“Mischief-makers, provocateurs and rabble-rousers"? Myanmar and foreign mercenaries

Last month, the Chief Minister of Mizoram, in eastern India, announced that “thousands” of Western mercenaries had entered the state in 2024 and crossed over the India-Myanmar border to train ethnic rebels based there. A prominent Indian commentator has suggested that this was part of a “possible covert operation” by the United States (US) and United Kingdom (UK) to destabilise the Myanmar junta.

Few serious observers would accept such claims, but the question of foreigners secretly entering Myanmar to support the country’s armed opposition groups is a long-standing issue that invites greater attention.

Since 1962, when the armed forces (or Tatmadaw) first seized power in Myanmar, an estimated 100 or more “soldiers of fortune” have offered to help the country’s armed opposition groups. Most have hailed from the US, but others have come from places as far afield as the UK, France, Belgium, Germany, Sweden, Finland, Russia, Japan, Canada and Australia. 

Some have had impressive pedigrees. They have included former US Marines and Special Forces (”Green Berets”), as well as veterans of the French Foreign Legion, Australia’s Special Air Service Regiment and Russia’s Spetsnaz.

Although dubbed “mercenaries” by successive Myanmar governments and the international news media, these foreign fighters, or “volunteers”, have rarely been paid. As far as is known, they have been motivated by a mix of idealism, opposition to Myanmar’s brutal military regimes and a wish for combat experience. A few have admitted to being inspired by stories about Myanmar in magazines like Soldier of Fortune and movies like Rambo 4.

Since the 2021 coup, about a dozen Westerners are known to have gone to Myanmar to help fight the junta. Some appear to have joined Karen groups in the east of the country, while at least two have linked up with the Chin resistance in the west. Some of these volunteers have claimed combat experience in Iraq, Afghanistan or Ukraine. The number is said to be growing, as those already in Myanmar try to persuade their former comrades to join them. 

There is little that such foreigners can teach the local insurgents about guerrilla warfare, given that the latter have been waging some of the longest campaigns in the world. The Karen struggle against Myanmar’s central government, for example, began in 1949. However, the volunteers can share their expertise in niche areas and train veteran insurgents to handle the more modern arms and equipment now becoming available.

According to news reports, volunteers have given advice and training in areas such as sniping, the use of improvised explosive devices, modern communications, and close quarter and urban battle tactics. They have also helped provide basic training for new recruits, particularly those youngsters from the cities with no prior experience of jungle warfare. 

Thanks to the many spies and informers around Myanmar’s borders, the presence of such outsiders soon becomes known to the junta’s intelligence services. Some of them have been recognised as relatively harmless fantasists and thrill-seekers. The state-run New Light of Myanmar has historically dismissed them as “stragglers” and “foreign meddlers”. Others have been called “mischief-makers, provocateurs and rabble-rousers”.  

If accepted as trained and experienced soldiers, however, they pose more of a problem for the regime. They are also seen as potential sources of intelligence from, and for, hostile agencies. Such concerns have doubtless increased since the passage through the US Congress of the Burma Unified through Rigorous Military Accountability (BURMA) Act of 2022. While it ruled out lethal aid, there was ample scope for sponsored training assistance and intelligence sharing.

Those individuals most often singled out for the Tatmadaw’s attention seem to be former military officers who have valuable skills they could pass on to the insurgents. Such volunteers have been hunted down and, where possible, killed. According to the UNHCR, between 1986-95 five French citizens, a Japanese national, an American and an Australian died fighting alongside Karen insurgents. There may have been other foreign casualties.

Occasionally, suspicions have arisen that the volunteers have had some official status, and may have even been acting on behalf of a foreign government. In this regard, it is worth noting that the Tatmadaw’s definition of a “mercenary” is quite broad. Myanmar’s security authorities have accused international aid organisations like Medecins sans Frontieres and the Christian humanitarian group the Free Burma Rangers of sponsoring mercenaries inside Myanmar, if not of actually being mercenary organisations themselves.

A small number of foreign fighters cannot have an appreciable influence on the strategic direction of the current civil war. Even at the operational and tactical levels their impact is likely to be minimal. Yet, should their numbers grow significantly, and they start to operate as formed combat units against the Tatmadaw, then the picture would change dramatically, not only in military but also in geopolitical terms.

Such a development is very unlikely. However, in this context press reports of “nearly 2,000 foreigners, including American and British nationals” crossing into Myanmar “to provide military training to resistance forces in Chinland”, take on added significance. Unsubstantiated claims of “possible covert operations” by Western countries can only make things worse by giving such stories a credibility they do not deserve.

The reaction of Myanmar’s junta to the reported influx of foreign fighters since 2021 is not known, but it can be guessed. Even if the recent reports are proven groundless, and the few volunteers currently in Myanmar are disavowed by their home governments, both are likely to encourage the generals’ fear of a concerted effort by the Western democracies to overthrow the military regime, in part through assistance to the armed opposition movement. 

This can only strengthen the junta’s distorted view of reality, harden its resolve to resist and complicate the international community’s fitful efforts to promote a peaceful resolution of the conflict.

Andrew Selth is an Adjunct Professor at the Griffith Asia Institute. His latest book is Myanmar: The Making of an Intelligence State (Singapore: ISEAS Publishing, forthcoming).