To the Secretary

by Mary Thompson-Jones

  Organizing health care for a vulnerable population was another huge undertaking. The USS Carl Vinson and the USNS Comfort arrived to offer 1,000 hospital beds, with 10 operating rooms, 24 surgeons, and 130 nursing staff on board. The ships were attached to a huge effort on land to assess local hospitals and clinics and supplement medical assistance, primary care, and disease prevention.

  At its peak there were 67 international search-and-rescue teams, comprising 1,918 staff and 160 dogs. “Recent search and rescue operations in Haiti are unprecedented, resulting in the largest number of known rescues in an international response. To the surprise of many, live rescues were still conducted 11 days after the earthquake, far surpassing the expected 72-hour window of survival.” 12

  Soon cables began focusing on a private sector eager to get back to work, especially the garment industry. Owners met to coordinate efforts to get factories up and running—their employment and foreign earnings were seen as a key aspect of recovery. About 30 to 40 percent of the country’s production capacity had been damaged.13

  All too soon, on February 28, the WikiLeaks cables stop, long before Haiti had completed its path to recovery. Nonetheless, the intensity of embassy coverage offers a case study in the early stages of disaster recovery and a chance to deconstruct, step by step, the architecture of one of the most massive and complex recovery operations ever mounted. Readers see firsthand how embassies cope, improvise, and organize. The embassy reporters had the advantage of knowing the terrain, with many officers having worked other crises elsewhere. They reported on crucial but less newsworthy items, personalized the accounts, and guided the initial planning and relief efforts. The embassy was widely praised for the professionalism of its actions, but its reporting was also a tour de force.

  In an interesting footnote, the death toll of the quake remains hotly disputed. The U.S. government and independent aid workers place the toll at anywhere from a low of 46,000 to 160,000. The Haitian government is accused of deliberately inflating the numbers from its initial count of 230,000 (widely seen as inflated and unsubstantiated) to 316,000 on the first anniversary of the quake as a means of getting more assistance.14 In contrast, the military government in Burma did exactly the opposite in the aftermath of Cyclone Nargis, essentially stopping the count at 138,000, for fear that acknowledging a higher number would lead to political instability.

  In fact, they were right.

  CYCLONE NARGIS AND THE WINDS OF CHANGE

  Half a globe away from Haiti lies Burma, with a population of nearly fifty-four million, making it almost as populous as Italy, with a geographic size larger than France.15 Located on the Bay of Bengal, its neighbors include Bangladesh, India, China, Laos, and Thailand. Like Haiti, it also ranks low on the UN Development Programme’s scale, coming in at 148 out of 187. But in Burma’s case, the lack of development can be traced to the military junta that ran the country from 1962 to 2011, following a socialist one-party model with occasional periods of martial law to suppress protest and reform movements. Its most famous pro-democracy dissident, Aung San Suu Kyi, endured years of house arrest and harassment before her party, the National League for Democracy, won by-elections in 2012, which led to her gaining a seat in parliament. By late 2015, her party had won a majority of seats in parliament.

  The United States imposed severe economic and investment sanctions on Burma in 1997 through the Office of Foreign Assets Control. Subsequent reviews reinforced and expanded prohibitions on importation of products of Burmese origin or on any sort of U.S. investment in Burma. Other countries and organizations, including the European Union (EU), imposed similar sanctions. Burma ended decades of isolation with a visit from Secretary of State Clinton in December 2011, which in turn led to the gradual lifting of some sanctions and additional meetings between Burmese president Thein Sein and President Obama in 2012 and 2013.

  The country’s size and geopolitical significance give added meaning to the story of Burma’s cyclone—a remarkable tale of destruction and transformation. The cyclone also offers proof that military juntas can be undone by their own bad habits—crony capitalism, corruption, and the isolation that comes from not being answerable to an electorate. Cyclone Nargis killed tens of thousands of people, but it was the disarray it wrought among the ruling generals, exposed as uncaring, incompetent, and paranoid, that helped to spell the regime’s end.

  The cyclone, a rare low-altitude storm with 120-mph winds, was the worst natural disaster in Burma’s history. It made landfall overnight on May 2–3, 2008, and sent a storm surge up the densely populated Irrawaddy River Delta. Nargis arrived a week before a previously scheduled national referendum on a new constitution, to which pro-democracy activists were urging a “no” vote.

  The embassy reporting was prescient. Days before the cyclone touched land, U.S. diplomats had warned, “The GOB [government of Burma] has traditionally turned down international assistance, as it did after the 2004 tsunami . . . the regime may be especially averse to assistance at what they consider a politically sensitive time.” 16 And in its first report following the disaster, on May 5, the embassy again emphasized that the scale of U.S. assistance would depend on the willingness of Burmese government authorities to accept it.17 Later that day, the embassy’s chief of mission exercised disaster assistance authority, declaring that “the disaster is beyond the capability of the host government to respond, and is of sufficient magnitude to warrant U.S. government assistance, and that it is in the best interest of the U.S. government to respond.” 18 Those criteria are required under U.S. law to set up a formal disaster relief operation.

  Subsequent cables depict an exasperating fight with the government. The junta leaders, perhaps revealing their naiveté about the strategic and technical elements of a massive assistance operation, were reluctant to allow commodities, aid workers, and aid assessors to enter the country. Burmese recalcitrance frustrated the efforts of the entire international community. The generals, hunkered down in their newly built capital of Nay Pyi Taw, two hundred miles north of the hard-hit Delta region, seemed unaware of the scale of the disaster. According to the embassy, this was because no mid-level underlings had the courage to inform them. Old and out of touch, the generals believed humanitarian assistance could be confined to deliveries of bottled water at the airport; they had no idea of the sophistication and coordination a modern humanitarian aid operation requires. The generals resisted any notion of the need for aid workers on the ground, confident they could handle the complexities of distribution. When they could not, they gave their people a new reason to wish for their removal. With each passing day, lives were needlessly lost. The discovery that those who ruled were incapable of caring for their people opened new avenues for pro-democracy activists.

  A few days following the cyclone, the embassy warned that although Burma had requested international assistance, it was not yet ready to permit entry of either UN or U.S. government assessment teams, “so they should not make any travel plans.” 19 This soon became a refrain, as the embassy described the extensive damage and the many signs that Burma’s leaders were in denial. Despite the destruction of the Irrawaddy Delta, including the collapse of 95 percent of the buildings, “the Minister of Social Welfare asserted Rangoon [also known as Yangon, the former capital, and still the country’s commercial center and most populous city] was ‘not severely hurt; not very big damage.’” 20

  The embassy immediately saw the political implications of the cyclone, noting that the regime was determined to continue with the constitutional referendum on May 10, a week after the cyclone hit, albeit with at least a third of Burma’s population unable to vote. “This unprecedented humanitarian disaster has knocked both the regime and the pro-democracy opposition off their game. Both are grappling to respond. While the regime continues to make claims of recovery that people know are untrue, and to dismiss the need for international expertise to provide humanitarian relief, the generals may have to reverse course in order to assure their own survival
.” 21

  The embassy, still located in Rangoon, offered details of the immediate challenge of a massive cleanup. The government relied on army personnel but left them woefully ill equipped. “They can be seen around town trying to dismantle fallen trees with little more than knives and brooms.” 22 The embassy was also affected, reporting rather quaintly, “We received one chainsaw from Bangkok today and we will receive 4 more chainsaws within one or two days. Post has requested 2000 MREs [meals ready to eat], and Embassy Bangkok will send us batteries.” 23

  The storm’s destruction had huge economic implications for the Delta region, Burma’s outlet for export earnings. It sank eighty registered ships in the Rangoon River, cutting off access to the port and oil refinery. A refinery business source told the embassy that the government’s practice was to clear sunken ships with divers who “use saws and machetes to cut the ships into pieces. This can take up to six months for one ship.” 24

  But the humanitarian catastrophe was of primary concern. “UN local staff in Labutta reported a make-shift camp of 100,000 people has been set up with nothing to eat or drink. Corpses are floating everywhere, contaminating local waterways that people use for drinking water because they have nothing else.” 25 Two weeks later, the embassy’s concern mounted. “The GOB has yet to come to terms with the fact that it does not have the capacity to respond to this disaster . . . Relief supplies to date have not reached most of the victims in the region two weeks after Cyclone Nargis slammed into the Delta.” 26

  Soon the focus shifted to the prolonged delays in issuing visas for international relief workers. The embassy quoted sources saying that no high-level government officials dared to describe the full scope of the disaster to the seventy-five-year-old senior general, Than Shwe.

  Unpleasant pictures in the media reportedly make the Senior General retreat even further into isolation. According to our contacts, Than Shwe is above all concerned with saving face and holding onto power.

  . . . Meanwhile PM Thein Sein and the eight ministers on the national rescue committee reportedly have become more desperate. Sources told us Thein Sein expressed fear to [the third-ranking general] that 60,000 had lost their lives already and up to 300,000 could, if water, food and medicine were not delivered quickly.

  . . . Than Shwe’s isolation and paranoia know no bounds. All fingers point to him as the obstacle to delivering the humanitarian assistance the Burmese so desperately need, just like he is the obstacle to an inclusive political dialogue. Our many contacts are visibly distraught as they watch Burma’s humanitarian catastrophe worsen by the day because of the intransigence of Than Shwe. The question is who is brave enough to shunt Than Shwe aside? Most Burmese tell us no one. Other senior officials may passively sit while thousands needlessly die rather than challenge Than Shwe.27

  The international relief community was equally exasperated. Assistance teams languished without visas for weeks, and the Burmese government actually turned away sixty-two medics who arrived on a chartered relief flight from Bangladesh. The UN’s World Food Programme suspended relief shipments to Burma after the regime refused to release supplies from one of its flights.28

  Then, suddenly, the picture changed. A U.S. C-130 relief flight, accompanied by Pacific Command’s Admiral Timothy Keating, USAID administrator Henrietta Fore, and other American officials, was allowed to land on May 13. It was quickly followed by two more flights the following day and five the day after. In an understated description of behind-the-scenes diplomacy, the embassy wrote, “On May 11, the Chargé met with the Chinese Ambassador to discuss the possibility that Burmese authorities may object to Admiral Keating’s presence on the C-130. After further discussion, the Burmese authorities agreed not to object to the admiral’s visit.” 29

  The rarity of the chargé’s meeting suggests the extent of Chinese alarm over Burma’s resistance to aid—and the fact that many of China’s investment projects may have been suffering. “The opaque nature of China’s economic involvement in Burma is compounded by the reclusive nature of the PRC diplomatic presence here. The Chinese embassy regularly rebuffs requests for meetings and information from the Rangoon-based diplomatic community.” 30 The embassy was keenly aware of Chinese economic influence in Burma. An economic cable noted that Chinese investment had increased dramatically over the past decade, visible in hydropower, oil, gas, mining, and construction projects. Officially, China was Burma’s third-largest trading partner, after Thailand and Singapore, but embassy sources speculated that unofficial trade might be ten to twenty times the official trade value.

  Once on the ground, the delicate conversations between the U.S. delegation and the Burmese went nowhere. “The meeting went as we expected. The Burmese delegation, which did not include anyone with decision-making authority, was pleasant and cordial, but made no firm commitment to accept U.S. assistance beyond relief supplies flown into Rangoon. . . . If it was not clear before, it is now: the Burmese Government, at this time, welcomes the donation of commodities to assist with cyclone relief and only that.” 31

  On the other hand, the visit received an unprecedented amount of government-controlled news coverage, including nearly seven minutes on national television and pages of newspaper photos. “To most ordinary Burmese, the positive coverage of the deliveries of U.S. humanitarian aid was extraordinary . . . a real breakthrough. Today in Burma, where we have been unable to place even the most innocuous press release . . . we are enjoying the most positive attention we have ever received.” 32

  In later analytical reporting, the embassy revealed that the senior generals believed the United States was about to launch an invasion. It was inconceivable to them that a U.S. naval carrier could sail near Burmese territorial waters with no motive other than logistical support for humanitarian efforts. The chargé wrote, “While it would also be nice to think that our Nargis assistance had positively changed minds, it appears more likely that fear of a U.S. invasion prompted the opening . . . The fear of invasion was real, according to a variety of our contacts in the regime.” 33 Pro-democracy activists agreed, telling embassy officials later that the regime understood military might, “and only the presence of U.S. military ships had forced the generals to allow relief workers access to the post-Nargis Delta.” 34

  Willingness to accept aid did not last long. Despite a call from UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urging immediate issuance of visas to UN aid workers, Than Shwe was unresponsive. The embassy noted that the UN humanitarian assistance coordinator was not allowed to enter the country until May 18 and made no progress in obtaining permission for his international staff to visit the field. Other reputable international bodies, such as the Emergency Rapid Assessment Team of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), of which Burma is a member, were also denied permission to visit the field, as was the European Union’s commissioner for development and humanitarian aid.

  Indeed, the Burmese regime continued to ignore reality. Subsequent cables document how the on-again, off-again approach to visas became a pattern, with international aid workers almost as desperate to get in as the people they hoped to reach. “As we have seen too often, the GOB will make a concession and then start backtracking . . . The senior generals cannot resist micromanaging everything.” 35

  The consequences came home to roost at an international donor conference staged three weeks after the cyclone hit. “The regime’s hope for a cash-rich pledging conference fell flat as donors held on to their checkbooks . . . GOB hoped the conference would net billions of dollars to rebuild the ravaged delta. Donors instead chose to remind the generals that there is no free lunch.” 36 Despite the regime’s disappointment, the embassy doubted that the donors’ scolding would change the regime’s behavior.

  To understand the intellectual distance Burma’s leaders had to travel, a cable discussing prospects for the International Committee of the Red Cross to work in Burma noted that it took nine months for Burmese officials to hold a substantive discussion with the organizatio
n, which they viewed as “toxic.” 37 Burmese journalists were jailed for reporting on Nargis victims who dared to complain about the regime’s slow response.38 The regime continued to toy with aid workers’ visas, delaying renewal for the directors of CARE, Pact, and Save the Children, while denying renewal for two senior UN officials, a WHO epidemiologist and the UNDP country representative.39 Driving home the point, the embassy wrote that, as further proof of the regime’s paranoia, “the Orwellian-sounding Cartoon Exhibition Supervisory Committee” had pulled four cartoons from an exhibition to raise funds for cyclone victims.40

  Yet the embassy reporting offers evidence that the cyclone led, at least indirectly, to profound changes. Diplomatic colleagues suggested that the continuing international humanitarian presence had opened a small political space in the country as local NGOs got involved in the distribution of humanitarian aid.41 The embassy agreed, reporting, “Relationships between villagers and local authorities are changing and villagers are taking actions to ensure the aid is distributed transparently and evenly.” The continuing international relief effort “has the potential to move Burma towards democratic change by instilling participatory decision making and notions of accountability at a grass-roots level. The regime has opened opportunities to work with Burmese civil society to an unprecedented degree.” A World Bank expert in social impact analysis noted people were beginning to hold their leaders accountable. Civil society was starting to expand.42

  The cyclone brought changes in Washington, too. Embassy reporting and increased international attention on Burma raised awareness of a long-stagnant diplomatic relationship, possibly creating room for new thinking. Half a year after the cyclone, Secretary of State Clinton ordered a policy review. By August, Senator Jim Webb (D-VA) made the first congressional visit to Burma since Senator John Kerry had visited in 1999. The following month, Clinton announced changes in the United States’ Burma policy at the UN, saying that “engagement versus sanctions is a false choice.” She was the first secretary of state to visit Burma in more than fifty years. She wrote enthusiastically about her growing relationship with pro-democracy activist and Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi and her frustration over the country’s hesitant progress toward democracy, noting, “It is sometimes hard to resist getting breathless about Burma.” 43