What Myanmar stands to gain – and Thailand lose – from a President Clinton
As Bangkok cosies up to Beijing, Naypidaw is drawing away – giving the US an opportunity for a new strategic partnership in the region
With the presidential election in the United States getting nearer, there is one country where the outcome could have far-reaching consequences: Myanmar.
Donald Trump has not said anything noteworthy about Southeast Asia, but Hillary Clinton, who is leading in the polls, is a close friend of Myanmar’s State Counsellor and de facto head of government, Aung San Suu Kyi. There is not doubt that Clinton would feel more comfortable dealing with her than the generals who now rule America’s traditional ally in the region, Thailand.
Myanmar’s drift away from its previously close economic, political and military relationship with China – and the Thai government’s increasingly close ties with Beijing – opens the possibility of a new strategic partner for the US in the region.
Watch: Obama vows to lift Myanmar sanctions
As the writer Andrew Kaspar wrote in The Irrawaddy, a Myanmar-based online publication, in July 2014: “In Hard Choices, a 656-page tome in which Clinton recalls her visits to countries around the world, an entire chapter is devoted to [Myanmar], the only Asia-Pacific nation other than China to be afforded such prominence.”
