By: Grace Baranowski <[email protected]>

Half-way across the world, political turmoil embroils a nation. But even though it’s thousands of miles removed from our conscience, the repression of basic human rights is troublesome. The government has blocked the Internet and barricaded the people inside their own homes. As one human looking at the plight of thousands more, I’m concerned.
The political mess in Myanmar right now is a confusing red-orange mass of monks and fiery political discontent. The country (called Burma in years past), with a population of about 50 million, has suffered military rule since 1962, when a general ousted a civilian government. There was a democratic parliamentary election in 1990, according to The New York Times Online, but the current form of dictatorship, organized in 1988, cancelled the democratic win by Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. She has been under house arrest and was seen publicly for the first time in years during the rowdy street protests of the monks and students. She’s become a sort of rallying symbol for the population.

The current strikes began with outrage over increased gas prices—an incendiary political element anyway—that blew up into wild disagreement over decades of discontent. And even though the country’s leaders resorted to military intervention, the generals are bunkered down in a distant, Disney-fied version of their own country, surrounded by paranoia and dangerously bruised egos. Meanwhile, back in the actual major cities of Myanmar, corrupt soldiers and police officers (most probably scared) fight for some political dragon spewing suicidal bombshells. It’s an understatement to say that the situation could be fixed swiftly.

Yet that is how some in the world view it. The United States and the United Nations have already tightened sanctions, but that is a largely “symbolic” move, according to the New York Times Online. But what can sanctions do in a country that has such a history of violence and dictatorship? The U.S. government’s official response was hope for a speedy recovery and transition to democracy, but how realistic is it to hope this for a country that hasn’t ever known democracy (been ruled militarily since 1945)? What should we expect? The reality is that we can’t enforce democracy in another country whenever we feel like it. If anything, the United States should have learned from the political brouhaha of Iraq.

From what I see, there are several paths to take from this juncture, although none of them promise a healthy, “speedy recovery.”
Another dictator could take control, promising religious liberty to the monks and democratic ideals to the students, but then after a while, what’s not to say that power corrupts his fresh leadership into history repeated? Keeping a dictator in power would solve the problem of several different warring factions fighting for power in the inevitable vacuum, even more so if he were supported by the monks, but the official religion could mushroom out of control and limit the freedoms of others.

Furthermore, any neighboring or linked industries could be hurt as well by a dictator bent on isolationism or destruction. Myanmar occupies a strategic location near major Indian Ocean shipping lanes—the dictator could attempt to shut down shipping lanes in an effort to extort bribes to better the Myanmar economy illegally. Currently, it shares exports and imports with such neighbors as China, Thailand and India, although in the scheme of the partners’ economies, Myanmar does not occupy a significant market hold.

But even though it doesn’t hold much economic clout, another country could choose to invade in the current state of unrest. India could definitely use more space for its overcrowded population, and China has been attempting to build ocean-connected canals in Myanmar’s rivers.

To ensure the failure of that possibility or any other, our nation might add U.S. and U.N. troops to Myanmar, further stretching our military capacities. The troops would hypothetically stay there until the political turmoil died down a bit, but that could take years. Plus, when the United States plants troops in foreign countries, they have a habit of sticking around. For example, there are still U.S. troops guarding the border between North and South Korea.

Overall, Myanmar has several paths to take. Currently, it might be too mired in its political turmoil to look ahead to the possible future scenarios, but if it doesn’t take the time to do that now, or at least to allow for some improvement, they will face the same situation again in another 50 years.