Trump’s vicious and violent breach of democracy, the rule of law and human decency goes far and wide—worldwide.
On February 1st—a mere 26 days after the January 6th insurrection on the American Capital—The military coup in Myanmar became the most recent example of Trump’s revolting influence on would-be dictators everywhere.
While I listen to the experts and pundits explain what just happened in Myanmar, they don’t explain the reason why, after the military generals watched Trump on their high-definition televisions that the idea they could do the same in their own country wasn’t much of a reach.
The details of the forceful takeover have been widely reported, but the act and the timing of the coup couldn’t have been more specious.
I suspect that the military generals had been watching the US election and its horrific aftermath on their high-def televisions.
The idea that the generals could use Trump’s perverted rule book to re-take their own country after a decade of democratic rule wasn’t much of a reach.
For the last decade, Care for Peace, our Marin-based global health foundation has been working closely with Aung San Suu Kyi’s government officials and the Ministry of Health to build a prototype community development and health center in “deep rural” Myanmar, so it isn’t difficult for me imagine what was going on in the Myanmar generals’ heads as they watched the Trump circus:
They watched Trump blatantly lie that he had won the election by a landslide when everybody knows he hadn’t.
They watched Trump as he railed against the American Democratic Party and anyone that he didn’t agree with, and then I imagine the generals saw parallels with how they thought about Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy Party in Myanmar.
And they watched how Trump instigated insurrection, set his thugs on the Capital leaving 5 dead, many injured and our collective fear that the hallowed halls of our democracy had been violated.
“Hey! If Trump can do it, so can I!” the Commander-in-Chief Min Aung Hlaing might have said.
“It was an inside job led by the US President and his own army!” said another general.
“We have our own army! We are on the inside! We can do that too!” said yet another.
“Here’s our window of opportunity!” they all said together.
During the previous decade, Aung San Suu Kyi had taken her country out of the burning embers of the previous Military dictatorship to build a thriving democracy and a burgeoning free-market economy.
But then in 2017, Aung San Suu Kyi’s shining star went into free fall when a million Rohingya Muslims escaped her country’s persecution and trekked perilously across the border to safety in Bangladesh.
At the same time America’s shining star had already been in a two-year free fall under Trump’s deranged attack on democracy, on the rule of law and at anyone he didn’t like including our international allies.
Less than a month after the insurrection, the Myanmar military saw their opportunity.
“Now!” they said.
They declared martial law, arrested Aung San Suu Kyi and then rounded up anyone who might seem a threat to the coup.
They succeeded in taking over the government where Trump’s troops failed to take over ours.
While there is great hope that under President Biden’s leadership we can reconstruct all that Trump left behind during his four-year ‘reign of error’, there is still great cause to worry.
Trump’s attack on the U.S. Constitution and on the Democratic Party was an attack on the very heart of democracy that has now become threatened not only here at home but also within the hearts of hundreds of millions of people worldwide who hope with us that America so conceived and so dedicated to liberty, freedom and the rule of law, will long endure.
Trump’s vicious and violent breach on our democracy occurred on January 6th. Myanmar’s military’s vicious and violent breach occurred only 30 days after ours. Democracy died in Myanmar on February 1st.
I just hope that the day democracy died in Myanmar wasn’t a harbinger of a day when democracy dies in America.