No One Wins in the Myanmar Civil War -- Except a Country That Isn't Fighting It

In the deep jungles of Southeast Asia, the most devastating and underreported war of this century drags on: mostly due to how difficult it is for traditional news media personnel to be on the ground. The Myanmar Civil War has now dragged on for over five years and claimed almost 100,000 lives, in addition to displacing millions more. 

The world has barely noticed as the conflict enters a consequential phase where the difficult reality is becoming more and more obvious: No side is decisively winning, not even winning. But there is one external side which has been gaining from the start without firing a single shot.

When the Tatmadaw, Myanmar’s military staged a coup to seize power in February 2021, they made a tragic miscalculation, the military junta expected the people’s acceptance of the situation.

Instead, it faced a rebellion composed of scattered pro democracy youth, defected soldiers, ethnic militia rebel factions who were not united but were becoming ever more successful at gaining ground. 

Over time, these factions somewhat united to form a considerable force hammering away at the well funded, equipped and manned Tatmadaw army.

The ensuing result? At the peak of the rebel offensive, they combinedly controlled almost three quarters of the country’s territory. A collapse of the military junta government seemed imminent and their days appeared numbered.

But they survived.

In recent times, the pendulum of this Civil War has shifted towards the military junta quietly. This may be as a result of their military conscription campaign which was predicted to fail has instead produced thousands of new recruits racing to the front lines to defend the remaining territory and even commence counteroffensives.

The same drone warfare which brought rapid success to the rebels in the early stages of the civil war is now being used by the Tatmadaw to strike the rebels with accurate strikes as well as high quality reconnaissance drones feeding live data to the war Tatmadaw generals in Rangoon.

After a reshuffle in the commanders, the junta has pivoted from a defensive stance to a more tangible offensive gains retaking towns such as Mortang near the Thai border and Tonzang near their Indian border by May 2026. Additionally, a well-backed operation is underway to recapture the rare earth mineral resource rich state of Kachin towards their north.

But more than the Tatmadaw’s successful military comeback, this reversal in fortunes does not tell the whole story. The rebel alliance was always a fragile coalition based on convenience and is now unraveling.

For example, the ethnic militias which formed the military’s backbone wanted control over their ancestral lands, independence from what they consider the junta’s occupation.

Once their goals were met, they felt no need to push on and dethrone the junta. In contrast, the pro-democratic forces sought something far more ambitious: The complete dismantling of the Tatmadaw regime and injecting a proper democratic transition for the whole nation. This conflicted with the ethnic rebel group’s aims. Now this tension is causing a fracture.

The pro-democracy fighters were mostly urban youth without any formal military training and could have never sustained a long drawn-out war on their own.

They blended into the ethnic militia’s structures. Once these allied armies started to fade, the numbers dwindled, the weapon flows stalled and the organizational structure of the rebels started to crack.

The scenario today is a rebellion that still holds major territories but lost the cohesion and will to push any further towards a final winning strike. This puts the Myanmar military junta in a comfortable yet uneasy position: They are not winning, but neither are they losing.

But there is a non-combatant faction who has been shaping this conflict from the very beginning: China.

Beijing is not a direct combatant in Myanmar’s civil war, it has not provided any troops like North Korea provided to Russia in Ukraine, no air or drone strikes like Iran had provided to Russia to use against Ukraine, nor do they have any military alliance with Myanmar. Instead, China played with leverage.

From coercing and bribing rebel groups to abandoning hard fought for positions to allow mining contracts for Chinese companies to smuggling weapons through proxies to the rebels when required as well as bankrolling the junta when it was convenient, China’s message to all sides silently has been not to interfere or prevent Chinese investments.

Myanmar is not just a neighbor to China in South Asia, it is actually a huge resource hub, energy corridor and in terms of location, placed very strategically providing a lifeline for rare earth metals flowing from Myanmar to Chinese processing factories.

Critically, a pipeline runs from Myanmar’s coastline to China’s Yunan province providing Beijing with an energy route that bypasses any potential blockades from the Strait of Malacca to the Pacific Ocean. Additionally, Myanmar’s cities host shadow economies for Chinese elites.

In short, the outcome of this war is largely irrelevant for China, as long as it does not affect their uninterrupted resource extraction and stable supply chains.

As the situation was from the beginning, the international community is largely expected to look the other way while Myanmar’s recent election was farcical, it appeared credible enough to give  Thailand, Philippines and a handful of other ASEAN nations the political cover they required to welcome the Junta back towards regional normalcy diplomatically.

The nation is exhausted, the number of atrocities keep rising, women and children keep being casualties. But despite all this, we are ready to turn a blind eye and move on without looking twice.

The tragedy in Myanmar will not stop, the junta rules a hollow state, the rebels hold territory but don’t have a future vision moving forward. The people of Myanmar remain trapped in poverty, fear and suffering.

Only China wins here, having never needed to fight at all.

Shafqat Aziz is a barrister (Lincoln’s Inn) and an accredited Civil-Commercial Mediator (ADR-ODR International).