Burma The Armed Forces Seize Power

By William Stewart/Rangoon

Red-and-gold peacock banners fluttered over much of Burma last week, symbols of a national student movement that had become an uprising. Once again, hundreds of thousands of protesting citizens poured into the streets of major cities in a concerted effort to bring down the tottering government of the ruling Burma Socialist Program Party (B.S.P.P.). To a large extent they had already succeeded. Burma's second largest city, Mandalay, was under the control of Buddhist monks: saffron-robed holy men, known as sanghas, were directing traffic. In Rangoon, the capital, the entire civil service had deserted the government. A new opposition leadership was working with students and monks to bring rice into the increasingly hungry city.

With the situation deteriorating rapidly, leaders of Burma's 180,000-member military took action. Rangoon announced Sunday that General Saw Maung, Burma's minister of defense and chief of the armed forces, had ousted civilian President Maung Maung, who took office just last month. Saw Maung immediately pledged to "restore law and order" and promised to hold multiparty elections that would end 26 years of one-party rule.

The coup came two weeks after Maung Maung himself had tried to deflect the revolutionary tide by announcing elections. But Maung Maung failed to set a date for the balloting, and the demonstrations went on. By last week the opposition's emerging leadership appeared to be focusing on the issue of how to negotiate a transfer of power. Three leading dissidents -- former generals Aung Gyi and Tin Oo, and Aung San Suu Kyi, daughter of one of Burma's great nationalist heroes and the country's newest and brightest political star -- wrote to Maung Maung formally rejecting the proposed elections. They were joined in that demand by former Prime Minister U Nu, who had been ousted from power in 1962. Later, a government election commission reportedly informed the regime that elections without the opposition's cooperation were impossible.

As the confrontation grew, the military seemingly remained loyal to Maung Maung and to Burma's strongman, former B.S.P.P. Chairman Ne Win, who was widely believed to be pulling strings behind the scenes. But last week some 6,000 soldiers, sailors and airmen appeared to have joined the revolt. In Rangoon graduates of the influential Defense Services Academy, mostly majors and lieutenant colonels, issued a statement urging formation of an interim government that would include the opposition. At midweek Saw Maung appealed to the opposition on national television to avoid splitting the military.

That plea was widely interpreted to mean that the government doubted the loyalty of its own troops, and its concern seemed largely justified. Of the nine regional commands in Burma, all headed by brigadier generals, about half are said to remain loyal to Ne Win. But regional command troops are locally recruited and almost certainly would not fire on their own people if ordered; nor would their junior officers. Last week a captain of one of three elite infantry divisions in Rangoon went over to the opposition, creating a new wash of speculation about the fealty of even the most trusted troops in the nation.

Meantime, it appeared that surreptitious dickering over an interim government was already under way. As General Tin Oo, a former armed forces Chief of Staff, told TIME, "We expect a counterproposal from the government. What they need is an honorable exit, and they should have it." The regime was believed to have been bargaining to retain the Defense and Home ministries in any interim administration, which would leave it in control of the army and police forces.

Another proposal called for a nonpartisan government formed from leading figures representing various "interests" and "forces" in Burmese society, rather than political parties. That would please U Nu, who has always been an independent, if erratic, political figure. The nonpartisan approach would also suit Aung San Suu Kyi, a political amateur who has charisma but no organized backing. Says she: "The country accepts me because they trust me and they associate me with my father," Aung San, who was assassinated in 1947.

As the maneuvering continued, Saw Maung busied himself with speeches to the military in which he promised that "good news" was on the way. That probably referred to a major concern of leading government and military officials: personal safety. They have been horrified by, among other things, public beheadings of people believed to be government agents. Many officials and their families have sought protection at Rangoon General Command, a military base some 14 miles north of the city, or at Tower House, a multistory building near Ne Win's villa at Rangoon's Inya Lake.

By week's end, the stage was set for Saw Maung's coup when the government announced that members of the military and civil servants could no longer belong to the B.S.P.P. That decision effectively divorced the army from the ruling party. At the same time, the Burmese people themselves, by some metaphysical process, seemed to sense that change was imminent. Astrology plays an important role in Burma, and last week one of the country's leading astrologers, Saya Gyi Theikpan Myint, predicted that by the end of September "the present party in power will disintegrate."

The astrologer may be right. Burma may now face a choice between the formation of an interim government that would represent all parties, or a tragic confrontation between the military and the increasingly assertive opposition.