Brotherhood Alliance of Three Ethnic Armies a Key Player in Myanmar’s Civil War

The Brotherhood Alliance—the tripartite military alliance made up of the Arakan Army (AA), Ta’ang National Liberation Amy (TNLA) and Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA)—has again come under the spotlight for its recent talks with the regime.

Indisputably, the military alliance—which first made its name known in 2016—has become one of the key players in Myanmar’s civil war and politics.

Established in 1989, the MNDAA, also known as the Kokang Group, was reconstituted after many of its fighters were forced to flee Kokang in the wake of the Myanmar military’s large-scale assault in 2009. It took three to four years for the Kokang Group to rebuild itself.

The AA and the TNLA have inherited the revolutions of the Rakhine and Ta’ang peoples from their predecessor organizations. The AA was established in 2009, and the TNLA was reconstituted in 2011. Both groups started from humble beginnings with a few dozen soldiers.

All three groups are based near the Chinese border in northeastern Myanmar, and emerged around 2010. They are led by men in their 30s and 40s.

Over the next decade, they established systematically organized and well-armed forces with combat capabilities.

Once the underdog

While their fellow ethnic armed organizations (EAOs), including the Kachin Independence Army (KIA), backed up the three groups, the Myanmar military underestimated them. They joined the nationwide ceasefire and peace process as members of the United Nationalities Federal Council, but the Myanmar military did not allow them to sign the Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement (NCA) in September 2015.

In early 2016, the Myanmar military demanded that the three groups surrender. Peace brokers paid by the Myanmar military threatened them with the “four cuts” strategy—the Myanmar military’s doctrine designed to sever rebels from the keys inputs of funding, food, intelligence and recruits.

The government’s Peace Commission demanded that the three EAOs lay down their arms if they were to attend the first session of the Union Peace Conference. A Myanmar military peace negotiator even said: “Even if they wish to join the Union Peace Conference, it is not the Taung Pyone festival,” referring to an annual Nat spirit festival held at Mount Popa that all are free to join.

The three EAOs responded by launching a joint offensive in Mongkoe in northern Shan State around the end of 2016, halting Myanmar’s border trade with China through Muse. Once considered minor groups, their military capabilities raised many eyebrows.

Between 2015 and 2017, the three groups joined the summits of EAOs held in Panghsang, which is under the de facto control of the United Wa State Army (UWSA). They also became members of the Federal Political Negotiation Consultative Committee (FPNCC), a political alliance of EAOs based in northeastern Myanmar and led by the UWSA. The FPNCC seeks alternatives to peace building outside the NCA path. The three groups also formed an alliance between themselves known as the Brotherhood Alliance.

The MNDAA started fighting the Myanmar military in 2015. The TNLA fought 200 to 300 clashes with the Myanmar military yearly between 2014 and 2020. The AA also fought the Myanmar military from late 2018 to 2020 in western Myanmar’s Rakhine State. The battles enabled them to assert their existence. Fighting between the AA and the military flared up again in Rakhine State between August and November 2022.

In a decade, the AA has grown into a powerful army with around 100 battalions totaling some 30,000 troops, the TNLA has grown to seven brigades with around 8,000 troops, and the MNDAA has grown to four brigades with around 6,000 troops. Combined, their strength stands at around 45,000 to 50,000. In terms of their size and combat capability, they inevitably play an important part in Myanmar’s civil war.

EAOs with a long history in Myanmar’s civil war including the Karen National Union (KNU), KIA, Karenni National Progressive Party and Chin National Front are publicly cooperating with the shadow National Unity Government in Myanmar’s Spring Revolution. And the Brotherhood Alliance is also backing the resistance forces engaged in the revolution.

Led by young leaders in early middle age, the Brotherhood Alliance is different from traditional EAOs in the way they think and act. They are also close to other powerful EAOs like the UWSA, Shan State Progress Party (SSPP) and National Democratic Alliance Army (NDAA), and thus deserve close attention when analyzing the Spring Revolution.

Brotherhood Alliance and China

China moved to establish close ties with the Brotherhood Alliance following the latter’s attack in Mongkoe in 2016. Beijing did so purely out of its own interests, as the three groups are fighting along the border and are active in areas that house Chinese investment projects including oil and gas pipelines.

China managed to pressure the Myanmar military into allowing the Brotherhood Alliance to attend the second and third sessions of the Union Peace Conference. Myanmar military leaders, however, refused to meet the representatives of the three EAOs attending the second session of the peace conference.

Since 2016, China has pushed for talks between the Myanmar military and the Brotherhood Alliance. China brokered talks between the Myanmar military and six EAOs based on the border including the UWSA, SSPP, NDAA and the Brotherhood Alliance in November 2021, following the military coup in February that year.

In late 2022, China made a further move and pressured the Brotherhood Alliance to stop fighting the regime.

Myanmar military changes its tone

The Myanmar military previously believed it would be able to annihilate the Brotherhood Alliance, each of whose members started with a few dozen troops.

But in reality, far from crushing the three groups, the military has suffered heavy losses in fighting them.

After two years of intense fighting from 2018, the Myanmar military made a truce with the AA ahead of the election in November 2020. Faced with strong armed resistance across the country after the coup in February 2021, the Myanmar military attempted to coax EAOs into ceasefires with the aim of concentrating its energy on crushing the People’s Defense Forces (PDFs).

As such, the Myanmar military has attempted to make peace with the Brotherhood Alliance. Previously, it was forced to make peace with them under pressure from China. So, China and the Myanmar military are each pushing for a ceasefire with the Brotherhood Alliance to serve their own interests.

Talks in Mongla

Against such a backdrop, the junta’s National Solidarity and Peace Negotiation Committee (NSPNC) and the Brotherhood Alliance held talks in Mongla, an area controlled by the NDAA, on June 1, 2023.

Attending the talks were NSPNC chairman Lieutenant General Yar Pyae, other military officers, and deputy chiefs of the AA, TNLA and MNDAA. Chinese special envoy of the Yunnan Province foreign affairs department Guo Bao was also present at the meeting.

At the meeting, Yar Pyae echoed junta boss Min Aung Hlaing and said the Myanmar military did not stage a coup, but took over the state’s responsibilities in line with the law. He urged the three EAOs to support its proposed election. He said the regime would uphold the NCA path and military-drafted 2008 Constitution in discussing self-determination for ethnicities.

The Brotherhood Alliance demanded that their troops detained by the regime be released and that they be removed from the list of unlawful associations. The AA called for lifting restrictions on delivery of humanitarian supplies to people affected by Cyclone Mocha in Rakhine State.

The meeting came to an end after the Brotherhood Alliance replied that they only came to listen to the junta’s viewpoints, and would report the regime’s discussions to their respective central executive committees.

Three-sided problem

China wants stability at the border, and domestic peace in Myanmar so that it can promote trade with, and increase investment in, Myanmar.

Obviously, China is pushing for dialogue neither for the sake of the Myanmar military nor the EAOs, but purely to serve its own interests. From China’s point of view, it can promote its interests in Myanmar only when the country is stable.

It is also a strategic objective for the Myanmar military to secure a ceasefire with the powerful Brotherhood Alliance. Only when it separates the military alliance from democratic forces based in central Myanmar will it be able to concentrate its energy on crushing the PDFs. And the regime would use the NCA and the 2008 Constitution to put off the issues of federalism and self-determination.

From its experience, the Brotherhood Alliance is well aware that it can have no rights if it doesn’t have an army. They have no trust in the Myanmar military, which has perpetrated various war crimes in their ethnic states and has always tried to crush them when the opportunity arises. They are also well aware that the Myanmar military will come for them the day it gains the upper hand over pro-democracy forces in the country.

More importantly, the Myanmar military is unwilling to grant them the degree of self-determination and self-administration they want. To put it more simply, it does not want to see a second Wa State, an autonomous enclave controlled by the UWSA in Shan State. The Brotherhood Alliance is aware that it could not reach an agreement with the Myanmar military on that even if it negotiated for centuries.

But then, they all are under the influence of China, as they are all based on the Chinese border. So, China will keep pushing the Brotherhood Alliance to go to the negotiation table. The Myanmar military will also try to coax them by making some concessions.

The Brotherhood Alliance will keep attending the talks because of pressure from China, but those meetings will never deliver any results. So, it did not come as a surprise when the Myanmar regime and the MNDAA fought in Kokang on June 2 and 3 after they held talks on June 1 in Mongla.

Moe Sett Nyein Chan is a military observer.