Reuters: <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dec 15 – Generals from Myanmar’s junta held peace talks in June near the border with China with representatives of three powerful ethnic armies. They sat across a wide table covered with blue cloth and decorated with elaborate bouquets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But the rebels were playing a double-game.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Secretly, the ethnic armies – collectively called the Three Brotherhood Alliance – had already laid the groundwork for Operation 1027, a major offensive launched in October that has become the most significant threat to the regime since it seized power in a 2021 coup.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“We were already preparing for the operation when we met them,” said Kyaw Naing, a spokesman for the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA), a largely ethnic-Chinese group that is part of the rebel coalition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Reuters interviewed a dozen resistance officials with knowledge of the operation, as well as analysts and other people familiar with the matter. Some spoke on condition of anonymity because the offensive is ongoing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They disclosed previously unreported elements of the planning, including details of the formation of a unified battlefield brigade and the extent of China’s impatience toward the junta, which some analysts believe emboldened the militias.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Operation 1027, named after the date it began in late October, has delivered nationwide victories for the alliance and other groups fighting the military, which unseated Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi’s civilian-led government in February 2021.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The junta cracked down on protests after the coup, sparking a grassroots rebellion and re-igniting conflict with some ethnic armies. The military, known as the Tatmadaw, has ruled Myanmar for five of the past six decades, and its soldiers are feared for their brutality and scorched earth tactics. The army says tough measures are required to fight groups it considers “terrorists.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Two members of the Three Brotherhood Alliance together with five other armed groups formed the new Brigade 611 in early 2022, four rebel officials told Reuters. The formation’s strength numbers in the “thousands”, one of them said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It was a display of unprecedented cooperation among outfits that come from different parts of Myanmar, speak different languages and traditionally have had different priorities, according to a November report from the U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP), a Washington-based think-tank focused on conflict prevention and resolution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The operation came amid rising anger in Beijing with the junta over rampant crime on the border, which created conditions that supported the blitzkrieg, according to two analysts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
China, a key junta ally that also has close relations with some ethnic Chinese militias in the borderlands, has been riled by Myanmar’s inability to shut down online scam centres along the frontier that have become a scourge across Southeast Asia<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As of October, more than 20,000 people, mainly Chinese, were being held in over 100 compounds in northern Myanmar, where the workers – many of them trafficked – defraud strangers over the internet, according to a USIP estimate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The centres have become a major public security challenge for China and Chinese officials delivered an ultimatum in Beijing this September to their Myanmar counterparts: eliminate the compounds or China would do so, according to a person briefed on their meeting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Numerous scam centres were caught up in the recent fighting, allowing many foreign nationals<\/a> who had been trapped to flee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Myanmar’s junta, as well as China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Ministry of Public Security, did not return requests for comment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In a Nov. 29 speech, junta leader Gen. Min Aung Hlaing said the fighting near the border originated from long-standing issues and the military was focused on combating insurgents “for peace and stability in the region.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n The regime has since held China-facilitated talks with the Three Brotherhood Alliance, a junta spokesman said on Dec. 11<\/a> without providing further details. Beijing said it supports such talks, while the alliance said on Wednesday it remains determined to defeat the “dictatorship”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n