"This article is written in response to Time to engage Myanmar?s military by Adam P MacDonald, published on this site on February 4."..... "It is troubling to recently hear of international assertions that the sovereign panacea for what ails Myanmar is the mere "professionalization of the Tatmadaw" - ie, the military. This is profoundly off the mark in grasping what Burman-dominated armed forces both have been and still remain: either a brutally armed enterprise or a profit-making military machine. "Educating leadership out of its dark old ways" reflects the same naivete that the world has witnessed in failed international interventions in both Iraq and Afghanistan. Internationals, seeing themselves coming to the rescue in Myanmar, are on the same track again. In order to reach viable solutions for this country with its rich geo-strategic, human and natural resource potential, there are several critical realities to be faced concerning military reform or Security Sector Reform (SSR) as it is referred to in Myanmar?s case. The context for this understanding should be based on the realization that the Tatmadaw is the core of a massive repressive governance apparatus, whose old power brokers are still in power. In simplest terms, Burman generals have provided the central direction and muscle in designing and wielding the Burman-dominated Army as the lead instrument of government in dominating ethnic minorities. This has been for the specific purpose of controlling ethnics? ancestral lands rich in most of Myanmar?s natural resources, host to the majority of its hydro-power potential, and dominating most of its borders and international trade route access. In other words, the basis for Myanmar?s economy..."