US Pairs Myanmar Peace Push With a Hunt for Rare Earths

Washington wants a seat at Myanmar's mineral table, and it's using peace talks to get there. A State Department strategy document, approved August 31 and posted online more recently, lays out how the US mission in Myanmar — still called Burma in the text — plans to expand American influence and open a path to the country's rare-earth resources, according to Strait Times.

The diplomacy is already moving. Reuters reported last month that US officials quietly held talks with Myanmar's nominally civilian government, led by the former general behind the 2021 coup that plunged the country into civil war. The UN estimates that war has killed 100,000 people and displaced more than 3.5 million. The re-engagement, which involves the State Department's top intelligence official Michael Vance, breaks with years of US efforts to isolate the military.

The strategy names rare earths directly. It calls for work toward a ceasefire that offers a pathway to a lasting peace agreement by 2030, including at least three multistakeholder forums that produce agreements or policy proposals on fiscal federalism and territorial demarcation — steps it says will create opportunities to access Burma's bountiful rare earth resources and combat scam centers. Those negotiations would involve the country's many armed groups, from pro-democracy forces to ethnic insurgents who have fought the military for decades. Most of the minerals sit in conflict-hit areas and currently ship to China.

What the document doesn't say may matter just as much. It never spells out whether Washington intends to lift sanctions or resolve the compliance headaches that keep investors away. The US still maintains financial sanctions on coup leader-turned-president Min Aung Hlaing, other military-backed government figures and their business interests, though the Trump administration has removed several Myanmar nationals and companies from its list.

There's a commercial to-do list too. The mission aims to boost US exports to shrink Washington's trade deficit with the impoverished nation and to lock in at least three major commercial or investment deals worth more than $5 million each for American companies. It also prioritizes law enforcement cooperation against online scam centers that target Americans, plus expanded help repatriating Myanmar nationals from the United States.

The State Department didn't respond to a request for comment on the document. For now, the blueprint shows how far Washington is willing to reach — into a war zone, and into a mineral supply chain it has spent years watching Beijing dominate.