Chinese policy choices designed to seek advantage of instability in Myanmar

China has moved to consolidate its influence in the strategically important neighboring country Myanmar which is unstable after the February 1, 2021 coup by Tatmadaw (Myanmar's armed forces).

Yan Naing, writing in The Irrawaddy said that with the Western world riveted on the Ukraine crisis, the still-simmering cauldron of Myanmar presents perfect waters for the Chinese dragon to fish in.

On the surface, China appeared to support calls for a return to democracy, but it has also relished Myanmar's isolation and the consequent shift into China's grip, said Yan.

China has nimbly used ASEAN to project its own narratives, with pro-China ASEAN members on both sides of the divide vis-a-vis the junta ensconced in Naypyitaw.

The Ukraine war now seems to have added to China's sense of opportunity. Earlier this week, the Myanmar military received a shipment of arms and ammunition, including CH-3 drones, from China. Meanwhile, from March 15, a six-month course in the Chinese language will get underway in Kunming for 50 senior members of the Myanmar junta-affiliated Union Solidarity & Development Party (USDP), reported The Irrawaddy.

They will be schooled in the intricacies of not only Mandarin but also the ideological precepts espoused by the Chinese Communist Party. Such initiatives by China are aimed at ensuring influence and control in the long run--i.e., even if in the future some semblance of an election is held in Myanmar, by cultivating political outfits such as the USDP, Beijing will ensure that its diktat continues to run in the country, said Yan.

On the economic front, too, Nyapyitaw is increasingly dependent upon the behemoth Chinese economy. China has poured resources into the China-Myanmar Economic Corridor which will connect China's Yunnan Province to strategic ports on the Bay of Bengal, such as Yangon and Mandalay.

Not only will it boost Chinese manufacturing in its somewhat remote southwestern region, but it will also advance China's aim of encircling India through investments into crucial maritime assets on India's periphery.

Other Chinese projects towards this end are the funding of the Yangon-Sittwe Road (which would also provide the shortest overland route to the Indian Ocean from southern China) and assistance to the Tatmadaw in building a naval base in Sittwe--located across the Bay of Bengal from Kolkata, eastern India's largest megapolis--enabling any maritime force stationed there to threaten India's eastern seaboard, said Yan.

Beijing's dabbling in Myanmar is not a one-off instance of great power politics. It is but one in a string of policy choices designed to seek advantage of instability in any country drifting from the Western world's narrative in order to occupy any economic, military, or political space thus vacated.

Myanmar should learn from the examples of Sri Lanka, the Maldives, Pakistan, Djibouti, and Afghanistan into Chinese strategy and behavior, which usually starts with a political/military/economic crisis, and culminates in that country becoming economically beholden and hopelessly indebted to China, losing its own agency and voice in the international arena, advised Yan.

( With inputs from ANI )