"One day, the much maligned military machine in Burma will give way to new ways of governing this truly extraordinary country. In a nation where good news is rarely forthcoming, there is at least some solace in knowing that perhaps that most quintessential of all Buddhist truths - impermanence - applies as much to dominant political regimes as it does to everything else. No government lasts forever, and clearly there will come a time when the Generals now ruling Burma will no longer be in power, and when more open forms of governance will begin to take root in this nation of over 50 million rights-holders. Of this we can be certain. What remains unknown, of course, are the questions of when and even more vitally, how? What might have appeared to have been the when moment in September 2007, quickly became yet another Oh no, not again refrain as it became clear that Than Shwe and his backers were as far as ever from relinquishing power. The human tragedies and gross ineptitude shown following Cyclone Nargis provided a stage for additional expectations that structural change might be near, but this too failed to materialise..."