(WASHINGTON) -- As a U.S. team of experts heads to Myanmar to assist in recovery from the devastating earthquake that killed more than 2,000 people in Southeast Asia on Friday, international teams, including those from China and Russia, are filling the void in the U.S. absence.
The U.S. said Monday that it would provide $2 million in aid and a small U.S. Agency for International Development emergency response team has been deployed to assess the situation in Myanmar, but officials said that it had not yet been able to enter the country as of Monday morning.
While the dollar amount of initial aid is in line with what the U.S. has pledged in the past, the overall pace of the response has been slower. In the aftermath of the 2023 earthquake in Morocco, for example, a USAID Disaster Assistance Response Team was deployed just hours later, although Morocco did not ultimately ask for DARTs.
That same year when Libya endured catastrophic flooding, DARTs were deployed the same day. And when a major earthquake struck Turkey and Syria that same year, the DART teams were also launched just a few hours after the disaster hit. In both cases, the DARTs took a few days to get on the ground.
The U.S. response comes amid President Donald Trump’s efforts to dismantle USAID, laying off thousands of employees, revoking funding for more than 80% of its programs and closing its headquarters, although those efforts are being challenged in multiple court cases.
On Friday, the State Department announced it was officially shuttering the agency and taking over “many of USAID's functions and its ongoing programming."
The State Department has pushed back on the assessment that cuts to USAID have limited the earthquake response, but officials say there has been at least some logistical impact caused by the reorganization, rather than a lack of funding.
“I would reject the notion this is obviously a result of the USAID cuts and that kind of funding,” State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said Monday. “We’re certainly in the region.”
In the meantime, it was Chinese teams that arrived 18 hours after the quake and more than 400 Chinese personnel are now on the ground in the region. Beijing has sent in planes full of supplies, providing $14 million in aid. China also has multiple teams in Thailand.
It’s a public relations win for China, showing it can be a reliable partner when its neighbors are in crisis.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning on Monday posted on X photos and videos of Chinese workers on the ground, rescuing survivors and delivering supplies, saying, “China, a friend in need.”
A leading aid group said in a statement to ABC News on Tuesday that the U.S. has already “missed the first urgent window to help find survivors.”
Abby Maxman, president and CEO of Oxfam America, blamed the Trump administration’s dismantling of USAID for what she characterized as the U.S.’s “severely compromised” emergency response.
"For decades, the US Government has responded to sudden onset emergencies primarily by providing humanitarian support through USAID. With USAID effectively gutted and critical staff receiving their final notices in the midst of an emergency, the US Government’s ability to respond to the humanitarian crisis in Myanmar and future crises is severely compromised," Maxman said. "Speed, collaboration, and resources are life and death matters when disaster strikes. The illegal decision to dismantle USAID means the U.S. will be unable to show up like it has in past emergencies."
At the site where a high-rise building collapsed on Sunday in Bangkok, a group of U.S. military personnel were coming and going from the search area throughout Monday. The American team is working with Israeli soldiers to search for survivors, sending drones into areas too dangerous for rescue workers to reach.
“We’re learning a lot from the Americans, and they’re bringing in a lot of good equipment,” said Choktong Issarangkool, one of the volunteers in the rescue and search teams who is also acting as a translator for the American teams.
Thais say they are grateful for the American assistance, something this region has become accustomed to following a natural disaster: U.S. aid teams have always been among the first on the ground to help.
State Department officials said discussions regarding a more extensive response to the earthquake are ongoing, including the possibility of sending a DART team, although it might be smaller than in past efforts.
“Our disaster experts, including those based in Bangkok, Manila and Washington, D.C., continue to monitor the situation with coordination with U.S. government counterparts in the region,” Bruce said.
She emphasized that the $2 million of initial support would be implemented through partner organizations that were already working in the impacted areas.
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