As Myanmar’s military regime struggles to contain a rising tide of armed resistance to its coup of 2021, its unchallenged airpower has already emerged as a central factor in the civil war. At the dawn of 2023, the question now confronting both sides is whether the Myanmar Air Force’s improving capabilities will prove decisive.
With hostilities almost certain to escalate during this impending dry season, observers and analysts wonder whether sustained MAF bombardments will be sufficient to halt the advances and break the resolve of the still fragmented federal-democratic armed opposition, allowing the military to reassert control over wide swathes of territory now held by various rebel forces.
Lethal airstrikes on civilians, most shockingly at a school in Sagaing’s Depayin township last September and at a concert near the Kachin jade-mining center of Hpakant in October, have underscored the ruthless indifference of the military’s ruling State Administrative Council (SAC) to mass civilian casualties.
As the world busy dealing with the Ukraine war, Myanmar junta is waging brutal war against civilians population of Myanmar using its Russian Su-30 jets. According BBC reports, Russian pilots and crews are helping Myanmar to carry air strikes against school, hospital and monastery.
Russia has been the key backer of Myanmar Junta supply fighter jets, ammunitions and helicopters to Myanmar.
More air-delivered atrocities are expected in the coming months, possibly as part of a deliberate strategy aimed at targeting popular support for the war while seeking to divide powerful ethnic resistance organizations (EROs) being offered peace deals from Bamar-led Peoples Defense Forces (PDFs) that have been branded as “terrorists” that must be crushed.
But strikes on civilians that have roused international condemnation are part of a wider campaign that has expanded into the centerpiece of the junta’s war effort. Since mid-2022, the MAF has ramped up a strikingly high tempo of daily sorties aimed not only at beating back attacks by PDFs and their ethnic army allies, but also at hitting ERO bases, command centers and economic resources in an unprecedented blitz.
Opposition forces in Kachin, Karen, Karenni, Shan and Chin states have borne the brunt of the bombardment with the most recent strikes on January 10 targeting for the first time the Camp Victoria headquarters of the Chin National Army on the Indian border.
Air power showcase
Showcased at a December 15 ceremony to mark the MAF’s 75th anniversary, a steady ratcheting up of combat aircraft numbers in service has been one element of the marked improvement in MAF capabilities seen in 2022.
Presided over by junta chief Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, the event showed the newly commissioned first of six new Sukhoi SU-30 jets purchased from Russia in 2018 that are now the pride of the MAF.
Lethal airstrikes on civilians, most shockingly at a school in Sagaing’s Depayin township last September and at a concert near the Kachin jade-mining center of Hpakant in October, have underscored the ruthless indifference of the military’s ruling State Administrative Council (SAC) to mass civilian casualties.
More air-delivered atrocities are expected in the coming months, possibly as part of a deliberate strategy aimed at targeting popular support for the war while seeking to divide powerful ethnic resistance organizations (EROs) being offered peace deals from Bamar-led Peoples Defense Forces (PDFs) that have been branded as “terrorists” that must be crushed.
But strikes on civilians that have roused international condemnation are part of a wider campaign that has expanded into the centerpiece of the junta’s war effort. Since mid-2022, the MAF has ramped up a strikingly high tempo of daily sorties aimed not only at beating back attacks by PDFs and their ethnic army allies, but also at hitting ERO bases, command centers and economic resources in an unprecedented blitz.
Opposition forces in Kachin, Karen, Karenni, Shan and Chin states have borne the brunt of the bombardment with the most recent strikes on January 10 targeting for the first time the Camp Victoria headquarters of the Chin National Army on the Indian border.
Air power showcase
Showcased at a December 15 ceremony to mark the MAF’s 75th anniversary, a steady ratcheting up of combat aircraft numbers in service has been one element of the marked improvement in MAF capabilities seen in 2022.
Presided over by junta chief Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, the event showed the newly commissioned first of six new Sukhoi SU-30 jets purchased from Russia in 2018 that are now the pride of the MAF.
Also spotted at the show was one SOKO G-4 Super Galeb, an aging jet trainer/ground attack jet bought from Yugoslavia, when Yugoslavia was still a country. As one Bangkok-based military analyst noted dryly: “It looks rather as if they are on a ‘get me anything that flies and drops bombs’ search.”
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