The Indian discourses on Myanmar are increasingly looking surreal. The official mantra is that New Delhi and the leadership in Myanmar have one hell of a Faustian deal between them, to crush the Naga insurgent groups advocating separatism within Myanmar and in India. The government has leaked to the press that the iconic figure of the Indian Army's recent "hot pursuit"-cum-revenge attack on Naga rebels, National Security Advisor Ajit Doval is packing his bags to travel to Myanmar to discuss a joint action plan of security operations for the period ahead to crush the ethnic separatists in our northeastern regions.
However, the red carpet welcome accorded to the Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi in Beijing should come as an eye-opener for the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, calling attention to the dramatic shift of the tectonic plates of regional politics. Suu Kyi arrived in Beijing on June 10 on her first visit to China, a five-day visit, and by the second day, President Xi Jinping had received her at the Great Hall of the People. By that time, she had talked business with China's foreign policy focused State Councillor Yang Jiechi. As a western report promptly took note, "That is the kind of all-star line-up usually lined up (by Beijing) for major national leaders, not opposition party figures." The angst is palpable in the western media - Suu Kyi is spinning out of western control.
But then, in the run-up to her arrival in Beijing, Chinese media had amply signaled that in the Chinese assessment, she is the life force of Myanmar's political future; she is no more to be perceived as a one-dimensional western plaything; and that Chinese diplomacy needs to urgently make the required adjustment to the advent of democratic rule in Myanmar that can be expected following the general election in November.
Clearly, China anticipates that it is distinctly within the realms of possibility that Suu Kyi would eventually emerge as the country's president. The Chinese commentaries all but suggested that much diplomatic legwork preceded Suu Kyi's visit to China and that Beijing has grounds to expect that Suu Kyi has come to appreciate the crucial importance of the role of Chinese economic assistance and political support in the consolidation of democratic rule in her country.
The Xinhua dispatch quotes Xi that "a community of common interests and common destiny sharing weal and woe" bind the two countries together and that China takes "a strategic and long-term perspective" toward ties with Myanmar. Most important, Xi assured Suu Kyi that Beijing will do all it can to boost the cooperation provided her leadership "will also maintain a consistent stance" on the relationship "and be committed to advancing friendly ties, no matter how its (Myanmar's) domestic situation changes", apart from playing a "constructive role" in moulding the public opinion in her country toward relations with China "in an unbiased and rational way". Meanwhile, the Chinese overture to Suu Kyi is to be seen against the backdrop of the robust efforts Beijing has been making lately to help Myanmar clean up the decades-old fratricidal strife involving ethnic armies that has been tearing the country apart. Significantly, Chinese diplomats are making this a joint effort with the United Nations.
Thus, negotiations are commencing in the town of Chiangmai in mountainous northern Thailand to formalise a draft ceasefire accord involving the authorities and all armed groups. The draft accord was initialled in March by the government and the Nationwide Ceasefire Coordination Team comprising the ethnic groups.
To cut a long story short, it will be useful if before proceeding to Naypyidaw, capital of Myanmar, Doval first travels on a trans-Atlantic flight to New York to have a quiet word with Indian diplomat, Vijay Nambiar, aide to the UN secretary-general Ban Ki-Moon and Special Envoy of United Nations. Actually, it is Nambiar who is jointly brokering the historic peace accord in Myanmar paving the way for the democratic transition along with Sun Guoxiang, special envoy of China on Asian Affairs.Suffice it to say, the Indian security establishment is hopelessly missing the plot by planting cock-and-bull stories in the Indian media that Beijing instigated the June 4 attack on the Indian Army in Manipur in a political conspiracy to sabotage Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Bangladesh. Whereas, the ground reality is that Myanmar's democratisation process is accelerating in anticipation of an end to the insurgencies bleeding that country. The emergent democratic forces in Myanmar do not have the mindset of a "national security state". Moreover, the Naga insurgents will soon cease to be the enemies of the Myanmarese state while they continue their militant struggle inside India in the absence of a robust search for peace in India's northeast region, facilitating a vacation of the Indian Army. And, the calculus of power in Myanmar will inexorably slip out of the hands of the military, which has been India's key interlocutor.
The bottom line is that "communist" China could realise the stirrings of democracy in neighbouring Myanmar and will swiftly make the necessary readjustments to harmonise with the spirit of the times, while "democratic" India seems unable to do that and is hopelessly tying itself in knots and resorting to mass hysteria over "hot pursuit" and what not in order to cover up policy failures.Probably, what Modi requires at this point is a counterpart to Yang Jiechi in professional experience to assist him in New Delhi.
The heart of the matter is diplomacy is not the stuff of intelligence; all that cloak-and-dagger stuff is seductive when handed down to the public in media "plants", and may even merit a police award or two for our functionaries, but is actually hot air and bravado in the handling of inter-state relationships. Diplomacy is cerebral in quality, it has substantial intellectual content, and it demands handlers with professional skills - and, of course, minds with the exceptional ability to transmute raw intelligence into fine thought processes that go into the making of sustainable, enduring foreign policies. India misses J N Dixit as National Security Advisor today.
Article by M K Bhadrakumar in Communist Party of India Marxist organ, People's Democracy, 13 June 2015 in New Delhi
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