A tyrant nobody knows

Perfection,of a kind,was what he was after wrote W.H. Auden in his Epitaph on a Tyrant.

Perfection,of a kind,was what he was after wrote W.H. Auden in his Epitaph on a Tyrant. Perhaps it is this ambition that moves Than Shwe,the senior general in the junta which has run Myanmar into the ground. It may explain an inexplicable folly: building Naypyidaw Seat of Kings,a grand new capital in a remote malaria-ridden area 320 km 200 miles from Yangon,Myanmars main city and former capital.

The project seems to obsess him. In this biography,Benedict Rogers recounts an anecdote from a former American military attaché in Myanmar,who approached Than Shwe at a reception to introduce himself. Before he could utter a word,Than Shwe recited: Canberra,Sydney; Washington,DC,New York; The Hague,Amsterdam; Ottawa,Toronto. Many countries have an administrative capital separate from the major economic and population centres. Then he sauntered away.

At least the American recognised the general. If Than Shwe were to take his place in a line-up of war criminals and tyrants,few outside his own country would know either the face or the name. Yet Than Shwe has for two decades misruled a country of more than 50 million people. So Mr Rogerss attempt to analyse his life story is a valiant bid to do what is clearly needed.

Sadly,however,his search for the truth is doomed. Even if Mr Rogers,a writer and human-rights activist,knew Burmese,he would grapple with the secrecy that surrounds the junta. As it is,he has had to rely on gossip,anecdote,dubious official reports,speculation and extrapolation. Even a detail as basic as where the general was born is carefully attributed to a source close to a businessman reputed to be close to Than Shwe.

Worse,Than Shwe seems to be several different people. A senior United Nations envoy thinks him quite a vain guy,who dresses well,sits straight and looks good. To a former Thai diplomat,however,he is a stout man with glasses and teeth covered in red spots from betel nut.

Some things were already known about him: that he outraged public opinion when leaked video footage showed his daughters astonishingly lavish wedding,in one of the poorest countries in the world. It is also no secret that he is superstitious. It is less known perhaps that a favourite soothsayer is a tiny,hunched deaf-mute in her mid-forties,widely known as ET. And it may not be general knowledge that one explanation for another folly forcing farmers to plant jatropha for biofuels was that an astrologer had advised this method to neutralise the powers of his nemesis,the detained opposition leader,Aung San Suu Kyi.

But if the book adds little to what we know for certain about Than Shwe,it is nevertheless a timely account of the awfulness of the regime he heads,whose leaders seem sure to continue to hold real power even after a stage-managed election in November. As Mr Rogers points out,Than Shwes predecessor,Ne Win,also gave his dictatorship a civilian mask.

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But Than Shwe himself remains a mystery: not least because few people seem to think him very bright. His tactical nous and staying power have been consistently underestimated,perhaps because of the consensus characteristic that emerges from Mr Rogerss biography: in the words of a Western diplomat whom he quotes,Than Shwe is a bit of a thug.