The Road to Mandalay...

…once littered with bougainvillea, jasmine and other lush jungle fauna is now covered with blood and the litter of fleeing multitudes as the Myanmar army mows down its own in an internecine struggle decades old…if ever there was a time for the United Nations to show what it’s made of, this is it. We need to see some major diplomacy here, and never mind putting more boots on the ground & guns in-country.

Be assured intervention could come from China, Burma/Myanmar’s largest trade partner, or Russia another one, and America of course has a hand in everything so it too must be considered. Burma’s totalitarian army has lots of guns and the three China, Russia & America are major arms dealers so there’s that to deal with; everyone has a vested interest.

Unfortunately for the poor People of Burma there’s a lot of oil and gas nearby that the aforementioned all have a craving, crying, hedonistic need for - so the strategy for who gets what if the Burmese Army gets routed, is a chess game…it’s anybody’s guess…the Chinese are not kowtowing to anybody these days – Mattel Toys kissed their ass after China sent lead-paint tainted toys for America’s kids – what’s with that? And Russia is reasserting itself as a force to re-reckoned with – George Bush is Vladimir Putin’s patsy; Bush thinks Putin is his friend; he isn’t. Putin likes American Jazz, not America.

I have no way of proving it but in my estimation a number of Burmese people have been beaten up, tortured or killed in just the time it’s taken me to write these few abysmally deficient paragraphs trying to highlight their plight…it’s everyone’s business; we’re all in this together and if we can help we are duty bound to do so even if only to sign a petition…no one expects you to sell the farm, grab your musket and head for Rangoon.

It’s a complex world and a wonder that anything runs at all.