11 - Transition and Small Change (March 1972 to February 1978)

Summary

Behold, I sent you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves: be ye therefore wise as serpents and harmless as doves.

Matthew 10:16

By 1972, opposition to Ne Win's revolution appeared enfeebled, but still a nuisance and a potential threat. No one could predict the future but, as ever, yesterday's enemies might be tomorrow's assets. As Ne Win had by 1972 been fighting on all sides for thirty years — against imperialists, fascists, communists, separatists, racists, religionists, capitalists, chauvinists, and the merely misguided — he could cope with nuisances, though they and other irritations apparently undermined his health and equilibrium. The tensions of the previous five years appeared to have been weathered. Though the Chinese were still providing support for the Burma Communist Party (BCP), the party itself generated little enthusiasm amongst the majority of the population, and the rebellion was kept going only with the assistance of ethnic separatists and Chinese-dominated border minorities. Still, small urban cells persisted amongst the students and intellectuals. The attempt by U Nu and his Parliamentary Democracy Party (PDP), the old right of Myanmar, had failed to rally the people to its banner and the Americans and the British, while they may have considered the possibility of supporting Nu's movement briefly, had realized the futility of that option. Better not to stir the cauldron of Myanmar politics for fear of losing the country's neutrality in the Cold War.

Nu's link with Karen and other separatist forces had damaged his credibility with the majority of the population, and the Karen National Union (KNU) and its armed wing, the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA), though still a potent insurgent force, was in no position to threaten Ne Win's regime. India was reassured of Burma's neutrality in its conflicts with Pakistan and China, and when pressed to decide, had proven that its neutrality was tempered by realism, as in the recognition of its new, and troublesome protégé, Bangladesh. Ne Win's radical brand of neutralism, though paying a heavy price in terms of delayed economic development, was ensuring peace for the overwhelming majority of the population. That peace and stability was welcomed by many then as a respite from the chaos of the previous decades. Most who were adults in the early 1970s had lived through the turmoil of the Second War World, the resistance, and the Civil War.