Junta chief Min Aung Hlaing has ordered all military reserves to prepare for front-line battle amid a shortage of combat soldiers, according to military sources.
The call-up comes after the junta lost over 100 bases and numerous soldiers to the resistance’s ongoing Operation 1027 offensive, which has spread from northern Shan State to the middle of the country.
The order for reservists to join the front-line fight came from the junta boss himself, said former army captain Lin Htet Aung, citing a military informant.
“All auxiliary forces have been put on alert, with many already sent to infantry battalions for the frontline,” said Lin Htet Aung, who defected to the nationwide civil disobedience movement (CDM) following the 2021 military coup.
Military doctors still studying for degrees or working at military hospitals have also been ordered to join combat troops in conflict zones.
“The military is currently faced with multiple front lines across the country and suffering shortages of combat troops. The junta seems to be trying to fill the gaps with all the military personnel it can find,” said the ex-captain, a member of People’s Embrace, a group formed by former military personnel to help soldiers who refuse to fight for the regime.
The Irrawaddy could not independently verify his report.
Operation 1027 was launched last Friday by the ethnic Brotherhood Alliance of the Arakan Army, Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) and Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA). It has so far seized over 100 junta bases and several towns in northern Shan and Kachin states and upper Sagaing and Mandalay regions.
The offensive has been joined by other anti-regime groups, including the powerful Kachin Independence Army (KIA).
Operation 1027 attacks have killed dozens of regime troops and forced dozens more to surrender their bases and weapons. Resistance groups have also seized at least seven towns, including border towns in northern Shan, where overland trade with China has been shut down.
Despite deploying artillery and airstrikes, junta troops have so far been unable to retake any of the bases lost to Operation 1027.
Resistance groups have expanded the offensive over the past few days, seizing junta bases and towns elsewhere in the country.
Junta troops were already suffering heavy losses before the latest resistance offensive, according to political analyst Ye Myo Hein, a visiting scholar at the US Institute of Peace and a global fellow at the Wilson Center.
He estimated in May that the military had lost at least 21,000 personnel through casualties, desertion and defections since the coup, leaving a force of about 150,000 personnel including 70,000 combat soldiers.
Since early this year, the military has been planning to fill the gaps in combat units by calling up 30,000 reservists, another military analyst said.
