After the Second World War, the US became a new foreign patron more intrusive than anything Siam had experienced in the colonial era. While Britain had focused on its colonies and had never taken more than peripheral interest in Siam, the US seized on Thailand as an ally and base for opposing the spread of communism in Asia. To build Thailand’s capability for this role, the US helped to revive and strengthen the military rule, which had faltered at the close of the Second World War, and supported a revival of the monarchy. To consolidate Thailand’s membership of the ‘free world’ camp in the Cold War, the US promoted ‘development’, meaning primarily economic growth through private capitalism. To achieve ‘national security’, US funding helped to push the mechanisms of the nation-state more deeply into society than before.