I'll preface my remarks —submitted here at the express request of Claire, who should feel free with editing or deleting them as she sees fit— by acknowledging that I claim zero expertise in predicting or discoursing upon "geopolitical significance". But with the critical exceptions of India's northeastern states (and of Russia), I do have decades on the ground throughout all the countries and regions addressed in Vivek's essay; primarily as a university-affilitated researcher and independent consultant on wide-ranging ecological and societal "problemscapes": to use enviro planning jargon.
The focus of my fieldwork and of my previous academic writing has been the broad-spectrum evaluation —both pre- and post-implementation— of energy development and water resources management; port and navigation improvements; and interbasin transfer (IBT) schemes throughout that region.
I have more recently been producing interactive visualization apps and publications of which several relevant online examples will be hotlinked below....
I will not speak here of the descent of much of Myanmar into bloody madness following the 1st February 2021 Tatamadaw (Myanmar's national military) coup, which otherwise figures —if slenderly— in my upcoming virtual presentation at IAIA 2021.
In the forefront of the national problemscape theretofore is that Myanamar has the worst electrical generating capacity amongst the ASEAN countries. And absent enormous and speedy expansion of that capacity, industrialization, agricultural intensification, and overall modernization of the country are essentially foreclosed: Myanmar, with its population of ~55 million has a present total installed capacity of 4,400 megawatts (1 MW = 1,000 kW) of which only ~4,000 MW is connected to the national grid; to which in any case about one third of the population still has no mains access.
By comparison, Thailand, with a population of ~75 million, has at present ~45,000 MW of domestic installed capacity, plus another ~6,000 MW contractually allocated from existing Thai- and Chinese-developed energy projects (predominantly hydro but also thermal, and possibly to soon include photovoltaic solar) inside Laos.
Vivek mentioned the Myitsone hydropower project(s) in Myanmar's restive Kachin State as a key Chinese initiative. In 2018, I spent some weeks in Myitkyina, the Kachin State capital, travelling widely by land and by water (given the severe limitations of the movement of foreigners) and had seen about as much as possible, from the ground, the primary site of the "shelved in deference to the peoples will", Myitsone hydroelectric project, at the toe of the prospective staircase of seven dams with a combined installed capacity of ~20,000 MW: approaching the eventual installed capacity of all existing, under-construction, and in-planning hydropower installations within the vastly larger Lower Mekong Basin: excluding Yunan and Tibet.
Apr 13, 2021Liked by Claire Berlinski, Vivek Y. Kelkar
It occurs to me that Myanmar is less a matter of acquisitive importance to the People's Republic of China than it is of denial importance. With the deal the PRC signed with Russia concerning PRC access to Siberian resources (and the resulting subordination of Russia to the PRC, but that's for another tale) and the nascent PRC colonization of the vasty spaces of eastern Siberia, the PRC soon will have all the access to cheap, nearby and easily protectable supplies of oil, natural gas, timber, gold, etc, etc that are the wealth of that part of Siberia. It has no need of Myanmar's resources or to deal with those troublesome and fractious natives.
The PRC does, though, have a large interest in opening a third front (in addition to the chicken neck and the "disputed" PRC-India border that lies between occupied Tibet and Pakistan) against India. Myanmar also gives a measure of denial leverage to those shipping lanes that feed Japan and the RoK and through which so much of American imports flow.
Russia's interest in Myanmar is much the same as was its interest in northern Korea and Vietnam in years gone by--just to be in the way, to claim relevance, and today to assert a measure of independence from the PRC.
Apr 13, 2021Liked by Claire Berlinski, Vivek Y. Kelkar
In three generations, are we going to meet a lot of Chinese young people who are ashamed of the colonial actions of 100 years ago, lamenting their great grandparents exploitation of the third world? Or is the CCP going to mold the historic record well enough that they won't be judged by future generations?
Instead, can we warn the Chinese public about this encroaching guilty feeling and pump the brakes on this sort of expansionism?
This is the problem with not being a historicist. I have zero confidence in how this is going to play out. Thanks for the incredibly informative article.
I'll preface my remarks —submitted here at the express request of Claire, who should feel free with editing or deleting them as she sees fit— by acknowledging that I claim zero expertise in predicting or discoursing upon "geopolitical significance". But with the critical exceptions of India's northeastern states (and of Russia), I do have decades on the ground throughout all the countries and regions addressed in Vivek's essay; primarily as a university-affilitated researcher and independent consultant on wide-ranging ecological and societal "problemscapes": to use enviro planning jargon.
The focus of my fieldwork and of my previous academic writing has been the broad-spectrum evaluation —both pre- and post-implementation— of energy development and water resources management; port and navigation improvements; and interbasin transfer (IBT) schemes throughout that region.
I have more recently been producing interactive visualization apps and publications of which several relevant online examples will be hotlinked below....
<https://cultivateunderstanding.com/pdfjs-2.3.200-dist/web/viewer.html?file=../..//Digital_Media/interbasin_transfer/interbasin_xfer_Salween_Chaophraya.pdf>
I will not speak here of the descent of much of Myanmar into bloody madness following the 1st February 2021 Tatamadaw (Myanmar's national military) coup, which otherwise figures —if slenderly— in my upcoming virtual presentation at IAIA 2021.
<https://cultivateunderstanding.com/pdfjs-2.3.200-dist/web/viewer.html?file=../..//Digital_Media/IAIA_2021/presentation.pdf>
In the forefront of the national problemscape theretofore is that Myanamar has the worst electrical generating capacity amongst the ASEAN countries. And absent enormous and speedy expansion of that capacity, industrialization, agricultural intensification, and overall modernization of the country are essentially foreclosed: Myanmar, with its population of ~55 million has a present total installed capacity of 4,400 megawatts (1 MW = 1,000 kW) of which only ~4,000 MW is connected to the national grid; to which in any case about one third of the population still has no mains access.
By comparison, Thailand, with a population of ~75 million, has at present ~45,000 MW of domestic installed capacity, plus another ~6,000 MW contractually allocated from existing Thai- and Chinese-developed energy projects (predominantly hydro but also thermal, and possibly to soon include photovoltaic solar) inside Laos.
Vivek mentioned the Myitsone hydropower project(s) in Myanmar's restive Kachin State as a key Chinese initiative. In 2018, I spent some weeks in Myitkyina, the Kachin State capital, travelling widely by land and by water (given the severe limitations of the movement of foreigners) and had seen about as much as possible, from the ground, the primary site of the "shelved in deference to the peoples will", Myitsone hydroelectric project, at the toe of the prospective staircase of seven dams with a combined installed capacity of ~20,000 MW: approaching the eventual installed capacity of all existing, under-construction, and in-planning hydropower installations within the vastly larger Lower Mekong Basin: excluding Yunan and Tibet.
<https://cultivateunderstanding.com/pdfjs-2.3.200-dist/web/viewer.html?file=../..//Digital_Media/Mong_Ton_eBook/thanlwin_landing_page.pdf>
Great article.
So much going on here I was unaware of. Thanks.
It occurs to me that Myanmar is less a matter of acquisitive importance to the People's Republic of China than it is of denial importance. With the deal the PRC signed with Russia concerning PRC access to Siberian resources (and the resulting subordination of Russia to the PRC, but that's for another tale) and the nascent PRC colonization of the vasty spaces of eastern Siberia, the PRC soon will have all the access to cheap, nearby and easily protectable supplies of oil, natural gas, timber, gold, etc, etc that are the wealth of that part of Siberia. It has no need of Myanmar's resources or to deal with those troublesome and fractious natives.
The PRC does, though, have a large interest in opening a third front (in addition to the chicken neck and the "disputed" PRC-India border that lies between occupied Tibet and Pakistan) against India. Myanmar also gives a measure of denial leverage to those shipping lanes that feed Japan and the RoK and through which so much of American imports flow.
Russia's interest in Myanmar is much the same as was its interest in northern Korea and Vietnam in years gone by--just to be in the way, to claim relevance, and today to assert a measure of independence from the PRC.
Eric Hines
In three generations, are we going to meet a lot of Chinese young people who are ashamed of the colonial actions of 100 years ago, lamenting their great grandparents exploitation of the third world? Or is the CCP going to mold the historic record well enough that they won't be judged by future generations?
Instead, can we warn the Chinese public about this encroaching guilty feeling and pump the brakes on this sort of expansionism?
This is the problem with not being a historicist. I have zero confidence in how this is going to play out. Thanks for the incredibly informative article.