Burma the Centre of Global Fascism

I've noticed a lot of concerning patterns in regards to the direct parallels between the Fascist movements of Europe and that of Burma that are in conjunction with the Tatmadaw. The reason first and foremost being that of ideological similarity between the two movements, typically when you look at specifically European fascist they often center on race and a complete unassailable focus on the state sidelining things like religion, the true form of culture inherited from their respective nation but it has never had it as a central focus.

This is until the rise of the 969 movement which although fully formed as a cultural and political movement in the 2010s[ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/969_Movement ]. With said movement going back to the main leader joining the 969 movement in 2001 [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/969_Movement ]. Their main emphasis and messaging being on the protection of Burmese/Buddhist culture and the majority race of Myanmar from Muslims. Which sounds scathingly similar to the messaging utilized by the European far-right as of current which is a complete branching out compared to older and less contemporary far-right European movements which often, as I've stated have a total or near focus on race.

The 969 movement also happens to utilize the same methods of transmission utilized by the European far-right, being through social media in the form of Facebook, symbolism through flags or esoteric symbols or dog whistles such as "969" [ https://observers.france24.com/en/20130503-%E2%80%98969%E2%80%99-digits-terrifying-muslims-burma ]. The number "969" being remarkably similar to the use of the "Black Sun" symbol often used in European far-right contexts, the similarity being both are used as estoeric symbols to identity in and out groups, seperate those in the know from those who don't. But none of these tactics were seen in the 21st century European far-right until they were utilized by the Burmese far-right which shows greater support for the potentiality of collaboration or at least implicit admiration occurring from the European far-right towards the Burmese far-right as the 969 movement had been the ones who pioneered this much earlier. This is then also supported by how European far-right activity even in the 2010s were relatively limited with the only center of these exact methods/tactics being solely from Burma. These said propaganda tactics firstly started with the propagation of Wirathu's messaging the the 2000s form of propaganda in the form of CDs [ https://www.irrawaddy.com/news/burma/govt-admits-not-doing-anything-to-stop-sales-of-anti-muslim-propaganda.html ].

Then in regards to the transmission of modern tactics this is firstly seen in the form of a direct webpage, the earliest archive being from 2013 [https://969movement.org/what-is-969-movement/ ]. But compared to other far-right European movements this wasn't just a webpage, it already due to past propagation of propaganda through CDs and the '969' dogwhistle has already helped the movement itself gain momentum. So when the ban of censorship was lifted in the 2010s, Wirathu used this to his advantage in the form of this site [ https://969movement.org/what-is-969-movement/ ]. But on top of this already pre-built ideology which again has a central focus on religion also with the earliest archive also being from 2013 being a forum page [ https://web.archive.org/web/20131030043058/https://969movement.org/forum/ ]. The forum itself contains direct categories like "General Dicussion", "Dhamma Talk" and most importantly "Organizing" which itself in the archive contains 2 posts by the admin one being "Open Positions" [https://web.archive.org/web/20131030044049/https://969movement.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=6 ]. Which itself contains the positions of "Executive Director", "Chief Marketing Officer" and "IT Intern" but one constant remains between said positions, a requirement being that they all speak English which wouldn't have made sense unless they had direct intentions to export Buddhist Fascism across borders and eventually, globally, the job posting itself goes on to gain over 274 views [ https://web.archive.org/web/20131030043656/https://969movement.org/forum/viewforum.php?f=4&sid=e7dbcf31476ed50ad1fa9925e4e4b87c ]. This was a position of media dominance never before seen for any far-right leader like Wirathu, none had an active website, an active means of coordination but most of all none of them were on the Times except of course, Wirathu. [ https://www.thetimes.com/travel/destinations/asia-travel/sri-lanka/sri-lanka-bans-time-magazine-789qnnbkb85 ] It fact, there was so much fear at least by Sri Lankan governments that the Times magazine had the potentiality to incite radicalism and violence they'd banned it, but not the West, now a far-right leader's face was directly in front of and being viewed by the far-right of Europe. And for the final proof that it was indeed international, the site itself states "The creator of this blog is an American Buddhist of the Theravada school and supporter of the 969 message and its leader Ven. Wirathu. I decided to create this website after being disgusted at the despicable Time Magazine article.", this means that Wirathu didn't even have to reach the far-right, they came to them instead [ https://969movement.org/what-is-969-movement/ scroll to the bottom ].

Then finally from the 2010s to the 2020s they'd begin disseminating more and more through the use of disinformation through Facebook. [ https://www.irrawaddy.com/opinion/guest-column/burmese-neo-nazi-movement-rising-against-muslims.html ] This is when their influence now combined with the website would begin permeating globally for everybody to see, thus allowing for the far-right in Europe to see a full display of tactics and coordination for the 21st century. And is now the exact same model used by the far-right in Europe and now across the globe. And it wasn't just the tactics of the 969 movement that were utilized, in fact the original American creator of the 969 movement's site here deliberately wanted the movement to spread, so much so they proposed "to use a modified version of the bylaws of the Wikimedia Foundation for the 969 Movement Inc." [ https://web.archive.org/web/20131030044052/https://969movement.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=5 ]. This was deliberately done so in order to decentralize the movement itself and for "people in their own countries to start 969 Chapters for their own organizing efforts" which explains why the far-right despite being so decentralized are capable of coordination on a mass-scale through the internet because a modified version of Wikimedia had been co-opted, the only that was used for the 969 movement. But rather than simply using Buddhism, since they're in Europe they chose Christianity and "European Civilization" as that would've been more effective for a local context, but ultimately the template and central core of the far-right is the 969 movement. This is highlighted once again when the creator of the site states in the same post, "There needs to be discussion at how much (or little) ordained monks participate in this process and what the opinions of the 969 monks in Myanmar are about this proposal." [ https://web.archive.org/web/20131030044052/https://969movement.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=5 ].

And Burma has not only been co-opted for the simple means of efficiency but has possibly also been done so due to a singular alignment with Fascism's idea of a 'proletariat nation'. [ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P6bWO3XxLfY&t=105s ] In Fascist theory, proletariat nations are nations that have often been oppressed, much like how Myanmar has since the 1900s been fighting colonialism, Japanese fascism, sanctions but it has also does so whilst remaining completely and utterly Burmese. Of course, the formation of this ideology is in itself proof, somehow the poorest nation in ASEAN had the will and pride to articulate and coordinate to form an entirely new ideology that would now form a distinct branch of Fascism and of course in 2019 cause a genocide of the Rohingya population. [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rohingya_genocide ] Predating this there were already Muslim shops being systematically discriminated against meaning this had been building up for about a decade now, much much earlier than the development of Fascist movements in Europe. Which completes the pictures as to why Burma would completely fit the imagination of the European far-right as unlike Japan which is although apart of the far-right movement in some capacity they have ultimately, at least in the eyes of the European far-right, have been "corrupted" by the West and India too. But Burma completely shatters the category in itself, not imitating European Fascism but completely asserting it's own vision. But of course like all Fascist ideologies it still has a collective myth, the most obvious being of the colonial Burmese empire, the Toungoo Empire. It arose from a small city state, a single city state dubbed "Taungoo" from about 1510-39 that seperated from Ava. [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Ava ] And in 1599 would grow to encompass an entire sub-continent, systematically move entire populations, enslave them, force Theravada Buddhism, Burmese legislature and even go as far as threaten the Chinese. [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Toungoo_Empire] And of course in the 1800s during the Burmes-Anglo wars whilst entire subcontinents like India fell there weren't as many revolts. The Burmese persisted across 3 wars, across 60 years and even then 20 more years of guerilla warfare would persist. [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-Burmese_Wars ] It even got to the point that Burma had to be give an entirely seperate constitution from British India's allowing for more greater local independence . [ https://www.burmalibrary.org/mm/government-of-burma-act-1935-the-1937-constitution ] And of course Burma was also the earliest of the colonies due to General Aung San's efforts to become a fully independent nation. A combination of all these fuel fascist and far-right imagination, even after an entire century the Burmese have persisted and it seems they're still going.

There was also this meeting that took place between Daw Aung San Su Kyi and Viktor Orban of Hungary where in 2019 met specifically to address Muslims[ https://www.dw.com/en/opinion-in-cozying-up-to-orban-suu-kyi-falls-even-further-from-grace/a-49108276 ]. Coincidentally during a time when anti-Muslim sentiment in Europe was still relatively low due to the much lower population and no formal "movement" had occurred unlike in the 2020s where there's already growing concerns of far-right radicalism. Simply put a noble laureate that was meant to championing Burmese democracy genuinely had no business ideologically aligning this similarly on such an issue which ends up supporting my point that Burma specifically may be playing a central role in influencing fascism in Europe and the greater far-right movement occurring in Europe as it'd simply make no sense for a policy this seperated from global discourse to have seemingly occurred between Burma and Hungary of all countries. This had also happened during the year 2019 when the attacks on the local Rohingya weren't just coincidence or a singular event but now a consistently maintained state-backed policy by the NLD and Daw Aung San Su Kyi as a result [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rohingya_genocide#2017%E2%80%93present:_Rohingya_genocide ]. This also highlights, directly the development of fascism to again be much earlier than that of European fascist movements which means the origins of Buddhist Fascism completely predates that of the European far-right's.

Note: Sorry about any grammatical or spelling errors, I have learning difficulties so I often have to type in college, sorry. But please do engage with the essay on the thread if possible. ^_^

Also cleaned up the links' formatting so people wouldn't have to manually copy and paste anymore.