ABSTRACT
On March 2, 1962, the Burma Tatmadaw 1 staged a bloodless coup, overthrowing the government of U Nu and ending Burma’s fitful post-Independence experiment in parliamentary socialism. The coup, led by General Ne Win, Tatmadaw Chief of Staff, and some senior officers who called themselves the Revolutionary Council, initially promised little more than the preservation of the Union. There was nothing in the takeover to suggest momentous political, social, or economic change. After all, military takeovers were increasingly familiar facts of political life in countries emerging from the colonial experience. In 1960 Burma went through 18 months of military tutelage during the “Caretaker Period,” and power was returned subsequently to civilians. Within a year it became apparent that this was no ordinary coup, no hiatus in parliamentary politics as the Caretaker Period had been. Rather, the coup brought to rule a group of officers who, once they consolidated their power within the Revolutionary Council, were committed to revolution in Burma. Marxist in inspiration, Leninist in application, this revolution had as its goal nothing less than an idealized Burmese state as indebted to Buddhist visions of the “just society” as to the radical socialist ideas which flavored its policy statements. Over twenty years, Ne Win led Burma along the “Burmese Way to Socialism,” a tortured course of revolutionary change which plunged the country into near economic ruin but in its later years led to modest growth and a reasonably developed political system. Throughout, the Tatmadaw was the central pillar of the Revolution. Although its politicized leadership exchanged battledress for mufti in 1972, the Tatmadaw remains the seat of power and decisions involving Burma’s future will involve the military centrally in plotting any new course.
