The old soldier who leads Myanmar is called "the bulldog" — for good reason.
Pro-democracy demonstrators by the thousands may be willing to sacrifice themselves in the streets but stand little chance of success unless they — or other forces — can oust a jowly, high school dropout with delusions of royal grandeur from his post of virtually absolute power.
Senior Gen. Than Shwe has shown no willingness to step down as head of the ruling junta, compromise with protesters, or listen to international calls for reform in Myanmar, also known as Burma.…"The very fate of Burma is linked to Than Shwe, whose manic, xenophobic and superstitious character bode ill for a country that needs to pull itself into the 21st century and into the international community of democratic nations," says the Irrawaddy, a Thailand-based news magazine that maintains a "Than Shwe Watch" column.…The 74-year-old junta leader has remained publicly silent throughout the crisis, sequestering himself in his remote, bunker-like capital, filtering news from the demonstrations and the outside world through the narrow prism of more than a half-century of military service."As long as he is No. 1, things probably will not change. He is very, very stubborn, and he doesn’t see the problem being with his council but with the demonstrators," says Donald M. Seekins, a Myanmar scholar at Japan’s Meio University.
Naypyitaw (pronounced NAY’-pee-daw), or "Royal City," is the new capital deep in the countryside that Than Shwe ordered built in a bizarre act laden with royal pretensions.
Numerous, but unconfirmed, stories have circulated about the portly, bemedaled Than Shwe acting like a king and his daughters ordering military officers to treat them as royalty…
General Shwe’s house [Google Earth]
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