BANGKOK—Diplomatic cables from the US Embassy in Rangoon show that American officials were optimistic about dialogue with Burma's military government when Democrat Senator Jim Webb met Snr-Gen Than Shwe in August 2009.
“It is certain Than Shwe believes he has unclenched its fist,” said a cable released by Wikileaks on Dec. 12. The note opined that the Burmese ruler regarded the Webb-Shwe meeting and the release of American prisoner John Yettaw as a major concession, thereby requiring an American counter-offer.
“We should allow Burmese Foreign Minister Nyan Win to visit the Embassy in Washington following UNGA [United Nations General Assembly],” the cable's author wrote.
The meeting between Webb and Than Shwe “was decidedly more upbeat than expected,” with the reclusive Burmese ruler said to have “greeted Senator Webb and the Chargé [Larry Dinger, U.S. Chargé d'Affairs in Rangoon] warmly.”
Than Shwe repeatedly spoke of “friendship” throughout the conversation, which Sen. Webb oiled by swiftly changing the subject when pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi was mentioned.
The Webb-Shwe meeting on Aug. 15, 2009 came just days after Suu Kyi was sentenced to three years additional house arrest after US citizen John Yettaw entered her Rangoon home earlier in 2009, breaching the terms of her earlier house arrest, according to the Burmese courts.
Yettaw was released by the Burmese during Sen. Webb’s visit, while Than Shwe commuted Suu Kyi’s sentence to 18 months, meaning she was to be freed on Nov. 13 2010—a week after Burma held its first general elections in two decades.
Suu Kyi also met with Sen. Webb during his visit, and stressed her openness to talk to the Burmese rulers “without preconditions,” according to the leaked cable.
Webb in turn emphasized the importance of freeing Suu Kyi to the Burmese rulers, saying that most of the world judged the Burmese government “by how it treats ASSK,” according to notes from the meeting.
However, in the time since her release on Nov. 13, Burma's rulers have shown no indication that they will engage with Suu Kyi.
Than Shwe's well-known antipathy toward the Nobel laureate, which is confirmed by US diplomatic accounts, ensured she was to be denied any role in the new faux-civilian government to be formed early in 2011 following the junta's manipulations to ensure that their Union Solidarity and Development Party won a landslide victory in the Nov. 7 election.
Another cable newly-released by Wikileaks covers a 2006 meeting between Christopher Hill, Assistant Secretary of State under the Bush administration, and China's Vice Foreign Minister Wu Dawei.
According to notes from that meeting, Wu told his American counterpart that, “Burmese officials made clear that their vision for national reconciliation does not include Aung San Suu Kyi,” adding that “most senior leaders fear her.”
China is the second biggest investor in Burma, after Thailand, and its government is thought to be closer to the regime than anyone else.
Dinger, writing in February 2009, speculated that one reason the Burmese junta wanted to talk to the US was because some of the generals were growing concerned “with Burma's ever-growing dependence on China.”
Sen. Webb's meeting with Than Shwe, the first between the Burmese ruler and an American official, came the day after Sen.Webb and Dinger sat down with Prime Minister Thein Sein on Aug.14.
At this meeting, Thein Sein criticized US sanctions on Burma, according to the cable, but said his administration wanted “the ability to communicate directly with Washington.”
Other Burmese ministers and officials attending the meeting included Foreign Minister Nyan Win and U Thaung, Minister for Science and Technology, who Thein Sein touted to Sen. Webb as a possible negotiator on behalf of the Burmese in any dialogue with the Americans.
Months before the unprecedented meeting between Sen. Webb and Than Shwe, the US embassy in Rangoon proposed changing US government policy on the country's name, to use “Myanmar” instead of “Burma”, as one of the concessions to be offered to the junta. Burma's military rulers changed the country's name in 1989, but the amendment has not been acknowledged by the US and many of Burma's opposition groups.
This concession would have come about if the junta accepted “some tweaks to the electoral process,” such as accepting international observers.
The US Embassy in Rangoon also hoped that some relaxation of Suu Kyi’s house arrest might have been granted, and that some of the country’s more than 2100 political prisoners might be released before the election, with the International Committee of the Red Cross granted access to remaining detainees as per international law.
However none of this happened, despite PM Thein Sein’s pledge to Sen.
Webb to hold fair elections. It all makes the US representatives seem somewhat naive in retrospect—the only official international observers allowed to monitor the rigged Nov. 7 election were diplomats already stationed in Burma who were willing to accompany a delegation led by the North Korean Ambassador.
Speaking in India as the voting took place on Nov. 7, US President Barack Obama dismissed the election as a farce, though the US has said it remains open to dealing with the Burmese regime.
The new cables do not show the Americans to be entirely gullible, however. While the US contemplated a mutual upgrading of diplomatic representation to Ambassador level, there was no indication that sanctions against the Burmese junta and its business cronies would be dropped. Amid all the panglossian hopes for reform in Burma, the Americans still retained some of their diplomatic sharp edge.
After initially fearing that the US navy attempt to bring aid in May 2008 to survivors of Cyclone Nargis was a disguised invasion plan, the junta later expressed gratitude for the assistance, according to American diplomats.
In a cable in April 2009 suggesting that properly designed aid could have political purposes, Dinger said: “Aid is subversive more directly as well: recipients understand who helps them (international donors) and who doesn't (the regime).”
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