洛杉矶时报 别把缅甸责任归咎于中国

希钦斯（Christopher Hitchens）在《石板书（Slate）》宣称，“只要中国的拥抱继续”，“缅甸军政府的耻辱与痛苦”将持续下去。希钦斯不是唯一一个把中国称为军政府操纵者的学者。诺贝尔和平奖得主威廉斯（Jody Williams）在《华尔街日报》上表示，“中国必须利用它和军政府的‘特殊关系’”“安排释放（昂山）素季以及另外数百名（如果不是数千名的话）的政治犯”。民主党参议员克里（John Kerry）已经表达了类似的观点，各种人权组织呼吁美国和欧洲抵制北京的夏季奥运会。

　　但中国领导人对缅甸出名不妥协而且仇外的军队的实际影响力有多大？

　　为1989年创立缅甸“临时革命政府”的亲民主21部落组织联盟提供建议的欧维伦（William Overholt）表示，“如同所有外国人一样，他们的影响力实际上非常有限。”“这个政府的整套理论就是与世隔绝，因此没有人可以影响它。”

　　研究缅甸五十年的康奈尔大学离休教授巴德格利（John H. Badgley）表示，最好把缅甸的统治者理解为一个不容易受影响或买断的民族主义党派。“认为一些外部组织可以胁迫他们进行行为改造的概念是错误的。”

　　真相在于没人真正理解是什么令缅甸正常运作。那是以爱保密的、偏执的、怀疑一切外国事物的政治文化为特点的信息真空。世界看到缅甸以无法在1988年实行的方式抗议，但这并不像是C-SPAN（一美国电视台）可以在内务部设立站点的方式。将军们的决策进程仍然是个谜，而学者们以他们的先验承诺填补这个真空。流亡者推动制裁；孤立主义者倡导抑制；对中国强硬派谴责中国。

　　但中国并不是缅甸落后的原因。它甚至不算共犯。在六十年代末，中国开始公开支持缅甸共产党，促成漫长而血腥的内战。《远东经济评论》的前通讯员及被缅甸政府列入黑名单的缅甸专家林特内（Bertil Lintner）表示，缅甸将领记住惨痛的内战，而中国并不真的信任这些反复无常的家伙。“它们是新盟友。”

　　尽管（或因为）这种脆弱的同盟，中国最近支持缅甸，在1月否决一项联合国安理会决议（如俄罗斯一样）。但尽管在北京显然有控制权（例如否决权）的领域给北京施压会有意义，但大多数反华论点不是政治的，而是经济的。对中国强硬派并没能明确感觉到北京实际上有多大影响力。

　　中国不是缅甸最大的贸易伙伴；泰国才是。欧维伦表示，“你不断地看到那些关于中国在缅甸的石油和天然气资产的提法。”“但实际上这些是微不足道的。中国对缅甸天然气的态度是：泰国人已经签下了大部分，而印度人想要剩余部分。”中国在建造石油和天然气管道——但这些管道所承载的天然气将流向中东。这是支持抵制的虚弱素材；欧维伦把这种想法称为“发疯”。

　　那么为什么都聚焦在北京？西方要影响一小群爱保密的将领的意图一再受挫；十年的制裁并没能令缅甸更靠近民主。可能是对中国（我们期望这个国家理性回应倡议）的倚重传递了以使馆抗议、烛光守夜以及在线请愿者的方式“做点事”的必要性。也可能是中国已经是消极性的所在地，足以成为替罪羊。在缅甸持有贵重的石油财产的西方公司一直比中国更能躲避注意力。

　　问题不在于富裕国家没能够哄缅甸向前进，或者施加压力是徒劳的。但是以全能的玩家和疲弱的附庸国划分世界和以善与恶划分世界一样，不再可能得出明智的决策。对缅甸的明智评估开始于承认我们所知甚少，承认我们（哪怕是中国）多么无能为力。（作者 Kerry Howle）

Don't blame China for Myanmar

Neither China nor any other nation has much sway over the ruling junta.

By Kerry Howley

October 6, 2007

These are supposed to be humbling times for foreign policy analysts -- chaos in Iraq having made it harder to cast the United States as omnipotent, omniscient and self-actualizing. But judging by the reactions to the recent protests in Myanmar, also known as Burma, the commentariat hasn't stopped ascribing otherworldly powers to ambitious governments. It's just that they're choosing different governments.

The "shame and misery of the Burmese junta," claimed Christopher Hitchens in Slate, will endure just "as long as the embrace of China persists." Hitchens isn't the only pundit casting China as puppeteer to the junta. "China must use its 'special relationship' with the junta," explained Nobel Peace Prize winner Jody Williams in the Wall Street Journal, "to arrange the release of Ms. [Aung San] Suu Kyi and hundreds -- if not thousands -- of other political prisoners." Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) has expressed similar sentiments, and various human rights groups are calling for the United States and Europe to boycott the Summer Olympics in Beijing.

But how much sway do Chinese leaders actually hold over Myanmar's famously intransigent, xenophobic military?

"They actually have very limited leverage, as all foreigners do," said William Overholt, who advised the pro-democracy coalition of 21 tribal groups that created the Provisional Revolutionary Government in Burma in 1989 and is now director of Rand's Center for Asia Pacific Policy. "The whole theory of this government is to cut itself off from the world so no one can influence it."

That certainly comes through in the propaganda, which I saw much of during the year and a half I spent living and working in Yangon. Under Burmese law, all printed material must contain a government statement of Burmese nationalist principles under the heading "people's desire." Principle No. 1? "Oppose those relying on external elements, acting as stooges, holding negative views." That message applies to China too: Stooges come in many stripes.

John H. Badgley, a retired Cornell University professor who has studied Myanmar for 50 years, says its rulers are best understood as a nationalist party not easily influenced or bought off. "The notion that some external group can come bludgeon them into behavior modification is just false," he said.

The truth is that no one really understands what makes Myanmar tick. It is an information vacuum, characterized by a surreptitious, paranoid political culture suspicious of all things foreign. The world is watching footage of Myanmar's protests in a way that would have been impossible in 1988, but it's not as if C-SPAN can set up shop in the Ministry of Home Affairs. The generals' decision-making process remains a mystery, and pundits fill the void with their a priori commitments. Exiles push sanctions; isolationists advocate restraint; China hawks blame China.

But China is not the cause of Myanmar's backwardness. It may not even be much of an accomplice. In the late 1960s, China began openly supporting the Communist Party of Burma, contributing to a long and bloody civil war. "Burmese generals remember the bitter civil war, with China on the other side, and China doesn't really trust those erratic guys," said Bertil Lintner, a former correspondent for the Far Eastern Economic Review and a Myanmar expert who has been blacklisted by the government. "They are new allies."

Despite, or maybe because of, this fragile alliance, China has stood by Myanmar recently, vetoing a U.N. Security Council resolution in January (as did Russia). But although it makes sense to pressure Beijing in areas in which it clearly has control, such as its own veto power, most of the anti-China arguments are not political but economic. Here China hawks have lost a clear sense of how much influence Beijing really has.

China is not Myanmar's biggest trading partner; Thailand is. "You keep seeing these references to Chinese oil and gas assets in Burma," Overholt said. "The reality is that they're trivial. China's attitude toward Burmese gas is that the Thais have already signed up for most of it and the Indians want the rest." China is building an oil and gas pipeline -- but the gas it will carry will flow to the Middle East. This is weak stuff to hang a boycott on; Overholt calls the idea "nutty."

So why all the focus on Beijing? The West has been repeatedly frustrated in its attempts to influence a small group of secretive generals; a decade of sanctions has not brought Myanmar closer to democracy. It may be that leaning on China -- a country we expect to respond rationally to incentives -- channels the need to "do something" in the same way embassy protests, candlelight vigils and online petitions do. It may also be that China is a locus of negativity already, ripe for scapegoating. Western companies with valuable oil holdings in Myanmar have attracted less attention than has China.

The point isn't that wealthy nations have no role to play in coaxing Myanmar forward, or that applying pressure is futile. But casting the world in terms of all-powerful actors and weak client states is no more likely to lead to smart policymaking than casting it in terms of good and evil. A smart assessment of Myanmar starts with acknowledging how little we know, and how powerless we -- and even China -- may well be.

Kerry Howley is a senior editor at Reason magazine who spent 18 months working at the Myanmar Times.