Myanmar military regime enters year 5 in terminal decline

Myanmar’s military approaches the fourth anniversary of the coup d’etat that put them in power in terminal decline.

The economy continues to atrophy, with even .

Further south, the Karen National Liberation Army and allied people’s defense forces (PDFs) are slowly taking pro-junta border guard posts along the frontier with Thailand.

In Tanintharyi, local PDFs have increased their coordination and are pushing west from the Thai border towards the Andaman Sea coast, diminishing the scope of the military-controlled patchwork of terrain in Myanmar’s southernmost state.

Some of the most intense fighting of late has been in the Bamar heartland, including Sagaing, Magway, and Mandalay.

The military has stepped up their bombings, artillery strikes, and arson, that killed 52, wounded over 40 and destroyed 500 homes, had no military utility.

Finally, the state of the economy is even more precarious given the loss of almost all border crossings.

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Although the SAC technically still controls Muse and Myawaddy, which links them to China and Thailand, respectively, opposition forces control much of the surrounding territory.

While Karen forces have not made a bid to take Myawaddy, the main border crossing, they are pinching in along Asia Highway 1 to Yangon.

On Jan. 11, some 500 reinforcements in 30 armored personnel carriers were deployed from Hpa-An to Kawkareik in Kayan state near the Thai border to keep the last main overland trade artery open.

To sum it up, the junta is entering the fifth year of military rule with its power rapidly slipping away.

Although they still control one-third of the country – land that holds two-thirds of the population – their mismanagement of the economy has left the military regime broke.

Spread too thin across too many fronts simultaneously, it’s hard to see the SAC doing anything to arrest their terminal decline in 2025.

Zachary Abuza is a professor at the National War College in Washington and an adjunct at Georgetown University. The views expressed here are his own and do not reflect the position of the U.S. Department of Defense, the National War College, Georgetown University or Radio Free Asia.