra
(14:42):
and Rekine population and building off of the vitriol that
had built over decades. So this is kind of a
new paradigm that everyone is trying to better understand. But yeah,
it's it's kind of a new level.
Speaker 3 (14:55):
Of r Yeah, and it's particularly horrific. As you say,
I think sometimes the tendency, especially with people who perhaps
are not as familiar with the situation and history there
to lump ethnic groups in as sort of monolithic actors,
right or homogeneous to be like, okay, so they re
Hinja as represented by ARSA and the RSO have joined
the Hunter, which is not the case. Like every Hinger
(15:18):
person I speak to, everyone I speak to in Cox's
Bizarre shares a loathing for those organizations. They're forced conscription
of young people, and yeah, their solidarity with the hunter
that committed the genocide against and it continued to commit
the genocide against these people. And I think the first
thing we need to do is move away from that
kind of homogeneous perspective. But maybe we could explain there
(15:40):
have been a few accusations of the our Econ army
making attacks against a hiner people, right NGA specifically hinder
people who are not armed, who are not part of
ROSO or A. Yeah, can you explain like what we
know and what we don't know there?
Speaker 4 (15:57):
Sure?
Speaker 5 (15:57):
Yeah, I think there's just just are There is a
massive fog of war in Rekind state, may be worse
than any other part of the country, so it is
really difficult to disentangle fact from fiction here. But I
think there's pretty credible evidence that the Arkhan Army have
committed atrocities against hind Of civilian populations. In early August,
(16:19):
there was a specific incident in which hundreds of Rahinja
were killed in a drone strike, and Fortified Rights, which
is a human rights organization, conducted investigation to the incident
and asserts that the ark On Army was responsible for
that of course, the AA disputes these claims, and I
(16:39):
think there's a few recent interviews with the commander in
chief of the Army to nine where you know, he
articulates his side of the story, which you could find
on Irwadi dot com and.
Speaker 4 (16:50):
I think in a few other news outlets.
Speaker 3 (16:52):
Yeah, the diplomat did one as well. He's been on
a publicity tour I guess recently. Yeah, absolutely, you've seen this.
But like his tendency to cool or hint of people
bangladeshis it is unfortunate given that that's a language that
was used to justify the genocide.
Speaker 5 (17:10):
Right, absolutely, Yeah, it reflects kind of the language that
the Memora military used.
Speaker 2 (17:14):
Well, Bengali's he'll call them exactly. Yeah, it's very reflective
of that.
Speaker 5 (17:18):
Yeah, So this is really challenging, and part because I
think that there is kind of an important distinction between
the Metamora military and the ark On Army in this case,
in part because the ark On Army has a raw
public support among the rekind public and so it has
a more of a legitimate stake to governance than the
Menmora military, which has none. And so this is it's
(17:40):
kind of an issue that requires attention and an honest
accounting of the facts and a long process of reconciliation.
Part because of the ark On Army is likely there
to stay as a governing stakeholder. Yeah, so that that
is a really tricky kind of set of conditions.
Speaker 4 (17:58):
And the other side of this is that the re
kind of public.
Speaker 5 (18:01):
I think there is a deep sense of a grievance
among the rekind public. And this is a population that
has also faced years of intense political alienation and persecution.
Speaker 4 (18:12):
Not to mention war and violence.
Speaker 5 (18:14):
You know, last year when Cyclo and Moca hit the
Kind State, the Memora military did virtually nothing to help them.
Speaker 4 (18:21):
So it's a population with.
Speaker 5 (18:22):
Legitimate a grievances and they and their perception is that
the international community only focuses on the rehint of public's
well being. And I think the international community can do
a better job of showing sympathy for the rekind public's interests.
I think sympathy is not like zero sum in that sense,
and that needs to be done better. Yeah, But honestly,
like the equating a grievances is also really kind of
(18:44):
unfair and dishonest.
Speaker 4 (18:45):
And you know this.
Speaker 5 (18:46):
Rehindered population is marginalized to just such an extreme degree.
Speaker 4 (18:51):
And so those are a really interesting report by Doctors
Without Borders not.
Speaker 5 (18:54):
Too long ago it that showed that only like six
hundred thousand of the two point eight million were Hinja
in the world, that in MR fifty seven percent of
living in camps and Bangladesh or in IDP camps and MEMR.
So it's like there's just like a highly vulnerable population
that has experienced genocide, you know.
Speaker 4 (19:13):
It's like there are there's a power in balance, you know.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
So it's like, I think it's not the same.
Speaker 4 (19:18):
I don't know.
Speaker 5 (19:19):
The whole process of kind Rhinda reorconciliation is one that
deserves immediate and urgent attention, but there's also a long
term process of constructing, you know, a governance structure that
is acceptable and that's not a highly exclusionary of Rhinda and.
Speaker 4 (19:36):
These sorts of things. So it's a it's a highly
and beyond the.
Speaker 5 (19:39):
Fact that we need more a deliberate investigation in some
of these incidents, I think a broader conversational reconciliation and
justice needs to needs to take place.
Speaker 3 (19:49):
Yeah, and it's definitely one at least you know, I
speak to people who are probably on the more progressive
side of the resistance, and it's one that they've acknowledged,
like it's something that they need to address, and kind
of the litmus test for like a post hunter mean mars,
like are there places for these people who they weren't
places for in this state before? But yeah, how we
(20:10):
get there is it's difficult, and I don't think that's
not that's not a clear pathway that anyone's kind of
pointed to this yet.
Speaker 4 (20:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (20:18):
The one thing I would add is like this is
sort of emblematic of broader perceptions of MEMR and approaches
to peace building a MEMR is that there's there's often
a horizontal approach that like we need to work on
the intercommunal level, individual level trust building, that sort of thing.
And I think there is a place for that for sure.
But we've done a couple pieces of research with an
(20:41):
academic at UG Austin who has found some really interesting
stuff about like the nature of conflict in the country
and nature of cohesion in the country. And she's found
including through some experimental research, studies and designs which are
quite revealing. I think that national identity is often more
important to respondence in her surveys than ethnic identity, which
(21:03):
is which kind of cuts against like the traditional perceptions
of how Memra is, like, Oh, it's this irreconcilably fractious
place and it's so hard to build trust between communities.
Speaker 4 (21:13):
And that sort of thing.
Speaker 5 (21:14):
But for her research kind of points to the vertical dimension,
where it's the nature of Memor politics and the nature
of governance structures that highly exclusionary, discriminatory governance structures have
sustained conflict for so long in the country.
Speaker 4 (21:30):
And this is kind of like the main argument for
the resistance.
Speaker 5 (21:33):
You know, it's like a lot of the stakeholders, at
least a critical mass within this resistance movement, they're trying
to assert a new political paradigm in the country, you know,
a more stable political paradigm in which the Memour military
is not a dominant stakeholder, in which violence is not
your source of power, in which that's not built on
(21:53):
exclusionary norms of belonging. So it's like it is genuinely
a revolution in this sense, and that is why they're
they're kind of pushing against the international pressures to enter
into a power sharing your dream with the VMR military
because there's a perception that if them our military it
remains in a position of political power, they will interrupt
this reform process and then violence world persist.
Speaker 4 (22:16):
In the country.
Speaker 3 (22:17):
Yeah, yeah, and I think that's probably a reasonable assumption
to make. Like, again, this is like one of those
things that I see a lot in different places in
the world where I go, right, there's this tendency to
see things, I think from sort of colonial perspective and
just be like, oh, these ethnicities will squabble and fight,
and like that's not necessarily the case at all, And
like if you look even to the PDFs, Like I
(22:39):
was speaking to someone the other day who was saying, like,
there are jib Muslim women fighting with the koren right now,
which is something that doesn't align up with this idea
of like ethnicities which are clashing and can't combine. And
we saw like a statement of solidarity from the Karenni
to the Kurdish people, which doesn't line up with this
(23:02):
idea of an inherently Islamophobic like you know, sort of
massive of Buddhist people in the Amma, which I think, Yeah,
it's a little oversimplified to say that stuff and I
think sometimes reductive, and it's the analysis of me and
Mark as a place where colonialism is still occurring, and
the methods of colonialism, like lots of the things you
(23:23):
describe right, like promoting fractures, promoting these different ethnic identities
which are seen as kind of zero sum and mutually exclusive.
These are things that the United Kingdom did or Britain
did all around the world for centuries. And it's not
rocket science to see how that jumps to another group
which especially in some cases was trained by the British
(23:44):
or had relations with the British, and you know, to
see how we got there. But I think we'll take
another little break here, we'll come back, and I want
to discuss the resilience of the Hunter and how it's
hanging on.
Speaker 2 (24:05):
All right, we're back.
Speaker 3 (24:07):
So for the last little segment of this podcast, I
would like to discuss how the Burmese military is holding
onto powers. When I speak to soldiers who have defected,
I speak to I've spoken to about half a dozen,
I guess soldiers who have defected over time. It's almost
comic how disorganized and chaotic things are, and at the
(24:28):
same time it's terrible the way like every single one
of them has described to me that their families are
essentially held as collateral to stop them deserting, right, and
so they had to work with the civil disobedience movement
to first extract their families before they themselves took their
weapons in most cases because they get a bounty for
their weapons and went to join the resistance or in
(24:49):
some cases went into exile. So like, maybe that gives
us a good view on how the Hunter is it's
continuing to force people to fight in this war that
it's losing. Can you explain a little bit of how
they've held onto power?
Speaker 5 (25:02):
Sure, Yeah, I guess the first thing to note is
that rates of defection are totally historic. I mean, yeah,
by our account, about fifteen thousand deserters, which is actually
not radically different than historical norms. The mem Our military
has comparatively high rates of desertion even before the coup,
so that's not, you know, far outside of the norm.
(25:25):
But the defection, I think there's about fifty eight hundred
defectors by our account since the coup, which is unprecedented.
There's never never really been defection to resistance in memr's history.
The other factor is the number of individuals who are
surrendering without a fight with you know, without with putting
up little resistance. That number is hard to count, but
(25:48):
it's our by our raid, it seems to be quite high.
There's forms of acts of disloyalty occurring that are not,
you know, spurring institutional collapse, but are that are degrading
the memoir of military's fighting capabilities, which is a really
important dynamic. So say that at the outset outset. The
other thing I'd say is that, like, I think we
(26:08):
need to sort of think about this at three levels. So,
like the rank and file soldiers, they are significantly demoralized.
Most did not join the military to fight. They joined
the military for economic stability and for social status, and
neither of those are available to them under this military's leadership.
(26:29):
They certainly did not join to commit atrocities against the
Bamar Buddhist population, which.
Speaker 4 (26:34):
Is now what they're enforced to.
Speaker 5 (26:35):
So I think that population, the large number of rank
and file soldiers, is highly demoralized, and that's where you
have seen lots of desertion, defection, often from the front lines.
Though that population's defection desertion is not going to trigger
institutional collapse.
Speaker 4 (26:50):
At the second level, you have like.
Speaker 5 (26:52):
A command or core major, major and above, and these
I think since Operation ten twenty seven you've seen their
morale to drop. And I mean there's been the fall
of Latio and the loss of the Northeast Regional Command,
the first time in the Memors history that a regional
commands been taken that had sent shockways through the commander level.
(27:16):
The other thing is that min Onligne, the Commander in Chief,
in his attempt to consolidate power and protect himself from
from internal fragmentation, he's rotating commanders based on loyalty, not
based on effectiveness, which is also degrading the Memora Military's
fighting capability.
Speaker 4 (27:35):
But it's also that's maybe.
Speaker 5 (27:37):
One reason why you haven't seen less acts of disloyalty
within that layer.
Speaker 4 (27:41):
At the senior levels.
Speaker 5 (27:42):
I mean mostly most of those senior Memorial military officials
who are based in Apida, I think they until the
fall of Lastio and the resistance moving into Mandalay, there
was relatively high levels of sense of security and morale
was was okay, I suppose, but the full of Lastio
(28:03):
and the ensuing events has really inflamed internal frustration from
what we understand so, and this has also triggered some
some shifts in the way in which the MEMR military
operates its patronage structures.
Speaker 4 (28:16):
So traditionally the patriot in structure is essentially like a
feudal state.
Speaker 5 (28:20):
I mean you have like a commander in chief that
is extremely powerful, has authority to rotate or fire or
arrest virtually anyone.
Speaker 4 (28:27):
I mean, just huge amounts of powers centralized there.
Speaker 5 (28:30):
The deputy commander in chief has little capability to challenge
the commander in chief's authority. But then you have these
regional commanders that operate as feudal lords at the regional level.
They're able to extract huge amounts of value or wealth
through you know, attractive.
Speaker 4 (28:46):
Industries, illegal industries, all with total impunity.
Speaker 5 (28:49):
But often you know, with the approval of nipidal and
that approval was often just given. Now it's less it's
less easily given. I mean you've seen nineties senior officers shuffled,
changed positions since the coup, and fifty have been removed
or arrested by our tracking. And you've also seen individuals
(29:11):
detained and arrested. Because I think there's fifteen kernels or
above mostly brigadier generals and major generals who have been
arrested for business related activities, which I think is emblematic
of the restructuring of the patronage network and centralizing the
patronage network with men Online himself. If you do not
(29:33):
have his personal approval, you cannot conduct business activities, including
these highly lucrative scam operations that are generating billions in
value but also really frustrating the Chinese.
Speaker 4 (29:44):
So this whole patronage structure.
Speaker 5 (29:46):
Which is critical to sustaining the Memora military, is being reoriented,
and we'll see whether or not that.
Speaker 4 (29:52):
Helps sustain the institution or introduces more instability.
Speaker 5 (29:55):
But ultimately, the forms of resilience I guess you would
call it are the one maybe you pointed to. I
mean their structure. I mean it's like rotating officer, commanders
and senior officers regularly holding families hostage. Essentially, you know,
a soldier sent to the front lines, its family remains
in the barracks. Payment is often made to the families,
(30:17):
not to the front line's soldier, and there's retribution if
the frontline soldier defects or deserts. This is also where
the fifty eight hundred number I mentioned earlier is likely
irradical undercounting because and also the fifteen thousand desertions because
a lot of people are recorded as KIA when they're.
Speaker 4 (30:35):
Actually they've deserted or defected.
Speaker 5 (30:38):
So anyways, I'm not sure if that answers your question,
which some thoughts relatives tosiliencia.
Speaker 2 (30:44):
No, I think it does.
Speaker 3 (30:45):
Yeah, one of the guys I met, we've described basically
his entire I guess squad went out on a patrol
and defected. I guess the PDF have been I had
to describe it really, but it's basically shit talking them
in their barracks or like in the position for months
right there.
Speaker 2 (31:01):
Like you see this a lot. It's a kind of.
Speaker 3 (31:03):
Unique feature of the of the conflict in the MR
guys with megaphones, just being like, you can surrender if
you want.
Speaker 2 (31:10):
You know, your life is miserable.
Speaker 3 (31:12):
And I guess in this case it worked, And yeah,
they will be read to as KIA. They went out
in a patrol and never came back.
Speaker 5 (31:18):
But yeah, I mean, I guess the other dynamic is that,
like you need to align motivation and opportunity for defection
desertion and the motivation is there in a lot of cases,
but opportunity is not. You know. The resistance is committing
some resources to these efforts, but it's really limited given
the scale of the challenge.
Speaker 2 (31:39):
Yeah, there's a lot.
Speaker 5 (31:40):
Of factors that need to kind of come together, like
the ability to safely communicate with resistance, the ability to
move into resistance, all the areas of the perception that we.
Speaker 4 (31:49):
Were accepted and not phase retribution.
Speaker 5 (31:52):
The perception there was that living conditions are acceptable to them.
Speaker 4 (31:56):
You know.
Speaker 5 (31:56):
So there's all these conditions and given the call of
defection desertion which could be like major attribution against your family,
and deep uncertainty about leaving this institution that is kind
of a.
Speaker 4 (32:08):
State within a state.
Speaker 5 (32:09):
That's why we're not seeing the kind of large scale,
commander level defection desertion I think.
Speaker 3 (32:15):
Right, So, one last thing I wanted to talk about
before we finish up. If people, I guess keep tabs
on the conflict, they would have seen recently a video
I'm sure you've seen the Kachin Independence Army shooting down
in aircraft with an FN six Chinese man portaal air
defense system. It's what they sort of called manpads. I'm
sure women can carry them to just fine or anyone
(32:38):
else for that matter. But I think it happened in
January and the video has just come out. Can you
explain the significance of that within the conflict landscape?
Speaker 2 (32:46):
And we am a yeah.
Speaker 5 (32:47):
I guess there's a couple of points. One is about
China's posture and the other is about the military balance.
I think the Menomour military's air power is its primary
comparative advantage. I think this point it has fewer by
infantry forces than the resistance, but that it's heavy artillery
and especially it's air power. You know, that's how it
(33:10):
terrorizes the population. But it's also been a source of
It's been a very powerful mobilizing force. I mean, I
think after Phase one of ten twenty seven, the mmdaa
Ko Kong armed group, essentially it took back territory that
it proceeds to be their own and took the town
of Lau Kai, which was really surprising but a major advance.
(33:31):
And then everyone kind of perceived, Okay, they'll just stay
in the quote unquote Ko Kong areas, They'll stay where
they are.
Speaker 4 (33:36):
But I think there's a deep perception.
Speaker 5 (33:39):
Among the MDAA but also broader ethnic minority groups that
as long as the MR Military is in power and
has air capability.
Speaker 4 (33:48):
It will terrorize the public.
Speaker 5 (33:50):
Even if it cannot reach or ever take back lau Kai,
it will vomit. And that's exactly what we saw after
ten twenty seven. You saw air strikes and Laukai. You
saw air strikes and lights of the headquarters of the
Kachin Independence Army. You see airstrikes in parts of her
kind state that the mem R Military has no chance
of recapturing.
Speaker 4 (34:07):
You know, it's a terrorizing the pumbplic thing.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
Yeah, it's a punitive thing.
Speaker 4 (34:11):
Yeah, it's punitive thing. So and it also is powerfully motivating.
Speaker 5 (34:15):
It's like, okay, now you see the MNDA pushing all
the way to Lascio, and a lot of people didn't
think they would do that.
Speaker 4 (34:21):
But it's like, if you have a perception.
Speaker 5 (34:23):
That this m R military can hurt me from a distance,
they may need to eliminate them altogether in order to
achieve the level of stability and safety that they pursue.
Speaker 4 (34:33):
So like it's the double edged sword in that regard.
Speaker 5 (34:35):
But going back to your question, I mean, think like
if the resistance is capable of constraining the MR military's
air capability, it radically changes the balance of power.
Speaker 4 (34:47):
I mean, I think there are.
Speaker 5 (34:49):
Some elements of this that are been a primary focus
of some of the international human rights community, for example,
constraining access to jet fuel and these sorts of things
trying to push right arms margo, none of which I've succeeded,
but there's been kind of progress on the margins.
Speaker 4 (35:05):
Although I think we just saw Russia.
Speaker 5 (35:07):
Delivered jet fuel and the maritime routes in Southern Mars.
Speaker 3 (35:13):
So yeah, in exchange for the artillery shows that the
Mamma has sent to Russia, right, Oh.
Speaker 5 (35:18):
Okay, and realize okay, yeah, so I mean they're continued,
they're able to sustain that, and you know, and the
Chinese has sold i think six aircrafts last year, so yeah,
they still have this fighting capability, and they're still able
to extract foreign exchange essentially by stealing from exporters. But
that's a whole different conversation. But anyway, like I think, yeah,
(35:38):
this is a key dynamic if they're able to affect
their their air power. The other thing is that like
China is attempted to play both sides. I mean historically,
that's sort of their approach. I mean, they have deep
connections with armed organizations along its border, maybe closer even
than with the VMW or military. But they also provide
(35:59):
politically tuitimacy and material assistance to the Menmoral military. They
just actually signed an MU on law enforcement and security
or some sort with the military. That's a deep and
abiding relationship, in part because the Chinese don't see an alternative.
Speaker 4 (36:14):
I mean, I don't think they have much trust for
dan U G or other.
Speaker 5 (36:18):
Resistance groups, and despite the fact that they don't, they
don't also don't really trust the Memora military or perceed
them to be competent. They see them kind of as
their only potential partner in ipudot. But it's kind of
a question as to whether this strategy is still working
for them. I think we've seen lots of acts of
defiance from both sides, the meum Or military and resistance
(36:40):
groups visa China, I mean.
Speaker 4 (36:42):
The Man military. They've been pressuring.
Speaker 5 (36:44):
Them to hold elections for since the coup essentially, and
they're really no closer yeah to that happening. I mean,
I think they dissolve the NLD something the Chinese said
not to do, and more recently, they've designated a number
of resistance groups as terrorist organizations, which essentially obviates political negotiations,
(37:04):
which I think would certainly frustrate the Chinese, given that
they hope to achieve stability through political ingratiations between a
subset of resistance groups and the Manama military. So there
are these kind of acts of defiance also on the
resistance side. I mean, the Chinese are pushing for ceasefires,
and yet the resistance continues to push into the country,
(37:25):
and they're sort of a perception that, like, as the
resistance groups aligned with China, quote unquote aligned with China,
maybe they aren't a gain ascendency on the battlefield, in
particular that China's influenced gains.
Speaker 4 (37:39):
But I'm not sure whether that's the case.
Speaker 5 (37:40):
It might actually be in verse, like, as these groups
push into memmore and have more charitorial control, maybe they
have more options and they're less dependent on the Chinese.
So that relationship in the north along the Chinese border
is also very much in flux.
Speaker 4 (37:55):
I don't think it's clear exactly how that will play out.
Speaker 3 (37:58):
Yeah, no, it's not, And I think that's sort of
a big question that's overhanging. Obviously, you have actors that
are more close your line with China, like the United
Worst Date Army, who have sort of largely remained aloof
from the conflict or a loof maybe it's your own word,
but are not like directly committing most of their forces
to the Conflict's really a better way of saying it, right.
Speaker 4 (38:18):
Yeah, I think so.
Speaker 5 (38:19):
And now that there's a ton of pressure on them
to stop selling arms to other groups, So we'll see
where there that happens.
Speaker 3 (38:25):
Yeah, which is probably where the Kaschin Independence Army was
able to get the surface where missiles from, which brings
us back to that. Yeah, it's it's never not complicated,
but it's always very sad that, like the folks quit
in the middle of this are suffering horrendously and sometimes
suffering kind of out of sight and out of mind
(38:46):
for so many people. As you know, a news cycle
continues to kind of either trivialize or completely ignore what's
happening in me, amma, which is really sad. People often
ask me like where they can find reliable news sources
and where they can send them money if they want
to help people in Mema. Do you have any good
suggestions for that?
Speaker 5 (39:05):
Sure? Yeah, I mean I think for news, I guess
for like day to day news like Fronter Memr is
a fantastic source, as is Meanmar Now and the Irawadi.
Speaker 4 (39:15):
These are they have English.
Speaker 5 (39:16):
Language content that would be really interesting and accessible. My organization,
the US in suit Piece. You can check out our website.
We publish a lot of analytical work on there related
to the conflict. You're welcome to check there. I think
there's a really good another podcast, it's really good, Insight MEMR,
that is worth checking out. Started as like a Buddhism
(39:37):
oriented podcast talking about in Pasuma. Now its branched into
a much broader range of issues.
Speaker 4 (39:43):
Some of the best stuff I've heard and actually affiliated with.
Speaker 5 (39:47):
INSIGHTEMMR is an organization called Beta Burma that provides humanitarian.
Speaker 4 (39:51):
Assistance in one you could contribute to.
Speaker 5 (39:54):
There's an organization called Skills for Humanity that provides a
lot of humanitarian systems on the ground.
Speaker 2 (39:59):
Ye and you.
Speaker 5 (40:00):
Mentioned Liberate the NMAR before we start recording. That can
also be a good support.
Speaker 2 (40:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (40:06):
Yeah, I think schools to humanity also accept maybe they
accept direct I was speaking to them about like medical
equipment that they needed. Yeah, they they accept direct donations
or not. But people who want to volunteer medically, let's
want to look out for.
Speaker 2 (40:21):
Yeah, that was fantastic. Billy is there anyway?
Speaker 3 (40:24):
And I think you else you'd like to plug like
why people can follow you or us i P online.
Speaker 4 (40:28):
Us i P dot org. Most of my writing is
on there.
Speaker 5 (40:32):
I'm on Twitter, Twitter at b I L L e E,
the number four, the letter D. But yeah, I mean
I checked those sources I mentioned. It's rather there's not
more kind of content in the mainstream media, but there's
there's a lot of really incredible reporting coming from the
ground from people taking incredible risks to share information. So
(40:54):
encourage you to support some of those local outlets.
Speaker 3 (40:57):
Yeah, definitely, including financially if you can. It's like they're
doing the work that really needs to be done.
Speaker 2 (41:03):
Thank you so much for your time.
Speaker 3 (41:05):
Thank you, James, and we appreciate you being our host.
Speaker 2 (41:07):
Jeers It could.
Speaker 1 (41:11):
Happen Here is a production of Cool Zone Media from
one podcast from cool Zone Media. Visit our website folzonmedia
dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts or Wherever you listen to podcasts, you can
now find sources for it could happen here, listed directly
in episode descriptions. Thanks for listening.
All Zone Media.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Hi everyone, and welcome to it could happen here.
Speaker 3 (00:08):
I'm James and today I am joined by Billy Ford
from the United States Institute Piece.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
A third time podcast guest.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Billy.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
How many?
Speaker 4 (00:16):
I think it's just my second, but thanks for second?
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Okay, Yeah, well I'll give you a bonus one.
Speaker 4 (00:20):
Thanks for the invite.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
Yeah, and we're here to discuss the revolution in Memma
and bring you up to date on conflict stuff and
natural disaster stuff and answer some questions people have asked
me by emailing me. So yeah, thanks for joining us, Biddy.
We're at another crossroads in the conflicts we talked about
before we started recording. Can you pres explain to folks
(00:42):
like what has happened since ten twenty seven?
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Part two?
Speaker 4 (00:47):
Sure?
Speaker 5 (00:47):
Yeah, I mean, I think last time we talked, we
were just kind of in the throes of the initial
ten twenty seven things. I mean, I think zooming out
for a second, the you know, February twenty twenty one, coup,
September seventh, twenty twenty one, defensive wars announced and armed
resistance really kicks off. And then twenty twenty three October
(01:11):
things really escalate. After a few years of steady gains
by the resistance. Then there was a major level change
in the trajectory of the war favoring the resistance forces. Yeah,
I think, as you mentioned, there was a second phase
of ten twenty seven in July in early August that
took things kind of to another level, although it is
(01:33):
kind of just a continuation of a sustained.
Speaker 4 (01:36):
Push by the resistance. I think some have perceived these.
Speaker 5 (01:40):
Moments of October twenty twenty three in August twenty four
adds real watershed moments. But I think we can see
how these are illustrative or broader trends, trends in which
the mem or military is losing its capability to defend
strategic positions, it's inability to counter attack on the resistance side,
(02:02):
much greater coordination among resistance armed stakeholders, growing fighting capability,
better weapons access, all these sorts of factors that have
swung the balance of military power further in the favor
of resistance forces. But essentially what happened in July and
August was, building off of the October advances, the resistance
(02:24):
in northern Shan State, not far from the Chinese border,
pushed further into central miandmar In collaboration. This was essentially
ethnic based armed organizations collaborating with Bamar People's Defense Forces
under the command structure of the National Unity Government, and
they started making advances into central Burma. So whereas the
(02:45):
initial phase of the war and the NUG strategy was
to focus on building relationships between the People's Defense forces
under their command with ethnic based armed organizations and focusing
strategically on the peripheries to build those relationships, to build
ethnic buy into the broader revolution, to get access to weapons,
and to make steady advances. Now we're at a phase
(03:07):
where the resistance is pushing into central Meanmar. Now the
focus is on the city of Mandalay and central Burma,
which is the biggest commercial center of the country. So yeah,
I mean this has sparked another phase of I think
pressure and anxiety within Napida and the capital among the
(03:27):
state Administrative Council, hunta leadership, and yeah, more energy on
the resistance side. And it's kind of it's occurred alongside
advances on multiple other fronts. I mean, in the very
north of the country, Chen State, starting in March, the
Kachin force has pushed the Memori military out of it, it
was two hundred posts within four months. Similarly in Rakine State,
(03:50):
which I think, well, maybe we'll touch on more. The
aur Accon Army has made steady advances, so it's not
just in these subregions. It's happening virtually all over the
country at this point.
Speaker 3 (04:00):
Yeah, it does seem and like clearly the essays the
Hunter is kind of on the back foot, like it
started to forcibly conscript people, which in turn kind of
get people a choice between the resistance or the military,
and seems like more of them a choosing their resistance.
Some of the conscriptions, you know, people can buy out
of them, which obviously causes not great for the morale
(04:22):
of the population. And that's combined with shortages and inflation.
Pretty shit situation for folks living under Hunter.
Speaker 5 (04:29):
Oh yeah, absolutely, I mean I think the memor of military,
I mean, there's a big question here about like the
resilience of this meam or military. I mean, frankly in
militaries in other countries have collapsed and are much less pressure.
So there's a question here about like what is holding
this all together, particularly given that its primary resilience factors
(04:50):
are heavily degraded. I mean things like its ideological value.
I mean it's historically been about what we hold the
country together. We manage the diversity of this complex country.
We defend the Bamar and the Buddhist populations. These factors
are no longer credible. I think it's more than one
hundred thousand homes in central Burma have been burnt to
(05:11):
the grounds. Most of those are Bamar Buddhists. And you know,
someone in the Sanga have risen up. The Buddhist Songa
have risen up in protests, including a recent killing of
a senior monk. So I think that ideological foundation is
totally degraded. The other factors, which are economic, the economic
benefits of being in this institution are also withering, as
like the entire economy is collapsing as your reference. And
(05:34):
then the third component is like the social status that
want to cheese through. Being a member of this institution
used to be a place where you could get economic
benefits and social benefits, and now it's really neither.
Speaker 4 (05:45):
I mean you're reviled or a target.
Speaker 5 (05:48):
For resistance assassination if you're affiliated with the institution.
Speaker 4 (05:53):
So I think the question remains as.
Speaker 5 (05:54):
To like what are the key factors keeping it in
place given all of these pressures that it's facing, And
you know, happy to go into that, but I think
there's there. It's an interesting case study in institutional resilience
and the challenges faced by a resistance movement that has
major resource constraints and you're fighting up against a military
institution that has learned how to orchestrate and sustain authoritarian
(06:20):
governance structures for decades.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
So yeah, yeah, yeah, I think we can maybe circle
back to that. One thing I did want to talk
about before we move on to talking about what's happening
in recind State is I wanted to talk about the
recent flooding that people will have probably seen if they
have these friends on social media or keep keep an
eye on publications in a region. Can you explain a
(06:42):
little bit about like the scale of the flooding and
the absolutely bungled if any response from NAPYDAL.
Speaker 4 (06:48):
Sure.
Speaker 5 (06:49):
Yeah, I think the latest figures that I've seen were
one hundred and sixty thousand displaced, six hundred and thirty
affected by the floods, two one hundred and thirty dead,
and seventy missing.
Speaker 4 (07:00):
I think that's what I saw this morning.
Speaker 5 (07:02):
But yeah, I mean I think that gives you a
sense that this is another humanitarian catastrophe on top of
a I think what is now rated the second most
intense violent conflict in the world by Accolade.
Speaker 4 (07:15):
So this is just one crisis on top of another.
Speaker 5 (07:18):
And yeah, as you kind of alluded to, the Memora
military is incapable and in unwilling to kind of address
the needs here of the population.
Speaker 4 (07:28):
I mean, the one factor is that they.
Speaker 5 (07:30):
Don't have territorial control to move resources if they had
the political will to provide assistance. But of course they're
doing the exact opposite. In some of the most flood
affected parts of the country, they are continuing to conduct
air strikes on civilian populations. I mean, it's it's just
kind of a level of brutality that's kind of hard
(07:50):
to have them.
Speaker 4 (07:51):
But yeah, I mean there's all these other kind of
ancillary effects of this.
Speaker 5 (07:54):
I think there's signs of a cholera outbreak and yen Gon.
The economic conditions, as you mentioned a little bit earlier,
are horrendous. I mean, like the economy's lost thirty percent
of its value, and it's not a rich country to
begin with. Inflation is I think thirty two percent year
on year, with the memoar Chat having lost two hundred
percent of its value, I mean.
Speaker 4 (08:16):
Yeah, it's two hundred percent less value than it was. Yeah.
So this is like, you know, it's just.
Speaker 5 (08:22):
One catastrophe on top of another, and it's really testing
the Memur public's capacity to kind of support one another,
which is that's really been the incredible story here, and
it's not the first time that the MEMMR military, the
governing stakeholder, has failed to meet the needs and that
moment of crisis. Of course, psychloanargus one of the worst
(08:45):
natural disasters in the region's history was another instance in
which the Memmur military refused international assistance and kind of
instrumentalized humanitarian catastrophe for political aims.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (08:59):
Yeah, I think people it's worth reading up on that
if you're interested in like the sort of longer term
history of the conflict and of sort of the military
in Miamma. Maybe now it's a good time to take
a break and we'll come back and discuss a little
bit about Racine state.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
And we're back. Okay.
Speaker 3 (09:25):
So I think if people follow the conflict, they will
have probably seen like a series of conflicting and confusing
articles and messages about what's going on in Rakine State,
and some of that is because there's not a great
deal of reporting in the English language, a great deal
of sources in the English language. And even if there
(09:46):
is that, none of us can really make it to
Racine State right now. Going through Bangladesh would be quite
quite a challenging thing to do with that at this time.
And so I guess we should start breaking down if
people aren't aware the people who live and have lived
for a long time in Rakine State and the conflicts
have fixed it between them and the Burmese state.
Speaker 4 (10:05):
Sure, yeah, I.
Speaker 5 (10:06):
Mean Rakine State borders Bangladesh on the western side of
the Arts along coastal border as well, and the site
of some of the largest extractive oil and gas projects,
including the terminal for a major gas pipeline that feeds
fourteen percent of u Non Province's GP, So it has
huge strategic value. It's also China's aiming to kind of
(10:29):
access the Indian Ocean and circumvent the Strait of Malacca
by going directly to this kind of region of the country,
So it's highly strategically important. But it's also I think
it's the second poorest state in the entire country and
arguably the most conflict affected.
Speaker 4 (10:48):
At least since twenty twelve ish.
Speaker 5 (10:51):
So the population of Rakind state is highly diverse, kind
of the last to have the broader country's demographics. Woods
of Bamar population, which is the dominant ethnic group at
the national level, the ethnic majority is kind. There's I mean,
historically a very large Muslim population of Rahinja Muslims primarily,
(11:13):
but also other Muslim minority groups including Kahman Muslims, and
then a number of other smaller ethnic minority groups Murmaji,
Kami and others, as well as a small Hindu population.
So you can kind of get the sense that this
is a highly diverse space. I mean, many of the
listeners will have heard twenty sixteen twenty seventeen, Go was
(11:34):
the site of a massive clearance operation and the genocide
of Rhinja Muslims, about seven hundred and fifty thousand of
whom were pushed into Bangladesh and almost all of them
are still there inhabiting the largest refugee camp in the world. Yeah,
I mean, overall conditions for the Rhinja it's hard to
imagine a more difficult set of conditions. The Bangladesh government
(12:00):
is quite impatient have hosted many hundreds of thousands of Rahinja,
some for seven years but others for actually for much
longer than that, as twenty sixteen twenty seventeen was a
moment in a genocide, but there have been instances of
memoir military atrocities against the Hindu population dating back to
the nineteen seventies as well.
Speaker 4 (12:21):
So this is a long term kind of situation in
which the Bungadesh have been coasting Rehinja.
Speaker 5 (12:27):
And yeah, I mean I think conditions in those camps
are really really challenging. The major issue now is the
arising and security in the camps, as some Rhinja militia
groups have gained ascendency in the camps, most of which
have very little public support, and when the Renja population
should be noted, the major dynamic that that's happened recently,
(12:48):
I mean the Arakan Army, which is almost entirely of
Kine ethnic groups and has broad public support among the
Rakine population of Rakind State, has made massive advances across
Hine State and now controls virtually all of northern Rakine
State and is pushing south. It took the city of
Tondue and the airport, which is the first time a
(13:09):
resistance group had taken an airport. It recently took a
naval base, the first time that has ever happened in
the history of the Memory military, and now it's pushing
its forest south as guas potentially threatening to control the
entire state. So as this has occurred, the MR military
is in a state of complete panic, and as it
(13:30):
is losing forces on this front, but also on numerous
other fronts, it has attempted to kind of buttress its
forces through force conscription and in the most potentially the
most horrifying move imaginable, it is forcibly conscripted the Rowhinja
into the MR military. They conducted genocide against the Rhinda
(13:51):
population and now they are forcing them to wear the
uniform of their genocider. It's kind of a level of horror.
It's hard to understand.
Speaker 4 (14:00):
And one way.
Speaker 5 (14:01):
In which they've undertaken this effort is by collaborating with
Rehindra militia forces including ARSA, the Salvation Army and the
Rhindra Saldarity Organization ARSO, which have presence in the camps
and have been facilitating recruitment from the camps. So the
primary aim here as a military one, but a secondary aim,
(14:21):
which is really critical, is undermining interching cohesion in rekind
state because ultimately, like the BMW or military operates through coercion,
force and violence, but also through fragmentation so that it
doesn't face a unified resistance. And in this case they
want to incite instability by creating hatred between the Rhindra
(14:42):
and Rekine population and building off of the vitriol that
had built over decades. So this is kind of a
new paradigm that everyone is trying to better understand. But yeah,
it's it's kind of a new level.
Speaker 3 (14:55):
Of r Yeah, and it's particularly horrific. As you say,
I think sometimes the tendency, especially with people who perhaps
are not as familiar with the situation and history there
to lump ethnic groups in as sort of monolithic actors,
right or homogeneous to be like, okay, so they re
Hinja as represented by ARSA and the RSO have joined
the Hunter, which is not the case. Like every Hinger
(15:18):
person I speak to, everyone I speak to in Cox's
Bizarre shares a loathing for those organizations. They're forced conscription
of young people, and yeah, their solidarity with the hunter
that committed the genocide against and it continued to commit
the genocide against these people. And I think the first
thing we need to do is move away from that
kind of homogeneous perspective. But maybe we could explain there
(15:40):
have been a few accusations of the our Econ army
making attacks against a hiner people, right NGA specifically hinder
people who are not armed, who are not part of
ROSO or A. Yeah, can you explain like what we
know and what we don't know there?
Speaker 4 (15:57):
Sure?
Speaker 5 (15:57):
Yeah, I think there's just just are There is a
massive fog of war in Rekind state, may be worse
than any other part of the country, so it is
really difficult to disentangle fact from fiction here. But I
think there's pretty credible evidence that the Arkhan Army have
committed atrocities against hind Of civilian populations. In early August,
(16:19):
there was a specific incident in which hundreds of Rahinja
were killed in a drone strike, and Fortified Rights, which
is a human rights organization, conducted investigation to the incident
and asserts that the ark On Army was responsible for
that of course, the AA disputes these claims, and I
(16:39):
think there's a few recent interviews with the commander in
chief of the Army to nine where you know, he
articulates his side of the story, which you could find
on Irwadi dot com and.
Speaker 4 (16:50):
I think in a few other news outlets.
Speaker 3 (16:52):
Yeah, the diplomat did one as well. He's been on
a publicity tour I guess recently. Yeah, absolutely, you've seen this.
But like his tendency to cool or hint of people
bangladeshis it is unfortunate given that that's a language that
was used to justify the genocide.
Speaker 5 (17:10):
Right, absolutely, Yeah, it reflects kind of the language that
the Memora military used.
Speaker 2 (17:14):
Well, Bengali's he'll call them exactly. Yeah, it's very reflective
of that.
Speaker 5 (17:18):
Yeah, So this is really challenging, and part because I
think that there is kind of an important distinction between
the Metamora military and the ark On Army in this case,
in part because the ark On Army has a raw
public support among the rekind public and so it has
a more of a legitimate stake to governance than the
Menmora military, which has none. And so this is it's
(17:40):
kind of an issue that requires attention and an honest
accounting of the facts and a long process of reconciliation.
Part because of the ark On Army is likely there
to stay as a governing stakeholder. Yeah, so that that
is a really tricky kind of set of conditions.
Speaker 4 (17:58):
And the other side of this is that the re
kind of public.
Speaker 5 (18:01):
I think there is a deep sense of a grievance
among the rekind public. And this is a population that
has also faced years of intense political alienation and persecution.
Speaker 4 (18:12):
Not to mention war and violence.
Speaker 5 (18:14):
You know, last year when Cyclo and Moca hit the
Kind State, the Memora military did virtually nothing to help them.
Speaker 4 (18:21):
So it's a population with.
Speaker 5 (18:22):
Legitimate a grievances and they and their perception is that
the international community only focuses on the rehint of public's
well being. And I think the international community can do
a better job of showing sympathy for the rekind public's interests.
I think sympathy is not like zero sum in that sense,
and that needs to be done better. Yeah, But honestly,
like the equating a grievances is also really kind of
(18:44):
unfair and dishonest.
Speaker 4 (18:45):
And you know this.
Speaker 5 (18:46):
Rehindered population is marginalized to just such an extreme degree.
Speaker 4 (18:51):
And so those are a really interesting report by Doctors
Without Borders not.
Speaker 5 (18:54):
Too long ago it that showed that only like six
hundred thousand of the two point eight million were Hinja
in the world, that in MR fifty seven percent of
living in camps and Bangladesh or in IDP camps and MEMR.
So it's like there's just like a highly vulnerable population
that has experienced genocide, you know.
Speaker 4 (19:13):
It's like there are there's a power in balance, you know.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
So it's like, I think it's not the same.
Speaker 4 (19:18):
I don't know.
Speaker 5 (19:19):
The whole process of kind Rhinda reorconciliation is one that
deserves immediate and urgent attention, but there's also a long
term process of constructing, you know, a governance structure that
is acceptable and that's not a highly exclusionary of Rhinda and.
Speaker 4 (19:36):
These sorts of things. So it's a it's a highly
and beyond the.
Speaker 5 (19:39):
Fact that we need more a deliberate investigation in some
of these incidents, I think a broader conversational reconciliation and
justice needs to needs to take place.
Speaker 3 (19:49):
Yeah, and it's definitely one at least you know, I
speak to people who are probably on the more progressive
side of the resistance, and it's one that they've acknowledged,
like it's something that they need to address, and kind
of the litmus test for like a post hunter mean mars,
like are there places for these people who they weren't
places for in this state before? But yeah, how we
(20:10):
get there is it's difficult, and I don't think that's
not that's not a clear pathway that anyone's kind of
pointed to this yet.
Speaker 4 (20:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (20:18):
The one thing I would add is like this is
sort of emblematic of broader perceptions of MEMR and approaches
to peace building a MEMR is that there's there's often
a horizontal approach that like we need to work on
the intercommunal level, individual level trust building, that sort of thing.
And I think there is a place for that for sure.
But we've done a couple pieces of research with an
(20:41):
academic at UG Austin who has found some really interesting
stuff about like the nature of conflict in the country
and nature of cohesion in the country. And she's found
including through some experimental research, studies and designs which are
quite revealing. I think that national identity is often more
important to respondence in her surveys than ethnic identity, which
(21:03):
is which kind of cuts against like the traditional perceptions
of how Memra is, like, Oh, it's this irreconcilably fractious
place and it's so hard to build trust between communities.
Speaker 4 (21:13):
And that sort of thing.
Speaker 5 (21:14):
But for her research kind of points to the vertical dimension,
where it's the nature of Memor politics and the nature
of governance structures that highly exclusionary, discriminatory governance structures have
sustained conflict for so long in the country.
Speaker 4 (21:30):
And this is kind of like the main argument for
the resistance.
Speaker 5 (21:33):
You know, it's like a lot of the stakeholders, at
least a critical mass within this resistance movement, they're trying
to assert a new political paradigm in the country, you know,
a more stable political paradigm in which the Memour military
is not a dominant stakeholder, in which violence is not
your source of power, in which that's not built on
(21:53):
exclusionary norms of belonging. So it's like it is genuinely
a revolution in this sense, and that is why they're
they're kind of pushing against the international pressures to enter
into a power sharing your dream with the VMR military
because there's a perception that if them our military it
remains in a position of political power, they will interrupt
this reform process and then violence world persist.
Speaker 4 (22:16):
In the country.
Speaker 3 (22:17):
Yeah, yeah, and I think that's probably a reasonable assumption
to make. Like, again, this is like one of those
things that I see a lot in different places in
the world where I go, right, there's this tendency to
see things, I think from sort of colonial perspective and
just be like, oh, these ethnicities will squabble and fight,
and like that's not necessarily the case at all, And
like if you look even to the PDFs, Like I
(22:39):
was speaking to someone the other day who was saying, like,
there are jib Muslim women fighting with the koren right now,
which is something that doesn't align up with this idea
of like ethnicities which are clashing and can't combine. And
we saw like a statement of solidarity from the Karenni
to the Kurdish people, which doesn't line up with this
(23:02):
idea of an inherently Islamophobic like you know, sort of
massive of Buddhist people in the Amma, which I think, Yeah,
it's a little oversimplified to say that stuff and I
think sometimes reductive, and it's the analysis of me and
Mark as a place where colonialism is still occurring, and
the methods of colonialism, like lots of the things you
(23:23):
describe right, like promoting fractures, promoting these different ethnic identities
which are seen as kind of zero sum and mutually exclusive.
These are things that the United Kingdom did or Britain
did all around the world for centuries. And it's not
rocket science to see how that jumps to another group
which especially in some cases was trained by the British
(23:44):
or had relations with the British, and you know, to
see how we got there. But I think we'll take
another little break here, we'll come back, and I want
to discuss the resilience of the Hunter and how it's
hanging on.
Speaker 2 (24:05):
All right, we're back.
Speaker 3 (24:07):
So for the last little segment of this podcast, I
would like to discuss how the Burmese military is holding
onto powers. When I speak to soldiers who have defected,
I speak to I've spoken to about half a dozen,
I guess soldiers who have defected over time. It's almost
comic how disorganized and chaotic things are, and at the
(24:28):
same time it's terrible the way like every single one
of them has described to me that their families are
essentially held as collateral to stop them deserting, right, and
so they had to work with the civil disobedience movement
to first extract their families before they themselves took their
weapons in most cases because they get a bounty for
their weapons and went to join the resistance or in
(24:49):
some cases went into exile. So like, maybe that gives
us a good view on how the Hunter is it's
continuing to force people to fight in this war that
it's losing. Can you explain a little bit of how
they've held onto power?
Speaker 5 (25:02):
Sure, Yeah, I guess the first thing to note is
that rates of defection are totally historic. I mean, yeah,
by our account, about fifteen thousand deserters, which is actually
not radically different than historical norms. The mem Our military
has comparatively high rates of desertion even before the coup,
so that's not, you know, far outside of the norm.
(25:25):
But the defection, I think there's about fifty eight hundred
defectors by our account since the coup, which is unprecedented.
There's never never really been defection to resistance in memr's history.
The other factor is the number of individuals who are
surrendering without a fight with you know, without with putting
up little resistance. That number is hard to count, but
(25:48):
it's our by our raid, it seems to be quite high.
There's forms of acts of disloyalty occurring that are not,
you know, spurring institutional collapse, but are that are degrading
the memoir of military's fighting capabilities, which is a really
important dynamic. So say that at the outset outset. The
other thing I'd say is that, like, I think we
(26:08):
need to sort of think about this at three levels. So,
like the rank and file soldiers, they are significantly demoralized.
Most did not join the military to fight. They joined
the military for economic stability and for social status, and
neither of those are available to them under this military's leadership.
(26:29):
They certainly did not join to commit atrocities against the
Bamar Buddhist population, which.
Speaker 4 (26:34):
Is now what they're enforced to.
Speaker 5 (26:35):
So I think that population, the large number of rank
and file soldiers, is highly demoralized, and that's where you
have seen lots of desertion, defection, often from the front lines.
Though that population's defection desertion is not going to trigger
institutional collapse.
Speaker 4 (26:50):
At the second level, you have like.
Speaker 5 (26:52):
A command or core major, major and above, and these
I think since Operation ten twenty seven you've seen their
morale to drop. And I mean there's been the fall
of Latio and the loss of the Northeast Regional Command,
the first time in the Memors history that a regional
commands been taken that had sent shockways through the commander level.
(27:16):
The other thing is that min Onligne, the Commander in Chief,
in his attempt to consolidate power and protect himself from
from internal fragmentation, he's rotating commanders based on loyalty, not
based on effectiveness, which is also degrading the Memora Military's
fighting capability.
Speaker 4 (27:35):
But it's also that's maybe.
Speaker 5 (27:37):
One reason why you haven't seen less acts of disloyalty
within that layer.
Speaker 4 (27:41):
At the senior levels.
Speaker 5 (27:42):
I mean mostly most of those senior Memorial military officials
who are based in Apida, I think they until the
fall of Lastio and the resistance moving into Mandalay, there
was relatively high levels of sense of security and morale
was was okay, I suppose, but the full of Lastio
(28:03):
and the ensuing events has really inflamed internal frustration from
what we understand so, and this has also triggered some
some shifts in the way in which the MEMR military
operates its patronage structures.
Speaker 4 (28:16):
So traditionally the patriot in structure is essentially like a
feudal state.
Speaker 5 (28:20):
I mean you have like a commander in chief that
is extremely powerful, has authority to rotate or fire or
arrest virtually anyone.
Speaker 4 (28:27):
I mean, just huge amounts of powers centralized there.
Speaker 5 (28:30):
The deputy commander in chief has little capability to challenge
the commander in chief's authority. But then you have these
regional commanders that operate as feudal lords at the regional level.
They're able to extract huge amounts of value or wealth
through you know, attractive.
Speaker 4 (28:46):
Industries, illegal industries, all with total impunity.
Speaker 5 (28:49):
But often you know, with the approval of nipidal and
that approval was often just given. Now it's less it's
less easily given. I mean you've seen nineties senior officers shuffled,
changed positions since the coup, and fifty have been removed
or arrested by our tracking. And you've also seen individuals
(29:11):
detained and arrested. Because I think there's fifteen kernels or
above mostly brigadier generals and major generals who have been
arrested for business related activities, which I think is emblematic
of the restructuring of the patronage network and centralizing the
patronage network with men Online himself. If you do not
(29:33):
have his personal approval, you cannot conduct business activities, including
these highly lucrative scam operations that are generating billions in
value but also really frustrating the Chinese.
Speaker 4 (29:44):
So this whole patronage structure.
Speaker 5 (29:46):
Which is critical to sustaining the Memora military, is being reoriented,
and we'll see whether or not that.
Speaker 4 (29:52):
Helps sustain the institution or introduces more instability.
Speaker 5 (29:55):
But ultimately, the forms of resilience I guess you would
call it are the one maybe you pointed to. I
mean their structure. I mean it's like rotating officer, commanders
and senior officers regularly holding families hostage. Essentially, you know,
a soldier sent to the front lines, its family remains
in the barracks. Payment is often made to the families,
(30:17):
not to the front line's soldier, and there's retribution if
the frontline soldier defects or deserts. This is also where
the fifty eight hundred number I mentioned earlier is likely
irradical undercounting because and also the fifteen thousand desertions because
a lot of people are recorded as KIA when they're.
Speaker 4 (30:35):
Actually they've deserted or defected.
Speaker 5 (30:38):
So anyways, I'm not sure if that answers your question,
which some thoughts relatives tosiliencia.
Speaker 2 (30:44):
No, I think it does.
Speaker 3 (30:45):
Yeah, one of the guys I met, we've described basically
his entire I guess squad went out on a patrol
and defected. I guess the PDF have been I had
to describe it really, but it's basically shit talking them
in their barracks or like in the position for months
right there.
Speaker 2 (31:01):
Like you see this a lot. It's a kind of.
Speaker 3 (31:03):
Unique feature of the of the conflict in the MR
guys with megaphones, just being like, you can surrender if
you want.
Speaker 2 (31:10):
You know, your life is miserable.
Speaker 3 (31:12):
And I guess in this case it worked, And yeah,
they will be read to as KIA. They went out
in a patrol and never came back.
Speaker 5 (31:18):
But yeah, I mean, I guess the other dynamic is that,
like you need to align motivation and opportunity for defection
desertion and the motivation is there in a lot of cases,
but opportunity is not. You know. The resistance is committing
some resources to these efforts, but it's really limited given
the scale of the challenge.
Speaker 2 (31:39):
Yeah, there's a lot.
Speaker 5 (31:40):
Of factors that need to kind of come together, like
the ability to safely communicate with resistance, the ability to
move into resistance, all the areas of the perception that we.
Speaker 4 (31:49):
Were accepted and not phase retribution.
Speaker 5 (31:52):
The perception there was that living conditions are acceptable to them.
Speaker 4 (31:56):
You know.
Speaker 5 (31:56):
So there's all these conditions and given the call of
defection desertion which could be like major attribution against your family,
and deep uncertainty about leaving this institution that is kind
of a.
Speaker 4 (32:08):
State within a state.
Speaker 5 (32:09):
That's why we're not seeing the kind of large scale,
commander level defection desertion I think.
Speaker 3 (32:15):
Right, So, one last thing I wanted to talk about
before we finish up. If people, I guess keep tabs
on the conflict, they would have seen recently a video
I'm sure you've seen the Kachin Independence Army shooting down
in aircraft with an FN six Chinese man portaal air
defense system. It's what they sort of called manpads. I'm
sure women can carry them to just fine or anyone
(32:38):
else for that matter. But I think it happened in
January and the video has just come out. Can you
explain the significance of that within the conflict landscape?
Speaker 2 (32:46):
And we am a yeah.
Speaker 5 (32:47):
I guess there's a couple of points. One is about
China's posture and the other is about the military balance.
I think the Menomour military's air power is its primary
comparative advantage. I think this point it has fewer by
infantry forces than the resistance, but that it's heavy artillery
and especially it's air power. You know, that's how it
(33:10):
terrorizes the population. But it's also been a source of
It's been a very powerful mobilizing force. I mean, I
think after Phase one of ten twenty seven, the mmdaa
Ko Kong armed group, essentially it took back territory that
it proceeds to be their own and took the town
of Lau Kai, which was really surprising but a major advance.
(33:31):
And then everyone kind of perceived, Okay, they'll just stay
in the quote unquote Ko Kong areas, They'll stay where
they are.
Speaker 4 (33:36):
But I think there's a deep perception.
Speaker 5 (33:39):
Among the MDAA but also broader ethnic minority groups that
as long as the MR Military is in power and
has air capability.
Speaker 4 (33:48):
It will terrorize the public.
Speaker 5 (33:50):
Even if it cannot reach or ever take back lau Kai,
it will vomit. And that's exactly what we saw after
ten twenty seven. You saw air strikes and Laukai. You
saw air strikes and lights of the headquarters of the
Kachin Independence Army. You see airstrikes in parts of her
kind state that the mem R Military has no chance
of recapturing.
Speaker 4 (34:07):
You know, it's a terrorizing the pumbplic thing.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
Yeah, it's a punitive thing.
Speaker 4 (34:11):
Yeah, it's punitive thing. So and it also is powerfully motivating.
Speaker 5 (34:15):
It's like, okay, now you see the MNDA pushing all
the way to Lascio, and a lot of people didn't
think they would do that.
Speaker 4 (34:21):
But it's like, if you have a perception.
Speaker 5 (34:23):
That this m R military can hurt me from a distance,
they may need to eliminate them altogether in order to
achieve the level of stability and safety that they pursue.
Speaker 4 (34:33):
So like it's the double edged sword in that regard.
Speaker 5 (34:35):
But going back to your question, I mean, think like
if the resistance is capable of constraining the MR military's
air capability, it radically changes the balance of power.
Speaker 4 (34:47):
I mean, I think there are.
Speaker 5 (34:49):
Some elements of this that are been a primary focus
of some of the international human rights community, for example,
constraining access to jet fuel and these sorts of things
trying to push right arms margo, none of which I've succeeded,
but there's been kind of progress on the margins.
Speaker 4 (35:05):
Although I think we just saw Russia.
Speaker 5 (35:07):
Delivered jet fuel and the maritime routes in Southern Mars.
Speaker 3 (35:13):
So yeah, in exchange for the artillery shows that the
Mamma has sent to Russia, right, Oh.
Speaker 5 (35:18):
Okay, and realize okay, yeah, so I mean they're continued,
they're able to sustain that, and you know, and the
Chinese has sold i think six aircrafts last year, so yeah,
they still have this fighting capability, and they're still able
to extract foreign exchange essentially by stealing from exporters. But
that's a whole different conversation. But anyway, like I think, yeah,
(35:38):
this is a key dynamic if they're able to affect
their their air power. The other thing is that like
China is attempted to play both sides. I mean historically,
that's sort of their approach. I mean, they have deep
connections with armed organizations along its border, maybe closer even
than with the VMW or military. But they also provide
(35:59):
politically tuitimacy and material assistance to the Menmoral military. They
just actually signed an MU on law enforcement and security
or some sort with the military. That's a deep and
abiding relationship, in part because the Chinese don't see an alternative.
Speaker 4 (36:14):
I mean, I don't think they have much trust for
dan U G or other.
Speaker 5 (36:18):
Resistance groups, and despite the fact that they don't, they
don't also don't really trust the Memora military or perceed
them to be competent. They see them kind of as
their only potential partner in ipudot. But it's kind of
a question as to whether this strategy is still working
for them. I think we've seen lots of acts of
defiance from both sides, the meum Or military and resistance
(36:40):
groups visa China, I mean.
Speaker 4 (36:42):
The Man military. They've been pressuring.
Speaker 5 (36:44):
Them to hold elections for since the coup essentially, and
they're really no closer yeah to that happening. I mean,
I think they dissolve the NLD something the Chinese said
not to do, and more recently, they've designated a number
of resistance groups as terrorist organizations, which essentially obviates political negotiations,
(37:04):
which I think would certainly frustrate the Chinese, given that
they hope to achieve stability through political ingratiations between a
subset of resistance groups and the Manama military. So there
are these kind of acts of defiance also on the
resistance side. I mean, the Chinese are pushing for ceasefires,
and yet the resistance continues to push into the country,
(37:25):
and they're sort of a perception that, like, as the
resistance groups aligned with China, quote unquote aligned with China,
maybe they aren't a gain ascendency on the battlefield, in
particular that China's influenced gains.
Speaker 4 (37:39):
But I'm not sure whether that's the case.
Speaker 5 (37:40):
It might actually be in verse, like, as these groups
push into memmore and have more charitorial control, maybe they
have more options and they're less dependent on the Chinese.
So that relationship in the north along the Chinese border
is also very much in flux.
Speaker 4 (37:55):
I don't think it's clear exactly how that will play out.
Speaker 3 (37:58):
Yeah, no, it's not, And I think that's sort of
a big question that's overhanging. Obviously, you have actors that
are more close your line with China, like the United
Worst Date Army, who have sort of largely remained aloof
from the conflict or a loof maybe it's your own word,
but are not like directly committing most of their forces
to the Conflict's really a better way of saying it, right.
Speaker 4 (38:18):
Yeah, I think so.
Speaker 5 (38:19):
And now that there's a ton of pressure on them
to stop selling arms to other groups, So we'll see
where there that happens.
Speaker 3 (38:25):
Yeah, which is probably where the Kaschin Independence Army was
able to get the surface where missiles from, which brings
us back to that. Yeah, it's it's never not complicated,
but it's always very sad that, like the folks quit
in the middle of this are suffering horrendously and sometimes
suffering kind of out of sight and out of mind
(38:46):
for so many people. As you know, a news cycle
continues to kind of either trivialize or completely ignore what's
happening in me, amma, which is really sad. People often
ask me like where they can find reliable news sources
and where they can send them money if they want
to help people in Mema. Do you have any good
suggestions for that?
Speaker 5 (39:05):
Sure? Yeah, I mean I think for news, I guess
for like day to day news like Fronter Memr is
a fantastic source, as is Meanmar Now and the Irawadi.
Speaker 4 (39:15):
These are they have English.
Speaker 5 (39:16):
Language content that would be really interesting and accessible. My organization,
the US in suit Piece. You can check out our website.
We publish a lot of analytical work on there related
to the conflict. You're welcome to check there. I think
there's a really good another podcast, it's really good, Insight MEMR,
that is worth checking out. Started as like a Buddhism
(39:37):
oriented podcast talking about in Pasuma. Now its branched into
a much broader range of issues.
Speaker 4 (39:43):
Some of the best stuff I've heard and actually affiliated with.
Speaker 5 (39:47):
INSIGHTEMMR is an organization called Beta Burma that provides humanitarian.
Speaker 4 (39:51):
Assistance in one you could contribute to.
Speaker 5 (39:54):
There's an organization called Skills for Humanity that provides a
lot of humanitarian systems on the ground.
Speaker 2 (39:59):
Ye and you.
Speaker 5 (40:00):
Mentioned Liberate the NMAR before we start recording. That can
also be a good support.
Speaker 2 (40:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (40:06):
Yeah, I think schools to humanity also accept maybe they
accept direct I was speaking to them about like medical
equipment that they needed. Yeah, they they accept direct donations
or not. But people who want to volunteer medically, let's
want to look out for.
Speaker 2 (40:21):
Yeah, that was fantastic. Billy is there anyway?
Speaker 3 (40:24):
And I think you else you'd like to plug like
why people can follow you or us i P online.
Speaker 4 (40:28):
Us i P dot org. Most of my writing is
on there.
Speaker 5 (40:32):
I'm on Twitter, Twitter at b I L L e E,
the number four, the letter D. But yeah, I mean
I checked those sources I mentioned. It's rather there's not
more kind of content in the mainstream media, but there's
there's a lot of really incredible reporting coming from the
ground from people taking incredible risks to share information. So
(40:54):
encourage you to support some of those local outlets.
Speaker 3 (40:57):
Yeah, definitely, including financially if you can. It's like they're
doing the work that really needs to be done.
Speaker 2 (41:03):
Thank you so much for your time.
Speaker 3 (41:05):
Thank you, James, and we appreciate you being our host.
Speaker 2 (41:07):
Jeers It could.
Speaker 1 (41:11):
Happen Here is a production of Cool Zone Media from
one podcast from cool Zone Media. Visit our website folzonmedia
dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts or Wherever you listen to podcasts, you can
now find sources for it could happen here, listed directly
in episode descriptions. Thanks for listening.
It Could Happen Here News
Hosts And Creators
Robert Evans
Garrison Davis
James Stout
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