Two years afterMyanmars coup on February 1 2021, the countrys large and growing resistance forces receive almost no attention outside the country.

The democratic opposition, fronted by the National Unity Government (NUG), but comprising many different groups, armies, militias and individuals, has also struggled to gain awareness, even for its substantial battlefield successes.

And perhaps most notably, theoppositions pleas for weaponsfrom the West to fight against an increasingly brutal crackdown by the military junta have gone unheeded.

The difference with the Wests response to Ukraines war against Russia could not be more stark. While the two conflicts are not completely analogous, it is nonetheless striking how much Ukraine has galvanised the international community, while Myanmar has almost completely been ignored.

No charismatic, wartime figure

Part of this has to do with the visibility of a central, iconic leader. Withousted leader Aung San Suu Kyiand other public figures locked up, Myanmars resistance forces have no recognisable public face.

The NUG has an acting president, Duwa Lashi La, who makes occasionalYouTubeand social media appearances. While he enjoys a strong reputation among ethnic Kachin in the countrys north, he is barely recognised on the global, or even national, stage.

By contrast, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskys transformation into a wartime commander has resulted in a huge global profile. He has given carefully scripted speeches toforeign parliamentsand rousing addresses to both the Ukrainian people andkey international meetings.

His constant efforts to refocus attention on the next phase of fighting in Ukraine have inspired his own people, and have made the Ukrainian flag a potent symbol of defiance in the face of tyranny.

A lack of a simple narrative

Ukraine has mastered the digital battlefield, too. Its leaders have simplified the narrative and calibrated it in a powerful way to emphasise a good versus evil struggle in which Western democracies are compelled to offer both symbolic and material support.

The complexities in Myanmar ethnic, linguistic, geographic, ideological, historical and more make such a narrative much harder to muster and sustain.

Thegenocide of the Rohingyain 2017, whichtook place under the Suu Kyi-led government, also muddied the waters of the previously simplistic tale of a Nobel Peace laureate facing off against a brutal Myanmar military.

Suu Kyis government did not have oversight or control over the military that carried out the bloody purge, but this hardly seemed to matter. Suu Kyis decision to offer astubborn defenceof the militarys actions at the International Court of Justice in 2019 dramatically shifted international opinion.

Now, with Myanmars treatment of the Rohingya still such a raw issue, its unclear whether Suu Kyi or her democratically elected government deserves the sympathy and support from the West they once received.

A fringe actor on the global stage

Geography matters, too. In a global strategic sense, Myanmar has almost always been an afterthought in the West.

In contrast, for a century or more, Ukraine has been a constant site for strategic competition, especially in the duels between Western powers and the government in Moscow. The attacks on Ukraine over the past decade by a nuclear-armed Russia are therefore seen by Western powers as a first-order geopolitical threat.

As such, the US alonecommittedabout US$50 billion in total assistance to Ukraine in 2022, about half of which was military aid.

With Myanmar a far less important site of conflict, most of the international community (including the regional body of Southeast Asian states, ASEAN) have been reluctant to provide military support for the resistance fighters.

Historically,weapons smuggled into Myanmarto support anti-government armies have used neighbouring countries, most notably Thailand and India, as the gateways. Today, however, the leaders in Bangkok and New Delhi are reluctant to get too entangled in Myanmars mess. They also have their own insurgencies to keep an eye on.

When weapons and materiel do flow into Myanmar today, they are moved quietly, with as much deniability as can be marshalled. With no Western government publiclysupplying the resistance with weapons, the fighters areresortingto crowdfunding to buy weapons and using explosives pieced together with salvaged metal.

Meanwhile, the military junta has built up ahuge arsenal of weaponspurchased from Russia and China, or made domestically usingsupplies from companies in countries like the US, Japan and France.

Geopolitics may also matter when it comes to the international courts, as well.

There are two parallel genocide cases relating to Myanmar and Ukraine winding their way through the International Court of Justice in The Hague. The Ukraine case, still less than 12 months old, has received formal interventions byalmost all Western states, 33 in total.

By contrast, the Myanmar case relating to the Rohingya was launched in 2019 and not asingle countryhas formally intervened, despite several countries indicating they may do so.

An opportunity to support democracy

Another reason for the tentative international response to the Myanmar conflict is the expectation, particularly in ASEAN, that Myanmars coup-makers will, in the end, hold enough ground and continue to control the levers of power.

But we should ask if this assessment is correct. In early 2023, after two years of protest and violence, the junta looks especially vulnerable.

For example, influential voices within ASEAN, notably fromMalaysiaandIndonesia, have begun strongly rebuking the Myanmar military.

They seemingly no longer want the entire regions reputation tarred by the juntas brutal mismanagement of Myanmar. They are also aware that anti-regime forces are taking and holding significant ground.

Under these conditions, the international community needs to move more quickly to consider a future for Myanmar after this war ends. That means dramatically limiting the militarys ability to gain international legitimacy, ramping up efforts to starve the generals of weapons and financial resources, and supporting war crimes prosecutions in international courts.

At the same time, Myanmars revolutionary forces need support both on the battlefield and in civilian efforts to rebuild a traumatised society.

The invasion of Ukraine has clearly demonstrated, for the first time in many years, that Western military force can be successfully used to support a democracy under siege. If only a small fraction of the support to Ukraine was provided to Myanmars resistance fighters, they could be given the chance to one day build a thriving democratic state in the heart of Asia.

First published in THE CONVERSATION on January 30, 2023