New Mandala

20 responses so far ↓

• 1 Patrick Jory // Oct 2, 2006 at 12:55 pm

  Hello Andrew, First time here and not quite sure of my way around, but saw a familiar name and thought I’d drop by for a chat.

  It’s very, very depressing. All of the major international TV networks and print news agencies that I have been able to look at this morning are talking about Surayudh as a “former army commander”, “professional soldier”, “miltary reformer”. As far as I can see there is NO MENTION that he is a privy councillor and one of the king’s close advisors!! It’s pathetic! It is not Surayudh’s military background, but the fact that he is a close advisor to the king that is the key to his appointment as PM. In McCargo’s words, he is part of “network monarchy”.

  The coup group are producing a theatre, where the main actor is the military – and everyone believes it! They can not control the media and political discourse outside the Thailand so they must engage in these theatrics to convince the international community that it was a military, not a royalist coup. Because if a powerful critique implicating the monarchy in the coup began circulating in the international media it would be extremely dangerous not only for the coup group but for the monarchy itself. So the military in fact is the fall guy for the royalists. We MUST tell people WHO is producing the play.

  Witness the extraordinary manipulation of the coup group’s name: in Thailand it is the “khana patirup rabop prachathipatai an mi phra maha kasat song pen pramuk” (thus ensuring Thais know the coup has the support of the monarchy, and thereby shielding it from criticism courtesy of the lese majeste law) whereas in the English version it is the “Council for Democratic Reform” – no mention of the monarchy. All of this is designed to hide the monarchy’s involvement in the coup from the international community.

  We must therefore condemn in the strongest possible terms the fact that a privy councillor has been appointed by a royalist military junta which has just carried out a military coup, arrested elected politicians at gun-point, seized control of the media, shut down critical websites, purged miltary and police officers appointed by the former elected civilian government, and banned political activity.

  Why can’t intelligent people put two and two together and condemn what has happened, a coup d’etat NOT by the military but by the royalists, who are protected from any criticism because of the strict bans on any critical reference to the monarchy in political discourse?

  Rather than cheering on a royalist puppet apppointed by a military junta spouting the king’s inane self-sufficiency nonsense (which the royal family itself has never practised) we must unequivocally condemn the appointment. It must never be forgotten that the Thai electorate has just been disenfranchised at the barrel of a gun.

• 2 XKMasada // Oct 2, 2006 at 10:24 pm

  It’s not just you – lots of young people that I know are asking for the first time in their lives what the King’s role in the whole situation was/is. Of course, most of them have been indoctrinated to believing that “If the King endorses it, it must be good.” But at least it’s better than “The King is not involved in politics” myth that has been built over the last 50 years.

  Sooner or later, the situation for the junta/Surayud government will turn ugly (as inevitably happens after a coup) and people will start asking what went wrong – did the King endorse the wrong people, or was the King’s endorsement flawed in the first place?

  The palace has been drawn out. If the situation is managed incorrectly (or correctly, depending on who’s perspective you’re taking), this whole mess could be a set up for the greatest blow against the monarchy since 1932.

• 3 Vichai N // Oct 3, 2006 at 2:30 am

  Sooner or later YKMasada? And why should it go INEVITABLY wrong? From what wisdon or prescience do you make your doomsday forecast for the Thai Kingdom?

  Already the transition into a civilian interim government is 2 days ahead of schedule. And those Thaksin children are likely to face Baht 5.0 billion tax fine on that AwfulRich-Temasek-Shitty deal. I would call that very quick progress YKMasada! And before Thaksin can even complete unpacking his 100 or so luggages in London, there is already stampede to be delisted from Thai Rak Thai party roster. Maybe those TRT members have finally seen the light . . but I doubt that. These TRT crooks will just run when their dark deeds are about to be uncovered and without Thaksin to shield them . . all they can do is run.

  The monarchy has been an institution in Thailand for much longer than you were employed by the Shinawatra YKMasada. If the King openly endorsed the military coup, and the majority of the Thai citizenry also approved by the way, it must be because Thaksin was seriously endangering the peace and harmony of the Kingdom.

  I remember you YKMasada in the Nation Forum. You were so openly in favor of Thaksin’s extrajudicial rampage in that Y2003 anti-drugs campaign (deplored by the King by the way). So I know where you stand on the ‘rule of law’ issue.

  I just thought it was sweet justice that Thaksin should be extrajudicially deposed from office, and, maybe later on his illgottens seized by the extrajudicial junta. That won’t even be enough justice still for the 2,000 or so defenseless souls Thaksin murdered in his Y2003 ya ba extrajudicial rampage.

• 4 XKMasada // Oct 3, 2006 at 4:26 pm

  Vichai N, history is my guide. There has not been a single coup in modern Thai history that was not followed or preceded by bloodshed. The Army is like some evil sword in a Hong Kong kung fu movie – once the weapon comes out of its scabbard, it must taste blood. It’s a byproduct of the way of the their thinking. Violence is the raison d’etre of the military.

  The Ror Sor Chor coup 1991 resulted in massive bloodshed in 1992. Both Young Turk I and II failed, but resulted in armed fighting in Bangkok and many dead and injured. The military seized power in the evening of 6 October 1976 right after it massacred students at Thammasat. Thanom’s self-coup in 1971 resulted in many deaths in 14 October 1973.

  Maybe you can say that Sonthi is different, that he’s a career soldier, he wants no power – he just wants to serve the King, blah blah blah… But Sonthi is Surayud’s boy, and Surayud is Prem’s boy, etc. There is a continuous ideological link between all of Thailand’s military dictators: they all believed that electoral democracy was unsuited for Thailand, that stupid villagers – even 60 million of them! – could not be wiser than one man, and that anything that threatened the ultimate power of that one man deserved to be utterly destroyed. This latest coup has made this ideology clear to yet another generation of Thais, and it is a lesson they will not forget.

• 5 Vichai N // Oct 3, 2006 at 9:25 pm

  Too bad Thaksin did not heed history’s lesson YKMasada. And he had lots of recent historical lessons that would have given him warning not to abuse his powers: Suharto, Marcos, Estrada.

  It was Thaksin who brought the tanks to the streets of Bangkok YKMasada.

  I do not believe your doomsday forecast for Thailand. You make sweeping statements about people and generals you do not know and you are only carried by your blind affection for that corrupt person Thaksin Shinawatra. Good riddance to him.

• 6 Vichai N // Oct 3, 2006 at 10:36 pm

  YKMasada you said – “There has not been a single coup in modern Thai history that was not followed or preceded by bloodshed.” Because you spoke with such authority on the subject, I checked and discovered you were bullshitting YKMasada.

  According to Gulfnews.com:

  “In principle, any military coup against a democratically-elected government must be condemned. The experience of Third World countries suggests that coups have never helped establish better systems or put nations on the course of reforms and stability. On the contrary, they have always accompanied by bloodshed and caused additional problems, divisions and backwardness.

  In Thailand, however, military coups looked different. Since 1932, the year in which Thailand became a constitutional monarchy, the country has witnessed 17 successful coups, all of which were bloodless with their leaders remaining loyal to King Bhumibol Adulyadej, retaining the monarchic system, and avoiding the prosecution of their predecessors. In several cases, coups took place as a way out of the mess created by elected civilian governments or as a prelude to introducing a better democratic system. This, according to many Thais, is applied to the recent military coup led by army commander General Sonthi Boonyaratklin that ousted caretaker prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra last week.”

  Can you remind me again YKMasada why you got so much kick out of Thaksin’s extrajudicial rampage in Y2003 that resulted in 2,500 or so defenseless unarmed villagers killed merely because some poorly paid undertrained hicks of policemen included these suspects in a police blacklist?

• 7 anonymous // Oct 7, 2006 at 4:44 pm

  Vichai … there was only 10 including this recent coup, where did you count the 17 coups????

• 8 XKMasada // Oct 7, 2006 at 8:45 pm

  Vichai, I’m not bullshitting. Gulfnews.com is wrong.

  Read my post. A year after the 1991 coup, there was widespread killing in the streets and torturing of prisoners. The 1st Young Turk coup failed and led directly to the 2nd Young Turk coup, which caused violent fighting in the streets between rebel and government factions. The coup of1976 happened on the evening of the 6 October 1976 massacres. The list of coups that have ended in bloodshed goes on and on and on and on……

  anonymous, the list of 17 coups probably includes the unsuccessful ones. The Boworadej Rebellion of 1934, when King Prajadhipok’s forces tried to overthrow the young government during the middle of elections. Resulted in aerial bombing of Bangkok and large scale fighting in several provinces. The Songsuradet Rebellion. Numerous coups in the late 1940’s and early 1950’s. Young Turk 1 and Young Turk 2.

• 9 Ant // Oct 8, 2006 at 1:35 am

  Did anyone catch the news yesterday or the day before about the taxi driver who crashed his taxi into a tank in protest of the coup?

• 10 Vichai N // Oct 8, 2006 at 12:55 pm

  But of course you were bullshitting YKMasada. I was aware that the 1992 unsuccessful was bloody, so too was the 1976 democracy uprising against Thanom. But here are your exact authoratative words YKMasada:

  “…history is my guide. There has not been a single coup in modern Thai history that was not followed or preceded by bloodshed. ”

  you said ‘every’.

• 11 Nganadeeleg // Oct 8, 2006 at 2:44 pm

  Who cares if it was a military or royalist coup?

  The average Thaksin voter would respect the coup even more if the king wanted it, so what’s the big problem?

  Please don’t reply with nonsense about ‘democracy’ etc

• 12 Teth // Nov 10, 2007 at 9:05 am

  It is interesting how Vichai N. has disappeared. Perhaps he has developed a sense of shame. Perhaps his anger has simmered away into nothingness. Perhaps he is still finding an excuse.

• 13 Andrew Walker // Nov 10, 2007 at 9:32 am

  Vichai is currently in his Jeru mode. Not sure what will prompt a switch back to Vichai. May be something to do with the moon.

• 14 nganadeeleg // Nov 10, 2007 at 10:28 am

  The Thailand portion of this blog/forum would be rather boring without Jeru & Vichai.

  Without them, I wonder whether Republican would manage to be self sufficient in sprouting his anti royal vitriol.

  Also, Andrew has been rather quiet of late in his support of PPP(TRT) – perhaps he thinks that Samak is a self sufficient blowhard, and doesn’t need AW’s overt support.

• 15 Andrew Walker // Nov 10, 2007 at 10:57 am

  Please remind me, Nganadeeleg, where I have expressed support for PPP/Samak.

• 16 nganadeeleg // Nov 10, 2007 at 3:41 pm

  PPP = TRT (same trainer & owner, different jockey)

  http://rspas.anu.edu.au/rmap/newmandala/2006/06/16/some-thoughts-on-the-political-crisis-in-thailand/#more-56

• 17 Grasshopper // Nov 10, 2007 at 9:10 pm

  nganadeeleg, pretty sure what I read there was Andrew’s support for democratic process -

  I don’t agree with all aspect of Thaksin’s economic development policy, though I consider much of the critique of his so-called populist policies to be misplaced. And I certainly do not wish to endorse his government’s flagrant abuses of human rights both in the South and in the notorious war on drugs. Nor am I, like many others, comfortable with Thaksin’s apparent manipulation of key democratic institutions. But, my support is motivated by the belief that the fundamental democratic institution is the ballot box.

  You must have cast a pretty big net to come up with only that. Also, if democratic process for you is just a horse race then this is clearly a perfect example of why Thailand only has Democracy-Lite 0.7 Beta installed! -_-

• 18 nganadeeleg // Nov 10, 2007 at 11:38 pm

  I cannot be bothered searching all AW’s posts, so I just went to his first one – remember I’m not an academic, and this is just a hobby to me.

  Maybe I am mistaken, but from the tone of New Mandala, I have formed the impression that AW (and a few others here) are barracking for Samak (PPP).

• 19 Historicus // Nov 11, 2007 at 5:20 am

  nganadeeleg : get another hobby. Your accusations are tiresome.

• 20 nganadeeleg // Nov 11, 2007 at 9:33 am

  Thanks for the tip, Historicus, but I it’s my hobby, not yours, so I will give it up when it becomes tiresome to me, not you.

  At least we agree on something, or have you changed your view since 26th October when you stated: I am not enamoured by PPP and despise Samak

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