It had long been predicted by conservative commentators that, under Aung San Suu Kyi, Myanmar's foreign policy would take on a distinct Western orientation. That was never going to happen. Despite her close links with the West and her natural inclinations to lean that way, Aung San Suu Kyi and those advising her knew that Myanmar's national interests remained in being non-aligned and encouraging good relations with all countries. This stance also recognised Myanmar's modest ability to influence the region's strategic environment.

Conservative pundits have long predicted that, under any administration led by Aung San Suu Kyi, the country's foreign policy would lurch towards the West, increasing bilateral tensions with China and making Naypyidaw an important player in the strategic competition between Washington and Beijing. That will not happen, but Myanmar's current non-aligned stance will undergo minor adjustments.

Aung San Suu Kyi—who is tipped to head up the foreign ministry in the new Cabinet—has always been on good terms with the West, which for decades supported her struggle for democracy and human rights in Myanmar. Through her hand-picked president, she will doubtless consolidate these links, but she knows that Myanmar's long-term interests lie in maintaining an even-handed approach to all foreign countries, including its two most powerful neighbours.

Also, despite the advent of a democratically elected government, Myanmar's armed forces retain considerable influence. The generals would not support any change in foreign policy that could threaten Myanmar's unity, stability or sovereignty. They know that these three “national causes” are best served by firm but friendly relations with both regional neighbours and the great powers.

After decades of isolating and punishing the former military regime, the United States is keen to restore bilateral relations with Myanmar. Given its critical geostrategic position and membership of ASEAN, it is also a factor in Washington's “tilt” towards Asia. Claims that the US plans to use Myanmar to “contain” China, however, lack credibility. In any case, such a provocative policy would be rejected by the new government.

The 1930s are considered by many to be the heyday of pulp fiction magazines in the United States, UK and elsewhere. The portraits of Myanmar painted in their short stories and novelettes encouraged outrageous views of the country and its inhabitants. These images were often cemented in the popular imagination by the more slickly produced and profusely illustrated popular magazines of the 1950s and 1960s. Even so-called “men's magazines” carried unlikely stories about Myanmar and its people.

Ask foreign visitors to Myanmar what literary works they associate with the country and the chances are that most will cite Rudyard Kipling's iconic 1890 poem “Mandalay”, or George Orwell's 1934 novel Burmese Days. Yet, many other Western publications have helped shape Myanmar in the public imagination. These include children's stories, plays, travelogues and memoirs.

Most of these works have painted a mental picture of Myanmar as a remote land of golden pagodas, gilded Buddhas and picturesque villages. The latter were invariably populated by demure “Burma girls” waiting for their European lovers to return. In Myanmar's steaming jungles, dacoits (or bandits) lurked among a menagerie of exotic wildlife, all waiting to attack anyone who crossed their paths.

Increasingly, scholars are examining how Western literature encouraged such perceptions and what attitudes flowed from them. One genre that is usually overlooked in this regard is pulp fiction. Particularly during the 1920s and 1930s, stories in popular magazines promoted an Orientalist view of Myanmar that emphasised its “otherness” and contributed to some fanciful notions about the country and its people.

The term “pulp fiction” comes from the cheap magazines published during the first half of the 20th century that were printed on low quality (“pulp”) paper. They had colourful covers, contained short stories and novelettes, and were aimed at a mass audience. At their peak, during the 1930s, there were over 150 separate titles, produced mainly in the United States. The most successful pulps sold hundreds of thousands of copies per issue.

At a time of rising literacy, and before televisions became common, these magazines were popular among boys and working-class men. Pulps exposed them to people, places and action of kinds they could never experience themselves. To quote one observer, the “mix of fantasy, horror, mystery and suspense, punctuated by episodes of torture, sadism, sex and other risqué elements” offered them an escape from their everyday lives.

Much of my work on Myanmar over the years has involved research on, and analysis of, the country's political and security environments. For a change and relief, almost, I would occasionally explore aspects of the country's history and popular culture. However, every now and again someone would say something, or something would happen, which sparked memories of my two and a half years living in Rangoon during the 1970s. This often led to excursions back in time to explain, even if only to myself, quirky and unusual phenomena that made my time in Myanmar so memorable.

As I have discussed elsewhere, in their memoirs world statesmen have tended not to give much attention to developments in Myanmar, even if they made extravagant statements about the country when in office. Also, when former diplomats have written about their postings to Yangon few have dwelt in depth on professional matters, relating for example to political events and bilateral exchanges with the local officials. Most have favoured personal reminiscences, focusing on curious aspects of the local scene, unusual cultural practices, and strange phenomena that, true or not, were likely to add some local colour and interest to their publications.

Some of these accounts of life in Myanmar have struck me as rather patronising. Also, I have wanted something that was more considered, and made a greater contribution to public knowledge about a country that has long been little known and poorly understood. However, when I came to jot down some of my own recollections of the country, I found it easier to understand the impulse to record amusing stories, rather than serious discussions. There was something about Myanmar, particularly in those days of Ne Win's inept and heartless socialist regime, which seemed to encourage irony, satire and parody.

Perhaps, as Lord Byron once wrote, “if I laugh at any mortal thing, ‘Tis that I may not weep”.

As the civil war in Myanmar reached its two-and-a-half-year mark, it became increasingly difficult to predict the final outcome. There was a range of factors that pointed to a possible victory for the opposition movement and a range of factors that argued equally strongly against such a result. Time was clearly a factor, but that seemed to be on the side of the junta. The international community continued to watch and wait on the sidelines, reluctant to commit beyond strong rhetoric and largely symbolic gestures.

When Charles Dickens wrote these words in 1859, he was thinking of the French Revolution, but they can also be applied to the civil war in Myanmar—considered by some observers to be another revolution. For the conflict there gives rise to feelings of both hope and despair. To many, the Burmese people have everything before them, but there are others who look at recent and likely future developments and are much less optimistic.

The hopeful signs have been widely publicised and are easily identified.

The nationwide civil disobedience movement that arose spontaneously after the military coup of 1 February 2021 has managed to survive the junta's brutal campaign against it. The opposition movement has created a shadow National Unity Government (NUG), which consists of 17 ministries and numerous other bodies, including at least four intelligence agencies and eight diplomatic missions overseas.

The NUG has announced a range of policies that seem aimed at correcting the social inequities seen under past military—and quasidemocratic— administrations. For example, it has declared that, under a new federal government, the Muslim Rohingyas will no longer be denied citizenship, the armed forces will be under civilian control, and greater autonomy will be granted to the ethnic minorities that make up 40 per cent of the country's population.

Aung San Suu Kyi was once held up as an exemplar of the virtuous prince. Not long after taking office in 2016, however, she came crashing down in the estimation of her admirers—at least those outside Myanmar. The main reason for this was Aung San Suu Kyi's public defence of military operations against the Muslim Rohingyas in Rakhine State, described by the UN as “ethnic cleansing”, possibly even genocide. Inside the country, however, she remained as popular as ever, despite her government's failure to deliver on its earlier promises of far-reaching reforms.

There was a time, not so long ago, when Myanmar State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi was hailed by the international community as “the bravest and most moral person in the world … the immaculate heroine who allows us all to feel a little better about human nature”.

As a political prisoner for almost fifteen years, she was widely lauded for her moral and physical courage, her unwavering commitment to the principles of universal human rights and her steadfast advocacy of peaceful political change. From world capitals to the smallest villages of Myanmar, from the highest in rank to the lowest in social status, the charismatic opposition leader with “orchids in her hair and iron in her will” was an inspiration to millions.

In recognition of her sterling qualities, Aung San Suu Kyi was awarded the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought in 1990, the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991 (for her “non-violent struggle for democracy and human rights”), the International Simon Bolivar Prize in 1992, the Jawaharlal Nehru Award for International Understanding in 1993, the Companion of the Order of Australia in 1996, and the Olof Palme Prize in 2005.

In 2008, she was awarded the United States Congressional Gold Medal, the country's highest civilian honour. When it was finally presented to her, in 2012, President Barack Obama expressed his admiration for “her courage, determination and personal sacrifice in championing democracy and human rights over the years”.

Twelve months after the November 2020 elections, and some ten months on from the February 2021 coup, an overview of developments in Myanmar delivered a sobering assessment. Despite some upbeat predictions, mainly on the part of the opposition movement and its foreign supporters, there was in fact little to cheer about. Indeed, looked at carefully and objectively, the forecast for the country was rather gloomy.

It has been just over a year since Myanmar emphatically re-elected Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy as the dominant partner in the country's quasi-civilian government. Next February, it will be a year since the armed forces, or Tatmadaw, ignored that result and seized power.

Over the past ten months, the scope and intensity of political violence in Myanmar has grown dramatically. The bitter civil wars that have long blighted the border areas now encompass the entire country, as groups from the majority Bamar population in the central regions have joined ethnic minority armed organisations in their struggles against military domination.

At first, the nationwide civil disobedience movement (CDM) against the coup was characterised by boycotts, resignations, demonstrations, street barricades and symbolic gestures like the coordinated beating of pots and pans at night. The new regime responded with conventional crowd control measures, usually conducted by the national police force.

However, within weeks the police were largely replaced by the armed forces and the level of violence rapidly escalated. The soldiers resorted to lethal force, prompting the resistance movement to manufacture defensive shields, body armour and weapons of their own. Armed with sling-shots, petrol bombs, bows and arrows and improvised airguns, however, they had little chance against the well-armed troops sent against them. The number of civilian casualties quickly mounted.

A number of ethnic minority armed organisations based around the country's periphery expressed solidarity with the protesters. They began to offer rudimentary military training and (in a few cases) weapons and explosives to some of those who had fled the cities. These ethnic minority armed organisations also took advantage of the regime's preoccupation with the civil unrest in central Myanmar to expand their territories and commercial interests.

Six months out from the coup in Myanmar, there had been countless articles, op-eds and other opinion pieces published in the international news media and online. Most were optimistic, to a greater or lesser degree, reflecting the hopes and dreams of their authors. However, even allowing for the difficulty of making predictions about Myanmar, a careful analysis of the country's likely future painted a much bleaker picture.

Predicting Myanmar's future has always been a risky business. It opened up to academics, journalists and others after the abortive 1988 pro-democracy uprising, but there is still much about its politics, economy and society that remain little known and poorly understood. For example, despite being the most powerful institution in the country for over half a century, its armed forces (or Tatmadaw) still defy detailed analysis.

In these circumstances, only a very bold or foolhardy observer would claim to be able to see where the country is heading, beyond the short term. Even so, it is important that some effort is made to identify emerging trends and to make cautious assessments about the likely course of events. For, without such a picture in mind, it is difficult to understand the significance of current developments and to formulate realistic policies aimed at tackling specific problems.

Before attempting a description of what Myanmar could look like over the next year or two, it might be helpful to lay down a framework for analysis, and state some basic assumptions.

First, Myanmar's security forces are larger, stronger and better resourced than any of the country's ethnic armed organisations (EAO), either taken individually or considered as part of an anti-junta coalition. The opposition's “new age rebels”, such as the self-proclaimed People's Defence Force (PDF) and sundry armed resistance groups, including local militias and urban guerrilla cells, are uncoordinated, poorly trained and ill-equipped.

Second, the “young officers’ coup” postulated by some activists is a remote prospect. Nor is Commander-in-Chief Min Aung Hlaing likely to be ousted by army “soft-liners” willing to negotiate a deal with the prodemocracy movement. The “defection” of hundreds of soldiers and police personnel will not make any real impact. They are useful in propaganda terms, and can pass on some practical skills, but they will not change the overall balance of forces.

As happened after the abortive pro-democracy uprising in 1988, the analysts, activists and others commenting on the 2021 coup soon divided into two broad camps. On the one side were those keen to condemn the junta and promote the most positive story about the opposition movement. On the other side were more dispassionate observers who tried to provide objective, evidence-based assessments, regardless of their political impact. For those members of the public unfamiliar with the situation in Myanmar, it was sometimes difficult to know which stories to believe.

It was a year ago tomorrow that Myanmar's armed forces seized power after rejecting the results of a mostly free and fair general election. Since then, there has been a dramatic decline in all the standard political, economic and social indicators. Criminal activity and COVID-19 cases aside, the only statistics that have gone up are those recording the number of people killed, wounded or displaced in the bitter civil war that is now raging across the country.

Given the dearth of reliable information about Myanmar, and the strong emotions aroused by the terrible events of 2021, objective, evidence-based analyses of the crisis are difficult. Some broad observations are possible, but opinions vary widely on precisely what has happened, what it all means and what is in store for the country in 2022. As in the past, notably after the 1988 pro-democracy uprising, the public commentary on Myanmar is deeply divided.

Broadly speaking, those commentators, popular pundits and activists writing about Myanmar, mainly for the news media, but also for online publications and social media platforms, fall into two schools. For the sake of argument (and setting aside the many qualifications that immediately spring to mind), they can be called the idealists and the realists or, more prosaically, the optimists and the pessimists.

The two schools share some similarities. Both have described in graphic terms the dreadful state of affairs inside Myanmar. The human rights abuses of the armed forces (or Tatmadaw) have dominated the headlines, but as 2021 progressed Myanmar's economy collapsed, essential services failed, people fell below the poverty line, food and medicines became harder to find and the pandemic spread. Over 400,000 people have been internally displaced since the coup, and about 32,000 refugees have fled to Thailand and India.

Reading Donald Gregg's book, Pot Shards, about his time in the CIA, part of which was spent in Myanmar, I unexpectedly came across a reference to ghosts. It was a subject that had fascinated me ever since I went to Myanmar in 1974. I was prompted to write the following piece for the Mekong Review, a quarterly literary magazine that was making a strong impression among Southeast Asian specialists at the time.

Anyone who has lived in Myanmar (formerly Burma) for any period can probably tell a story or two about ghosts. If they have not experienced a visitation themselves, they usually know someone who has done so. Indeed, so ubiquitous are such tales that, even among foreign circles in Myanmar, where one might expect a fair degree of scepticism, there is often a quiet acceptance that there are phenomena in the country that simply cannot be explained in terms of the rational calculations that usually govern daily life.

Such beliefs have been the subject of several scholarly studies. In 1967, for example, the American anthropologist Melford Spiro wrote a book titled Burmese Supernaturalism that not only explored the world of animist spirits called nats, but also devas, witches, wizards and ghosts. In 2014, Jane Ferguson published an article in the Asia Pacific Journal of Anthropology that described how workers at airports in Myanmar currently manage ghostly influences. The same year, Susan Conway published her fascinating study of Tai Magic: Arts of the Supernatural in the Shan States and Lan Na.

All three authors were struck by the diversity of supernatural beings in Myanmar, and their easy acceptance as natural phenomena by members of the local population.

There have been several accounts by contemporary observers of encounters with ghosts in Myanmar. For example, in her prison memoir Nor Iron Bars a Cage, Ma Thanegi described an incident in which a group of spectral women created such a noise that the guards suspected an attempt by the prisoners to incite unrest. On another occasion, some prisoners saw a group of men in old-fashioned uniforms climbing up some stairs, only to disappear. In his book From the Land of Green Ghosts, Pascal Khoo Thwe described a scene in the jungle in which he encountered the spirits of executed government soldiers.

Myanmar is not a popular subject for philatelists outside the country, but there is a dedicated community, based mainly in the UK, who follow developments in the field closely. Most are members of the Burma (Myanmar) Philatelic Study Circle, which produces an illustrated quarterly journal called The Burma Fantail. The journal publishes short reports on new stamp issues, interesting historical items and philatelic curiosities. It even runs the occasional tonguein- cheek story, like the one below.

Not many philatelists know that, in 1962, the Burmese government issued a commemorative postage stamp to honour the world's most famous superhero, Superman. At least, that was the story told by the American publishing giant DC Comics.

In August 1954, the comic book Superman No. 91 included a story entitled “The Superman Stamp”. It was later revised and republished under the title “The Secret of the Superman Stamp” in Superman No. 153, issued in May 1962. The first story was set in the fictional city of Metropolis, but in the second some of the action took place in Rangoon.

It is unclear why Burma was chosen as the setting for the revised version of this story. Apart from its role in the Second World War, the country was poorly known. It may have had something to do with General Ne Win's coup d’etat on 2 March 1962, which for a brief period thrust Burma into the world's headlines. It is more likely, however, that it was simply because the country's capital was then called Rangoon.

The plot of the second Superman story was as follows:

After an earth tremor, Rangoon was threatened by a geyser of boiling water that erupted in the middle of the city. Its citizens were rescued by Superman, who tapped the geyser to provide the city with a permanent supply of hot water. Out of gratitude, the mayor of Rangoon decided to issue a commemorative postage stamp, honouring the Man of Steel.

In order to obtain appropriate artwork, the mayor and a photographer went to Metropolis. The latter took a full-face shot of Superman holding a giant globe, which the mayor felt was ideal for his purposes. However, when he saw the photo, Superman asked the mayor not to use it and offered to perform another super-feat just for him, to use on the stamp.

After National League for Democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi was sentenced in a series of show trials to a total of 33 years in jail, a few foreign commentators wrote that she had effectively been dealt out of Myanmar's power games. They felt that she was no longer relevant to the course of the civil war or any future peace discussions. However, the visit to Naypyidaw in April 2023 by the Thai Foreign Minister, who spoke to Aung San Suu Kyi, was a reminder to all who would listen that she remained an important factor in Myanmar's political future.

It has been suggested recently that Myanmar's imprisoned State Counsellor, Aung San Suu Kyi, has been left behind by history, and she is no longer relevant to the outcome of the civil war that has been raging around the country since the 2021 military coup. Given her pivotal role in Myanmar's politics over the past 35 years or so, this idea warrants closer inspection.

The claim seems to have been prompted by the visit to Myanmar in April of the outgoing Thai Foreign Minister, Don Pramudwinai, who was granted an interview with Aung San Suu Kyi. He later said that she was in favour of a “dialogue without preconditions” aimed at achieving a negotiated solution to Myanmar's crisis. This option has long been rejected by both the junta and the shadow National Unity Government (NUG).

Don's visit has been criticised by the NUG and other opposition groups as a stunt designed to strengthen Bangkok's ties to Myanmar's military regime and to justify the outgoing Thai government's much criticised attempts at two-track diplomacy, outside formal meetings of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. It has also been seen as a way to put pressure on Indonesia, as ASEAN's current chair, to modify its tough stance against the junta, which has brushed aside ASEAN's Five-Point Consensus.

A photograph by Nic Dunlop, of a large and imposing statue outside the Defence Services Museum in Naypyidaw, led to this intellectual excursion into the semiotics of Myanmar's military government. It prompted one New Mandala reader to enquire: if an explanation of the statue's individual elements was so important, why not simply ask someone in the Myanmar government to say what they all meant? It was a fair question.

Readers of New Mandala will doubtless be familiar with Nic Dunlop's iconic photograph of the 10-metre high statues of Burma's three warrior kings (Anawratha, Bayinnaung and Alaungpaya) which tower over the main parade ground at Naypyidaw. On a recent visit to the capital, however, the Bangkok-based author, photographer and film-maker took a picture of another statue which is less well known.

This other statue, which stands in the grounds of the enormous new Defence Services Museum, consists of three life-size figures. One holds aloft a leafy branch, another raises a five-pointed star, and the one in the middle carries an unfurled flag. As seen in Nic's photo below, the statue's massive red and white pedestal surmounts a large white star, above the emblem of Burma's armed forces (or Tatmadaw).

This striking triptych does not appear to be identified in any way, raising a number of questions not only about the meaning of the statue itself, but also the symbolism of each component part. It is possible to read too much into such public displays but, by looking back through modern Burmese history, a number of possibilities present themselves.

Judging from their uniforms and military helmets, the three figures are soldiers. Taken together, they probably represent the Tatmadaw. It is curious that these figures are not portrayed in a way that better illustrates the three services, namely the army, navy and air force, but perhaps the designers of the statue wanted to emphasise that each figure had the same symbolic significance.

The figure on the left could be holding up a branch of the padauk tree, long revered by the Burmese for its strength and durability. Alternatively, it could be a sprig of laurel leaves, which represents victory in most Western cultures, or even an olive branch, universally known as a symbol of peace— as seen for example in the seal of the United Nations.

During 2009, Myanmar captured the world's headlines again. It was reported that, not only was it developing a close relationship with fellow pariah state North Korea, but the military regime in Naypyidaw had shown an unhealthy interest in acquiring nuclear technology from Pyongyang, in violation of UN sanctions. There was little hard evidence to support such claims, but for a while there were many in the region and further afield who believed that Southeast Asia could face the nightmare of an unstable and nuclear-armed dictatorship in its midst. This article, written for the Australian Strategic Policy Institute's Policy Analysis report, was an attempt to clarify the picture.

Over the past few months, there has been a spate of reports in the news media, accusing Burma and North Korea of engaging in activities that have serious consequences for regional—and possibly even global—security. If they are accurate, these reports would be grounds for considerable concern. Before drawing any firm conclusions, however, it is important to separate what is actually known from what is assumed, or the product of speculation. Also, despite being reported together, some of these developments may not in fact be connected, in which case they deserve a more nuanced treatment than they have received to date.

Six Headlines

Apart from occasional stories about the Naypyidaw government's human rights violations—most recently its harsh treatment of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi—Burma does not often feature in the mainstream news media. North Korea is mentioned much more often, but until recently was rarely linked with its fellow “outpost of tyranny” (as the two countries were once described by Condoleeza Rice). In a remarkable confluence of events, however, since the beginning of June there have been six developments that have tied Burma and North Korea together in the news media, and in the public imagination.

The first development was the publication on 9 June of several photographs showing underground facilities being constructed in Burma. Over the following weeks, more photographs were released, purporting to reveal a “network of secret bomb-proof tunnels”. It was claimed by the opposition Democratic Voice of Burma that between 600 and 800 such tunnels were being built, all with the help of North Korea. The purpose of these facilities was not clear, but activists and Burmese exile groups were quick to cite the photographs as evidence of nefarious dealings between Naypyidaw and Pyongyang.

One of my regular interlocutors in Rangoon was the resident World Health Organisation representative, who could always be counted upon to provide hair-raising stories about life in the old capital, and elsewhere. One subject that tended to come up often, on one occasion prompted by the sight of a rat scurrying across the floor of an up-market hotel reception room, was Rangoon's rodent infestation problem. I was later to learn that Rangoon was by no means alone in this regard, with Paris, London and New York still considered among the most rat-infested cities in the world.

When I was posted to the Australian embassy in Rangoon (now Yangon) in 1974, I spent my first six weeks living at the Strand Hotel. This was before the grand old building was renovated and turned into one of the city's most exclusive hostelries. As I was sitting in an enormous bathtub one night soon after my arrival, I was surprised to see what I thought was a mongoose run across the bathroom floor. On investigating further, I discovered that it was in fact a large rat. This was my introduction to the former capital's most prolific form of wildlife.

I was reminded of this incident recently when reading Bad Lands, a memoir by Tony Wheeler, who co-founded the Lonely Planet guide book company. He described a similar experience in the Strand Hotel in 1979:

The American travel writer Andrew Harper once claimed that, during the 1980s, the Strand's rats were almost as legendary as the ducks at Memphis's famous Peabody Hotel.

The Mergui (or Myeik) Archipelago has always had about it an air of mystery and romance, an image promoted by descriptions in early travelogues, pulp fiction, juvenilia and adventure movies. For many years, few people visited the area. Its remoteness and natural beauty, however, has now made it vulnerable to exploitation by unscrupulous entrepreneurs and a military government desperate for foreign currency.

For most of the 20th century, the Myeik (formerly Mergui) Archipelago in the far south of Myanmar was rarely visited by foreigners. The few transport services available were unreliable and modern amenities like hotels and restaurants were almost non-existent. There were occasional naval patrols but security was poor and the safety of travellers could not be guaranteed. After General Ne Win's coup d’etat in 1962, official restrictions on travel to the region were imposed, prompting the name “the forbidden islands”.

Over the past 20 years, the situation has changed, but the future of this remote and little known part of Myanmar remains uncertain.

The Myeik Archipelago consists of 804 islands stretching 400 kilometres down the coast of Tanintharyi (old Tenasserim) Division from Dawei (formerly Tavoy) in the north to Kawthaung (Victoria Point) in the south. This 26,000 square kilometre region is very lightly populated. Indeed, most islands are uninhabited, although some host small communities of Moken sea nomads (also known as Salone or Selung). Apart from a few military installations and huts used by seasonal fishermen, there are no settlements to speak of.

During the 17th and 18th centuries, Mergui on the mainland was a busy seaport and trading centre where goods were offloaded for the journey overland to Thailand (then called Siam). In 1859, after conquering lower Myanmar, the British government investigated the feasibility of constructing a 113 kilometre-long ship canal across the Kra Isthmus to facilitate the flow of trade goods from India to Bangkok and Singapore. Ships often sheltered in the archipelago, waiting for favourable weather to cross the Indian Ocean.

The appearance online of yet another sensational story about Myanmar was a reminder of the “post-truth” world we now seem to live in. It prompted another look at the perennial problem faced by Myanmar watchers and other observers, of inaccurate and misleading articles about the country's security environment. Many such stories are easily dismissed, but some have potentially serious consequences.

There is something about Myanmar which seems to attract bizarre ideas and wild stories. It may be the dearth of hard information about the country, which encourages gossip, rumours and speculation, or perhaps it is the volatile nature of Myanmar's security environment which prompts outrageous claims. Understandably, passions run high on many issues.

In this “post-truth” world, in which objective facts and careful analysis seem to be less influential in shaping public opinion (and even official policies) than appeals to emotion and personal belief, we need to be constantly on our guard.

Consider the latest batch of stories about Myanmar which have appeared in the news media and online. Granted, some have only cropped up once or twice, and in relatively low profile outlets, but others have achieved some prominence. In any case, their mere appearance, without any caveats or warnings, lends them a credibility they often do not deserve.

For example, a Chatham House report about modest infrastructure improvements on Myanmar's Great Coco Island in the Andaman Sea prompted a flurry of misleading reports. Even those which cited the original study accurately implied that China could be building, or had already built, an intelligence collection station on the island, a claim that was comprehensively debunked a decade ago.

At least two commentators have claimed recently that Western governments are secretly “fuelling” the civil war in Myanmar, by funnelling supplies to the opposition National Unity Government and armed ethnic organisations. One story has even stated that the US Navy was covertly providing arms to insurgents through “coast-kissing” operations off western Myanmar.

In August 2023, an article was published online that claimed Western intelligence agencies were secretly supporting armed elements of the opposition movement in Myanmar. That was one development long feared by the junta and identified by strategic analysts as a potential tipping point in the civil war. Yet the article cited no evidence and raised several questions that went unanswered, raising serious doubts about the validity of its claims.

For decades, Myanmar's generals have been convinced that they are under attack from foreign intelligence agencies, which they believe operate secretly within the country and around its borders to undermine military rule, encourage internal unrest and sow confusion among the population.

Given this conviction, it would not have surprised any member of the current junta to read an article republished in Eurasia Review earlier this month, claiming that “Western intelligence agencies are fuelling an armed rebellion against the Myanmarese [sic] generals in power from the hideouts in Thailand”.

If true, this would be an important development. However, the claim warrants closer inspection.

There is no doubt that successive governments in Myanmar have been the subject of foreign intelligence interest. During the 1950s, for example, the CIA supported Nationalist Chinese (KMT) remnants in northern Myanmar. Following the 1962 military coup, the CIA supported former Prime Minister U Nu's exiled Parliamentary Democracy Party in its struggle against General Ne Win.

During the 1970s and 1980s, Beijing secretly provided aid to Burma Communist Party guerrillas along the border separating Myanmar and China.

After the abortive 1988 uprising, the US assisted the pro-democracy forces in various ways. For example, the Congress-backed National Endowment for Democracy gave funds and training to opposition groups based in Thailand. The US embassy in Yangon reportedly provided secret support to those opposed to the regime's 2008 constitutional referendum.

Other embassies in Myanmar have been accused of conducting secret intelligence operations. Indeed, it has been suggested that the decision to move the country's seat of government from Yangon to Naypyidaw in 2005 was prompted in part by the large number of foreign spies believed to reside in Yangon, and the vulnerability of the regime's confidential communications to interception by local diplomatic missions.

As occurred after the 1988 pro-democracy uprising, the coup in Myanmar in 2021 sparked a lively, at times even acrimonious, debate among activists, academics and other observers. One particularly controversial issue was the adoption, mainly by urban resistance cells, of a policy of “targeted killings”. Suggestions that the assassination of security force members and suspected junta supporters bore any resemblance to past or present terrorist campaigns in other countries was strongly resisted, partly because the “terrorist” label was routinely used by the junta to discredit the opposition movement.

During the 1970s and 1980s, when international terrorism was capturing global headlines and exercising the minds of politicians and security experts, there were heated arguments over how to describe this kind of political violence. It was more than just a theoretical exercise, as a rigorous definition of terrorism was required, not just for greater clarity in diplomatic exchanges and academic debates, but also to make policies and laws surrounding responses to this particular threat.

Countless definitions were offered, but few were very helpful. Some academic efforts were so long and detailed that they were impractical. Others, including a few that eventually found their way into formal legal instruments, were so broad and ambiguous that they could potentially be applied to almost any form of political protest. In the end, most professionals working in the field accepted that a universally applicable definition was impossible.

One key reason for this was that the term “terrorism”, strictly speaking a name coined to describe a specific set of violent actions, had become so hopelessly politicised that it could not be applied objectively. Also, in the popular mind at least, it was always accompanied by a heavy overlay of moral and emotional considerations. These problems were encapsulated in the maxim that “one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter” or, put more simply, “terrorism is what the bad guys do”.

As the civil war in Myanmar ground on, the competition between the junta's intelligence apparatus and the opposition movement became more intense. In response, the shadow National Unity Government and its armed wing, the People's Defence Force, began to develop intelligence capabilities of their own. At different levels and in different ways, these agencies performed the critical functions of intelligence collection, analysis and dissemination. Attention was also given to combat support and counter-intelligence. Their success in these endeavours, however, remained largely unknown.

In one of the British army's first primers on “small wars”, Charles Callwell wrote in 1896 that “in no class of warfare is a well organised and well served intelligence department more essential than in that against guerrillas”. This has since become a familiar maxim, quoted in countless books and taught in military academies around the world.

It has also been a lesson learned by authoritarian regimes in Myanmar, which has been wracked by insurgencies ever since it regained its independence from Britain in 1948. This lesson is now being relearned by the junta which seized power in February 2021 and is currently engaged in a bloody civil war against a coalition led by the shadow National Unity Government (NUG) and its People's Defence Force (PDF).

Myanmar has always been controlled through powerful intelligence agencies. The British colonial government relied heavily on intelligence collected through its police forces. After Ne Win's coup in 1962, the Military Intelligence Service was an ever-present threat to Myanmar's citizens. Between 1983 and 2004, the Directorate of Defence Services Intelligence and Office of the Chief of Military Intelligence exercised enormous influence over Myanmar's national affairs.

These days, the Office of the Chief of Military Security Affairs reaches into the lives of the population through an extensive network of spies and informers. Even before the coup, it had invested in technology that permitted it to tap internet connections, listen to phone calls, track social media users and locate mobile phone subscribers. CCTV cameras in the major cities carry facial and licence plate recognition software. This data is supplemented with imagery from drones.

A major research project on Myanmar's place in popular Western music, mainly during the colonial period, eventually led to a book that was published in 2017. Before then, however, a short article on the subject was included in the Griffith Asia Institute's quarterly Newsletter.

For decades, scholars have been trying to answer the question: how was colonial Burma perceived in and by the Western world, and how did people in countries like the United Kingdom (UK), United States (US) and Australia form their views? GAI Adjunct Associate Professor Andrew Selth has just completed a six-month study which helps to answer this question.

Historians have described how, over the centuries, accounts of Burma by traders, officials, soldiers and missionaries gave rise to a range of myths and misconceptions. One scholar has examined the portrayal of the country in European novels. Others have surveyed the travel literature of the last 100 years and weighed its impact on popular perceptions of Burma in the West. Another has looked at representations of Burma in feature movies. They have all noted how press reports, photographs and paintings also influenced how Burma was viewed during the Victorian and Edwardian eras.

To date, however, no one has looked in a systematic way at how Western perceptions of colonial Burma were influenced by the popular music of the day. Indeed, music is absent from almost all overviews of the country. Given the extraordinary impact of Rudyard Kipling's barrack-room ballad “Mandalay”, and the many musical works it inspired, this is surprising.

From the beginning of the First Anglo-Burmese War in 1824 until the end of the Second World War in 1945, more than 100 songs and tunes were written in English-speaking countries with distinctly Burma-related themes. Some works stood alone while others formed part of musical comedies or operettas. Even more referred to Burma (or a recognisably Burmese place like Mandalay) in passing. This was in addition to the hundreds of hymns composed in or about Burma by European missionaries. Servicemen deployed to Burma added to the lexicon with their own ditties, ballads and marches.