In 1988, student activists in Myanmar were protesting the military-dominated government of Gen. Ne Win. At some point, a rumor took hold that the U.S. Navy would be sending a ship to support them. One protester, who decades later still preferred not to give his name, said that he chartered a boat of his own to go greet the Americans. Others in Yangon, convinced of coming U.S. support, dug bomb shelters and printed signs to welcome the American GIs. Needless to say, the U.S. military never came. The boat that many expected was likely the USS Coral, passing nearby on a routine voyage.

But although the United States never sent a battleship in support of Myanmar's democracy, over the coming decades, U.S. policymakers emerged as consistent, if imperfect, advocates of it. Up through 2024, Republican and Democratic administrations consistently used sanctions, refugee programs, Voice of America broadcasting, and other tools to weigh in on the side of those fighting for freedom.

In 1988, student activists in Myanmar were protesting the military-dominated government of Gen. Ne Win. At some point, a rumor took hold that the U.S. Navy would be sending a ship to support them. One protester, who decades later still preferred not to give his name, said that he chartered a boat of his own to go greet the Americans. Others in Yangon, convinced of coming U.S. support, dug bomb shelters and printed signs to welcome the American GIs. Needless to say, the U.S. military never came. The boat that many expected was likely the USS Coral, passing nearby on a routine voyage.

But although the United States never sent a battleship in support of Myanmar’s democracy, over the coming decades, U.S. policymakers emerged as consistent, if imperfect, advocates of it. Up through 2024, Republican and Democratic administrations consistently used sanctions, refugee programs, Voice of America broadcasting, and other tools to weigh in on the side of those fighting for freedom.

Now, however, much of this support has been curtailed. Instead, the Trump administration appears to be laying the groundwork to cooperate with the military regime in a—likely unsuccessful—bid for rare-earth minerals. A number of entrepreneurs have emerged in the gray space between business and diplomacy, all seeking to help broker a deal between U.S. President Donald Trump and the junta. As one of them told Foreign Policy, “This is Shark Tank.”

In the early 1990s, Myanmar advocacy emerged emboldened from the success of the anti-apartheid campaign in South Africa. Amid the optimism following the end of the Cold War, Washington passed several rounds of sanctions, starting in 1997, that stopped almost all imports from Myanmar and U.S. investment in the country. At the same time, a group of U.S. funded media, human rights groups, and humanitarian organizations began collaborating with activists and practitioners in Myanmar and the diaspora. In doing so, they nurtured a pro-democracy bloc that continued for........

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