It was not long ago that General Min Aung Hlaing, the leader of the recent military coup in Burma (also known as Myanmar), was being fêted by the UK. In 2013, he met General Sir David Richards, the then head of Britain’s armed forces, who praised Burma’s “remarkable progress” in moving towards democracy and described Hlaing as “highly intelligent and well-intentioned”. After decades of dictatorship, Burma’s military had freed its most high profile political prisoner, Aung San Suu Kyi, and was finally letting her run the country in league with the army. UK training for Burma’s security apparatus soon followed Richards’ meeting with General Hlaing, and Suu Kyi spent a day at Britain’s top military academy, Sandhurst.