เมื่อวันที่ 8 พฤษภาคม 2555 คุณปู่วัย 62 ปี คนหนึ่งต้องเสียชีวิตในโรงพยาบาลภายในเรือนจำของประเทศไทย ไม่ถึงหนึ่งปี หลังถูกตัดสินโทษจำคุก 20 ปี ในข้อกล่าวหา ส่งข้อความ SMS หมิ่นสถาบันกษัตริย์ของไทยสี่ข้อความ

เขาเสียชีวิตอย่างเดียวดาย ไร้ซึ่งภรรยา นางรสมาลิน ลูก และหลานๆ อยู่เคียงข้าง นายอำพล ตั้งนพคุณ ซึ่งเป็นที่รู้จักอย่างกว้างขวางในประเทศไทย ในชื่อ “อากง” ซึ่งแปลว่า คุณปู่ กลายเป็นเหยื่อของกฎหมายที่คร่ำครึ และไม่เป็นธรรมอย่างกฎหมายหมิ่นพระบรมเดชาณุภาพ และพระราชบัญญัติคอมพิวเตอร์ มาตรา 112 ซึ่งบัญญัติไว้ว่า

ผู้ใดหมิ่นประมาท ดูหมิ่น หรือแสดงความอาฆาตมาดร้ายพระมหากษัตริย์ พระราชินี รัชทายาท หรือผู้สำเร็จ ราชการแทนพระองค์ ต้องระวางโทษจำคุกตั้งแต่สามปีถึงสิบห้าปี

นายอำพลถูกตัดสินเมื่อวันที่ 23 พฤศจิกายน 2554 ให้จำคุกเป็นเวลา 5 ปี สำหรับการส่งข้อความ SMS แต่ละครั้ง เขายืนยันความบริสุทธิของตนเอง ตลอดการดำเนินคดี และจนถึงปัจจุบัน

เขาให้การต่อผู้พิพากษาว่า เขาไม่รู้วิธีส่งข้อความ SMS และครอบครัวของเขาก็ยืนยันเช่นนั้น

ข้อความดังกล่าวถูกส่งไปให้นายสมเกียรติ ครองวัฒนสุข เลขาประจำตัวของอดีตนายกรัฐมนตรี นายอภิสิทธิ เวชชาชีวะ หัวหน้าพรรคประชาธิปัตย์ และนายสมเกียรติ นำข้อความดังกล่าวไปแจ้งกับเจ้าหน้าที่ตำรวจ

กระบวนการไต่สวน ไม่สามารถอธิบายได้ว่า นายอำพล มีหมายเลขโทรศัพท์มือถือของนายสมเกียรติได้อย่างไร นอกจากนั้น หมายเลขที่ส่งข้อความ ก็ไม่ใช่หมายเลขโทรศัพท์ของนายอำพล แต่กระบวนการไต่สวนกลับกล่าวหาว่า ข้อความดังกล่าวถูกส่งมาจากโทรศัพท์มือถือ ที่มีหมายเลข IMEI เดียวกับของนายอำพล ผู้พิพากษาไม่สนใจหลักฐานที่แสดงว่า หมายเลข IMEI สามารถลอกเลียนแบบได้ ซึ่งแสดงให้เห็นถึงการขาดความเข้าใจอย่างสิ้นเชิง ในความซับซ้อนของเทคโนโลยีโทรศัพท์มือถือ

นายอำพลถูกจับกุมเมื่อวันที่ 3 สิงหาคม 2553 เขาถูกกักตัวไว้ 63 วัน จนได้รับการประกันตัวในวันที่ 4 ตุลาคม 2553 ในวันที่ 18 มกราคม 2554 เขาถูกตั้งข้อกล่าวหา และถูกจองจำ จนกระทั้งวันที่เขาสิ้นชีวิต

คณะกรรมการสิทธิมนุษยชนแห่งเอเชีย ได้แสดง ความเป็นห่วงอย่างลึกซึ้ง ในเรื่องการรักษาพยาบาลของเขา

ในขณะนี้ สาเหตุการตายของนายอำพลยังไม่เป็นที่ทราบแน่ชัด (อยู่ระหว่างการผ่าพิสูจน์) แต่ในขณะที่ถูกตัดสิน เขายังป่วยด้วยโรคมะเร็งกล่องเสียง ซึ่งการคุมขัง ทำให้เขาต้องขาดจากการรักษาพยาบาลที่เหมาะสม

ได้มีการนำเสนอข่าว การตายของเขาอย่างกว้างขวาง ทั้งในสื่อไทยและสื่อต่างประเทศ:

• ประชาไท
• New York Times
• Wall Street Journal 
• BBC
• Associated Press
• Agence France Press
• Reuters
• เนชัน
• บางกอกโพสต์
• Voice of America
• The Diplomat
• Radio Australia
• United Press International
• The Herald Sun
• The Atlantic

คดีนี้มีปัญหาที่น่าเป็นห่วงด้วยเหตุผลสองประการ

ประการแรก กระบวนการไต่สวน ไม่สามารถพิสูจน์ได้ว่า ข้อความดังกล่าว ถูกส่งโดยนายอำพล เขายืนยันเสมอว่าเขาเป็นผู้บริสุทธิ เขาและพยานปากอื่นๆ ให้การกับศาลว่า เขาไม่รู้วิธีการส่งข้อความ SMS ด้วยซ้ำ และผู้พิพากษาอ้างถึงคำให้การดังกล่าวไว้อย่างชัดเจน ในคำตัดสิน (จากเว็บไซต์ iLaw) ดังนี้

สำหรับประเด็นสำคัญในคดีที่จำเลยตั้งประเด็นว่า หมายเลขอีมี่ หรือรหัสประจำเครื่องโทรศัพท์อาจถูกปลอมแปลงได แต่จำเลยไม่สามารถหาตัวผู้เชี่ยวชาญมายืนยันได้ ส่วนประเด็นที่ว่า เอกสารในสำนวนฟ้องที่หมายเลขอีมี่หลักที่ 15 ไม่ตรงกับหมายเลขอีมี่ในเครื่องโทรศัพท์ คือในเอกสารบางจุดแสดงว่าเป็นเลข 0 บางจุดแสดงว่าเป็นเลข 2000 ขณะที่ในเครื่องโทรศัพท์จริงๆ เป็นเลข 6  ศาลวิเคราะห์ว่า หมายเลขอีมี่ 14 หลักแรกเท่านั้นที่มีความสำคัญ ตามที่พ.ต.อ.ศิริพงษ์ ติมุลา จากกองบังคับการปราบปรามอาชญากรรมทางเทคโนโลยี กล่าวและได้พิสูจน์ด้วยการใช้เว็บไซต์สำหรับตรวจสอบเลขอีมี่แสดงให้เห็นในศาลแล้วว่า เมื่อพิมพ์รหัส 14 หลักแรกตามด้วยรหัสสุดท้ายหมายเลข 6 เท่านั้นจึงปรากฏข้อมูลว่าเป็นเครื่องโทรศัพท์ยี่ห้อโมโตโรล่า แต่ถ้าเปลี่ยนเป็นเลข 0-5 และ 7-9 ทั้งที่ควรปรากฏว่าเป็นเครื่องรุ่นอื่นแต่จากการทดสอบแล้วไม่ปรากฏว่าเป็นรุ่นใดเลย จึงยิ่งชี้ให้เห็นชัดว่าหมายเลข 14 หลักแรกเท่านั้นที่ใช้ในการระบุตัว ตามที่โจทก์กล่าวอ้าง

แม้โจทก์จะไม่สามารถนำสืบพยานให้เห็นได้อย่างชัดแจ้งว่าจำเลยเป็นผู้ที่ส่งข้อความตามฟ้องจากโทรศัพท์เคลื่อนที่เครื่องดังกล่าว ไปยังโทรศัพท์เคลื่อนที่ของนายสมเกียรติ ครองวัฒนสุข เลขานุาการส่วนตัวของนายอภิสิทธิ์ แต่ก็เพราะเป็นการยากที่โจทก์จะสามารถนำสืบได้ด้วยประจักษ์พยาน เนื่องจากจำเลยซึ่งเป็นผู้กระทำความผิดดังกล่าวย่อมจะต้องปกปิดการกระทำของตนมิให้บุคคลอื่นได้ล่วงรู้ จึงจำเป็นต้องอาศัยเหตุผลประจักษ์พยานแวดล้อมที่โจทก์นำสืบเพื่อชี้วัดให้เห็นเจตนาที่อยู่ภายใน

ยังไม่มีใครรู้ว่า ใครเป็นผู้ส่งข้อความดังกล่าว แต่เป็นไปได้ยากมากที่จะเป็นนายอำพล

ประการที่สอง ถึงแม้ว่า ข้อความดังกล่าว ใช้ภาษาและคำพูด ที่ก้าวร้าว แต่การตัดสินโทษจำคุก 20 ปี นั้น ยังต้องมีการถกเถียงกันอย่างเข้มข้น ถึงความเหมาะสมของโทษนี้ ในประเทศที่มีการปกครองแบบประชาธิปไตยสมัยใหม่ อย่างที่ประเทศไทยอ้างว่าเป็น

ข้อความที่ส่ง พุ่งเป้าไปที่ราชินีสิริกิติ ภรรยาวัย 79 ปีของกษัตริย์ภูมิพล อดุลยเดช สิริกิตขึ้นชื่อในเรื่องมุมมองที่เป็นเผด็จการแบบสุดโต่ง และมีส่วนเข้าไปแทรกแซงการเมืองไทยมาหลายทศวรรษ แม้ว่า โดยทางการแล้ว ประเทศไทยจะเป็นประเทศที่ปกครองแบบกษัตริย์ภายใต้รัฐธรรมนูญ ซึ่งวังมีบทบาทในเชิงสัญลักษณ์เท่านั้น

สิริกิติ และภูมิพล มีความสัมพันธ์ที่ระหองระแหงกันมาตั้งแต่ราวๆ ปี 2528 ถึงแม้ในประเทศไทย ข้อเท็จจริงนี้จะไม่เป็นที่ทราบในทางสาธารณะ โทรเลขของสหรัฐที่รั่วออกมา เมื่อปี 2552 รายงานว่า:

ก่อนกลางปี 2551 กษัตริย์ และราชินี ใช่ชีวิตส่วนใหญ่ แบบแยกกันอยู่ ตลอดช่วง 20 ปีที่ผ่านมา ยกเว้นในการปรากฎตัวต่อสาธารณะ ความจริงที่ถูกปิดบังนี้ เริ่มขึ้นหลังจากที่ราชินี หายตัวไปจากสายตาของสาธารณะเมื่อปี 2529 เกือบ 6 เดือน เพื่อฟื้นฟูสภาพเหนื่อยล้าของจิตใจ จากการที่กษัตริย์ ปลดนายทหารเสือคู่ใจออกจากตำแหน่ง และหลังจากนั้น ความสัมพันธ์ในวงเครือญาติ ก็แตกระแหงอย่างรุนแรง โดยเหลือเพียงไม่กี่คนที่สามารถเข้าได้กับทั้งสองฝ่าย

ความร้าวฉานระหว่างภูมิพล และสิริกิติ มีมูลเหตุมาจาก ความสัมพันธ์อย่างเปิดเผยของราชินีกับทหารเสือคู่ใจ พันโทณรงค์เดช นันทโพธิ์เดช แต่ทั้งคู่ก็มึความไม่ลงรอยกันอยู่ก่อนแล้ว ในเรื่องการปกครอง และการสืบราชสมบัติ ทั้งภูมิพล และสิริกิติเชื่อว่า วังควรมีบทบาทเป็นศูนย์กลางทางการเมืองในประเทศไทย แต่ในขณะที่กษัตริย์ นิยมวิธีแบบเล่นอยู่เบื้องหลังเงียบๆ คอยกล่าวสุนทรพจน์เมื่อสถาบันต้องมีบทบาท ราชินีกลับระมัดระวังน้อยกว่ามาก และดำเนินกิจกรรมต่างๆ อย่างออกหน้าออกตา นอกจากนั้น (จนกระทั่งเมื่อไม่นานมานี้) สิริกิติยังยืนกรานที่จะให้รัชทายาทที่ถูกลืม และก้าวร้าวอย่าง ฟ้าชายวชิราลงกรณ์ขึ้นครองราชเป็นกษัตริย์รัชกาลที่ 10 ต่อจากภูมิพล โดยไม่สนใจเสียงทัดทานของภูมิพล

ถึงกระนั้น ระหว่างปี 2550 ถึง 2551 ก็ต้องมีการเปลี่ยนตัวผู้สืบราชสมบัติใหม่แบบถอดราก สิริกิติต้องยอมจำนนต่อวชิราลงกรณ์ในที่สุด หลังจากมีวีดีโอฉาววันเกิดแบบพิศดารของสุนัขสุดรักของเขา ฟูฟู ในวีดีโอ ศรีรัตน์ ภรรยาคนที่สามของเขา หมอบอยู่บนพื้นแบบเปลือยเปล่าเหลือเพียงชุดชั้นในชิ้นล่าง หลังจากนั้นฟ้าชายทิ้งศรีรัตน์ไป เพื่อใช้เวลาส่วนใหญ่ในเยอรมนี พร้อมด้วยอนุภรรยาคนใหม่ ระหว่างรับการรักษาโรคที่ยังไม่เป็นที่ทราบแน่ชัด ดังเช่นปรากฎในโทรเลขลับของสหรัฐเมื่อปี 2552:

เป็นเวลาหลายปีที่ราชินีสิริกิติสนับสนุนความสนใจในตัวฟ้าชายวชิราลงกรณ์อย่างแข็งขัน และเป็นผู้อยู่เบื้องหลังที่สำคัญ ในสายตาของอีกฝ่ายอย่างฟ้าหญิงสิรินทร ซึ่งเป็นที่พึงพอใจอย่างกว้างขวางในทางสาธารณะ ยกตัวอย่างเช่น ราชินีเป็นแรงเคลื่อนที่สำคัญเบื้องหลังฟ้าชายในการเยือนวอชิงตันเมื่อปี 2546 เธอตั้งใจอย่างมากที่จะปรับภาพลักษณ์ในสายตาของคนไทย ให้สามารถยอมรับกับกษัตริย์ในอนาคตได้ บุรุษที่เพิ่งแต่งงานใหม่ และจะมีบุตรไว้สืบสกุลต่อในไม่ช้า

ความสัมพันธ์ระหว่างแม่ลูกเปลี่ยนไปแบบพลิกฝ่ามือ ในปี 2550 เนื่องมาจากสองเหตุผล: การปรากฎของวีดีโอ และภาพนิ่งของศรีรัตน์ ภรรยาวชิราลงกรณ์ ในชุดเปลือย ทั้งบนอินเตอร์เนต ซีดี และกระจายไปทั่วทั้งกรุงเทพ กับปัญหาที่ดังขึ้นเรื่อยๆ ระหว่างที่ฟ้าชายใช้ชีวิตอยู่นอกประเทศไทย ในปี 2551 ราชินีและฟ้าชายมีปากเสียงกันกลางโรงพยาบาล ระหว่างราชินีรับฟังสรุปคำวินิจฉัย โดยฟ้าชายด่าว่าเธอด้วยความโกรธแค้น ต่อหน้านางกำนัล หลังจากนั้น นางกำนัลหลายคนปฏิเสธที่จะเข้ารับใช้ ถ้าฟ้าชายเข้าพบราชินี

ฟ้าชายวชิราลงกรณ์ใช้ชีวิตส่วนใหญ่ (เกือบ 75%) ในสองปีหลังอยู่ในยุโรป (หลักๆ จะพักที่บ้านพักตากอากาศ ในสปาบำบัด 20 กิโลเมตรนอกเมืองมิวนิค) กับอนุภรรยาหลัก และสุนัขสุดรัก ฟูฟู วชิราลงกรณ์อาจจะป่วยด้วยโรคที่เกี่ยวกับเลือด (หลายแหล่งข่าวอ้างว่า เขาติดเชื้อเอดส์ หรือไวรัสตับอักเสบซี หรือ “โรคมะเร็งเลือด” ที่พบได้ยาก หรือรวมๆ กัน ทำให้ต้องมีการเปลี่ยนถ่ายเลือดเป็นประจำ) ภรรยา(คนที่สาม)คนปัจจุบัน ศรีรัตน์ และลูกชายวัย 4 ขวบที่รู้จักกันในชื่อ องค์ที พักอยู่ในพระราชวังสุโขทัยของเขา ในกรุงเทพ แต่เมื่อวชิราลงกรณ์กลับมากรุงเทพ เขาจะพักอยู่กับอนุภรรยาคนที่สอง ในห้องพักรับรองพิเศษของกองทัพอากาศ ทางปีกหก สนามบินดอนเมือง (หมายเหตุ: อนุภรรยาทั้งสองคน เป็นพนักงานต้อนรับของการบินไทย ฟ้าชายเปลี่ยนจากการขับเครื่องบินเอฟ5เอส มาเป็นเครื่องบินโบอิ้งและแอร์บัส ของการบินไทย เมื่อไม่กี่ปีที่ผ่านมา จบหมายเหตุ) เป็นที่รู้กันมานานถึงความก้าวร้าว และอารมณ์ที่แปรปรวน ทำให้มีไม่กี่คนที่สามารถอยู่วงในของฟ้าชายได้นาน

ความไม่ลงรอยกันระหว่างสิริกิติ และวชิราลงกรณ์ เป็นตัวเปลี่ยนอย่างสิ้นเชิงในสมการการเมืองของประเทศไทย แทนที่จะสนับสนุนลูกชายของตนเองขึ้นครองราชหลังจากที่ภูมิพลเสียชีวิต สิริกิติตัดสินใจว่าควรอยู่ในอำนาจในฐานะผู้สำเร็จราชการแทน ในนามลูกคนเล็กของฟ้าชายกับศรีรัตน์ หลังจากที่กษัตริย์เสียชีวิต โดยวชิราลงกรณ์จะถูกกีดกันออกจากการขึ้นครองราช ผู้นำฝ่ายกษัตริย์นิยมอย่างเปรม ติลสูลานนท์ และอานัน ปันยารชุนเกลียดวชิราลงกรณ์มานานแล้ว และเชื่อ (จริงๆ) ว่า ถ้าเขากลายเป็นกษัตริย์ มันจะหมายถึงจุดจบของวัฒนธรรม “เครื่องข่ายอำมาตย์” ในประเทศไทย พวกเขาเป็นพันธมิตรกับสิริกิติ และพยายามเคลื่อนให้เธอเข้าสู่อำนาจหลังการเสียชีวิตของภูมิพล ซึ่งจะนำไปสู่มิติใหม่ของความขัดแย้งทางการเมืองในประเทศไทย เนื่องจากมีความเชื่อว่า ผู้นำที่ได้รับความนิยมอย่าง ทักษิณ ชินวัตร เป็นพันธมิตรกับวชิราลงกรณ์ ทำให้ฝ่ายกษัตริย์นิยมมีความพยายามอย่างแน่วแน่กว่าเดิม ที่จะทำลายบทบาททางการเมืองของเขา พวกเขากลัวว่า ถ้ารัฐบาลที่ชี้นำโดยทักษิณมีอำนาจอยู่ ในขณะที่ภูมิพลเสียชีวิต พวกเขาจะไม่มีทางขวางการขึ้นครองราชของวชิราลงกรณ์เป็นราชกาลที่ 10 ได้ (เป็นเรื่องน่าประหลาด ที่ความสัมพันธ์ระหว่างกษัตริย์และทายาทราชสมบัติของเขาพังลงมาหลายสิบปีแล้ว แต่ตอนนี้เขาดูเหมือนจะอยากให้วชิราลงกรณ์ขึ้นครองราชต่อ เป็นการเปลี่ยนจุดยืนจากหน้ามือเป็นหลังมือ ระหว่างภูมิพลและสิริกิติ)

 ตั้งแต่ปี 2550 สิริกิติเริ่มยื่นมือเข้ามาขัดขวางทักษิณ และสนับสนุนการเคลื่อนไหวของกลุ่มคลั่งเจ้าขวาจัดอย่างเสื้อเหลือง ตามรายงานโทรเลขลับของสหรัฐเมื่อเดือนพฤศจิกายน 2551:

สภาพแนวรบทางการเมืองของทักษิณถูกขีดขึ้นอย่างชัดเจน ถึงแม้จะมีผู้เล่นหลายคนเข้าร่วม…เครื่องยนต์ทักษิณต้องเจอกับกลุ่มผสมระหว่าง กษัตริย์นิยม ชนชั้นกลางกรุงเทพ และคนจากภาคใต้ โดยมีราชินีสิริกิติโผล่ออกมาร่วมในแนวรบ เพราะบทบาทของกษัตริย์ภูมิพลลดลงไปมาก…พวกเขาทั้งสองข้าง กำลังวางตำแหน่งตัวเล่นหลักของฝ่ายตนเอง ในจุดที่ว่างอยู่กับเราในทางลับ มันจะเป็นช่วงเวลาที่ประเทศไทยต้องเผชิญกับความจริง หลังจากที่กษัตริย์สวรรคต

ในวันที่ 13 ตุลาคม 2551 ราชินีสิริกิติละทิ้งการเสแสร้งว่าอยู่เหนือการเมืองทุกอย่าง เมื่อเธอเข้าร่วมในงานศพของอังคณา ระดับปัญญาวุฒิ หรือ “น้องโบว์” หนึ่งในผู้ร่วมชุมนุมเสื้อเหลืองที่เสียชีวิต ในการปะทะกัน ระหว่างตำรวจ และผู้ชุมนุมต่อต้านทักษิณ ที่พยายามขัดขวางการเข้าทำงานของรัฐสภาในวันที่ 7 ตุลาคม ดังหมายเหตุของทูตสหรัฐ:

ราชินีสิริกิติ ได้ละทิ้งตัวอย่างที่กษัตริย์ภูมิพลทำมาตลอดหลายสิบปี ด้วยการลากสถาบันกษัตริย์ที่มีภาพของการอยู่เหนือการเมือง ให้เข้าสู่ความอลม่านทางการเมือง ทำให้อนาคตของสถาบันอยู่ในอันตราย…

ราชินีสิริกิติ แสดงออกทางการเมืองอย่างชัดเจน ผิดธรรมเนียมปฏิบัติแต่เดิม โดยการเข้าร่วมงานศพของผู้ชุมนุมพันธมิตรรากหญ้าคนหนึ่ง ซึ่งเสียชีวิตในระหว่างการปะทะกันของกลุ่มพันธมิตรและตำรวจ เมื่อวันที่ 7 ตุลาคม แม้กระทั่งคนใกล้ชิดของราชินีบางคน ยังออกมาแสดงความกังวลในการแสดงออกทางการเมืองที่มากเกินไป เนื่องจากมันไปทำลายหลักการที่กษัตริย์พยายามส่งเสริมมานาน คือ การอยู่เหนือการเมืองของสถาบัน หลังจากการปรากฎตัวของราชินี กระแสของการหมิ่นพระบรมเดชานุภาพเพิ่มขึ้นอย่างชัดเจนในทางสาธารณะ โดยส่วนใหญ่มีเป้าหมายพุ่งตรงไปยังตัวราชินี

การเข้ามาเกี่ยวข้องกับการเมืองของสถาบันกษัตริย์ดังกล่าวในเวลาเช่นนี้ เพิ่มความไม่แน่นอนให้กับการสืบราชสมบัติมากขึ้นในท้ายที่สุด และมันอาจเป็นลูกศรที่ย้อนกลับมาทำร้ายเหล่ากษัตริย์นิยม เมื่อเวลาในการกำหนดบทบาทใหม่ของสถาบันกษัตริย์มาถึง หลังจากสิ้นองค์กษัตริย์

การเอื้อมมือเข้ามายุ่งการเมืองอย่างไม่มีท่าของสิริกิติ ทำให้เกิดเสียงวิจารณ์ถึงความเหมาะสม ในกระทำของเธอ และของสถาบันกษัตริย์ มันเป็นข้อพิสูจน์สุดท้ายสำหรับคนไทยหลายคนว่า วังเป็นศัตรูของพวกเขา ไม่ใช้ผู้คุ้มภัย โดยมีการโจมตีสิริกิติอย่างหนักบนโลกออนไลน์ เพื่อเป็นการตอบโต้ เหล่าผู้นำทหารที่อยู่ฝ่ายสิริกิติ เข้าปราบปรามกลุ่มผู้ไม่เห็นด้วยอย่างรุนแรง ดังปรากฎในโทรเลขของสหรัฐ:

การวิจารณ์สถาบันกษัตริย์ไทย โดยเฉพาะอย่างยิ่งราชินีสิริกิติ ทั้งบนโลกออนไลน์ และในทางสาธารณะเพิ่มขึ้นอย่างมากเมื่อเร็วๆ นี้…

การเพิ่มขึ้นของคดีหมิ่นพระบรมเดชานุภาพ ความถี่ของการแสดงความคิดเห็นต่อคดีหมิ่น และความเข้มงวดในการดำเนินการของหน่วยงานของรัฐ ชี้ให้เห็นว่า บางภาคส่วนของสังคมมีความไม่พอใจอย่างมาก ต่อพฤติกรรมของสมาชิกบางคนในครอบครัวเจ้า หรือแม้กระทั้งตัวสถาบันเอง ถ้าหน่วยงานของรัฐปิดกั้นการแสดงความคิดเห็นต่อสถาบันกษัตริย์อย่างหนักหน่วง อาจส่งผลในทางตรงกันข้าม เพราะการปิดปากคนหลายๆ กลุ่ม อาจทำให้การนินทาพฤติกรรมที่ไม่เหมาะสมของเจ้าบางคน เปลี่ยนเป็นการตั้งคำถามอย่างมีนัยยะ ต่อบทบาทของสถาบันกษัตริย์ ภายหลังการเสียชีวิตของกษัตริย์ภูมิพลผู้เป็นที่รัก

ทั้งหมดคือเบื้องหลังการเพิ่มขึ้นของการกระทำที่เป็นศัตรูต่อสิริกิติในประเทศไทย เธอกลายเป็นบุคคลที่น่ารังเกียจสำหรับคนไทยหลายคน โทรเลขของสหรัฐรายงานถึงป้ายโฆษณาที่โจมตีสิริกิติ ทั่วทั้งภาคใต้ของประเทศไทยในเดือนสิงหาคม 2552 และมีการทำลายรูปของราชินีในจังหวัดทางภาคอิสานด้วย นอกจากนั้นยังมีเรื่องที่ถูกแพร่กระจายไปบนโลกออนไลน์ (ยังไม่ยืนยัน) เกี่ยวกับการครอบครองเพรชสีน้ำเงินของสิริกิติ ที่ถูกขโมยมาจากราชวงศ์ซาอุดิอารเบีย โดยคนงานชาวไทยในปี 2532 โดยไม่เสียอะไรเลย (ผมเขียนเรื่องราวดังกล่าวไว้ ที่นี่)

ข้อความ SMS ทั้งสี่ข้อความที่ถูกใช้กล่าวหาว่า ส่งโดยนายอำพล ตั้งนพคุณ ก็มีใจความในประเด็นเหล่านี้ ใครก็ตามที่เป็นคนส่ง มีความไม่พอใจอย่างมาก กับพฤติกรรมของราชินีสิริกิติ เช่นเดียวกับคนไทยอีกหลายคน เนื้อหาของข้อความไม่ถูกเปิดเผยสู่สาธารณะจนกระทั่งเร็วๆ นี้ และมีใจความดังแสดงไว้ด้านล่าง พร้อมกับคำแปลภาษาพูด เป็นอังกฤษ ข้อความทั้งหมดถูกนำมาจากเอกสารของศาล โดยสามารถดู ในรูปแบบ PDF ได้ที่นี่:

• ข้อความแรก 9 พฤษภาคม 2553 – ขึ้นป้ายด่วน อีราชินีชั่วมันไม่ยอมเอาเพชรไดรมอนด์ไปคืนซาอุฯ ราชวงศ์หัวควยมันพังแน่
• ข้อความที่สอง 11 พฤษภาคม 2553 – อีราชินีชั่ว อีหีเหล็ก มึงแน่จริงมึงส่งทหารเหี้ยๆ มาปราบพวกกูซิวะ โคตรอีดอกทอง ชั่วทั้งตระกูล
• ข้อความที่สาม 12 พฤษภาคม 2553 – สมเด็จพระเจ้าอยู่หัวหัวควย อีราชินีหีเหล็ก ไอ้อีสองตัวนี้มันบงการฆ่าประชาชน ต้องเอาส้นตีนเหยียบหน้ามัน
• ข้อความที่สี่ 22 พฤษภาคม 2553 – ช่วยบอกไอ้สมเด็จพระเจ้าอยู่หัวหัวควยกับอีราชินีหีเหล็ก และลูกหลานของมันทุกๆ คนต้องตาย

ข้อความทั้งหมดรุนแรง เต็มไปด้วยความเคียดแค้น เนื้อหาของมันคงทำให้คนไทยหลายคนตกใจ ไม่ว่าพวกเขาจะมีมุมมองกับสถาบันกษัตริย์อย่างไร ไม่มีหลักฐานที่ทำให้เชื่อได้ว่า ข้อความถูกส่งโดยนายอำพล และไม่ว่าใครก็ตามที่เป็นคนส่ง คำถามที่ว่า พวกเขาควรถูกตัดสินให้จำคุก 20 ปี ภายใต้การปกครองแบบประชาธิปไตย ของศตวรรษที่ 21 หรือไม่ ยังคงเป็นคำถามที่ต้องถกเถียงกันอย่างหนัก

ตัวภูมิพลเองยังคงบาดหมางกับสิริกิติ และตั้งแต่เดือนกันยายน 2549 เขามีชีวิตอยู่ภายในโรงพยาบาลศิริราช ซึ่งตั้งอยู่ทางตะวันตกของแม่น้ำที่ไหลผ่านกรุงเทพ อย่างเจ้าพระยา และปฏิเสธที่จะกลับบ้าน ภายในพระราชวัง แม้ว่าหมอประจำตัวจะอนุญาตให้ทำได้ เห็นได้ชัดว่าสุขภาพร่างกายของเขากำลังแย่ลง แต่สุขภาพทางใจของเขาต่างหาก ที่เป็นเรื่องกังวลของชนชั้นนำไทย ดังเช่นแกนนำของผู้นิยมเจ้าอย่าง อานัน ปันยารชุน ที่บอกกับทูตสหรัฐ ราล์ฟ “สกิป” บอย์ช ในปี 2547:

อานันกล่าวว่า เขาเป็นห่วงสุขภาพทางร่างกายของกษัตริย์น้อยกว่า ความสามารถของกษัตริย์ที่จะรับฟังคำแนะนำ และได้ประโยชน์จากกลุ่มคนใกล้ชิด อานันท์กล่าวว่า กว่าครึ่งของคนที่ทำงานในวังต้องการเพียงแค่สถานะ และอิทธิพลทางสังคม มีเพียงหนึ่งในสามเท่านั้นที่อุทิศตนให้กษัตริย์ เขากล่าวว่า กษัตริย์ทรงโดดเดี่ยว และเกือบตลอดเวลา เขาไม่สามารถเลือกได้ว่าบุคคลใดที่เขาจะใช้เวลาร่วมด้วย

ในเดือนตุลาคม 2549 สุเทพ เทือกสุบรรณ เลขาพรรคฝ่ายกษัตริย์นิยม ผู้เต็มไปด้วยเรื่องคดโกง ของพรรคประชาธิปัตย์ บอกกับทูตสหรัฐว่า ภูมิพลมีอาการป่วยทางใจ:

เมื่อจับหน้าผากของเขา สุเทพอ้างว่า สุขภาพทางกายของกษัตริย์ปกติดี แต่ที่ทำให้เป็นห่วง คือสุขภาพทางใจของเขา ซึ่งถูกกดดันจากสถานะของอาณาจักรอันเป็นที่รักของเขา หลังจากที่เขาจากไป

ชาวต่างชาติคนหนึ่งที่อาศัยมานานในไทยสังเกตเห็นในสิ่งเดียวกัน และรายงานไว้ในโทรเลขที่รั่วออกมา ของสหรัฐ:

 เป็นที่ชัดเจนว่า ไม่มีทางเลย ที่ใครจะสามารถวิเคราะห์ได้อย่างถูกต้องถึงความรู้สึกในใจของกษัตริย์ หรือหาข้อสรุปที่แน่นอนระหว่างพัฒนาการทางการเมือง ความเป็นไปได้ของความเครียดทางอารมณ์ และความเจ็บป่วยทางกาย อย่างไรก็ตาม นักสังเกตุการณ์คนหนึ่ง ซึ่งอาศัยอยู่ในไทยมานาน ตั้งแต่ปี 2498 อ้างกับเราเสมอตลอดปีที่ผ่านมาว่า กษัตริย์แสดงอาการพื้นฐานของโรคซึมเศร้า – “มันก็ควรเป็นเช่นนั้น เมื่อต้องเห็นสิ่งที่เกิดในอาณาจักรของเขา หลังครองราชมา 62 ปี ในบั้นปลายของชีวิต” – และอ้างว่า เพราะความทุกข์ทางใจนั่นแหละ ที่ส่งผลต่อสุขภาพทางกายของเขา

ในเดือนพฤศจิกายน 2552 ทูตสหรัฐนายอีริค จี จอห์นเขียนเกี่ยวกับภูมิพลว่า:

เนื่องจากหลายสาเหตุเริ่มต้นมานานจากโรคพาคินสัน โรคซึมเศร้า และอาการปวดหลัง

ความสัมพันธ์ระหว่างกษัตริย์และภรรยาของเขา รวมถึงลูกๆเกือบทั้งหมดถูกทำให้แย่ลง มีเพียงลูกสาวคนที่สอง สิรินธร ที่ยังคงใกล้ชิดกับเขา ความเคารพนับถือที่กระจายไปอย่างกว้างขวางในหมู่คนไทย มาเป็นเวลานาน เริ่มเสื่อมลง ดังเช่นนายอำพล เขาดูเหมือนถูกกำหนดให้ตายอย่างโดดเดี่ยวด้วยใจที่แตกสลาย อีกหนึ่งเหยื่อผู้โชคร้ายภายใต้คำสาปของกลุ่มคนคลั่งเจ้าในประเทศไทย

On Tuesday May 8, 2012, a 62-year-old grandfather died in a prison hospital in Thailand less than a year into a 20-year jail sentence for allegedly sending four SMS messages with offensive comments about Thailand’s monarchy.

He died alone, away from his wife Rosmalin and their children and grandchildren. Ampon Tangnoppakul, widely known in Thailand by the nickname “Akong”, which means grandpa, was a victim of Thailand’s archaic and unjust lèse majesté law and the draconian Computer Crimes Act. Article 112 of the Thai Criminal Code states:

Whoever defames, insults or threatens the King, Queen, the Heir-apparent or the Regent, shall be punished with imprisonment of three to fifteen years.

Ampon was sentenced on November 23, 2011, to five years in prison for each of the SMS messages he was accused of sending. He insisted on his innocence throughout the trial and afterwards.

He told the judges that he did not know how to send an SMS message, and his family concurred on this point.

The messages were sent to Somkiat Klongwattanasak, personal secretary to then-Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, the leader of the Democrat Party. Somkiat reported the messages to the police.

The prosecution was unable to explain how Ampon could have obtained Somkiat’s mobile phone number. Also, the phone number from which the messages were sent was not the same as Ampon’s number, but the prosecution alleged that the messages were sent from a phone with the same IMEI code as Ampon’s. The judges disregarded evidence about how an IMEI number can be cloned, and in general exhibited a total lack of understanding of the intricacies of mobile phone technology.

Ampon was arrested on August 3, 2010. He was held for 63 days until being granted bail on October 4, 2010. On January 18, 2011 he was formally charged and incarcerated, and he remained in jail until his death.

The Asian Human Rights Commission expressed grave concern over his treatment.

It is not yet known how Ampon died (an autopsy is pending) but when he was sentenced he was suffering from laryngeal cancer. He was prevented from receiving adequate medical treatment during his incarceration.

His death has been widely covered by the Thai and international media:

• Prachatai
• New York Times
• Wall Street Journal 
• BBC
• Associated Press
• Agence France Press
• Reuters
• The Nation
• Bangkok Post
• Voice of America
• The Diplomat
• Radio Australia
• United Press International
• The Herald Sun
• The Atlantic

The case was profoundly problematic for two reasons.

Firstly, the prosecution failed to prove that the text messages were sent by Ampon. The judges explicitly conceded this point in their ruling, as Thai website iLaw explains:

The attempt by Ampon’s legal team to prove that the 14 digit IMEI number used in evidence against Ampon was not reliable was dismissed by the court. The court relied on the mobile phone log provided by service provider and police witnesses to convict him.

The judge said that the prosecution could not clearly prove that the defendant was the person who sent the offensive text messages to the mobile phone of the Secretary to the then Prime Minister. But even so, because it is difficult for the prosecution to present compelling evidence, as the defendant who committed this offence would naturally conceal his actions so that others could not observe them, it is necessary to rely on circumstantial evidence which the prosecution presented to indicate the intentions of the defendant.

It is not known who sent the SMS messages. It is very unlikely that it was Ampon.

Secondly, while the messages contained offensive language and comments, there is considerable controversy over whether they should merit a 20-year jail sentence in a modern democracy, as Thailand claims to be.

The messages focused in particular on Queen Sirikit, the 79-year-old wife of King Bhumibol Adulyadej. Sirikit is notorious for her extremist authoritarian views and for having actively meddled in Thai politics for decades, even though Thailand is officially a constitutional monarchy in which the palace has a purely symbolic role.

Sirikit has been estranged from Bhumibol since the mid-1980s, although this fact has not been made public in Thailand. A leaked U.S. cable reported in 2009 that:

Prior to mid-2008, the King and Queen had lived most of the past 20 years largely apart, joint public appearances excepted. This unpublicized reality started after the Queen disappeared from public view in 1986 for about six months to recover from emotional exhaustion, in the wake of the King dismissing her favorite military aide de camp. Their social circles diverged sharply from then on, with very few figures spanning both camps…

The rift between Bhumibol and Sirikit was caused by the queen’s open adoration of a military aide, Colonel Narongdej Nandha-phothidej. But the two had already been divided over issues of governance and succession. Both Bhumibol and Sirikit believe the palace should play a central political role in Thailand, but while the king favours a quiet behind-the-scenes approach, paying lip-service to whatever constitution happens to be in force, the queen is far less cautious and much more aggressive in her activism. Also, until recently, Sirikit had been adamant that the deeply unpopular and volatile Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn should succeed Bhumibol as King Rama X, despite Bhumibol’s doubts.

During 2007 and 2008, however, the succession dynamics fundamentally changed. Sirikit finally gave up on Vajiralongkorn after a video was leaked showing a bizarre birthday party for his beloved pet poodle Foo Foo in which his third wife Srirasmi grovelled on the ground, naked apart from a thong, and after the prince abandoned Srirasmi to spend most of his time in Germany with his latest mistress, while undergoing medical treatment for an unknown disease. As the secret U.S. cable revealed in 2009:

For many years, Queen Sirikit actively promoted Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn’s interests and was seen as his greatest backer in the face of widespread public opposition and open preference for Princess Sirindhorn.  For instance,  she was the driving force behind the Crown Prince’s 2003 trip to Washington, which she intended as a cornerstone effort to rehabilitate his image in the eyes of the Thai people as an acceptable future King, one who had recently remarried and would soon produce an acknowledged male heir.

The mother-son relationship suddenly changed in 2007  for two reasons: the appearance of video and still photos of  Vajiralongkorn’s wife Srirasmi in the nude on the  internet/CDs then widely available in Bangkok; and a noisy  row over the amount of time the Crown Prince was spending  outside Thailand. In 2008, the Queen and the Crown Prince  had a shouting match at a hospital during the Queen’s brief  hospitalization, with the Crown Prince angrily berating her  in front of ladies-in-waiting… Several of the key ladies-in-waiting reportedly now refuse to be present when  the Crown Prince visits the Queen…

Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn has spent most (up to 75%) of the past two years based in Europe (primarily at a villa at a medicinal spa 20km outside of Munich), with his leading mistress and belovedwhite poodle Fufu. Vajiralongkorn is believed to be suffering from a blood-related medical condition (varying sources claim he is  either: HIV positive; has Hepatitis C; is afflicted by a rare form of “blood cancer,” or some combination which leads to  regular blood transfusions). His current (third) wife  Srirasmi and 4 year old son … known as Ong  Ti, reside in his Sukhothai Palace in Bangkok, but when Vajiralongkorn travels back to Bangkok, he stays with his  second mistress in the retrofitted Air Force VIP lounge at Wing Six, Don Muang Airport (note: both mistresses are Thai  Airways stewardesses; the Crown Prince has shifted from  flying F5s to Thai Airways Boeings and Airbuses in recent years. End note). Long known for violent and unpredictable mood swings, the Crown Prince has few people who have stayed  long in his inner circle.

The schism between Sirikit and Vajiralongkorn totally altered Thailand’s political calculus. Instead of supporting her son’s right to reign after Bhumibol dies, Sirikit decided she should rule as regent herself following the king’s death, on behalf of the prince’s young son with Srirasmi. Vajiralongkorn would be frozen out of the succession. Leading royalists like Prem Tinsulanonda, Surayud Chulanont and Anand Panyarachun had long hated Vajiralongkorn and believed (correctly) that if he became king it would spell the end of the traditional “network monarchy” in Thailand. They allied with Sirikit to try to engineer her dominance following Bhumibol’s death, and this opened a new dimension in Thailand’s political conflict. Because populist leader Thaksin Shinawatra was believed to be an ally of Vajiralongkorn, the royalists became more determined than ever to crush his political influence. They feared that if a government controlled by Thaksin was in power when Bhumibol died, they would be unable to prevent Vajiralongkorn becoming King Rama X. (Ironically, although the king’s relationship with his son and heir broke down decades ago, he now seems to favour Vajiralongkorn as his successor, in a complete reversal of the previous positions of Bhumibol and Sirikit.)

From 2006, Sirikit began intervening actively to thwart Thaksin and to support the extreme-right-wing ultra-royalist Yellow Shirt movement. As a confidential U.S. cable reported in November 2008:

The battle lines in Thailand’s political environment are clearly drawn, even if there are multiple actors in play…   The  Thaksin machine faces off against a mix of royalists, Bangkok middle class, and southerners, with Queen Sirikit having emerged as their champion, as King Bhumibol largely fades from an active role… They are positioning themselves for what key actors on both sides freely admit to  us in private will be Thailand’s moment of truth — royal  succession after the King passes away.

On October 13, 2008, Queen Sirikit abandoned any pretence of being above politics when she presided over the funeral rites of Angkhana Radappanyawut, nicknamed “Nong Bow”, a Yellow Shirt supporter killed during fighting between police and anti-Thaksin protesters trying to disrupt the functioning of parliament on October 7. As the U.S. embassy commented:

Queen Sirikit, departing from the example set by King Bhumibol over decades, has dragged an ostensibly apolitical monarchy into the political fray, to the institution’s probable future  detriment…

Queen Sirikit…made a bold political statement practically without precedent in presiding over the funeral of a PAD supporter from humble roots who died during the October 7 clash betweenPAD and the police. Even some figures close to the Queen have expressed their private unease at the overtly political act, since it seems to erode the concept, which the King has long sought  to promote, of an apolitical monarchy. After the Queen’s funeral appearance, there was a notable increase in public complaints about acts of lese majeste, with many seemingly targeting the  Queen…

Such politicization of the monarchy at this time appears to create extra uncertainty around the eventual royal succession, and it could well boomerang on royalists when the time comes to redefine the role of the monarchy after the  King’s passing.

Sirikit’s clumsy intervention sparked unprecedented criticism of her actions and of the Thai monarchy. It was the final proof for many Thais that the palace was their enemy, not their protector. There was a stunning surge in online attacks on Sirikit. In response, the pro-Sirikit military leadership cracked down harshly on dissent. As another U.S. cable observed:

Online and open public criticism of Thai royals, particularly of Queen Sirikit, has increased  recently…

The rise in high-profile lese majeste cases, the frequency of online remarks bordering on lese majeste, and the seriousness of the authorities’ response indicates that some segments of  society are highly dissatisfied with the behavior of some members of the royal family, if not the institution itself. If the authorities were to harshly repress critics of the monarchy, this could prove counterproductive, as quiet discourse in many circles could shift from mere gossip about some royals’ distasteful behavior to a more weighty questioning of the monarchy’s role after the death of widely-beloved King Bhumibol.

This is the background to growing hostility towards Sirikit in Thailand. She has become a hated figure for many Thais. U.S. cables report that banners attacking Sirikit were seen across southern Thailand in August 2009, and that pictures of the queen were vandalized in the northeastern Isaan province. There has also been widespread (but unconfirmed) online speculation that Sirikit is in possession of a priceless blue diamond stolen from the Saudi royal family by a Thai migrant worker in 1989 (a story I covered here).

The four SMS messages allegedly sent by Ampon Tangnoppakul focus on these issues. Whoever sent them was, like many Thais, deeply unhappy with the behaviour of Queen Sirikit. The content of the messages has not been made public until now. The four messages are reproduced below, with a colloquial English-language translation. They are taken from a court document which can be viewed in its entirety in PDF format here:

• First SMS, May 9, 2010. ขึ้นป้ายด่วน อีราชนีชั่วมันไม่ยอมเอาเพชรไดรมอนด์ไปคืนซาอุฯ ราชวงศ์หัวควยมันพังแน่ [Put it on billboards urgently, the evil queen refuses to return the diamond to Saudi, this dickhead dynasty will surely collapse.]
• Second SMS, May 11, 2010. อีราชีนีชั่ว อีหีเหล็กมึงแน่จริงมึงส่งทหารเหี้ยๆ มาปราบพวกกูซิวะ โคตรอีดอกทอง ชั่วทั้งตระกูล [The evil queen, the iron cunt, if you are brave enough, send your damn army to crack down on us, you master of whores, family of the bad people.]
• Third SMS, May 12, 2010. สมเด็จพระเจ้าอยู่หัวหัวควย อีราชีนีหีเหล็ก ไอ้อีสองตัวนี้มันบงการฆ่าประชาชน ต้องเอาส้นตีนเหยียบหน้ามัน [His Majesty dickhead king, the iron cunt queen, both of them ordered the killing of people. We will stamp on their faces with our heels.]
• Fourth SMS, May 22, 2010. ช่วยบอกไอ้สมเด็จพระเจ้าอยู่หัวหัวควยกับอีราชินีหีเหล็ก และลูกหลานมันทุกๆ คนต้องตาย [Please tell his majesty dickhead King, the iron cunt queen and all of their children, you'll all die.]

The messages are offensive and inflammatory. Their content is likely to shock many Thais, whatever their views about the monarchy. There is no convincing evidence they were sent by Ampon. And whoever sent them surely did not deserve 20 years in jail in a 21st century democracy.

Bhumibol himself remains estranged from Sirikit, and since September 2009 he has lived a reclusive existence in Siriraj Hospital on the west bank of the Chao Phraya river that weaves through Bangkok, refusing to return home to one of his palaces even when his doctors cleared him to do so. His physical health is clearly failing, but it is his mental health that worries many in the Thai elite. As Anand Panyarachun told U.S. ambassador Ralph “Skip” Boyce back in 2007:

Anand said he was less concerned about the King’s  physical health than about his ability to receive objective advice and to benefit from the company of friends. Anand remarked that half the people who work at the Palace did so only to acquire status and peddle influence; only around one-third of those at the court were there solely out of  devotion to the King. He said the King was lonely and, for the most part, could not select the people with whom he  spends his time.

In October 2009, Suthep Thaugsuban, the corrupt secretary-general of the royalist Democrat Party, told the U.S. embassy that Bhumibol was mentally ill:

Tapping his forehead, Suthep claimed that the King’s physical health was okay, but that the really  worry was his state of mind, depressed at the state of affairs in his Kingdom at the end of his life.

An unnamed longtime foreign resident of Thailand made a similar observation, also reported in a leaked U.S. cable:

There is clearly no way for anyone to analyze accurately the King’s state of mind, or draw certain conclusions between political developments, possible mental stress, and his physical ailments. However, one long-time expat observer of the Thai scene, present in Thailand since 1955, has repeatedly asserted to us over the past year that the King shows classic signs of depression — “and why  wouldn’t he, seeing where his Kingdom has ended up after 62  years, as his life comes to an end” — and claims that such mental anguish likely does affect his physical  condition/failing health.

In November 2009, U.S. ambassador Eric G. John wrote that Bhumibol was:

by many accounts beset long-term by Parkinson’s, depression, and chronic lower back pain…

The king’s relationship with his wife and most of his children has been poisoned. Only his second daughter, Sirindhorn, remains close to him. The widespread reverence that many Thais felt for him for decades is collapsing. Like Ampon, he seems fated to die isolated and heartbroken, another tragic victim of Thailand’s royal curse.

Two of the accused, But Pathamasarin and Chit Singhaseni, were royal pages who had served Ananda since he was a child. The third, Chaleo Pootomros, was Ananda’s former secretary. Also accused in absentia were Pridi Banomyong, former senior statesman of Thailand and leader of the Free Thai resistance movement against Japanese occupation during World War II, and Pridi’s aide, naval Lieutenant Vacharachai Chaiyasithiwet. Both men had fled Thailand in November 1947, fearing for their lives after the military seized power in a coup.

The junta that masterminded the coup, led by Field Marshal Phibun Songkram, had justified their actions by making the sensational claim that Pridi had masterminded the murder of the king, and his aide Vacharachai had been the shooter. Chaleo, But and Chit had been arrested for allegedly being involved in the conspiracy.

All five men were innocent. They had nothing to do with any plot to kill Ananda, and indeed no reliable evidence has ever emerged that anybody ever conspired to murder the king. The trial was a political stunt staged by the regime to give spurious justification for the coup and destroy the political aspirations of Pridi Banomyong, widely regarded then and now as a visionary statesman and the father of Thai democracy.

The trial dragged on for three years. Among those to testify were Ananda’s younger brother Bhumibol Adulyadej, who had become King Rama IX after the shooting, and Sangwan Talapat, mother of the two monarchs. During the trial, two defense counsel for the accused were murdered by police.

The verdict came on September 27, 1951. It took five hours for the judges to read the document. Sensationally, Chaleo and But were found not guilty. Chit was found guilty and sentenced to death. No verdict was given on Pridi or Vacharachai.

Both sides appealed the verdict, and in December 1953 the Appeals Court ruled that But was guilty along with Chit. Chaleo’s acquittal was upheld. The case moved to Thailand’s Supreme Court, the Dikka, which gave its judgment on October 13, 1954. All three men were found guilty and sentenced to death. They were executed by firing squad on the morning of February 17, 1955.

Contrasting with the inhumanity of the treatment the three men suffered was the compassion and courage shown by many who tried to save them. Fak Nasongkhla, a young lawyer, volunteered to defend the men when nobody else would, showing immense bravery given the risks. Chaleo’s 23-year-old daughter also joined the defense during the trial, having studied law so she could help her father. Several officials made an effort to save at least some of the three accused from a fate that was widely known to be a travesty of justice. In the end, they all failed.

A full English translation of the 1951 verdict, made by Bangkok firm International Translations, is below. It is in the British National Archives in London among other documents on the king’s death case. The document is not secret — the full verdict was read in public — but the translation is useful for those who, like me, cannot read Thai.

(Note: Apologies for two small glitches — one page is copied in a different style to the rest, and on one page I accidentally copied part of my hand too. This will be fixed on my next visit to the National Archives in London. The text remains fully readable.)

I  • II • III • IV • V

V. 

When it finally came, King Bhumibol’s tragic fall from grace was swift and savage.

Thailand celebrated Rama IX’s Diamond Jubilee in June 2006. It was 60 years since the 18-year old Bhumibol had accidentally killed his brother and become king of Siam. Now the elderly monarch was revered by most Thais and admired around the world as a visionary leader who had fused ancient tradition and modern statecraft to forge a stable democratic nation. Five days of royal pageantry marked the occasion, amid an outpouring of adoration from Thailand’s people and an impressive show of respect from the shrinking ranks of royal families around the world. Thirteen reigning monarchs attended the celebrations in person, and 12 others sent royal representatives; only two monarchies were missing. All over the country, Thais dressed in yellow to honour Bhumibol, and wore orange wristbands with the slogan “Long Live the King.”

On Friday June 9, a million people crowded into Bangkok’s Royal Plaza to see Bhumibol give a public address — only his third in six decades — from a palace balcony. Millions more watched intently on television. The 78-year-old monarch looked alert, robust and sprightly. Later that day, at the auspicious time of 19:19, hundreds of thousands of Thais who had gathered around the brightly illuminated buildings of the Grand Palace lit candles in his honour. On Monday June 12, the assembled monarchs were treated to the unforgettable sight of a royal barge procession: 2,082 liveried oarsman rowed 52 sleek vessels up the Chao Phraya river to Wat Arun, the temple of the dawn. Bhumibol sat aboard his personal swan-headed vessel Suphannahongse, representing the mythical bird ridden by the Hindu god Brahma. In a confidential cable, U.S. ambassador Ralph “Skip” Boyce described the 60th anniversary celebrations:

The multi-day gala offered  dramatic and often times moving evidence of the nation’s  respect and adoration for its monarch…

Twenty-five representatives of royal families from around the world joined with a who’s who of Thai politics and high society in commemorating the occasion in a series of Buddhist ceremonies, a public address by the King, fireworks, a royal barge procession on the river, and finally, a gala dinner at  the palace.

While the Thai people’s respect and reverence for  the 78 year old monarch is often cited, the weekend’s celebration was a rare occasion to see — and feel — the depths  of this sentiment in person.

In his six decades on the throne, Bhumibol had weathered many storms, always emerging with his reputation and prestige enhanced. Nobody else in Thai history had ever been so widely beloved and overwhelmingly popular as King Rama IX at the start of the 21st century. It seemed inconceivable that anything could go wrong now.

But over the four years that followed, the reckless behaviour of Thailand’s royalist elite brought the palace, and the country, to the brink of catastrophe.

The enormity of the tectonic shifts that were transforming Thailand became stunningly clear one Sunday afternoon, on September 19, 2010. More than ten thousand Thais had massed at the Ratchaprasong intersection, the symbolic centre of modern Bangkok. They were dressed in red, and they were full of anger and grief. It was four years to the day since royalist generals had seized power in a coup that snuffed out the precious embers of political progress so many Thais had risked their lives for in the Black May battles of 1992, and four months to the day since the military had crushed another mass pro-democracy rally in downtown Bangkok, storming the fortified encampment occupied by thousands of Red Shirt protesters who had blockaded the Ratchaprasong intersection for weeks to demand new elections. At least 91 people had been killed in the violence of April and May. Now the Red Shirts had returned to Ratchaprasong, to mourn their fallen comrades and protest against a government they regarded as illegitimate and murderous. Many of those in the crowd that thronged Ratchaprasong that day were quite clear who they blamed for the killings, and for the systematic injustice and repeated abrogation of democracy in Thailand. They blamed Bhumibol Adulyadej.

Towards the end of the rally, shortly before dusk, as the organizers tried to convince the angry protesters to disperse, a new chant rose up from the crowd. It began among those Thais right at the heart of the protest, in the centre of the intersection beneath the Skytrain tracks, and spread through the crowd until hundreds, perhaps thousands, were shouting it over and over again. It was a denunciation, using a Thai insult that literally means “monitor lizard”, a particularly reviled animal; the closest English-language equivalent is probably “bastard”:

The bastard ordered the killing. The bastard ordered the killing.

It was an extraordinary moment, utterly unthinkable until it suddenly happened. In the most public of places, right in the centre of the capital, hundreds of Thais were openly calling their king a murderous bastard.

Further evidence that everything had changed for the Chakri dynasty was the unprecedented anti-monarchist graffiti graffiti scrawled by protesters that day on the makeshift metal enclosure around the gutted shell of the Zen department store, part of the Central World megaplex that had been set ablaze during a wave of arson attacks after the crushing of the Red Shirt protest on May 19. The authorities had been trying to erase memories of the bloodshed and pretend everything was back to normal. The ruins of the Zen store were hidden behind corrugated metal walls emblazoned with slogans that were supposed to be reassuring. One repeated, over and over, a single phrase:

EVERYTHING WILL BE OK. EVERYTHING WILL BE OK. EVERYTHING WILL BE OK.

Another giant bannerproclaimed:

REBUILDING ZEN, LOVING THAILAND May this Rebuilding bring Peace and Prosperity to Thailand. We must Reconcile as we are One Country, One Family and One People.

On September 19, the protesters wrote their own slogans on the wall: crude, angry denunciations of Bhumibol and Sirikit and what they had done to Thailand. Within a day, the authorities had painted over the graffiti, removing any trace of the heresies that had been written there. But they could not paper over the widening cracks appearing in Thailand’s official royalist ideology that threatened to bring the whole edifice crashing down. The fairytale world of the monarchists had suffered a seismic shock.

Bhumibol was  four miles away when it happened, marking his own unhappy anniversary. Exactly one year before he had been admitted to Siriraj Hospital during a health scare and he had remained resident there ever since, unable or unwilling to leave. The glorious Diamond Jubilee celebrations just a few years before seemed like ancient history, a bygone era that was lost forever. It was a savage reversal of fortune for Bhumibol: his reputation and popularity had seemed utterly invincible, but now everything was in doubt. Increasingly decrepit, possibly paralyzed by depression, isolated in hospital, Bhumibol seemed to have no understanding of what was happening in his kingdom, and no idea what to do about the crisis facing the monarchy. He had nothing to offer besides silence.

How had everything gone so wrong so quickly? Bhumibol’s life’s work was supposed to be complete: the “People’s Constitution” of 1997 had been widely lauded as the crowning glory of his reign, laying the foundations for good governance in Thailand without the need for the king to keep intervening. King Rama IX was supposed to be enjoying semi-retirement by the seaside. Instead, Thailand was in crisis and the monarchy was at the centre of a political conflict that had rent the country asunder.

Every good fairy tale has to have a villain. And Thailand’s royalists have always needed a nemesis, so that Bhumibol’s profound goodness can be contrasted with the baleful forces of darkness that the palace is supposedly keeping at bay. They have no doubt who to blame for the unprecedented crisis facing the monarchy. He is a 62-year-old ethnic Chinese tycoon who made billions of dollars in the 1990s from lucrative telecommunications deals and went on to become the most successful elected Thai politician in history. His name is Thaksin Shinawatra.

Thaksin stormed to power with a thumping victory in the polls in January 2001, the first parliamentary elections held under the new constitution. His core message to Thailand was compellingly simple and brilliantly effective. He had become dazzlingly, dizzyingly rich over the previous couple of decades. And he promised to use his expertise to make Thailand successful and prosperous too.

Thaksin told the Thai people a gripping rags-to-riches tale of his life: he said he was a “simple peasant” who had built a business empire, launched satellites into the sky and earned an immense fortune through brains, guts and hard work. He portrayed himself as a dreamer who rose from humble origins thanks to his business savvy, an image encapsulated in the title he chose for his autobiography, Eyes on the Stars, Feet on the Ground. He often described how his early education was at a small temple school beside the market in the rural northern Thai town of Sankamphaeng. Classes were in a wooden sala in the temple grounds, and the teacher was the man who washed the monks’ alms bowls. In a speech in Manila in 2003 he declared:

Through my modest family background… I learned the hardship of poverty in the rural areas. I learned the importance of earning rewards by working hard.

In discussions in his villa in Dubai in 2010 with U.S. journalist Tom Plate for the book Conversations with Thaksin, he described his origins as “lower middle” class and claimed that his formative years growing up in the country gave him a crucial understanding of the lives, problems and aspirations of the poor.

Because I grew up in the rural countryside, I know. I used to talk to them when I was a young boy. My father hired the garden workers, and they came, they worked, they dug the soil, and then at lunch time they cooked their own meal, and then they did the work. I watched the way they ate. They didn’t go to market — they would catch the frog in the fields and cook it. They didn’t have anything; they just had rice. How can they live?

I understand. I saw this.

Thaksin’s immense wealth seemed to speak for itself: he seemed to have discovered the key to getting very rich very quickly. His speeches were full of business buzzwords and grand plans. And unlike most wealthy elite Thais, who treated the poor with barely disguised contempt, Thaksin reached out to ordinary people and promised to help them. As he told Plate:

I am a self-made billionaire but I grew up in a rural area where I was fully experienced in the reality of poor lives. Since then many decades have passed and yet they still live the same. I want to help them.

Thaksin also made the apparently reasonable argument that he was already so rich he had no reason to use political power corruptly to get even richer. He had all the money anyone could ever need. He often insisted he was making a huge sacrifice by agreeing to be prime minister. It distracted him from focusing on his business empire and multiplying his billions. It opened him up to public criticism and attack. It caused him all kinds of problems and inconveniences. But, for the good of the country, he had resolved to put the interests of Thailand ahead of the interests of himself and his family. He would help his people, selflessly and tirelessly.

Thaksin’s self-proclaimed entrepreneurial genius was another myth. During his years in the police he devoted the majority of his time and energy to launching business ventures on the side. Most of them, however, were total failures. As Pasuk Phongpaichit and Chris Baker recount in their biography Thaksin:

He and Pojaman opened a silk shop at the Trocadero Hotel. But sales were abysmal and they had to close the shop within a month, Next he drew on his experience helping his father’s cinemas. He bought the rights for distributing some Thai films in the provinces. After an initial success (with the hit film Ban sai thong), this business also languished. In 1979 he bought up an old cinema house in central Bangkok. When this failed, he tore down the cinema and converted it into apartments. This also failed. Pursued by angry clients and creditors, he had to downsize the project and then sell it off at a loss. By this time he was 200 million baht in debt.

Struggling, Thaksin decided to get into the computer business, and in 1981 he started a business leasing IBMs to government offices. His first major breakthrough came in 1986 when he won a hefty contract to supply IBM equipment to the police. Perhaps not coincidentally, he was also the police officer responsible for assessing what computer equipment the police required. He was on both sides of the deal: he drew up the plan detailing what the police needed, and then he won the contract to supply it to them.

In 1987, Thaksin left the police to concentrate full-time on business. He was approaching 40. His achievements had been far from stellar. He was still mired in debt. As he says in his autobiography, he was looking for “something big to clean up all the old mess”. It was the desperate dream of a failing gambler, praying for a miracle on the roulette wheel to put everything right. Most gamblers just keep on losing, their lives tumbling deeper into trouble. But a very few get the stunning stroke of luck they yearn for, hitting the jackpot and becoming suddenly richer than they could ever have imagined. Thaksin Shinawatra was one of them.

It was a time when vast fortunes could be made in Thailand. A remarkable boom in growth and investment took off in the late 1980s. Over the ten years from 1985/6, the economy more than doubled in size, and the urban middle class more than tripled. Industrialization and urbanization were transforming the country at breakneck speed, and there was an urgent need for new and better infrastructure, in transport and telecommunications in particular. Thailand’s road network remained rudimentary, Bangkok traffic was a mess, and the phone system was primitive. In 1992, Thailand country had only three telephones per hundred people, compared with 10 in Malaysia and 63 in Japan. The state was ready to invest billions of dollars to upgrade national telecommunications.

The problem for aspiring businessmen like Thaksin was that the Thai state already had lucrative symbiotic relationships with an elite group of established tycoons. This was the norm in southeast Asia, where there had long been a pattern of political leaders handing out monopoly contracts to selected businessmen, almost invariably ethnic Chinese. During much of the 19th century, as Siam’s absolutist Chakri rulers cemented and extended their control, many ethnic Chinese became rich through “tax farming”, an arrangement in which they bid for the right to collect some taxes — such as on opium, alcohol, gambling and lotteries — in an area of the country for an agreed fee. Everything they collected above the fee was their profit. This was how the Shinawatra clan had initially earned its riches: Thaksin’s great-grandfather Seng Sae Khu, a Hakka Chinese probably from Guangdong, became a successful tax farmer after migrating to Thailand in the 1860s. A century later, the Thai state still did business much the same way: lucrative projects and monopoly concessions were awarded via longstanding networks of tycoons, top generals, high-level bureaucrats, and shady provincial godfathers. Those who secured contracts were, of course, expected to reward their benefactors handsomely.

For an upstart businessman like Thaksin, trying to make it big in Bangkok with the help of contacts from provincial politics and the lower officer ranks of the police, it was an uphill struggle. The plum deals all went to more powerful tycoons with established networks. But when Prem Tinsulanonda stepped down as prime minister in 1988, the game suddenly changed. A new cadre of elected politicians had control of awarding contracts worth billions of dollars to Thai businessmen for the construction of the infrastructure needed to sustain the country’s dramatic economic boom and rapid urbanization. The government signed dozens of massive new concessions, maximizing the opportunities for rent-seeking by dividing projects among an ill-defined tangle of competing agencies and regulatory bodies. Thailand had — and continues to have — an exceptionally inefficient governance structure, allowing those running the country to maximize the amount of wealth they could extract for themselves at the expense of the broader population. During the administration of Chatichai Choonhavan, several mass transport projects for Bangkok were launched with no attempt at coordination or drawing up the most cursory master plan. The legacy of this approach is the continued gridlock that afflicts the capital, and the hundreds of decaying concrete pillars of the abandoned Hopewell project that scar the skyline of northern Bangkok. The situation was similar in telecoms, with military bureaucrats in the National Security Council seeing the sector as their turf, and two state agencies, the Communications Authority of Thailand (CAT) and the Telephone Organization of Thailand (TOT), competing with each other to earn the most for their officials through handing out monopoly deals, with consumers picking up the cost. Their rivalry and overlapping, unclear mandates retarded technological progress in Thailand, even well into the 21st century: the country was among the last in the region to introduce 3G technology.

For Thaksin, it was the chance of a lifetime, and he grabbed it. The old patronage networks that he had been finding it so difficult to break into were suddenly being redrawn, and new relationships were being formed. Everything was in flux. As businessmen scrambled to forge links with the new decision makers, Thaksin proved among the most adept at identifying and schmoozing the right people. He won seven of 22 telecoms and cable concessions awarded by the Chatichai government between 1988 and 1991, by far the biggest share, despite the fact that he was a relatively unknown and not particularly successful businessman while many of his rivals were established conglomerates with a long track record in the business. His concessions were in oligopolistic markets and many came with guaranteed competitive advantages over several years. In the space of only a three years, Thaksin’s fortunes had improved beyond his wildest dreams. As Pasuk and Baker point out:

The concessions were just the first stage of the moneymaking bonanza. From the late 1980s, Thailand’s shallow, narrow and illiquid stock market suddenly started to take off, thanks to a massive influx of speculative capital from foreign and domestic investors keen to grab a piece of Thailand’s “economic miracle” of double-digit GDP growth. The benchmark index was at 613 points at the end of 1990; just three years later it had leapt to 1,683. After securing his telecoms deals, Thaksin listed various subsidiaries of Shinawatra Group on the stock market. For investors looking for a way to surf the Thai economic boom, buying shares in telecoms firms holding monopoly multi-year concessions was a no-brainer. They piled in, share prices of telecoms companies went stratospheric, and Thaksin multiplied his wealth many times over.

He was well on his way to becoming a billionaire when potential disaster struck: the military coup that deposed Chatichai in 1991 upended the patronage networks in the telecoms industry all over again. The military quickly started looking for ways to squeeze money out of the concessions, and Thaksin had to lobby mightily to hold onto his contracts. He managed to get the support of some key generals: in December 1993, when his first satellite was finally launched, Thaksin proclaimed “I could not have this day without Big Jod”, meaning Supreme Commander General Sunthorn Kongsompong, front man of the junta. In 1999, two years after Sunthorn’s death, a longstanding feud between his wife and his main mistress flared up again in a legal battle over his estate. Thais were stunned when court documents revealed Sunthorn had left assets valued at up to six billion baht. The late general’s friends insisted his alleged wealth must be exaggerated: “He didn’t eat shark’s fin or abalone. And he only drank cheap whisky,” claimed Suchinda. A more likely explanation was that the general had been richly rewarded for helping Thaksin to hold on to his state concessions.

During the 1990s, Thailand had a succession of weak and short-lived civilian administrations. Each time a new coalition was briefly in the ascendancy, the holders of telecoms and transport concessions faced another shakedown as politicians tried to extract more cash from the deals to enrich themselves. As Ukrist Pathmanand wrote in The Thaksinization of Thailand, a book he co-authored with Duncan McCargo:

Even after having been granted their concessions, telecommunications companies continued to negotiate with politicians… This ongoing re-negotiation of details posed a constant threat to the interests of rival telecom groups. The instability of Thai politics from 1988 to 1997 caused a number of problems in the telecommunications business: not only did the government change eight times within nine years, but each of these coalition governments comprised numerous parties…

These changes illustrated the bargaining relationships between telecom groups and individual ministers, bargaining that undermined the integrity of the original decisions on the allocation of concessions. Changes of minister led to both costs and opportunities for telecom companies seeking to protect and expand their concessions…

When the government changed hands, each group also had to change its alliances. Apart from politicians and parties, these telecommunications companies also had to seek connections with military leaders, who continued to play very significant roles due to the lack of political stability, as well as sustaining good relationships with senior executives of those government enterprises in charge of the communications sector.

The major telecoms groups sought to buy the loyalty of politicians and officials, and aligned themselves with political parties they trusted to promote their interests. Thaksin decided to go further and enter politics himself. He joined the Palang Dharma, or “moral force”, party founded by Chamlong Srimuang. In 1994 Thaksin served briefly as foreign minister, and in 1995 Chamlong handed him the leadership of Palang Dharma. The party was supposed to stand for honest governance but after winning 23 seats in general elections in July 1995, Thaksin helped broker a seven-party coalition deal and joined the administration of the notoriously corrupt Banharn Silpa-archa as a deputy prime minister. He promised to solve Bangkok’s perennial traffic problems within six months, but never came close to doing so. He was more successful in another area: he managed to get his mobile phone concession extended to 25 years from 20.

Thaksin also hit the headlines when he gave a Daimler as a gift to one of his fellow deputy prime ministers, Air Chief Marshal Somboon Rahong of the Chart Thai party. Instead of keeping quiet about it, Somboon proudly drove the Daimler to parliament and told reporters who had given it to him. It was hardly the kind of behaviour voters wanted to see from the moral force party. Palang Dharma was propping up a corrupt and inept administration, and Thaksin was handing out luxury cars to his cronies.  Thaksin and Palang Dharma were punished mercilessly at the polls in November 1996. Realizing that his position was bleak, Thaksin didn’t even bother to stand for election. Palang Dharma won only a single seat. The party had been destroyed, and it was largely Thaksin’s fault. As McCargo & Ukrist wrote in The Thaksinization of Thailand:

Thaksin left the scene, apparently unfazed at having personally wrecked a medium-sized political party in just over a year.

But while his first foray into politics was a disaster, Thaksin’s Shin Group business empire was going from strength to strength. When Thailand was ravaged by the 1997 economic crisis, Thaksin was one of the few tycoons to emerge even stronger. Rival telecoms conglomerates were heavily leveraged and had to resort to fire sales of assets to stay afloat, but Shin Group had hedged most of its foreign currency exposure and picked up market share from its struggling competitors. There were persistent rumours that Thaksin had been tipped off in advance about the devaluation of the baht. As Tom Wingfield says in Democratization and economic crisis in Thailand:

Thaksin was one of the few entrepreneurs to benefit from the flotation of the baht in July 1997. He had hedged nearly 70 percent of his group’s foreign currency exposure prior to the baht devaluation, leading the Democrat Party to suggest that he may have been tipped off by the then Finance Minister, Thanong Bidaya, who he is known to have had a close relationship with. After leaving the government, Thanong was appointed to Shin Corp’s internal audit committee, further fueling speculation about collusion. The price of Shinawatra’s telecom shares also rose dramatically just prior to the baht flotation.

In August 1997, Thaksin had a third brief spell in government: he was made a deputy prime minister by the floundering coalition led by Chavalit Yongchaiyudh as it struggled to cope with the financial meltdown. By November, the government had collapsed.

Thaksin had failed to make much impact on politics. It was time for a change of strategy. He didn’t want a minor role in governments dominated by more established politicians, and he didn’t want to take orders from others. He wanted to be the boss. In July 1998, Thaksin launched his own political vehicle: the Thai Rak Thai party. The name was an explicit appeal to Thai nationalism: it means “Thais love Thais”. From the start, Thaksin promoted the party by contrasting his modern and dynamic management skills with the sclerotic style of rival politicians. McCargo and Ukrist describe how central his business success was to his rhetoric:

He pledged to run Thailand according to business principles, thinking and acting in a new way that was quick, decisive and effective. In other words, he would function as Thailand’s Chief Executive Officer, or CEO. This rhetoric was highly attractive to many who were dissatisfied with the country’s bureaucratic political and administrative culture…

But Thaksin’s self-proclaimed business wizardry was a myth: the billions he had earned had nothing to do with entrepreneurial genius or brilliant management. He made his fortune from massive concessions awarded by the state with inbuilt competitive advantages in fast-growing oligopolistic industries: they assured him a colossal income for years or even decades to come as long as he could hold onto them. They were effectively a license to print money, with limited risk. Anybody with enough management ability to manage a roadside food stall or a beauty salon could have become a billionaire if they had been given these concessions.

This does not mean it was easy for Thaksin to strike it rich: competition was ferocious to obtain the concession deals and then hang on to them, fending off politicians and bureaucrats trying to make the terms less favourable and rival firms attempting to get a piece of the action. But it was not economic competition, where the most efficient and innovative business managers tend to triumph. It was competition in the political sphere. Thaksin had to persuade politicians and bureaucrats to award the concessions to him rather than the other tycoons clamouring to get them, and every time the government changed he had to convince the new officials in charge to let him keep his sweetheart deals. He had to be continually cosseting, cajoling, flattering, bribing and bartering. He also needed a lot of luck: much depended on being in the right place at the right time, on chance political developments happening to favour him rather than rivals. As Pasuk and Baker observe in Thaksin:

Concessions are not simple one-time grants. The overall telecoms industry is not governed by any set of regulations or real master plan. Rather, the industry is based on a series of deals hatched between a handful of state agencies looking for new revenue opportunities on the one side, and a handful of businessmen looking for profits on the other. As one TOT executive said about the era when the concessions were created: “All we were thinking about at that time was how to sidestep the law.” Deals can always be adjusted, extended, or reinterpreted. Any change or any new deal may affect the profit-making opportunities of other deals. Management of a telecom business means continual management of the political context.

Earning billions of dollars in the space of just a few years is a totally abnormal economic phenomenon. It does not indicate prodigious management acumen: it is a symptom of gross inefficiency in the system. The huge oligopoly profits that were channelled to Thaksin and the government cronies who helped him were effectively being looted from Thailand’s people. The uncompetitive industry structure and lack of a level playing field meant that consumers had to overpay for the services they used, and this cash was going to the tycoons who ran the top telecoms firms and to their friends in the cabinet and the bureaucracy. Because he played the system well and had some very lucky breaks at just the right moment, an unremarkable businessman with a string of failed ventures behind him was able to grow rich beyond his wildest dreams with breathtaking speed.

Thaksin’s insistence that he was so wealthy that he would have no need to enrich himself through corruption is equally bogus. He has repeatedly claimed that entering politics was a virtuous sacrifice, solemnly stating in Eyes on the Stars, Feet on the Ground that:

I believe politics is a huge burden. Every Thai should make the sacrifice to participate. And someone like me should make the biggest sacrifice to participate in politics since I have the knowledge, the economic standing, and the management experience.

But for tycoons like Thaksin with major government concessions, there is no dividing line between business and politics. To succeed in business he needed to influence politics, and the more political power he achieved, the more he could use it to benefit his business empire. When it came to petty corruption, of course, Thaksin had no need to angle for bribes. He was a billionaire: he was somebody who bribed others. Thaksin hoped to profit on a much more spectacular scale. He would exploit his political clout to safeguard his concessions, channel new business to his conglomerate, and push to open lucrative new markets abroad. As Duncan McCargo argues in his paper Toxic Thaksin? in the journal Representation in September 2011:

Thaksin’s … immense wealth was based on inside connections — key to securing lucrative state concessions and licences — and access to information.

Entering politics gave Thaksin more connections and information to boost his business empire. His posturing about selfless sacrifice was transparently fake.

But whatever his faults, Thaksin brought long overdue political change to Thailand. His main motivation may have been personal power and enrichment, but he recognized that to gain the glory he desired for himself he needed to win the support and respect of his people. He did something revolutionary for Thailand: he took voters seriously.

The Thai Rak Thai party was an intriguing mashup of influences, ideas and core personnel from across the political spectrum. Socially conservative former Palang Dharma disciples rubbed shoulders with wealthy Bangkok business magnates and former student radicals who had fled into the jungle in the 1970s to join the communist insurgents. Thaksin had significant backing from leading business conglomerates, and won widespread support from small business owners and employees thanks to his promises to stand up to the IMF and put Thai companies first. Crucially, Thai Rak Thai also went to the trouble of formulating policies that would appeal to another crucial voting bloc — Thailand’s millions of rural poor. Nobody had ever bothered to do this before: the conventional wisdom among Bangkok’s establishment was that rural voters were uneducated and unsophisticated and the way to win their votes was through local personality politics and bribery. It never occurred to them to draw up a set of coherent policies that might actually benefit the 51 percent of the population employed in agriculture. Pasuk and Baker note how unprecedented this approach was:

In his electoral campaign, Thaksin made a direct appeal to the rural voter with a policy platform. No previous political leader had done anything similar.

Thaksin made genuine attempts to build a mass infrastructure for Thai Rak Thai and to attract support using methods that were innovative, at least in Thailand. It built an extremely strong local network, with an incredible eight million members signed up by the time of 2001 general election. It used modern marketing methods supported by a hefty advertising budget to establish awareness of the TRT brand, message and policy platform. Most other parties didn’t even have a brand, message or policy platform. Thaksin was, without doubt, bringing long overdue political change to Thailand. And the Thai Rak Thai slogan reflected that: “Think new, act new, for every Thai.”

But Thaksin made ample use of old-style Thai politicking techniques too, in particular the practice of bribing floating factions of MPs to join his camp. Thaksin brought one of the most successful political godfathers of the previous decade, Snoh Thienthong, into Thai Rak Thai. Snoh was a trucking tycoon from eastern Thailand who became the lynchpin of a large faction of MPs-for-hire and hawked them from party to party during the 1990s. A 2005 U.S. embassy cable describes him, with impressive understatement, as “a veteran politician and financier, who earned an unsavory reputation”. Around the same time as he brought his faction into TRT, Snoh also did a business deal with Thaksin, selling him the Alpine golf course and luxury housing estate in Pathum Thani. It was built on land that had been bequeathed to a temple in the will of an elderly woman; while Snoh was deputy interior minister the ministry disallowed the transfer, saying the temple could not pay the necessary fee, allowing Snoh to buy the land at a knock-down price. He built a golf course and luxury villas on it and then sold it to Thaksin. It was a particularly blatant and ugly case of theft by a powerful politician and the scandal hung over both of them for years.

It was a stunning result. And after taking office, Thaksin did something else unprecedented in Thai politics: he actually started to deliver what he had promised. His administration promptly and efficiently began implementing the policies that he had pledged in his election campaign. For Thai voters, weary of years of broken political promises, this was another welcome sign of change. Thaksin’s approval ratings soared even higher. Pasuk and Baker emphasize just how revolutionary Thaksin’s leadership was:

But despite his spectacular popularity and electoral success, Thaksin’s political future was  in jeopardy. Before his election victory, the National Counter Corruption Commission had ruled that Thaksin had concealed some of his assets in declarations made in 1997 when he was a deputy prime minister. It was against the rules for ministers to own companies that had state concessions, and so Thaksin had transferred Shin Corp shares to household staff including his maid and his chauffeur. Under the new constitution, the penalty for asset concealment was a five-year ban from politics. A ruling by the Constitutional Court on whether to uphold the accusations was due in mid-2001.

This was a formidable test of Thai democracy and the 1997 constitution. Thaksin claimed that he had made an “honest mistake”, saying he was so rich that he had trouble keeping track of all his wealth. This argument was clearly inadequate: it did not explain why he had transferred vast blocs of shares to his household staff. There was no serious doubt that he was guilty of the charges. But he was already the most popular prime minister Thailand had ever had, and he had just won a resounding victory at the polls. Would the judges have the nerve to enforce the rules and ban him from politics?

In the end, the checks and balances put in place to make Thai politicians more honest and accountable failed at the first major hurdle they encountered. Just days before the verdict, a majority of the 15 judges on the panel were set to find Thaksin guilty. But last minute secret interventions by some of Thailand’s most powerful figures and key members of the network monarchy forced some judges to change their stance. In a confused and insupportable decision in early August, Thaksin was cleared by a knife-edge margin of eight to seven.

The Bangkok Post reported on August 4 that:

A court source said two judges in the majority had made a last-minute change at the request of a person who has considerable clout, just one day before the court cast its formal vote. ‘I was forced to swallow my blood while writing this,’ the source quoted one of the judges as saying.

But it was a small minority of Thais who had misgivings about what had happened. Most were relieved that Thaksin was still their prime minister. He was still widely regarded as the best hope for Thailand’s future.

One person who never shared in the adulation of Thaksin Shinawatra was King Bhumibol Adulyadej. The king had always felt an instinctive contempt towards civilian politicians. He regarded them as his inferiors, and believed they were totally greedy, arrogant, stupid and corrupt. And Thaksin seemed particularly dangerous, because unlike most politicians of the past, he was popular and respected among millions of Thais. People looked to Thaksin to save the country and improve their lives. That was supposed to be the king’s job.

Bhumibol made his views very clear in his December 2001 birthday speech. As the New York Times reported:

For a man who hates criticism, this was about as unpleasant as it gets. People at the scene said his face grew red as he sat at humble attention.

The man in the spotlight was Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, a forceful leader who has spent considerable energy trying to silence criticism from politicians, academics and the news media.

The man who was making him squirm was no less than the king, Bhumibol Adulyadej, 74, a figure who carries enormous moral weight in Thailand despite the constitutional limits on his political role.

The king was speaking last week to an audience of the nation’s most powerful people, gathered at his palace for his annual birthday address, and he was using words like arrogance, double standards and national catastrophe.

”I can see the prime minister has a grim look on his face,” he said at one point, drawing nervous laughter from his audience, magnificent in their white uniforms, medals and sashes.

”He might be upset because he has always said he was happy,” the king went on. ”Perhaps it is happiness on the outside but unhappiness within. He might have no idea what to do because there seems to be no progress with anything.”

He did not stop there. ”So many people have noticed that the country is in a state of disaster instead of prosperity,” he said. ”Everything is getting worse and worse.”

Early in 2002, another reason for Bhumibol’s displeasure emerged. The Far Eastern Economic Review included a short, gossipy item in its Intelligence column on January 10, headlined “A Right Royal Headache”:

It promises to be a messy new year for Thailand politically, if the messages from some senior officials are to be believed. Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra is becoming an increasing source of irritation to King Bhumibol Adulyadej because of Thaksin’s perceived arrogance and his alleged attempts to meddle in royal family affairs. Thailand’s constitutional monarch has no formal role in day-to-day politics, but in a speech in early December marking his birthday he lambasted the premier in public. Thaksin is known to have business links with the king’s son, Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn. According to a senior official close to the palace, all this is frowned upon by the king, prompting speculation of a possible confrontation between the Prime Minister’s Office and the palace. The same source worries that Thaksin, who gained a massive majority in last year’s January 6 general election, may use his status as Thailand’s wealthiest businessman, with solid backing in parliament, to fend off the royal palace. That would have serious and worrying implications for the future stability of Thailand.

Thaksin reacted with fury. The Far Eastern Economic Review‘s two foreign correspondents in Thailand, Rodney Tasker and Shawn Crispin, were accused of lèse majesté (but not charged) and threatened with expulsion. Thaksin had already shown himself to be highly intolerant of media criticism (in April 2001 he threatened in televised remarks to Thai journalists to come to the Reuters office and beat me up because of an article I had written) and as his premiership progressed he did his best to crush dissenting voices.

With increasing ruthlessness Thaksin continued a an assault on the checks and balances on executive power put in place by the 1997 constitution. In his view, he had the overwhelming support of the people, so why should unelected bureaucrats constrain him? One by one, the institutions designed to curb the power of the prime minister were compromised and rendered toothless. The Senate, Thailand’s upper house, was supposed to be an assembly of wise and experienced elders with party political affiliation. It played a key role in selecting the members of other institutions designed to keep elected politicians in check. But Thaksin soon had a large number of senators in his pocket, allowing him to steadily co-opt all the institutions that were supposed to keep him in check.

Thaksin was becoming an increasingly dominant figure. His opinion poll ratings were going from strength to strength. He spoke directly to Thailand’s people with a weekly radio broadcast, bypassing the media he regarded as mainly hostile. He intervened in areas that the military regarded as its territory. In 2003, he named his cousin Chaisit as army chief, the most powerful military position in Thailand, infuriating other top generals and Prem Tinsulanonda, who had long regarded it his own prerogative to oversee promotions in the armed forces. He also abolished the military-run anti-insurgency command structure in southern Thailand, where a low-level separatist Muslim insurgency had long smouldered, putting the police in charge instead. The army’s role in the south had for decades been a key source of military prestige and also funding, both official and illicit. Thaksin was deliberately trying to impose his authority on the armed forces and undermine their political power. It caused immense resentment in the military, already disgruntled at its collapse in influence and prestige following the Black May violence of 1992.

Prem was particularly appalled. The old general’s frequent claims to have no interest in power was as hollow as Thaksin’s: as Duncan McCargo has argued, since the 1980s Prem had functioned as the key manager of Bhumibol’s network monarchy:

The octogenarian ex-cavalry general is a taciturn bachelor possessed of a peerless list of mobile phone numbers; he continues to exert considerable influence over official appointments. No one can refuse to take Prem’s calls, and few dare to deny his requests, since he is generally assumed to be asking on behalf of the King. But Thailand’s ‘network monarchy’ (my own coinage) extends far beyond Prem, the Privy Council, the military and the bureaucratic elite. It embraces the business sector, academics, journalists and social activists, some of whom have direct connections with the Palace, and some of whom are simply self-appointed guardians of royal interests.

Thaksin was neutralizing Prem’s power and replacing the royalist network with his own. McCargo explicitly discussed this struggle in Network monarchy and legitimacy crises in Thailand:

Thaksin set about systematically to dismantle the political networks loyal to Prem in a wide range of sectors, aiming to replace them with his own supporters, associates and relatives. Thaksin was seeking to subvert network monarchy, and to replace it with… a network based on insider dealing and structural corruption.

McCargo notes that Prem was widely believed to have played a key role in securing Thaksin’s acquittal by the Constitutional Court in 2001. Prem believed this would put Thaksin in his debt. Thaksin, however, had other ideas:

Thaksin had no intention of following these gentlemanly rules of the game. With the assets declaration case out of the way, Thaksin proceeded to freeze Prem out of key decisions, demonstrating his determination to create a new supernetwork, centred entirely on himself, and characterized by a more hierarchical structure.

In a revealing confidential cable in July 2006, U.S. ambassador Ralph Boyce recounted a conversation with Prem. Boyce was always sympathetic to the royalists and wary of Thaksin, and Prem revealed his bitterness about the lack of respect shown by Thaksin:

Prem said that, over Thaksin’s first five years as prime minister, he had not met much with Prem; Thaksin thought he knew everything already.

But Thaksin’s disregard for Prem, and his efforts to override the network of royalist “good men”, did not imply that he was hostile to Bhumibol and the monarchy. Thaksin just did not see why, in the 21st century, he should remain beholden to elderly men like Prem, clinging to outmoded power structures that belonged to an earlier era. He had an unprecedented electoral mandate. He was used to giving orders, not taking them. He believed that as a hugely popular prime minister, he was in charge of running Thailand: nobody else.

Prem thought differently, of course, and his growing resentment of Thaksin was to prove disastrous for Bhumibol and the future of the monarchy in Thailand.

Thaksin had little respect for Prem, but he still made an effort to behave in accordance with the expressed wishes of the palace. In an interview with the Far Eastern Economic Review in April 2002, he denied he had any problem with the royal family, saying his opponents were just trying to smear him: ”Someone is trying to make me clash ideologically with the people through the monarchy. That is very bad. I am wholeheartedly for the king and Thailand.” His opponents were using these tactics, he said, because: “They can’t topple me using the parliamentary system. They can’t do it, because of the people’s mandate and my strong leadership.”

Bhumibol’s December 2002 birthday speech focused heavily on the dangers of drugs. In particular, abuse of methamphetamines was rife in Thailand, and it was destroying lives and whole communities. It was the third time in a week that Bhumibol had spoken out about drug abuse: he had made similar comments to newly promoted generals a few days before his birthday, and again during the annual trooping of the colour. Bhumibol’s birthday speech explicitly called for a “war on drugs”.

Thaksin obliged. The “war on drugs” officially began on February 1, 2003. In the months that followed, hundreds of Thais suspected of involvement in the drugs trade, mostly small-scale dealers and mid-level operatives, were murdered. The police claimed that most of those killed were caught up in conflicts between criminal gangs, but it is widely accepted that the vast majority of deaths were extra-judicial killings perpetrated by the police. Human Rights Watch estimates more than 2,000 fatalities; the U.S. embassy put the death toll at 1,300. As Human Rights Watch reported, the killings began immediately after the drug war was officially launched:

In the first three-month phase of the crackdown that began on February 1, 2003, the   Royal Thai Police reported that some 2,275 alleged drug criminals had been killed. Most were shot with handguns. The government initially claimed that fifty-one had   been killed by police in self-defense and the rest in battles among dealers…

According to witnesses interviewed by Human Rights Watch, the first murders took place hours before the official start of the war on drugs. Late on January 31, 2003, Boonchuay Unthong and Yupin Unthong were shot and killed as they returned home with their son, Jirasak, eight years old, from a local fair in Ban Rai, Damnoen Saduak district, Ratchaburi.  Witnesses described seeing a man on the back of a motorcycle, wearing a ski mask, shoot Yupin, who was riding on the back of the family motorcycle. Boonchuay exhorted Jirasak to run away. Jirasak hid behind a fence and watched as the   gunmen walked up to Boonchuay and executed him with a shot to the head.  Convicted for a drug offense, Boonchuay had recently been released after eighteen months in prison. It was subsequently discovered that Yupin and he had been placed on a government blacklist.

The first day of the campaign, February 1, saw four killings. By February 5, six people   had been shot dead, and a week later the death toll stood at eighty-seven. Fifteen days into the campaign, the Interior Ministry announced that 596 people had been shot dead   since February 1, eight of them by police “in self-defense.” The deaths of alleged drug dealers, both those killed by police and those killed by others, were included in a February 17 report of the Ministry of the Interior informing the government about the progress of the campaign. The government actively publicized the deaths on state controlled television and radio as well as in newspapers, claiming that drug dealers were killing their peers to prevent them from leaking information to authorities.

The police’s unwillingness to investigate these deaths, combined with the unusually high number of drug-related homicides compared to years past, cast doubt on the credibility of the government’s story. Medical professionals complained that they were not being allowed to perform autopsies and that bullets were being removed from victims…

Several years later, after the royalist elite had firmly turned against Thaksin, they often cited the war on drugs as evidence he was corrupt and criminal. But at the time, the campaign was exceptionally popular: most Thais from all levels of society supported the policy, including Bhumibol himself. In his (typically rambling and opaque) birthday speech in December 2003, he also insisted most of the deaths were from gangland wars among drug dealers, and said the toll was a lesser evil than the many deaths caused by drug abuse.

In 2004, Sirikit also intervened explicitly in sensitive political issues. The conflict in southern Thailand was worsening, and two incidents in particular provoked widespread international condemnation. On April 28, insurgents launched a wave of attacks on police across southern Thailand, and 32 gunmen took refuge in the Krue Se mosque in Pattani province. The senior military commander on the scene, Pallop Pinmanee, disregarded instructions to seek a peaceful resolution to the standoff and ordered Thai forces to storm the mosque. All 32 insurgents inside were killed; the evidence suggested many had been executed after being captured. In October, scuffles broke out during a protest in the village of Tak Bai to protest the arrest of six local men. The police called in the army and hundreds of Muslim men were arrested. Their hands were bound and many were beaten by police and soldiers. They were then loaded into trucks to be driven to detention at an army camp. Stacked on top of each other in the trucks, dozens suffocated. The official death toll was 85. Both these incidents sparked fury among Thai Muslims in the south and led to violent reprisals by insurgents.

With the situation deteriorating, Sirikit gave a speech at Chitralada Palace in November calling for Thai Buddhists to be given help to defend themselves against Muslim insurgents. McCargo describes her intervention:

The monarchy had long taken a special interest in the area – the Queen normally spent several  weeks each year at their palace in Narathiwat – and was horrified by the turn of events. On 13 October, two officials in a palace car were murdered in Narathiwat, apparently while buying fruit for the Queen herself. Addressing over 1000 people at Chitrlada Palace in November, the Queen said she felt compelled to break her silence following a two-month visit to the South, her longest in many years. She denounced Muslims ‘she had never known’ as the brutal killers of many  government officials and ordinary citizens. She called upon the 300,000 Thai Buddhists in the region to stand firm and not leave the area. Thais could defend themselves by learning to shoot, added the Queen

The U.S. embassy noted that Sirkit’s “emotional remarks… suggested that direct action needed to be taken to protect the local Buddhist population”. Some of Bhumibol’s circle were appalled by the time of the queen’s intervention. Privy councillor Surayud Chulanont explicitly told U.S. ambassador Ralph Boyce that the speech had been unhelpful:

Commenting on HM Queen Sirikit’s speech in November 2004 where she spoke about the plight of Buddhist villagers in the South, Surayud said that he had suggested to the Queen before the speech not to go into too much detail about the South. I told Surayud that the Queen’s remarks seemed to reflect general views of most Thai people about Thai Muslims in the South. Surayud agreed, adding that her comments had not been helpful. Furthermore, Surayud surmised that the King’s silence on matters in the South in his December 5 birthday speech was one result of the Queen’s remarks. The King had different views on the South than did the Queen, but was not about to make that publicly evident.

Despite the misgivings among Bhumibol’s allies about Sirikit’s strident tone, she made another speech on the subject in April 2005, as a confidential U.S. cable recounts:

On April 23 Queen Sirikit gave a stern, at times passionate, 40-minute speech from the Chitralada Royal Palace in Bangkok on the violence in southern Thailand. Her remarks, broadcast simultaneously nationwide by all of  Thailand’s television stations, were delivered in front of nearly 1,200 members of the Village Scouts and members of other voluntary civil defense organizations from across the country.

In her remarks, the Queen said that Thais should not “sit idly by” while violence escalated.  She called for Thais to unite in a common effort against those responsible for southern violence, saying that citizens shouldn’t expect the government alone to solve the problem. She stressed that she was not asking for Thai citizens to take up arms, but was calling for all Thais to work with the government and serve as “eyes and ears” for security forces. The Queen, echoing recent statements by Prime Minister Thaksin and other RTG officials, suggested non-violent methods be used to restore peace in the South.

The government’s response was, predictably, complimentary of the Queen, with officials promising to heed her advice. Prime Minister Thaksin praised the Queen’s remarks, saying that Thais, “should take the Queen’s words to heart, and cooperate with Thai authorities by passing on useful information.” Interior Minister Chitchai said the Queens remarks “will be the light to guide our work.” Other officials echoed the praise, while urging southerners to provide information about militants.

As Boyce commented in the same cable, Sirikit’s comments risked inflaming the situation rather than calming anger in the south:

It has been extremely rare for a member of the Royal Family to speak publicly about an ongoing situation in the country. Historically, the Queen’s formal public speeches have been limited to her birthday, yet this is the second time in less than six months that the Queen has made formal remarks about the situation in the South. More unusually, the Palace did not announce ahead of time that the Queen would deliver the remarks or that the audience would be televised.

The Queen’s remarks — which we would characterize as reserved, but resolute – were quite different in tone from her highly emotional November 16, 2004 speech… where she indicated that direct self-defense measures were required to protect Buddhist Thais living in the South. This time she did not single out the embattled Buddhist population, but instead focused on all the innocent victims of the “brutish” militants, and the potentially devastating economic impact of the violence.

While the tone for the Queen’s speech was different, her immediate audience for her remarks was the same — the Village Scouts. The Scouts are a nationalist organization, originally organized by the government in the 1970s as a means to mobilize the rural population against the communist insurgency. The Scouts, with over 6.7 million members nationwide, organized a large rally in support of the Government following the Queen’s November remarks. Some local observers have expressed concern that the Scouts — who have a history of violence towards those seen as opposing the government — could aggravate the situation in the south by encouraging nationalist sentiment among the Thai populace, while further alienating southern Muslims. By keeping the Scouts in the picture, the Queen runs the risk of doing just that.

The most striking line of the speech seemed to be delivered directly to the Scouts; “I still remember the pledge of allegiance that all of you have uttered before His Majesty the King and myself that you will be loyal to the Nation, the Religion, and the Monarchy, and will defend the country.” To Thai ears “the Religion” means one thing, Buddhism.  While not explicitly doing so, the Queen could be interpreted by some as again having issued a call to action – to defend Buddhists.

The queen’s support of a hardline response to southern violence was in line with Thaksin’s own instincts. But Bhumibol’s network urged a more conciliatory approach, with Prem himself intervening at the end of February 2005 to urge Thaksin to follow the king’s philosophy of seeking to resolve the situation peacefully and cautiously. Within days, Thaksin set up a national reconciliation commission for the south under Anand Panyarachun, long one of Bhumibol’s favourites.

Surayud, meanwhile, was despatched to the south with Sirikit later in 2005, to try to keep her under control and persuade her to take a less confrontational approach. He briefed U.S. diplomats on the trip in November:

On November 10, Privy Counselor Surayud… briefed the Ambassador and DAS John on the situation in the South. Surayad had returned the day before from six weeks with Queen Sirikit in Narathiwat. He suggested that, although some progress was being made in reaching out to Muslim clerics and elders in the troubled region, Muslim youths continued to be disaffected and posed ripe targets for agitators. Surayud admitted that the Queen had shown a lack of understanding about the South in the past. Now, however, after spending more time interacting with residents in the region, he believes she now understands that the violence is being pushed by only a fringe of Muslim society. Surayud said that the Queen was in the south to promote agricultural and local handicraft projects and that, during the course of these promotions, she had many opportunities to meet with local residents, especially housewives, to hear their concerns. In conversations with southern leaders and ordinary citizens, the Queen and Surayud urged prominent clerics and political figures to lead by example, to speak out against violence, and to organize local self-defense groups in cooperation with the security forces.

For a privy councillor to speak about Sirikit in such terms, even in private, was striking. It illustrated the deep gulf that remained between Bhumibol and his estranged wife.

Thaksin Shinawatra became the first elected prime minister in Thai history to complete a full four-year term in office. In February 2005 he scored two more historic achievements: Thai Rak Thai won an extraordinary general election landslide, making Thaksin the first prime minister ever re-elected for a second consecutive term, and the first to win an overall parliamentary majority at the polls. It was a stunning riposte to his opponents.

Smaller parties were crushed. Most gave up the struggle and merged with Thai Rak Thai, swallowed up by Thaksin’s juggernaut. Thailand was moving towards a two-party system, but the main opposition Democrat Party was left far behind after a dismal election performance. Following his record election victory, Thaksin felt emboldened to further tighten his grip on power and eliminate potential threats.

Within his cabinet, even senior ministers were treated as little more than lackeys. U.S. ambassador Boyce told Thaksin during a dinner in May 2005 that “major decision-making obviously centered on him. Even his most trusted ministers appeared unwilling to embark in new directions without his specific instruction”.

With many members of the Senate under his influence thanks to judicious bribery, the upper house had effectively become a rubber stamp for Thaksin’s schemes. This in turn enabled him to undermine other key institutional safeguards. In November 2005, he got his revenge on the National Counter Corruption Commission. The entire NCCC leadership of nine commissioners was being replaced, and the Senate was tasked with selecting the new appointees. Seven of their choices were cronies of Thaksin, as a U.S. cable reported:

Seven of  the nine candidates selected have very close and obvious ties to the Prime Minister or the TRT. They include:

— A Deputy Secretary General to the PM, who is also the relative of the PM’s wife; — A Chairman of the Defense Ministry,s Advisory Board; — A Deputy Chief of the National Intelligence Office; — A former police academy classmate of the PM; — A Provincial Administrator that defended the PM and TRT after the Tak Bai incident; — A former professor of the PM and advisor to the PM’s  office; — A Supreme Court judge that has previously backed the TRT,  and who is also the brother of a TRT MP and the party’s legal advisor.

The unashamed obviousness of the move, as well as the degree of overkill, were typical of Thaksin. Subtlety and guile were never his strong points: he just streamrollered all perceived obstacles out of the way with brute force and blithe disregard for principles.

Two months earlier, Thaksin had used similar tactics to pack the National Broadcasting Commission with his allies too, as part of a sustained assault by the prime minister on critical and independent media coverage of his government. Thaksin hated criticism, often becoming visibly enraged by articles he didn’t like. Over lunch with Ralph Boyce in August 2005, he made the outrageous claim that he was being targeted by some unscrupulous media who resented his unshakeable integrity:

Thaksin complained vociferously about how he is targeted by the Bangkok elite and the media. He said there were two major problems in Thai society, the press and the courts. “In the old days, reporters and editors were paid off by crooked politicians and gamblers. Previous PMs were more subservient to the press too, frequently doing them favors.” He explained that his unwillingness to do so was the reason he is attacked in the Thai media.

Journalists not regarded as sufficiently deferential were hounded, and Thaksin’s network put further pressure on the press by channelling advertizing orders only to media that were considered friendly, and by buying large stakes in two newspaper groups. Press freedom in Thailand was being steadily undermined.

Thaksin Shinawatra was more powerful and more popular than any elected prime minister in Thai history. In March 2005, U.S. ambassador Boyce wrote a long diplomatic cable to Washington analyzing “THE THAKSINIZATION OF THAILAND“:

Dominating the scene as no previous civilian leader has ever done, Thaksin’s influence is everywhere. The Bangkok elite, which embraced him as the next new thing four years ago, has grown scornful of him, but he actually revels in thumbing his nose  at the capital’s chattering classes.  Himself a self-made man  from the provinces (according to his myth makers), he has successfully tapped into the aspirations of Thailand’s  millions.  And unlike previous regimes that rode into power by buying the loyalties of the rural areas, Thaksin has also won over the millions of Bangkok residents who are not from  the traditional elite — the mom and pop shopkeepers, the taxi drivers, the food stall vendors, department store salespeople and the day laborers…

Thaksin has significantly altered the Thai political scene, possibly forever (or at least as long as he is around).

The most momentous transformation unleashed by Thaksin was that he helped Thailand’s millions of rural and urban poor to find their voice at last. They had long been wearily resigned to the antics of a supercilious elite who competed to buy their votes at election time and ignored them otherwise. But as James Stent, a longtime resident of Thailand with decades of experience working in the country’s financial sector, wrote in his essay Thoughts on Thailand’s Turmoil, Thaksin “brought the majority of Thai people into politics, so that the old clique-filled world of political games that was played among the elite no longer goes unchallenged”. In particular, as Stent notes, Thaksin showed the rural population of Thailand that they were more powerful and influential than they knew:

Thaksin astutely recognized that the majority of voters were resident in the countryside, and that they had, over the preceding decades of steady economic development, become a sleeping but nonetheless restless giant that was just waiting to be awakened. Once awakened, that rural electorate has not returned to sleep.

This was the most significant development in Thai politics for decades. Thailand’s poor were increasingly connected to the world, increasingly aware of the injustices and double standards of Thai society, increasingly disinclined to passively accept a sclerotic and outdated feudal system in which their role was to uncomplainingly remain at the bottom of the heap. Thaksin told them their aspirations were valid and listened to their concerns. He opened up a world of possibilities in a nation long stifled by tradition and hierarchy.

Obviously he was far from being a selfless champion of the dispossessed. Thaksin’s authoritarian instincts, his seemingly insatiable greed, his hunger for absolute power and his determination to crush those who stood in his way were undoubtedly damaging to the development of genuine democracy in Thailand. The stranglehold on power Thaksin had achieved by 2005 was unhealthy in many ways. But it required the continued support of Thailand’s people via the ballot box. It was by no means a death blow to democracy.

In October 2005 the U.S. embassy analyzed the state of Thai democracy in a cable to Washington. Although Boyce was no fan of Thaksin, he did not see any massive threat to Thailand’s democratic development. On the contrary, he saw a country that had made huge progress:

Thailand is the most democratic country in the neighborhood, with a lively press and fiercely competed elections. Thailand’s remarkable political development, after a long period of military rule, progressed in tandem with its impressive economic development, which gave its citizens greater access to education and mass media, reinforcing the transition to  democracy.

The cable noted the risks inherent in Thaksin’s political dominance, and quite correctly emphasized the need for opposition parties and civil society to raise their game in order to challenge him:

Thaksin is the  strongest Prime Minister in Thai history — the only one, in fact, to serve out his full term and be re-elected. One of the goals of the 1997 Constitution was to build a more stable parliamentary system and stronger political parties by making it more difficult for MPs to jockey for political advantage by changing party affiliation.  Thaksin has cleverly used these provisions to increase the cohesion and clout of TRT  and expand his personal power. Thaksin also built his personal stature with populist programs, like cheap credit and cheap medical care, that won the enthusiastic support of the poorer voters, especially in the rural areas. Thailand’s opposition parties and NGOs have never come up against anything quite like Thaksin, and they are playing political catch-up. Thailand remains a democracy, but one in which the  balance among the political and social forces is unhealthy.

Thaksin’s overwhelming election victory in 2005 showed what could be achieved by a leader who took voters seriously and who made a genuine effort to reach out to the millions of Thais long marginalized and ignored by the political elite. This was democracy in action. Thaksin had convinced record numbers of voters to put their faith in him. It was up to his opponents to convince Thailand’s people that they offered a better alternative.

By 2005, several disparate groups were troubled by Thaksin’s spectacular success. Progressive Thais who genuinely wanted to see their country mature into a pluralistic democracy were alarmed and unsettled by the ascendancy he had achieved, and by the illiberal authoritarian tendencies that he embodied. They were troubled by the excesses of the “War on Drugs”, by his belligerent intolerance of criticism, and by his blatant sabotage of constitutional checks and balances. They saw Thaksin as a threat to democracy. And they were absolutely right. Thaksin Shinawatra was never a democrat.

As Australian scholar Michael K. Connors argues in Article of Faith: The Failure of Royal Liberalism in Thailand, his superb analysis of the anti-Thaksin movement:

Thaksin’s rise to power through the ballot box should not be allowed to disguise his fundamentally anti-democratic politics. The elected Thaksin regime (2001-06) was authoritarian in inclination even if the formal institutions of democracy were in place. Despite Thaksin’s arguably pro-poor policies, the depth and quality of Thailand’s democracy was greatly diminished under his rule.

The royalists were equally alarmed by Thaksin’s dominance, but not because he posed a danger to genuine democracy. It was because he posed a danger to their continued extra-constitutional influence. As Nick Nostitz, one of the best foreign journalists working in Thailand, wrote in volume one of his planned trilogy Red vs Yellow:

Thaksin, in his rise and during his consolidation of power, ruffled many feathers. His rule profoundly changed the political consciousness of large previously disinterested sectors of the Thai population. He was highly controversial, yet commanded stronger support among the population than any previous politician. He did not play by the rules. He became a threat to the established order.

The royalist concern was that Thaksin refused to play by the rules of “Thai-style democracy” and threatened the longstanding status quo in which traditional elites governed Thailand according to their own self-serving interpretation of what was good for society. Just as the palace was not a unified political entity, the ideology of Thai royalism encompassed multiple shades of opinion. Bhumibol and Sirikit disagreed strongly on the appropriate limits on royal intervention, and this was mirrored in the divisions between Thailand’s activist ultra-royalists and the more liberal monarchists who favoured a more careful approach. But while they disagreed on methods, they were united in their belief that decisions on governing Thailand should never be entrusted to the uneducated masses. Ruling the country was a job for the royal family and its allies. Ordinary people should never be allowed to forget their lowly place in the social hierarchy.

Thailand’s royalists had assumed that the 1997 constitution would allow the network of “good men” that had long run the country behind the scenes to continue pulling the strings. When it became clear that Thaksin was contemptuous of this unwritten gentleman’s agreement, they were appalled and afraid. The biggest loser from Thaksin’s ascendancy was Prem Tinsulanonda: Thaksin had no respect for the unconstitutional political influence that Prem seemed to believe was his divine right. But it was not just unreconstructed royalist dinosaurs like Prem who suffered a sudden collapse in power and prestige. The increasing dominance of a new power network centred on Thaksin undercut the traditional influence that even the more liberal royalist “good men” regarded as their unalienable birthright. Faced with the challenge that Thaksin posed, elite Thais who had always paid lip-service to the ideals of democracy and human rights began to show their true colours.

One of the uncomfortable truths about Thai politics is that even self-proclaimed progressives like Anand Panyarachun and Prawase Wasi are elitists who are hostile to the concept of popular sovereignty. The same goes for the Democrat Party and the leader it chose after the 2005 election debacle, Abhisit Vajjajiva. Abhisit believed he was on the side of democracy, and he managed to convince many international observers that he was sincere. A U.S. embassy cable in 2010 claimed Abhisit “generally has progressive instincts and says the right things about basic freedoms, social inequities, policy towards Burma, and how to  address the troubled deep South”. But in fact, the ideology of men like Abhisit and Anand is fundamentally anti-democratic. Thai royalism is not a unified ideology, and in particular has been divided into two broad camps for decades, mirroring the rift between Sirikit’s circle and Bhumibol’s: those favouring authoritarian rule with the military enforcing respect for the monarch and safeguarding Thailand’s traditional hierarchy, and those who argued for enlightened civilian rule by educated royalists who would govern more subtly according to royal wishes. Michael K. Connors calls the latter philosophy “royal liberalism“:

The principal point is that Thai liberalism, in so far as its advocates write about it, is held to emerge in constitutional struggles against authoritarianism, rather than emerging in bourgeois struggles against an absolute monarchy. Whatever its contested role, the perception is very strong that the monarchy is the font of liberalism…

Over time, Thai liberal democracy has come to mean governments which rule by the consent of the people when they are able to make the right choices, where power is divided among the executive, legislature and judiciary, and the king plays a guardianship role, and holds ultimate sovereignty. Fundamentally, liberalism in Thailand has been a disciplinary ideology that promotes the production of a citizen-body committed to elite constructions of nation, king and religion.

The royal liberals talked the language of democracy. They often sounded eminently reasonable and moderate, in contrast with Thaksin’s frequent shrill and intemperate outbursts. And they were disciples of King Bhumibol, who was widely revered as the monarch who brought democracy to Thailand. But their democratic credentials were as bogus as Bhumibol’s. They were deeply hostile to the idea of popular sovereignty, of allowing ordinary people to decide how Thailand should be governed.

The 1997 constitution had appeared to be a decisive victory for the brand of royalism espoused by the liberals: the military was disgraced, Bhumibol was too old and too out of touch to rule too directly, and so Thailand’s “good men” would govern on his behalf. The problem was that most of the country’s royalist elder statesmen were almost as geriatric as Bhumibol was, and their grasp on reality was as tenuous as his. They were relics of a dying world, with no comprehension of the changes transforming Thai society. Bhumibol’s Privy Council was supposed to be an advisory body made up of Thailand’s best and brightest; in fact, it was just a gerontocracy made up of 19 confused and querulous old men.

In the fairytale world of the royal liberals, everybody knew their place in the pecking order and humbly performed their duties, allowing the benevolent elites to rule the nation. They were obsessed with archaic and irrelevant notions of propriety and protocol. In the palatial homes of the elite royalists in walled Bangkok compounds, and in the executive offices of companies where the the network monarchists had comfortable seats on the board, servants and attendants still crawled on their hands and knees as a matter of course when serving those who lorded over them. This was how the royalists believed Thailand should be. Bhumibol and his disciples believed they alone had the wisdom and insight to understand their country. But they were blinkered old men who understood less with every passing year, and who did not even have the insight to realize how little they really knew.

Thailand’s Democrat Party was little different from its parliamentary rivals. It was mostly made up of cynical operators with no particular ideology, and its political survival depended on maintaining dominance in regions of southern Thailand where Democrat-aligned families had established a longstanding grip on power. But the Democrats had some politicians with a reputation for relative honesty and competence, and had become the favoured party of the royal liberals and of more progressive members of the urban middle class in Bangkok. Abhisit Vejjajiva was only 40 when he was chosen to be the party’s new leader, but aside from his youth he was a quintessential “good man”: upper-crust, patrician and elitist. He had been born in Britain as Mark Abhisit and educated at Eton and Oxford. Abhisit and Thaksin were polar opposites in terms of connecting with Thailand’s people. Thaksin was a natural communicator when it came to talking to ordinary people in Thai: he spoke to them as an equal, he was witty, he was blunt, and he was never condescending. But when speaking English to an international audience, he was unconvincing and slightly embarrassing. Abhisit, meanwhile, was smooth and articulate when speaking in English, but stilted and uncomfortable in Thai. He also had an incredible knack for being photographed looking uncomfortable and ridiculous during press events that were supposed to show him at ease among ordinary Thais. Most savvy modern politicians would run a mile when confronted with a hat made of condoms at an AIDS awareness event. Not Abhisit.

Thaksin’s electoral success was a clear signal to the Democrat Party and Thailand’s “good men” that they were losing the battle of ideas. They were failing to offer a credible and compelling vision of how Thailand should be governed that appealed to a majority of the population beyond privileges enclaves of Bangkok. They had long treated ordinary voters with contempt, and neglected to devise a sensible political strategy for combating Thaksin’s appeal. As Thaksin consolidated power after 2001, they remained in a state of denial. They proved utterly unable to rise to the challenge he posed. As Stent says:

In the elections of 2005, Thaksin’s party was returned to power with the largest mandate ever awarded by the electorate to a Thai political leader. The Democratic Party, effectively the only organized parliamentary opposition that remained, proved from the time of Thaksin’s election in 2001 unable to rethink its approach and image, or to present rural voters with any sort of credible alternative to Thaksin. The educated middle and upper classes of Bangkok were seething with resentment, but my own feeling at the time was that either they would have to put up some viable political alternative to Thaksin, or accept that they were going to have to live under the man for some time to come, as the inevitable price they paid for having failed to develop an inclusive national vision that reached out to and involved the poorer majority of voters who now had turned to Thaksin as their political idol.

But the Democrat Party and its royalist allies did not draw the obvious conclusion from their disastrous performance in the 2005 elections. They were unable or unwilling to acknowledge that their vision for Thailand was outdated and unconvincing. They concluded that their abject failure to win the support of voters was not a result of their own inadequacy and incompetence, but of the stupidity and ignorance of voters. They interpreted their failure to succeed via the ballot box as proof that Thailand was not ready for democracy. They retreated further and further into the very prejudices that had alienated most of Thailand’s people. And this pathetic, delusional, arrogant response to unequivocal evidence of their own shortcomings dragged Thailand deeper into crisis.

The belief that Thailand’s masses lacked the morals and education to make sensible democratic choices had long been a central theme of royalist ideology. The monarchists had always claimed that the Chakri kings were eager to give the people more democracy as soon as they were ready for it. To the royalists, proof that Thailand’s people were ready for true democracy would be their unquestioning support of whatever Bhumibol and his “good men” believed was good for the country. In fact, as Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson argue in their magisterial new work on politics and development Why Nations Fail, democracy is desirable precisely because it allows ordinary people to challenge the self-serving policies of the elite:

Of course, the decisions that democratic systems take will sometimes be misguided. But then again, so will the decisions taken by any other political system, any group, or any individual. Democratic politics will also lead to decisions and procedures that elites of all types dislike. Yet this is often not because the electorate’s ignorance or shortsightedness, but because their interests diverge from those of elites, and also because the educated elite doesn’t like giving up its monopoly on preaching what society should do.

Thai politics was poisoned by corruption and criminality at all levels. All major parties relied on the support of factions controlled by gangsters. Vote buying was endemic and once in office, parties routinely looted the country with impunity. The rot had clearly begun at the top: Thailand’s “good men” had failed over successive generations to clean up the system, and indeed most of them had profited personally from abusing their position. Even those who attempted to act with relative probity openly consorted with godfathers and crooks, with the excuse that this was simply how politics worked in Thailand. Instead of taking responsibility for tackling this parlous state of affairs, they absolved themselves of blame by claiming it was all the fault of the poor and dispossed, who sold their votes to unsavoury characters and so who were held to be responsible for all the failings of the powerful.

Thongchai Winichakul skewered the hypocrisy of this position in Toppling Democracy:

The blame usually falls on the less educated and poor voters, mostly in rural areas, who allegedly sell their votes in exchange for short-term and petty material benefits. They lack the proper understanding of democracy, it is said, and lack good morals because they are ignorant and uninformed due to their lack of education. They are held to be partly responsible for the failure of democracy. Most of the education campaigns against vote-buying target the rural population and the urban poor. They are held to be infected by the disease, while the urban educated middle class are less so or not infected at all. The latter are champions of democracy whose task is to clean up politics. Certainly, the discourse on vote-buying is not groundless, and there are people who care for nothing but petty material gains. But the discourse is a gross generalisation based on the urban middle-class bias against the provincial-based electoral majority.

There is no doubt that Thaksin Shinawatra was corrupt and dishonest. There is no doubt that he was scornful of human rights and constitutional checks and balances. But this was not why he was hated by his enemies among Thailand’s elite: the vast majority of them behaved no better than he did and were no more supportive of genuine democracy. Thaksin was hated because he played the game far better than his opponents. Unable to compete with his ability to win the backing of Thailand’s people via the ballot box, the royalists and the floundering elitists of the Democrat Party sought to demonize Thaksin and dimiss his millions of supporters as crude uneducated fools.

Had they taken the trouble to try to understand the views and aspirations of Thailand’s poor, the royalists would have discovered that most had no illusions about Thaksin. They were well aware that he was no saint. But he was the best alternative on offer. He was was straightforward, down-to-earth, approachable. He was blatantly self-serving, but he also understood that his political success depended on improving the lives of ordinary people. He displayed a level of political and administrative competence that contrasted starkly with the obvious ineptitude of most of Thailand’s elites. Far from being evidence of their unsophistication and venality, voting for Thaksin was a perfectly rational and sensible decision for millions of Thais. As Stent arges in Thoughts on Thailand’s Turmoil:

Bangkok friends retorted that Thaksin was elected only because of the power of his wealth, and that the voters were bribed. From my own experience in the village of Baan Ton Thi in Chiang Rai, I knew that Thaksin’s Thai Rak Thai party was indeed alleged to have paid THB 500 to each villager to secure their votes, but in conversations with the villagers, it was apparent that these villagers genuinely liked what Thaksin was doing for them, and felt that he was the first Thai politician who talked to them about their own welfare, and who delivered on his promises. It is a measure of the power of Thaksin’s PR machine that among the villagers, all good things that were happening in the kingdom were attributed to Thaksin. When I asked the villagers if it were not true that Thaksin was very corrupt, the amused response invariably was “Of course, he is corrupt — all politicians are corrupt, but this is the first corrupt politician who has done something for us.” To this day, the corruption, abuses, and personal wealth of Thaksin are glossed over by his rural supporters — not denied, just treated as irrelevant.

The royalists were unable to countenance such sensible and pragmatic behaviour. If Thaksin was the democratic choice of most ordinary people, then they saw only one response. Democracy would have to be subverted and destroyed.

Throughout King Bhumibol’s reign, when factions of Thailand’s political and military elite have felt under threat or wanted to undermine their opponents, they have traditionally tended to drag the monarchy into the argument. Claiming to be defending the palace against dark conspiracies to destroy the monarchy has long been an effective way to smear enemies and acquire a spurious aura of admirable patriotism. Such behaviour began within hours of Bhumibol being named Rama IX following the death of his brother Ananda, when royalist began spreading rumours that Pridi Banomyong had masterminded the killing and sent provocateurs to the British and American embassies to make the same claim. The coup group that seized power in November 1947, while disdainful of Bhumibol and the monarchy, also justified its actions by pretending to be crushing a republican plot. And in the decades that followed it has become commonplace during struggles among the elite for baseless accusations of anti-monarchism to be crudely tossed around.

It was, of course, utterly cynical for Thais who professed to believe the palace was sacrosanct and above politics to pretend their profane power struggles were in fact a noble struggle to defend the monarchy. It was also profoundly damaging to the reputation of the royal family. But this never stopped successive factions of the Thai elite cloaking themselves in fake royalist fervour. Bhumibol rarely did anything to dissociate himself from such dishonest and hypocritical behaviour. On the contrary, he repeatedly allowed his acolytes to abuse the reputation of the palace in support of their political games.

Decisively defeated by Thaksin at the ballot box, and unequal to the challenge of overcoming him through democratic methods, Thailand’s royalists inevitably turned to the time-honoured strategy of depicting him as an enemy of the monarchy. They wheeled out the same old tired paranoid myths that had always proved so effective in Thailand’s modern history, and which Walailak University professor Marc Askew describes in his 2011 paper The Ineffable Rightness of Conspiracy as Thailand’s “Primary Conspiracy Theory”:

The increasingly hysterical claim since late 2005 that the “monarchy is in danger” from evil plotters is a vital dimension of hyper-royalist Thai popular nationalism and an institutionalized discourse embraced and deployed by key palace-aligned conservative actors (notably Privy Council President Prem Tinsulanon, the now dominant Queen’s Guard faction of the military and the Democrat Party)…

The Primary Conspiracy Theory has long lurked in Thai conservative discourse, both as a central anxiety and a political weapon, reflecting the revival (and re-sacralization) of the monarchy in post-1945 Thailand. At times of system strain, such as the Cold War period, and currently in the anxious closing years of the ninth reign, it has been openly deployed as a mechanism to silence dissent and critique.

The royalists drew on several dubious arguments to support their claim that Thaksin’s ascendancy threatened the survival of the monarchy and the very foundations of the Thai nation. One recurrent theme was that by offering rural people loans and financial assistance to improve their lives, Thaksin was disregarding Bhumibol’s philosophy of “sufficiency economy” which posited that the poor should seek to better themselves gradually and incrementally without resorting to untraditional “short cuts”. The royalists argued that Thaksin had duped the poor into forgetting their place in society and putting their faith in “get rich quick” schemes that would overturn Thailand’s fragile environmental and spiritual harmony. A second claim was that Thaksin himself was overturning the natural order of things, arrogantly trying to usurp the role of the king, trying to seize a leading role in Thai society that could only be rightfully occupied by the monarch. The cable by U.S. ambassador Boyce on ”THE THAKSINIZATION OF THAILAND” in March 2005 referred to these royalist arguments, but also pointed out that while Thaksin had outraged the geriatric royalists around Bhumibol, he still could probably count on the support of the king’s son and heir, Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn:

For the moment… there is no other thing than the Thaksin thing.

Except maybe the King. In the age of Thaksin, the King has on several occasions made public his differences with Thaksin’s style and more importantly, his philosophy. As respected former Prime Minister Anand Panyarachun puts it, Thaksinomics teaches that it is OK to be greedy and that  money fixes everything. The King’s idea is somewhat  different and has been neatly summarized in a short pamphlet called, “What is  Sufficiency Economy?” This pamphlet draws on royal utterances over the past 25 years and essentially calls for a rural-based model of sustainable  development.  Of late, the pamphlet is being flogged by Privy Councillors, the head of the Crown Property Bureau, and noteworthy columnists as the antidote to Thaksinomics.

In addition, Bangkok observers have been aghast at what they perceive as Thaksin’s unwillingness to be appropriately obeisant to His Majesty. In the recent campaign, they claim, he swanned about upcountry as though he were the sovereign of the country. He is visibly impatient with the many royal ceremonies he has to sit through where he is not the center of attention. In this year’s Mahidol Awards, he fussed and fretted in his seat while the King spoke softly to the American and German doctors who were  being honored.

But the King will not be around forever, and Thaksin long ago invested in Crown Prince futures. Nevertheless, the debate over Thailand’s direction has been joined, with the outcome still in question.

Distaste for Thaksin Shinawatra and his domineering style of government brought together an ideologically diverse range of opponents in Bangkok. Royalist liberals and authoritarian hardliners who had confronted each other in the Black May battles of 1992 set aside their differences, united in seeing Thaksin as the greatest threat to their interests. They were joined by middle class Thais and NGO activists who genuinely supported participatory politics and respect for human rights. All of them rallied under the banner of democracy, convinced that Thaksin threatened the values they held most sacred. Labour activists and progressive young Thais found common cause with royalist dinosaurs like Prem Tinsulanonda and his ancient Privy Council cronies, buying into the myth that Bhumibol and his “good men” had supported democracy all along. They sidestepped the inconvenient fact that a majority of voters had democratically expressed a preference for Thaksin by dismissing his supporters as crude and uneducated. In Political Contests in the Advent of Bangkok’s 19 September Putsch, his analysis of the 2005/6 period in Thailand, Michael Montesano writes that ”many of Thaksin’s opponents displayed a sociological ignorance that bordered on bigotry”:

So strong was the hatred that motivated their opposition to the premier’s very real abuses of power, his cynicism and his greed that it led otherwise savvy critics to dismiss his support among Thailand’s increasingly disadvantaged majority as the consequence of a lack of information among members of that majority. If only they understood, if only they did not just sell their votes, well, these people would not vote for TRT. Or so it was argued. The possibility that the pro-TRT poor did indeed understand the objective conditions that they themselves faced, that they saw in Thaksin’s party the most appropriate recipient of their vote, seemed not to dawn on the majority of the prime minister’s Bangkok enemies.

Further evidence of Bhumibol’s displeasure with Thaksin’s antics was his failure to endorse a replacement for Jaruvan Maintaka, a 60-year-old career bureaucrat who as Auditor General investigated investigations of corruption — in particular, irregularities in the procurement of scanners for Bangkok’s new airport — rather more doggedly than the prime minister was comfortable with, much to his undisguised irritation. Thaksin’s allies uncovered a technical irregularity in the way she had been selected, and judges ruled in 2004 that her appointment had been unconstitutional. But Jaruvan was having none of it. Despite her salary being stopped and a replacement named, she continued to insist that she was Thailand’s rightful Auditor General and she would stay in her post until King Bhumibol signalled otherwise. When the government forwarded the name of a replacement for  Jaruvan to the palace for approval — usually a formality — the response was a prolonged silence that became increasingly uncomfortable for Thaksin. As a U.S. cable noted in September 2005:

Some 96 days after a candidate for new Auditor-General was submitted by the Senate for the King’s approval, the Palace remains mute, leaving the Thaksin Government in an awkward situation… The Palace’s silence has become deafening…

Chastened, the nomination of a replacement for Jaruvan was withdrawn in late September. Another U.S. cable reported this development:

The Thai public has shown an unusual amount of anger towards the Senate because the move to replace the current Auditor-General without the King’s endorsement has been seen as a challenge to the King’s authority. Although the King saves his direct involvement in political affairs for the most serious of issues, his silence on a proposal or a nominee almost always indicates his disapproval, and that he wants the parties to resolve it on their own. As more time continued to pass after this nomination was submitted to the King, the more it came to be seen as challenging the King to do something — not something customarily done in Thailand. By withdrawing the nomination, any perceived pressure for the King to make a statement on the matter —and thus any offense against the King — has ended. The King accepted the withdrawal for consideration to the post, but did not say anything more about the fate of the current Auditor-General…

Jaruvan told the American embassy in a meeting in November 2005 that she was convinced King Bhumibol supported her struggle. Her comments illustrate how the network monarchy worked: Jaruvan was a staunch royalist and on the basis of a few hints and a firm handshake, she had become convinced that she was acting in the interests of the king. Bhumibol was not explicitly controlling her — he had no need to:

Jaruwan truly believes she has the support of the King, and that if the Senate eventually does forward another nominee, he will withhold  his endorsement, as he did with previous nominee Wisut. There is no greater ally to have in Thailand than the King, whose moral authority are unquestioned here. Jaruwan is convinced she has the King’s support for many reasons. First, at the time she was appointed to be Auditor-General in 2001, she claims the King  firmly gripped her hand as he gave her a pin signifying her position, an act which many Thai would view as unusual and very significant. Second, Jaruwan says she has already  provided the King with summaries of the incidents of  graft,  and that he expressed his gratitude for her efforts. Lastly, Jaruwan claims that she has quietly received an offer from  the Palace to receive her salary for her entire five-year term, regardless of whether she returns to her post or not. (Comment: The King’s refusal to endorse the replacement for Jaruwan sent up by the Senate was a slap in the face for TRT, and we agree that he will most likely hold the line if another nominee is forwarded to him. However, it is unclear what more the King might be able to do to show support for Jaruwan, given constitutional limitations on his role.)

The episode illustrated one of the paradoxes of Bhumibol’s power: often the most effective thing he could do was to do nothing. By delaying his approval for government policies and appointments he disagreed with, he could send a powerful signal, without straying beyond the bounds of his constitutional role. Silence could often speak louder than words.

This was how the architects of the 1997 constitution had envisaged the system would work: institutional checks and balances underpinned by Bhumibol’s moral authority would keep elected politicians in their rightful place. The problem was that Thailand’s “good men” (and women) proved much less virtuous than the royalists had hoped. Public servants like Jaruvan who stood up to Thaksin were the exception rather than the norm: most were quite happy to accept the inducements he offered to go along with his schemes. And the members of the Thai elite who began challenging Thaksin most openly during 2005 were not members of Bhumibol’s royalist network: they were former allies of the prime minister who had turned against him out of spite because they felt their loyalty had not been adequately rewarded. Foremost among them were two opportunists angered by Thaksin’s perceived lack of respect and gratitude towards them: political godfather Snoh Thienthong and failing media magnate Sondhi Limthongkul.

Sondhi was a former journalist who had built an overextended media empire in Thailand that collapsed into bankruptcy when the 1997 financial crisis hit. He had long been a fervent supporter of Thaksin, declaring in 2003 that:

Thaksin is no saint, please do not be mistaken, but he is the best prime minister our country has ever had.

He fell out with Thaksin in 2004 after his friend Viroj Nualkhair, a financier who had saved Sondhi from bankruptcy after forgiving 1.6 billion baht in debt, was dismissed from Krung Thai Bank after the prime minister failed to intercede to save him. In 2005, Sondhi began using his Thailand Weekly television show to attack the prime minister. His criticism focused on two core themes: Thaksin’s corruption, and his alleged lack of respect towards the monarchy. Sondhi claimed Thaksin was a megalomaniac who was usurping the rightful role of King Bhumibol Adulyadej.

Snoh was an archetypal unprincipled old-school parliamentary operator who had long bankrolled a large faction of politicians that jumped from party to party throughout the 1990s, giving their support to whichever political leader offered the most lucrative inducements. Thaksin’s electoral success posed a serious challenge to Snoh’s power and influence: his Wang Nam Yen faction was no longer crucial for keeping the government afloat. And so it became a fifth-column in Thaksin’s administration. As a U.S. cable reported in May 2005:

Thaksin has had tense relations with Sanoh Thienthong from the period of his first administration (2001-5), when Sanoh regularly complained that he and his  faction were being eclipsed by a rival faction headed by Thaksin’s sister Yaowapha Wongsawasdi and not receiving sufficient senior appointments in the Thaksin government. The complaints of ill-treatment became louder following onset  of Thaksin’s second term earlier this year and selection of  Thaksin’s new cabinet.

Sanoh has not attempted to conceal his unhappiness over what he considers the slighting treatment that he and his faction members and allies have received from Thaksin in  the awarding of offices following February’s election…

A member of Snoh’s faction, Pramuan Ruchanaseree, published a book entitled Royal Powers in mid-2005, accusing Thaksin of hijacking the prerogatives of the king. Sondhi hammered on the same theme in his diatribes on Channel 9 television. Thaksin was well aware of the threat such accusations posed, and as usual when faced with criticism, he reacted in the worst possible way: in September, under pressure from the prime minister, Channel 9 took Sondhi’s weekly programme of the air. Just like the royalists, he failed to realize that in the 21st century, information and debate are increasingly hard to suppress. Sondhi broadcast his show instead by satellite and webcasts, and started holding huge rallies in Bangkok’s Lumpini park. Sondhi became a hero to the many middle and upper class Thais in Bangkok who were increasingly hostile to Thaksin. Thaksin’s clumsy response, launching multiple defamation lawsuits against his former friend, only boosted Sondhi’s popularity. By November, tens of thousands of Thais were turning up to rallies to listen to Sondhi, who was dressed in a T-shirt proclaiming “I will fight for the king”. The Yellow Shirt movement was born.

As Michael Connors says, Sondhi’s campaign was “an explicitly ideological mobilisation of the monarchy as a means to forge an anti-Thaksin coalition”. U.S. ambassador Boyce made the same point in a November 2005 cable, “THE KING AND HIM: THE OPPOSITION PLAYS THEIR KING“:

Evidence suggests that  Prime Minister Thaksin is alienating an ever-growing segment  of the political class. The antipathy that started with NGOs and journalists is spreading; by some accounts, it includes many in the military leadership and reaches even to the palace. At the same time, Thaksin’s populist policies are winning him acceptable numbers in the public opinion polls. His nationalist rhetoric on the South makes him look strong, (even if the government’s policies are ineffective.) In any  case, his lock on the National Assembly — 375 out of 500  seats — hamstrings the organized political opposition, which cannot stop the PM’s legislative program. Thai Rak Thai’s  (TRT) strong position in the allegedly non-partisan Senate  means that the Senate-appointed agencies that should act as a break on the PM’s power are suborned before they are even established. What’s a Thaksin opponent to do?

The anti-Thaksin forces are reduced to hoping for help from two extremes — the street, and the palace. There is some irony here: the democratic opposition and civil  society are pinning their short term hope on rather  undemocratic solutions.

Not only was the strategy employed by Sondhi and his allies inherently undemocratic, it was also profoundly dangerous for the monarchy. They were pressuring Thailand’s people to make a choice between their democratically elected prime minister and their king.

By 2005, many elite royalists and perhaps even Bhumibol himself had come to believe that Thaksin’s popularity posed a dangerous threat to the prestige of the palace. Decades of propaganda had fostered the myth that Bhumibol was the source of everything good in Thailand. People were taught that improvements in their lives were the direct result of the king’s gracious benevolence, which was routinely contrasted with the scheming venality of politicians. Thaksin epitomized the greed and corruption of politics which the royalists had always railed against, and millions of Thais believed his policies brought them genuine benefits. The royalist elite was alarmed and aghast.

Not only had Thaksin supplanted the influence of the “good men” of the network monarchy by creating his own increasingly dominant patronage-driven power structure, but he was also adept at spinning a self-serving mythology that the royalists feared would eclipse their own propaganda venerating the supreme and sacred role of the king. They continually stressed the immense moral gulf between Bhumibol (and by implication, themselves) and crooked politicians like Thaksin. But it was not the differences between Bhumibol Adulyadej and Thaksin Shinawatra that were so terrifying to them: it was the similarities. Both men were immensely wealthy and influential members of the elite who adeptly portrayed themselves as allies of Thailand’s poor. The royalists believed there was only room for one exalted champion of the dispossessed in Thailand. Like Bhumibol, Thaksin had proved highly adept at political theatre. His “mobile cabinet meetings” in which Thaksin and his top lieutenants descended upon an underprivileged corner of the country amid blanket media coverage to dispense largesse were the same kind of stunt as Bhumibol’s symbolic forays into the back of beyond to promote his “royal projects”. Indeed, Thaksin’s 21st-century media-saturated theatrics made Bhumibol’s past rural jaunts with his handmade maps and pencils he had sharpened himself look rather amateurish and inadequate by comparison. The degree of royalist outrage is apparent from comments by Prem Tinsulanonda to U.S. ambassador Boyce in July 2006:

Prem remarked that from the outset of his time as Prime Minister, Thaksin had been personally unprepared for the fawning reception he gets, especially when he travels around the country. It had gone to his head, Prem said, and made him believe that “he’s number one.” But Thailand was not like America, Prem added. “We already have a number one.” Thaksin needed to learn that he was the manager of the shop, not the owner. The people upcountry liked Thaksin and voted for him, but they didn’t revere him.

The fear among the royalists was, contrary to Prem’s bluster, many upcountry people really did revere Thaksin, and that this posed an existential threat to the monarchy.

In fact, most ordinary Thais saw absolutely no contradiction between their support for Thaksin and their ingrained adoration of Bhumibol. As Australian National University anthropologist Andrew Walker explains in his 2011 paper Royal Succession and the Evolution of Thai Democracy, most ordinary Thais had a pragmatic world-view that could easily accomodate a role for both the prime minister and the king:

This is a world-view in which power comes in many forms, and in which modern commercialization and administrative expansion have resulted in a proliferation of pathways to power. In this world-view, the king is one source of power, but the popular Thai cosmos is full of all sorts of power and influence, and Thais are adept at hedging their bets in maintaining a diverse network of relationships with potential sources of prosperity and protection. This is not a zero-sum game. Despite much speculation to the contrary, for most Thais there was no inconsistency in supporting both Thaksin Shinawatra and the king. Thailand’s masses readily accept that two, or more, styles of leadership and benevolence can exist side by side. The contemporary challenge for rural politics is to draw these various types of power into local networks that can support safe and prosperous livelihoods.

Some members of Thailand’s elite have much more rigid views about power, and they are not particularly adept at grasping the nuances of Thai popular culture. Whereas the villagers in northern Thailand pursue human security through cultivating connections with power in many different forms, the official Thai position is that the king’s symbolic potency lies at the centre of national security. This selective and elite narrative of security asserts that the king is the pre-eminent paradigm of virtuous and disinterested power, rather than accepting that he represents one of the many ways in which leadership can be expressed.

Thaksin had never shown hostility towards the royal family, let alone any republican leanings. He had gone out of his way to cultivate Vajiralongkorn in particular. He was impatient with some outmoded aspects of royal protocol, and he had little respect for the interfering “good men” of the network monarchy, but he was no enemy of Bhumibol’s. Yet like religious fundamentalists, elite royalists clung to a rigid and antiquated understanding of the world and reacted with unwarranted ferocity when their orthodoxy seemed to be facing a challenge. They were unable to be pragmatic about Thaksin’s rise, convinced it would lead to disaster for Thailand and its monarchy. And in their efforts to combat Thaksin in the years that followed, they unwittingly caused the very disaster they were so anxious to prevent: they dealt a catastrophic blow to popular support for the palace.

In his annual birthday speech in December 2005, Bhumibol once again took aim at Thaksin. His typically rambling and impenetrable monologue returned repeatedly to the theme of whether the king “can do no wrong”:

When you say the King can do no wrong, it is wrong. We should not say that… Actually I want  them to criticize because whatever I do, I want to know that people agree or disagree… Actually I must also be criticized. I am not afraid if the criticism concerns what I do wrong, because then I  know. Because if you say the King cannot be criticized, it means that the King is not human… If  they criticize correctly, I have no problem.

In the years since, this speech has been frequently cited as proof that Bhumibol is opposed to strict enforcement of the lèse majesté law. That interpretation remains controversial and open to debate, but one aspect of Bhumibol’s message was unmistakeable: Thaksin should learn to accept criticism.

In response, Thaksin dropped his lawsuits against Sondhi, pledging to be less sensitive in future. And in a lunch with U.S. ambassador Boyce a few days later, he seemed remarkably sanguine about the royal dressing down he had received:

Prime Minister Thaksin came to the residence on December 7 flush from what he considered a boost from the King’s birthday speech several days earlier. Thaksin said there were no unpleasant surprises in the speech and noted that the King had previewed the speech to him on November 21. The King counseled him not to be hot headed in response to  his critics. Thaksin replied that as he grew closer to age  60 he would mellow. According to Thaksin, the King’s frequent anecdotes during the December 4 speech referring to  the Prime Minister had the quality of inside jokes that he  and Thaksin shared. Thaksin noted that he had dropped his  lawsuits against fervent critic Sondhi Limthongkul. I asked him if this had taken the wind out of Sondhi’s sails. Thaksin thought so, saying that the Bangkok elite may be  easily duped by a “crook” like Sondhi, but “not for long.” …

Thaksin expressed satisfaction over what he termed a uniformly good relationship with the Palace. He related to me that when he called on the King following his massive 377  seat win last February, he intimated that it would be his  last term. “What, you will leave me alone?” Thaksin said the King replied. The Queen also urged that Thaksin see the King  regularly, citing his ability to cheer up His Majesty.  Thaksin agreed that the King’s chief motivation these days is the preservation of the status of the monarchy. He referred humorously to the first time he attended the King’s birthday  speech as Prime Minister. The King at that time made  critical comments about him. While he visibly cringed, Khunying Potjaman (Thaksin’s wife) dug him in the ribs with her elbow. The King told him later that he was lucky to have a Khun Potjaman to candidly advise him as well as encourage  him. When I asked Thaksin if the Queen was His Majesty’s “Khun Potjaman,” he said emphatically no. The Palace clearly  has two camps, with fundamentally different DNA in each.

Thaksin’s confidence was misplaced. On December 16, Boyce met Thai foreign minister Surakiart Sathirathai, a well-connected political operative who was deeply unpopular among the staff who worked for him at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Despite being stunningly underqualified, Suriakart was, with Thaksin’s full backing, making a quixotic bid to be the next secretary general of the United Nations. He told Boyce that Thaksin was hated by the royalist elite:

Surakiart unexpectedly delivered a downbeat analysis of Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra’s standing in the wake of the King’s speech. Surakiart contradicted Thaksin’s rosy view of the speech completely, reinforcing the view that the palace remains unhappy with the PM. Surakiart recognized that Thai Rak Thai (TRT) is still strong, particularly in the countryside, but repeated the  adage that “Prime Ministers are elected in the countryside  but deposed in Bangkok.” He said that rabble-rousing journalist/businessman Sondhi Limthongkhul is not the man to lead a successful opposition to Thaksin, but he may continue to plague TRT with his (accurate) revelations of  government corruption. Although Surakiart is an opportunist who has hitched his wagon to Thaksin’s star, he is also a member of the Bangkok elite, tied into the palace through his  wife, the daughter of the King’s former principal private secretary and current Privy Counsellor…

At the very outset of our meeting, Deputy Prime Minister Surakiart dismissed Thaksin’s contention that the King and the PM had discussed the issues in the King’s December 4 speech beforehand and reached an understanding. Surakiart explained that, if the King thought that Thaksin would listen to his private advice, then he would have given it privately. The King had 60 years of experience dealing  with prime ministers, and he knew how to handle them. The  problem was that Thaksin simply doesn’t listen, so the King felt compelled to make his points in a public, albeit  typically veiled way. Surakiart also refuted Thaksin’s claim that the Queen urged the PM to meet the King regularly to  ”cheer him up,” maintaining that the Queen was also no fan of Thaksin. Overall, Surakiart’s view tallied with what we’ve heard from other sources, that the palace, including the King, still has issues with the Prime Minister. Surakiart leaned toward the view that Thaksin had convinced himself that this was not so, and was just refusing to acknowledge the signs to the contrary.

Suriakart’s final plaintive question to Boyce illustrated the reasons for his concern:

If Thaksin goes down, he asked, “how will it affect my bid to be UN Secretary General?”

Despite the mounting criticism of his premiership, Thaksin did not appear to be in any serious trouble at the end of 2005. His opponents were making an increasing amount of noise, but had failed to shake Thaksin’s solid support among a majority of Thais. As Thitinan Pongsudhirak argued in Thaksin’s Political Zenith and Nadir in the journal Southeast Asian Affairs in 2006:

The Prime Minister’s contentious relationship with the king, whom the Thai people increasingly looked to as an institutional check on Thaksin’s runaway power, did not appear to be at a breaking point. Sondhi’s vendetta against Thaksin reached a critical point on 9 December 2005 when Thaksin’s critics of all stripes massed at Lumpini Park in central Bangkok. The event proved well attended but remained insufficient to rock Thaksin’s power. It was in need of a spark to fan the simmering public discontent against Thaksin.

In early 2006, Thaksin himself provided the spark. On January 23, Thaksin announced he was selling his family’s Shin Corp business empire to Singapore sovereign wealth fund Temasek for $1.8 billion in the largest corporate deal in Thai history. Thaksin hoped the move would protect from from accusations of policy corruption and conflicts of interest. “The stock transaction was not decided by Shin Corp,” he claimed, “but by my children who want their father to devote his attention to serving the country.” It was an astonishing misjudgment. The deal was structured in a way that preserved the fiction that Shin Corp remained majority owned by Thais: in fact, Temasek had control despite formally buying only 49 percent of the conglomerate. Moreover, the law was changed just a day before the deal was announced, raising the legal ceiling for foreign ownership of Thai telecoms companies to 49 percent from 25. And most disastrously of all for Thaksin’s reputation, he and his family managed to avoid paying a single baht of tax on the vast profits from the sale. The episode put many of Thaksin’s most glaring deficiencies on display: his arrogance, his greed, his readiness to abuse his public office for private gain. Had he been prepared to pay a token amount of tax on the multi-billion-dollar windfall he had engineered for his family, it is likely he could have avoided the storm that followed. Instead, Thaksin gifted his opponents the opportunity they needed to torpedo his premiership.

More than two years later in July 2008, Thaksin told U.S. ambassador Eric G. John that the sale of Shin Corp to Temasek decisively soured his relationship with King Bhumibol:

Thaksin reflected that he had enjoyed a good relationship with the King during his first term as Prime Minister. The King was particularly grateful that Thaksin had taken steps to improve Crown Property Bureau (CPB) management of its assets, significantly increasing the CPB’s wealth. The King’s attitude toward him soured after his Thai Rak Thai party won a supermajority (377 out of 500 seats) in the 2005 election. Thaksin said many figures at the palace felt threatened by his political power and his popularity with rural Thais, who appreciated his commitment to eradicating poverty.

Thaksin cited his decision to sell his Shin Corporation conglomerate to Singaporean investment firm Temasek as a key turning point in his relationship with the King. Thaksin claimed he told the King about the sale in an audience prior to a public announcement. On hearing that Thaksin would sell the conglomerate to a foreign entity, the King reportedly stiffened visibly and asked, “To whom?” Thaksin told the Ambassador he had not heard the King’s  question clearly and asked, “Pardon?” The King then erupted, loudly and angrily repeating his question. Thaksin told the Ambassador he had never before seen the King behave thusly. After this incident, Thaksin said, his political opponents effectively went on the offensive; the People’s Alliance for Democracy drew substantially more supporters to rallies, had more funding at its disposal, and effectively manipulated the issue of the Shin Corp sale, paving the way for popular acceptance of the 2006 coup d’etat.

Thaksin’s calamitous blunder came at a moment when his opponents appeared to be running out of steam. Indeed, Sondhi had called for a demonstration on February 4 that he said would be his last: interest in his campaign had dwindled and his regular Friday protests were by now attracting fewer than 10,000 people. A U.S. embassy cable described the February 4 rally as “SONDHI’S LAST STAND“:

Sondhi keeps telling the press that it is not his goal to overthrow the government. That’s good, because this demonstration doesn’t look like it will even come close to having that kind of impact. But it should be an impressive show of opposition to a government, and most particularly a Prime Minister, that has made some serious mistakes and alienated a lot of people. Thaksin’s highly controversial Shin Corp sell-off is a great big Chinese new years present from the PM to his most ardent critic, and public concern about the sale should significantly swell the numbers attending. A huge turnout will further weaken the PM, who is firm in his refusal to consider himself embattled — he told the press today that he would resign “in his next life.” …

At a meeting today with government officials, the Ambassador asked what was likely to happen on Saturday. An MFA official present said it was like a bunch of ants attacking an elephant. What mattered, he said, was what the elephant did. Most observers keep reaching the same conclusion: much will depend on Thaksin’s response to events. The official noted some concern over the PM’s regular weekly radio address on Saturday morning — would the PM be cool and reassuring, or would he be “his usual self?”

In the event, a crowd of up to 100,000 people packed into Royal Plaza Park for the protest. Another U.S. cable described the scene:

The diverse crowd, representing a wide range of ages, provinces and walks of life, entertained themselves with games of dart throwing at and hopscotch on the Prime Minister’s likeness. Organizers handed out yellow T-shirts and arm bands with the slogan “save the country.” Merchants traded in an array of products with more colorful and direct attacks on the PM — many not fit for print in a family reporting cable. Of note, representatives from labor groups, anti-electric power privatization, the teachers and poor farmers were all present.

Following a series of pre-game speakers and entertainers, Sondhi — looking vaguely messianic in his matching white headband and T-shirt, which stood out in the yellow-clad crowd — took the stage about an hour after sunset.  The late middle-aged media magnate decried the corruption of the Thaksin government in newly strident terms and led the crowd in chants of “Thaksin, get out!” before reading aloud his petition asking the King to dissolve the parliament and replace the PM. After asking the crowd to wait patiently, Sondhi and his entourage of movie-cameras and flag-bearers strode down the street two blocks to the home of Privy Council Chairman Prem Tinsulonda to deliver this petition.

The social diversity mentioned my U.S. diplomats was a striking feature of the anti-Thaksin rallies of early 2006. The yellow-clad protesters who gathered on February 4 and on subsequent weekends were a broad-based and relatively good-humoured alliance from across the ideological and political spectrum that drew together authoritarians and liberals, radical students and middle-class aunties, progressive activists and patrician establishment patriarchs, united in opposition to Thaksin Shinawatra.

By avoiding tax on his sale of Shin Corp, Thailand’s prime minister had breathed new life into the campaign to bring him down. It was the biggest mistake of his life. And he followed it with another bewildering blunder. On his weekly radio show on February 4, the same day as the rally, Thaksin made a clumsy attempt to proclaim his humility that was to disastrously backfire, declaring:

It would only take one person to remove me from office… His Majesty the King. If he whispered in my ear “Thaksin, it’s time to go”, I would certainly prostrate myself at his feet and resign.

Sondhi and Abhisit pounced on Thaksin’s statement, accusing him of dragging Bhumibol into politics. This was of course a supremely hypocritical allegation: Sondhi and his allies had been explicitly playing the royal card for months in their campaign against the prime minister. But Thaksin was clearly rattled, and his promise that he would humbly abandon politics if Bhumibol asked him to was to come back to haunt him in the months ahead.

Sondhi’s last stand was only the beginning. A week later, on February 11, another rally attracted more than 50,000 protesters. Sondhi widened his movement’s appeal by adding Thaksin’s plans for a free-trade agreement with the United States to the litany of grievances. More importantly, he announced the formal creation of a new mass movement: the People’s Alliance for Democracy. As a U.S. cable remarked:

The birth of the People’s Alliance for Democracy marks a turning point in the Sondhi-led movement to oust Thaksin. While Sondhi likely will continue to play a prominent role, the entry of student groups, the anti-FTA  crowd and others will likely alter the character of the  movement.  Many of the substantive issues remain the same,  but the tactics employed by the demonstrators — who now  include students and activists — may become more confrontational. Beyond these groups, the rallies also seek to draw on Bangkok’s middle class. While this weekend’s demonstration did attract some protesters from other provinces, it seemed to be a majority Bangkok crowd. If organizers are able to maintain their alliance and draw additional support from the countryside in a sustained campaign of public demonstrations, heretofore reticent opposition Members of Parliament will be under increasing  pressure to enter the debate. The police, who have shown great restraint so far, may face more provocation, however, as students and other potentially less docile groups join the anti-Thaksin coalition.

Within days, Thaksin suffered another blow, with the high-profile defection of another of his former allies to the mass movement seeking his ouster: eccentric ascetic activist Chamlong Srimuang. Chamlong had brought Thaksin into politics in the 1990s and staunchly supported him ever since, but showed signs of wavering in late 2005 when he spearheaded a typically quaint campaign by religious groups to oppose the planned privatization of state alcohol firm Thai Beverage. In February he announced he had been wrong all along about Thaksin, pledging his allegiance to the Yellow Shirts of the PAD. As the U.S. embassy commented:

Things are getting worse for the Prime Minister… Chamlong Srimuang, a retired general and former governor of Bangkok, was a prominent political figure in the 1980′s and 1990′s; his political influence has waned, but he still has star power. His criticism of Thaksin is especially noteworthy as he was the PM’s first political mentor: Thaksin got his start in Chamlong’s Palang Dharma party twelve ago. Chamlong is an outspoken critic of government corruption, a “Mr. Clean” who adheres to strict Buddhist precepts and organizes his supporters to demonstrate against social evils like alcohol. He says he will lead his “Dharma Army” to participate in the next protest rally on Feb. 26.

Chamlong brings some baggage along with him. After leading the popular uprising against the military dictatorship in 1992, he was blamed by some for contributing to the violence and the deaths of demonstrators. He stepped down from political life for several years to atone for his role in the bloodshed. Some press and NGOs are raising concerns that his participation on Sunday could spark violence in what have been, up to now, largely peaceful protests.

One thing Chamlong was good at was mobilizing mass protests. His declaration of support for Sondhi ahead of the planned rally on February 26 left Thaksin more rattled than ever.

On February 24, with the biggest ever mass protest against his government looming, Thaksin made another highly questionable decision. Following an audience with King Bhumibol, he announced he was dissolving parliament and calling snap elections on April 2. Thaksin clearly believed this would allow him to demonstrate the continued strength of his support among Thais, reestablishing his mandate and undercutting efforts by his enemies to challenge him. Thaksin’s great strength — and the key weakness of his opponents — was that in spite of the tens of thousands joining Yellow Shirt tallies in Bangkok, many millions of Thais still firmly backed the prime minister. The Democrat Party remained feckless and unpopular and was certain to fare dismally at the polls once again. A snap election, Thaksin believed, would help silence his foes.

The problem was that Thaksin’s decision gave the Democrats and the other small opposition parties the opportunity to sabotage his legitimacy and engineer a constitutional crisis by boycotting the polls. It took them several days to realize this and form a common front, but after plenty of dithering the Democrat, Chart Thai and Mahachon parties declared during March that they would not compete in the election. Meanwhile, Snoh Thientong finally announced a formal break with Thaksin, resigning from Thai Rak Thai, and the PAD rally in Sanam Luang on February 26 drew well over 100,000 people. Thaksin Shinawatra was suddenly looking distinctly vulnerable.

In a lunch with Boyce several months later in September 2006, Thaksin’s ally Bhokin Bhalakula claimed that both Prem and Bhumibol himself had privately told Thaksin to call the snap election:

When the Ambassador asked about the wisdom of Thaksin’s decision to dissolve the parliament in February, Bhokin replied that Thaksin had received advice to do so from Privy Council President Prem Tinsulanonda as well as then-Cabinet Secretary Borwornsak Uwanno. Bhokin then confided that Thaksin had discussed the matter directly with the King; when Thaksin had presented various alternatives to  resolve growing political tension, the King had said it would be better to dissolve the parliament.

Bhokin’s claims remain unconfirmed, but another leaked U.S. cable shows that Prem told Boyce that Thaksin had indeed begun consulting him regularly from early 2006, perhaps hoping to defuse the mounting confrontation with the network monarchy. When Thaksin made the fateful decision to seek a renewed mandate, he may have been walking into a trap set by his enemies.

In a late-February meeting with Boyce, privy councillor and retired general Surayud Chulanont insisted that King Bhumibol had no intention of being drawn into the conflict:

Surayud said that the King was not taking sides. Nonetheless, both sides were trying to drag him in. Media firebrand Sondhi Limthongkul had taken the lead, with his constant references to the King in his weekly demonstrations. Thaksin has played this card as well. (Comment: For example, in his weekly radio address right before the February 4 demonstrations, Thaksin commented that the King “only had to whisper in his ear” and he’d resign. Surayud said that Thaksin’s comment caused great perturbation among the Thai and was an inappropriate reference to the monarch. End comment.) The King’s focus is on preserving the monarchy, according to Surayud. The King also, naturally, wants there to be no violence.

Surayud also insisted there was no prospect whatsoever of a military coup. Boyce believed him, commenting: “As things stand now, we do not believe that the military wants to step in, nor does the King want to be caught in the middle.” But plenty of evidence surfaced during the month that Bhumibol was indeed trying to intervene. And Bangkok was rife with rumours that Prem was plotting against the prime minister behind the scenes.

During March, the pattern of duelling mass demonstrations that has been a feature of Thai politics ever since became established. A pro-Thaksin rally on March 3 drew more than 200,000 people, while well over 100,000 joined a PAD protest two days later. On March 9, a small bomb exploded outside Prem’s house. Nobody was hurt, but it was a sinister incident that marked the beginning of another trend in Thailand’s political crisis: unexplained bombings mainly targeting Thaksin’s opponents and their companies.

On March 12, out of the blue, came a curious royal intervention. At 8 p.m., all TV stations broadcast the iconic footage of Bhumibol lecturing the chastened kneeling figures of Chamlong and Suchinda in the king’s famous intervention to end the May 1992 violence. The broadcast began with the announcement that:

As the current situation has led  to the existence of a large diversity of different conflicting opinions, several groups in the society are worried that this may lead to unrest in the country. The TV  Pool of Thailand deems it appropriate to present His Majesty  the King’s advice given on 20 May 1992 to serve as a reminder  for consideration for all parties and individuals.

It appeared to be an eccentric message from Bhumibol to cool tensions. But since the May 1992 crisis ended with prime minister Suchinda stepping down, many Thais also interpreted it as a coded royal warning to Thaksin. According to a confidential U.S. cable:

The King’s principal private secretary, Asa Sarasin, told the Ambassador that the King himself ordered the film to  be shown in order to encourage a peaceful resolution to the  current political conflict. Although Asa says the intent of  the broadcast was not to favor either side, the initial  analysis is that it works against the Prime Minister, since everyone knows that part of the solution in 1992 was for the  PM under siege to step down. This was the view expressed to DCM by a military aide of Privy Councillor General Suryayud Chulanont…

The Palace’s tentative intervention is being widely viewed mainly as a call for negotiations and moderation. Thaksin supporters can claim that the message is aimed primarily at protest leader Chamlong, whereas others interpret the broadcast as a call for Thaksin to step down (i.e., the “whisper in the ear.”) The broadcast message is very much the King’s preferred style, vague enough to be interpreted in different ways by different audiences.

Bhumibol’s intervention only worsened the feverish atmosphere of intrigue, and the palace was forced into damage limitation mode, denying the king had ordered the broadcast. But the denial was bogus: it had indeed been Bhumibol’s idea, as Arsa Sarasin admitted again a few days later in a meeting with Boyce:

The Palace is trying to undo the furor caused by the broadcast Sunday night of the King’s intervention following the violence that resulted from the 1992 democracy protests…

Arsa admitted that the Sunday evening broadcast of the iconic film of the King’s intervention following the 1992 pro-democracy demonstrations  had provoked a wave of conspiracy theorizing. Arsa claimed that the King himself had wanted the film broadcast  to emphasize the need for peace and reconciliation. Following the broadcast, however, both sides seized on the film to justify their positions. The confusion was compounded because no one knew who had authorized or encouraged the TV  stations to show the footage. The PM and the government denied any role.

Arsa expressed his concern that both sides were exploiting the broadcast. On Tuesday, he had scrambled to issue a press statement to distance the Palace from all of  this.  First, they issued a statement saying that the Palace had had nothing to do with the Sunday evening broadcast. However, they quickly realized that this could provoke yet  another unintended reaction, since it would cause people to believe that the government had done it and was now covering  it up.  Arsa further assessed that the broadcast had been  beneficial overall, having a ‘cooling effect’ on the  protesters and on the situation in general. Therefore, his  office followed up with a second statement almost immediately. That statement noted that as film was “public information” the media could re-broadcast it on their own, providing they did so responsibly. Thus Arsa had tried to extricate the Palace from the political storm.

Even though he had just spent several days scrambling to deal with the controversy over the broadcast, Arsa insisted that Bhumibol had no wish to involve himself in the crisis at present:

Arsa described both sides as “implacable.” Both were trying to force the King to come down into the political arena. Arsa said that the King was just not ready to do this — yet.

The king’s secretary also insisted that the relationship between Bhumibol and Thaksin was not broken beyond repair:

The Ambassador asked about the relationship between PM Thaksin and the King. There has been much speculation about this question. In general, it is presumed that the King does not like Thaksin, but the Palace has been very discreet about its views. Arsa answered that the  relationship between the King and Thaksin is “correct.” The PM gets an audience with the King whenever he wants one.  Lately, however, the King “only listens,” he doesn’t say anything because “he’s afraid that Thaksin will quote him.” The Ambassador asked about the allegation that Thaksin has been less respectful of the King than previous prime ministers. Arsa said that the PM behaves in a respectful way, and that it seems the PM wants to be sincere. However, Thaksin is disrespectful generally to anyone else who disagrees with him.

Comments to Boyce by Arsa’s deputy, Tej Bunnag, also hinted that Bhumibol’s royalist circle was increasingly considering whether Thaksin’s removal should be engineered:

The Ambassador raised the question of how an intervention by the King would actually be perceived by the public. Tej agreed that, despite Thaksin’s popularity in the countryside, if the King did somehow remove him, this would be accepted by the population.

Quite clearly, Bhumibol and his circle were thinking about further intervention. The question that was preoccupying them was not whether intervention was appropriate, but how it should be done.

A week later, Boyce reported further evidence of Bhumibol’s animosity towards Thaksin. In line with rumours that had been circulating right from the start of Thaksin’s premiership, privy councillor Pichit Kullavanijaya and his wife said the king was angry at Thaksin’s efforts to court the support of Vajiralongkorn:

In a dinner over the weekend, the Ambassador discussed the current turmoil with Privy Councillor and West Point grad GEN Pichit Kullavanijaya and his well-connected wife. That both were quite vocal in their criticism of Thaksin was not surprising; the vehemence of their comments was unexpected, however. Pichit’s wife alleged that the King is thoroughly displeased because Thaksin’s efforts over time to curry favor with the controversial Crown Prince have “divided” the Royal Household.

It was an interesting admission that the palace itself was divided over how to deal with Thaksin.

At end-March Boyce paid yet another visit to Arsa Sarasin, to give the palace a copy of Paul Handley’s groundbreaking and controversial biography of Bhumibol, The KIng Never Smiles. Arsa insisted once again that the king was reluctant to intervene:

Asa discussed the Palace’s concerns about the repeated calls from anti-Thaksin demonstrators for the King to intervene to resolve the current political impasse. Asa said that the King did not intend to intervene, since that would be a set back for Thailand’s democratic development. The Palace believes that the situation can be resolved without the King’s intervention…

But Arsa went on to explain that he believed Thaksin would have to stand down within months, whatever the outcome of the April snap election. The reason the palace was not planning a major intervention to topple Thaksin was that the royalists believed that he was doomed anyway. There was no need for Bhumibol to get his hands dirty:

The Palace believes that the situation can be resolved without the need for royal intervention, and anticipates that Thaksin will  eventually be forced to step down…

It may take time, since the PM is “ignoring all the signals.”  But the Palace prefers this to the option of a premature and unnecessary interference in politics.

During March, under pressure not only from his opponents but also increasingly from his allies, Thaksin began considering the possibility of stepping down as prime minister and taking a break from politics. In the space of less than two months, he had rashly thrown away his tactical advantage and allowed his enemies to corner him.

One of the Thai Rak Thai members urging Thaksin to withdraw from politics for a while was Chaturon Chaisaeng, the education minister, a former student activist. In a meeting with Boyce, Chaturon said that “the sooner Thaksin can find an acceptable and dignified way to step down, the higher his chances are of returning to power after an interval”:

Chaturon described the PM’s dilemma. The PM is considering options in which he agrees to take a “temporary  break” from the leadership. However, he wants to have the validation of an election, in which he would demonstrate that he still has wide support. After the election on April 2, once he has proven he is still “beloved” by the people, then he might be prepared to announce that he will not be Prime Minister during the next Parliament, for the good of the country. He has already announced that this next Parliament would be in session for only about one year, to consider constitutional changes and “political reform,” and then there would be new elections.

Chaturon had no illusions that either side in the conflict held the moral high ground:

Chaturon commented on the theory that the current crisis represented the death struggle of the old “Bangkok elite” against the new political forces, represented by the PM. “Neither side is black or white,” he said, “they are both shades of gray.”

In a separate meeting, Surakiart Sathirathai also told Boyce it was imperative for Thaksin to step down soon. Suriakiart was a political opportunist with little natural allegiance to Thaksin, and was well connected with the royalist elite:

Deputy Prime Minister Surakiart Sathirathai told the Ambassador on March 17 that time was running out for Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra. If he finds a way to step down soon, he might be able to preserve his political future and return to office some day. If not, it would mean the end of his political life. Surakiart said that the PM was surrounded by “hawks” giving him bad advice…

In Surakiart’s view, if Thaksin did not agree to step down “within days,” then either Privy Councilor Prem Tinsulanonda or Army Commander Sonthi should tell him he had to step down. According to Surakiart, both the King and the Queen want Thaksin to step aside. (Surakiart’s wife is the daughter of the King’s former principal private secretary and current Privy Councillor, giving him good insights into the Palace views.)

Prem, of course, had long been an enemy of Thaksin and was fully in favour of the prime minister giving up the fight. In a meeting with Boyce on March 22, Prem declared: “He needs to go now.” By this stage, Boyce was actively intervening himself in the situation, telling Prem that some of Thaksin’s allies wanted the privy council president to pressure the prime minister to step down:

Prem asked, rhetorically “They think I should tell the PM?  I don’t even know where he is.”  Surprisingly, Prem said that Thaksin did not listen to his advice in any case…

If Thaksin steps down now, according to Prem, most  people would welcome it, and Thaksin would “win merit.” If he stays through the election, somehow seats a parliament and returns as prime minister under dubious circumstances, the  mobs will just come back. The people want another prime minister.

Prem’s comments were deeply disingenuous: it was not “the people” who wanted another prime minister, but royalists like himself, and other factions of privileged Thais in Bangkok. The rural majority remained supportive of Thaksin. And it was extraordinary that Boyce was giving his support to unconstitutional efforts to unseat the prime minister. Despite his sympathy with the anti-Thaksin movement, however, even Boyce recognized that Prem was not entirely trustworthy. He commented with considerable understatement that: “We note that Prem may not be telling us everything.”

Bowornsak Uwanno, a member of the royalist elite still nominally allied with Thaksin (he was cabinet secretary), told Boyce on March 28 that the prime minister had already decided to take a break from politics to cool tensions:

Bowornsak was critical of the opposition PAD leaders, especially Sondhi Limthongkul and Chamlong Srimuang, for trying to force the King to intervene and resolve the political impasse. He complained that the PAD leaders were trying to induce the PM to use force to end the demonstrations, and thus provoke a crisis that would bring down the government. The government, however, would not resort to force.

Bowornsak then volunteered that, after the election on April 2, he expected the PM to seek an audience with the King and “ask the King’s opinion.” Thaksin would then decide to step down for a period, during which political reforms could be undertaken. In fact, Bowornsak said, “perhaps a decision has already been made,” but the PM had to have the election first, before he would consider stepping down. “Things will be all right after the vote,” Bowornsak assured the Ambassador.

It was an astonishing reversal. Just a year after the most decisive election victory in Thai history, Thaksin seemed resigned to stepping aside — at least for a while.

The opposition boycott of the April 2 elections posed some serious problems for Thaksin and Thai Rak Thai. The prime minister’s support in most of the country was strong enough to ensure plenty of votes and a decent turnout, but in much of the south it was a different story. Large swathes of southern Thailand were traditionally Democrat Party territory and Thai Rak Thai had failed to make significants inroads there. According to electoral rules, candidates standing unopposed had to receive the support of at least 20 percent of registered voters in a constituency for the vote to be valid, and there was no way Thai Rak Thai could achieve this in some southern areas where it was very unpopular. If the election failed to fill all 500 parliamentary seats, because in some constituencies no valid candidate could be selected, Thailand could face a constitutional crisis. As usual, Thaksin and his allies sought to game the system by paying some dormant political parties to put up candidates in southern constituencies and pretend to contest the election, so that Thai Rak Thai could get around the 20 percent rule. It was another cynical abuse of the rules.

The election result demonstrated the strength of Thaksin’s support but also his weaknesses. Thai Rak Thai received about 16 million votes, 53 percent of all votes cast. Nearly 10 million people chose the “abstain” option on the ballot — essentially a vote against Thaksin — and there were nearly four million invalid votes. Thai Rak Thai dominated in central and northern Thailand and the northeastern Isaan province but performed abysmally in the south. Thaksin’s performance in Bangkok was also poor: in 28 of 36 constituencies in the capital the number of people who voted to abstain was higher than the number who voted Thai Rak Thai, a serious deterioration in support from 2005 when Thaksin’s party won 30 Bangkok seats.

In a defiant television interview on April 3, Thaksin claimed the election results vindicated him, but clearly the outcome was highly problematic. Thai Rak Thai candidates had been elected in 461 of the 500 seats in parliament, with 39 seats requiring votes to be rerun, mainly because of the 20 percent rule. If this parliament was ever to sit, it could hardly claim to be a representative body, Thanks to Thaksin’s unwise decision to call the snap election, and the opposition’s boycott, Thailand was facing a full-blown constitutional crisis.

With this troubling reality hanging over him, Thaksin travelled to Klai Kangwon palace in Hua Hin on April 4 for an audience with Bhumibol at around 5:30 in the evening. Afterwards, he returned to Bangkok and made a live televised address to the nation at 8:30 p.m. from Government House.

Ashen-faced, Thaksin announced that he would not be prime minister in the next parliament:

My main reason for not accepting the post of prime minister is because this year is an auspicious year for the king, whose 60th anniversary on the throne is just 60 days away. I want all Thais to reunite. We have no time to quarrel. I want to see Thai people unite and forget what has happened.

After his speech, Thaksin wept. His wife Pojaman, also in tears, tried to comfort him. Across the nation, many Thais were stunned.

There are multiple conflicting accounts of what transpired between Bhumibol Adulyadej and Thaksin Shinawatra at “Far From Worries” palace on April 4. Thaksin himself has given different versions of what happened. It remains unclear whether his decision was a result of receiving a royal “whisper in the ear”.

In a conversation with Boyce on April 7, Thaksin said he had always planned to step down as prime minister after the election. He added some frank comments about his relationship with the king:

Thaksin reviewed the events of the week. He said that, despite his defiant performance on TV Monday night, he had gone to the audience with the King on Tuesday knowing that he would have to step aside. He said that he knew that the King did not like him.  For the first four years of his  tenure, he and the King had had a good relationship. After  Thai Rak Thai’s (TRT) landslide victory in February 2005, the  relationship had deteriorated, since the King saw Thaksin as  challenging the King’s popularity in the countryside. Soon after dissolving Parliament in late February, Thaksin’s plan had been to hold the election in order to show his continued  relevance but then to take a break in order to allow the political situation to calm down. Although his support in the rural areas was strong, he faced opposition from a cabal  of the “Bangkok elite,” the press, “the mob,” and some privy councilors…

Thaksin appeared calmer and more relaxed than I have seen him in some time. The decision to step aside has relieved the enormous pressure on the caretaker PM.  However,  it has hardly solved the political dilemmas caused by this election.

A few days later, privy councilor Surayud Chulanont assured Boyce that Bhumibol had put no pressure on Thaksin to take a break from politics:

Surayud told the Ambassador that he  had heard an account of the April 4 meeting between PM Thaksin and the King directly from the King’s principal  private secretary, who had been present during the meeting. Because the meeting immediately preceded Thaksin’s nationally  televised announcement that he would “take a break,” many Thais have concluded (or chosen to believe) that the King somehow encouraged Thaksin to step down. In fact, Surayud  said, the King said very little in the meeting, beyond noting that the political situation was very tense. Thaksin did most of the talking; when Thaksin told the King he had decided not accept appointment as PM in the next government, the King “only nodded,” according to Surayud.

Surayud said that the decision to step aside was consistent with a plan Thaksin had formed before the  election. During a meeting on March 2, Surayud said, Thaksin had told the King that he would only stay on as PM through the June celebration of the King’s 60th year on the throne. By March 27, at a meeting with Surayud, Thaksin had revised  his plan, saying that he would step aside immediately after the election…

The Ambassador asked about Thaksin’s comment that the King did not like him. Surayud, weighing his words, said that the King had gotten wind of certain under-the-table transactions that had not pleased him.

The following month, however, Thaksin gave a very different account of events that day, telling U.S. official Karen Brooks explicitly that he was the victim of a “palace coup”:

He dropped several bombshells which, if true, recast the history of the past six weeks. Thaksin’s story now is that the King explicitly told him to step aside during the fateful audience on April 4. He told Brooks that he had planned to step aside after the election, but he wanted to stay on through the King’s 60th anniversary celebrations, and then resign. At the audience with the King, however, his hand was forced. After the audience, he gave his emotional speech announcing that he would not be PM in the next Parliament.

Thaksin claims that even this was not enough for the Palace. A few hours after the speech, he said, the King’s principal private secretary, Asa Sarasin, called him and said that he needed to “go completely.” Thaksin agreed to do so in three stages: he would leave as PM, then leave as MP, and finally leave as party leader. This was the reason he suddenly took “vacation” immediately after his announcement that he would step down.

Thaksin spun an elaborate tale of palace intrigue, accusing privy councilors Prem and Surayud of conspiring against him, including blaming Surayud for bringing Gen. Chamlong out of retirement to head the opposition “People’s Alliance for Democracy.”  He claimed that courtiers in the palace are manipulating the infirm and isolated King, Thaksin repeated his theory that the King sees Thaksin as rival for the loyalty of the people in the countryside. Thaksin denied trying to rival the King, saying that he was a just a “simple peasant” who wanted to be among the people and eat in noodle shops. He described the King, with barely-concealed disdain, as “provincial,” unaware of the changes that had taken place in the world (“never been on a Boeing 747″), and accused him of “thinking he owns the country.” Thaksin advisor Pansak Vinyaratn said that recent events were a return to “absolute monarchy.” Thaksin told Brooks that he “cannot come back as prime minister as long as this King is alive.” He unironically compared himself to Aung San Suu Kyy — the winner of a democratic election who is not allowed to take office. He dismissed the courts’ annulment of the elections as a sham. He claimed that, if it were not for his financial power and grassroots support, he’d be chased into exile.

Although Thaksin had pledged to withdraw from politics in three stages, he hoped to draw out the stages. He mentioned his strong relationship with the Crown Prince (implying that, once the present King was dead, he would have an ally on the throne.) He planned to lead TRT into the next elections — whenever they are — and run as an MP. He  expressed complete confidence that TRT would emerge with a commanding majority again. Thaksin would only announce that he would not serve as Prime Minister after the election, so  as not to affect the enthusiasm of TRT’s base or hamper their ability to set out the vote.

Boyce had always been far more sympathetic towards the royalists than Thaksin, and questioned whether his latest account was honest:

Thaksin’s diatribe and revisionist history are highly suspect; we are not convinced that the King and his minions pushed Thaksin out of office. Thaksin’s enormous ego has taken a tremendous battering this year, and it may be hard for him to grasp how a rag-tag bunch of demonstrators somehow started a process that led to this deadly challenge to his  political future.  He would rather see the King as his nemesis.

But in spite of his bias, Boyce did not deny that the royalists were conspiring to bring Thaksin down:

We agree with the underlying theme of Thaksin’s complaint — the palace has aligned against him and will (carefully) seek ways to support the effort to drive him from politics definitively.

Pansak Vinyaratn, Thaksin’s chief political advisor, gave yet another version of events during a meeting with Ralph Boyce and Eric John on May 22. Pansak’s account accords partly with what Surayud had said: Thaksin told Bhumibol he would stand aside, and Bhumibol simply nodded. Given that Pansak and Surayud were political foes, the fact they both agreed on this account of the meeting makes it likely that this is indeed what happened. But Pansak echoed Thaksin’s claim that after the meeting, the prime minister was telephoned by a senior royalist telling him he had to resign right away. He said the elderly Bhumibol was being manipulated by a network of royalists around Prem Tinsulanonda who were determined to drive Thaksin out of politics forever:

Asked about the circumstances behind Thaksin’s decision to step down as Prime Minister, Pansak accused a small cabal of advisors in the palace of interpreting the King’s words and actions to force Thaksin’s resignation. He said that Privy Councilor Prem Tinsulanonda (whom Pansak referred to as the “Monarch, Jr.”) was a key player in this group. He said that Prem viewed Thaksin as an “inappropriate” Prime Minister because he did not share enough with the “old power groups” in Bangkok.

Pansak reaffirmed that Thaksin had intended to withdraw from politics all along, but that he wanted to leave in a credible, face-saving manner. When Thaksin told the King, during their April 4 meeting, that he was willing to resign, the King nodded and then ended the meeting.  It was only later that Thaksin received a phone call from one of the King’s advisors telling him that the nod, meant that he should resign immediately. Pansak lamented that “Thaksin took the King’s ephemeral statements too seriously” and was thus manipulated by the King’s advisors. Asked if he thought Prem and his confederates were acting independent of the monarch, Pansak said, “Yes. The King is never that explicit.” Nevertheless, he noted, the outcome is favorable for the King as it allows him to maintain plausible deniability of any interference in the democratic process while appearing as the stabilizing force in Thai democracy. In the end, according to Pansak, “whichever serf wins, he will give credit to the King.”

Boyce was sceptical, commenting in his cable to Washington that Pansak’s “theory of a palace cabal acting independent of the King sounds farfetched”. In fact, events since April 2006 showed such a theory was not so far-fetched all all. Leading royalists were explicitly conspiring to bring Thaksin down. Bhumibol clearly approved of their aims — he too wanted Thaksin out of politics — but the extent to which he agreed with their methods remains unknown. This is how the network monarchy had served Rama IX for decades: they strove to achieve what they believed the king wanted, whether or not he had actually ordered them to do so. And now, the network monarchy was determined to destroy Thaksin Shinawatra.

The political intrigues of March and April 2006 were a turning point in Thailand’s political strife and the genesis of the crisis that has since engulfed the monarchy. This was the time that Thaksin Shinawatra realized beyond doubt that the “good men” of the network monarchy were explicitly and relentlessly conspiring to crush his political ambitions, and that King Bhumibol at the very least sympathized with their aims. Thaksin had never shown republican inclinations, but he was a born fighter, and it was now unambiguously clear that Bhumibol’s circle were his enemies. The years of shadow boxing were over. This was war.

In a very revealing speech to the Foreign Correspondent’s Club of Thailand in August 2007, Thaksin’s longtime ally Jakrapob Penkair said Thaksin had never intended to get into an open conflict with the palace and the network monarchy, but had drifted into the battle “sleepwalkingly”:

I was with him so I knew that he didn’t launch those policies philosophically. He simply wanted to do his job. He wants to be liked. He wants to be loved. He wants to  be a useful rich man.

Jakrapob’s analysis is highly credible because Jakrapob genuinely was a republican, and he had become increasingly impatient with Thaksin precisely because Thaksin did not have any particular ideological opposition to an activist monarchy. He just wanted to be able to govern without the meddling of geriatric royalists like Prem Tinsulanonda.

By enthusiastically sailing into battle against Thaksin, who for all his faults was the unambiguous electoral choice of Thailand’s people, the royalists turned him into a dangerous and vengeful enemy who had no intention of being bundled unceremoniously out of politics by a bunch of unelected and mostly elderly men who resented his power and popularity. The royalists were sleepwalking too, blundering into a far more perilous confrontation than they realized. They were dragging King Bhumibol — unwittingly or otherwise — into an unnecessary and bitter conflict that would prove devastating to the prestige and survival prospects of the Thai monarchy.

Bhumibol was by no means unaware of the enormous risks of stepping too boldly beyond his constitutional bounds, but his views about what constituted acceptable royal activism in a modern democracy were woefully out of touch with reality. This became clear on April 25, when the king made his most direct and open intervention of the crisis so far. In two speeches to judges broadcast on Thai television, Bhumibol said of the political situation: “It is, pardon me, a mess.” He ordered the judges to sort it out.

U.S. charge d’affaires Alexander Arvizu recounted what happened in a cable to Washington:

King Bhumibol Adulyadej yesterday gave two of the most direct and to-the-point speeches in recent years to the newly sworn-in judges of the Administrative and Supreme Courts. In these speeches, the King questioned the democratic nature of the April 2 general elections as well as the “correctness” of dissolving Parliament and calling for snap elections in the first place. He reminded the Administrative Court that it is their job to consider these issues, and opened the possibility of nullifying the elections. He further asserted that invoking Article 7 of the Constitution to have the royally-appointed Prime Minister would be undemocratic, The King therefore called on the courts and other institutions to work together to resolve the current political chaos…

In his first speech of the night to the judges of the  Administrative Court, the King asserted that “it is impossible for a democratic election to have only one party  and one candidate. This is undemocratic.”  He further  questioned why no one discussed whether dissolving the Parliament and calling for a snap election within thirty days was the “correct” decision in the first place.  If not, he  suggested, one would need to “solve the problem,” including  ”perhaps nullifying the elections.”

The King stressed that the current political state is quite a “mess,” and that for him to intervene would only make it messier. He called on the three courts (Constitutional, Administrative, and Supreme Courts) to work together to  ”urgently decide, otherwise the country would collapse.”

Bhumibol genuinely thought he was showing great restraint by rejecting calls for him to intervene directly through appointing a new prime minister himself, and instead giving the responsibility to the courts to sort out the mess. In his speeches he used the Thai word for “democracy” without any qualifications, unlike in his famous 1992 intervention when he dismissively spoke of “so-called democracy”. And — incredibly — according to privy councillor Surayud in a conversation with Boyce in May, Bhumibol had explicitly intended his words and actions to be a riposte to Paul Handley’s The King Never Smiles and its central thesis that Rama IX had meddled in politics throughout his reign. It was more evidence of Bhumibol’s obsession with his image and how he was perceived abroad:

Surayud explained that the King’s recent remarks to key judges emphasizing his position as a “monarch under the Constitution” were made in part as a response to allegations made in Paul Handley’s yet-to-be-published book “The King Never Smiles” which assert that the King has little respect for democratic principles. Surayud was convinced that the King intended to see the present political stand-off resolved through the courts.

But by telegraphing the outcome he wanted — the voiding of the April 2 elections — Bhumibol was not only obviously intervening himself, but he was also entangling another supposedly neutral institution in Thailand’s crisis: the judiciary. He was compromising the independence of the courts. And his apparent belief that wading into judicial territory was not just acceptable but in fact was a sign of his restraint and commitment to the constitution showed how little Bhumibol understood about how democracy should work.

Ever since Bhumibol’s speech that day, the Thai judiciary has played an activist role in Thailand’s political crisis, unambiguously siding with the royalists against Thaksin on repeated occasions. The courts had never been particularly admirable: for decades, money had usually been able to buy justice in Thailand. But following Bhumibol’s intervention, the judiciary has plainly been a player in the political conflict, issuing decisions time and again that targeted Thaksin and favoured his opponents. The king had only divided Thailand even further, and deepened the crisis the country was facing.

On May 8, as expected following Bhumibol’s remarks, the Constitutional Court ruled that the snap election had been unconstitutional, and new elections must be held. The judges had done exactly what Bhumibol had told them to do, as Boyce made clear in a cable on May 10:

The King’s statements likely served as a significant motivator for the Court. In a salient part of  his speech, the King said that “another point is whether it was right to dissolve the House and call for snap election within 30 days. There was no debate about this. If it is not right, it must be corrected. Should the election be nullified? You have the right to say what’s appropriate or not. If it’s not appropriate, it is not to say the government is not good. But as far as I am concerned, a one-party election is not normal. The one candidate situation is undemocratic.”

After nullifying the election, the judges went even further: they called for the election commissioners who had overseen the polls to resign. One complied but three refused, leading to another legal battle. In 2007 allies of Thaksin released a recording of a telephone discussion between two senior Supreme Court officials and a senior bureaucrat, discussing how to force out the election commissioners. It was clear from their discussion that they explicitly saw it as their duty to follow Bhumibol’s instructions: their duty was to the king, not to the law. But they were anxious to pretend otherwise, particularly in light of Handley’s book. At one point, Virat Chinvinijkul, who was Supreme Court secretary at the time (he is now a judge), declared:

When releasing information publicly we are afraid to talk about the Royal Address because it was his speech to direct us. We follow his orders. Foreigners won’t accept it.

Later in the conversation, Virat also stated that Prem Tinsulanonda was heavily involved, phoning the president of the Supreme Court every morning. Virat said that because of this, “His Majesty knows every step we take.” Prem was actively meddling in the deliberations of the supposedly independent judiciary on matters pertaining to the fate of Thaksin.

The extent of the collaboration by royalists, judges and generals to undermine Thaksin was further revealed by a dinner party hosted by Piya Malakul at his Sukhumvit residence on the evening of May 6. Piya was a minor royal who ran a media conglomerate had fallen out with Thaksin even before he became prime minister during a power struggle over the ITV television channel. He also had a long history of producing propaganda for the palace, including using his radio station to denounce protesters in May 1992 as republicans and traitors to Thailand. Guests at the dinner included Administrative Court president Akrathorn Chullarat, Supreme Court president Chanchai Likhitchitta, Supreme Court official Charan Pakdithanakul, privy councillor Surayud Chulanont and retired General Panlop Pinmanee — a slithery character who has changed sides with dizzying regularity throughout Thailand’s years of political crisis. The dinner party became public knowledge in 2009 when Panlop — by now back in Thaksin’s camp — told Thaksin that a coup had been discussed that evening. Surayud and Piya both admitted that the meeting took place, but both rather lamely insisted they had only exchanged views on the political situation. Surayud told a news conference that:

It would have been stupid of me to discuss plotting a coup with judges. I would have been better off discussing it with military commanders.

Piya told a similar story, claiming:

I only wanted to hear what the country’s top judges who happened to be my friends had to say about the situation… I can confirm there was no talk of a coup or about who was going to get what position. There was not a single military officer there. How could we discuss a coup?

Their denials were interestingly specific: they said they never discussed a military coup, but they did not deny discussing how to sabotage Thaksin’s political career. Given the events of April and May, particularly the sudden activism of the courts to undermine Thai Rak Thai, it is highly suspicious that judges met with senior royalists that evening.

The judicial intervention, however, had the unintended effect of giving Thaksin a way to remain in politics for the time being. He had promised not to be prime minister in the next parliament, but with the April elections annulled, a new parliament could be several months away, and Thaksin could continue as “caretaker prime minister” in the meantime. Having had some time to reflect, Thaksin had also made up his mind not to give up without a fight. He was going to try to stay in power.

On May 23, Thaksin Shinawatra formally resumed work as prime minister, chairing the weekly cabinet meeting. For the moment, he was still very much a political player.

During May 2006, Ralph “Skip” Boyce wrote a lengthy cable analyzing Thailand’s political crisis. He titled it: “MANICHAEAN STRUGGLE FOR THE SOUL OF THAILAND“. Boyce was by no means an objective observer of Thai politics, but he was astute enough to realize that the escalating conflict was far more than a power struggle over Thaksin’s influence:

The Thai political crisis  has grown increasingly complicated, as multiple lawsuits work their way through the three high courts, charged by the King  with finding a solution to the “mess” created by the “undemocratic” April 2 parliamentary elections. Thailand will spend most of 2006 in a protracted political crisis…

At issue is not just who will be the next prime minister. Rather, this is a confrontation between different models for Thai society, playing out in the struggle between the beloved King, and all he represents, and the popular prime minister, and what he portends. Right now, the momentum is running against Thaksin, who may have to pay a high price for his hubris. But in the longer run, the King is old and the Thailand he represents is changing. Thaksin faces serious challenges right now, but he, or someone like him, is likely to be back.

In his cable, Boyce analyzed the strengths and weaknesses of the alternative visions for Thailand represented by Bhumibol and Thaksin:

THE KING

On the one hand, the King represents traditional Thai values: respect for age and authority, moderation, modesty, and Buddhist values. He is the father of the people, his country is the Thailand of the rice farmers. He champions “sufficiency economy,” in which people eschew debt and dreams of quick riches, and instead build their lives around honest labor and prudent investment. Pictures of him are everywhere in the country, iconographic images often showing him with the elderly, the poor, and children.

On the other hand, to some the King represents an old and perhaps out-dated order. His periodic interventions in Thai politics may, as in 1992, have had a positive influence, but he has also supported military governments and condoned their human rights abuses in the past. Governments come and go, but the King has been there since before most Thai were born. Knowing this to some degree discourages the Thai from taking the training wheels off their democracy, building strong institutions and relying on them, instead of the monarch, to unify their nation and defend their rights.

THE POLITICIAN

On the one hand, Thaksin Shinawatra represents a modern political and economic order. He is decisive, not  risk-averse, confident about himself and about Thailand’s place in the world. He is the CEO of Thailand, Inc. His Thailand is best symbolized by Bangkok’s many luxury shopping malls — it’s big! it’s modern! everything here is imported and expensive! He advocates a mixture of capitalism (red in tooth and claw) with populism. He tells the rural people to do what he did — borrow money, think big, leave behind your rural roots, play the system, and strike it rich. I did, and so can you. People don’t put up his photos, but his Shin Corp. products are everywhere — its cell phones in every shopping center and many pockets, its TV station beamed to every TV set.

On the other hand, to some people Thaksin represents everything that is wrong with development in southeast Asia. He is greedy, corrupt, inherently undemocratic under his  facade, (did we mention corrupt?), conceited and self-promoting. In his heart, he defers to no one — not to  age, not to Buddhist hierarchy, and not to the King. He introduced many positive aspects to Thai politics: his party had a platform that attracted rural voters, and he kept many of his promises to them, introducing the 30 baht health scheme and cheap credit for farmers. But the cost was high — a Prime Minister who, in the end, disdains many of the key features of a democracy, such as a free press and civil society, and was eager to grasp power more openly and greedily than any civilian PM before him.

At the elite level, Thailand’s conflict was a clash between two rival power networks  — the informal alliance of leading royalists versus Thaksin’s political juggernaut. It was a bare-knuckles fight for supremacy among competing factions in the ruling oligarchy. Neither side was democratic or particularly admirable. The royalists tried to claim the moral high ground by insisting they possessed some kind of inherent virtue in contrast to the corruption and venality of the Thaksin camp. But in fact, most of the “good men” were no better than Thaksin’s cronies. The attempts to portray Prem as an ethical titan in a good-versus-evil battle with Thaksin were particularly ridiculous: his administration in the 1980s had been characterized by rampant corruption and shady backroom deals just like Thaksin’s in the 21st century. It was not a moral conflict: it was a naked power struggle.

But as Boyce observed in his cable, the conflict was not just a brawl between two elite networks. It was much more than that too. It was becoming an ideological battle over fundamental issues of concern to everybody in the country, from the richest to the poorest. It was a struggle over whether sovereignty derived from the monarch or from the people, over how democracy should work in 21st century Thailand, over what it meant to be Thai. For all Thaksin’s obvious corruption and authoritarianism, by 2006 he stood for those who believed in popular sovereignty and opposed the cabal of royalists and generals who for decades had run Thailand. Thaksin Shinawatra was no democrat, but he had found himself on the side of democracy.

The royalists of the network monarchy were incandescent over Thaksin’s return to work, viewing it as a brazen snub to Bhumibol’s wishes. It was certainly a brazen challenge to Prem and his cronies: Thaksin was signalling to them that he would not go down without a fight. With the 60th anniversary celebrations of Rama IX’s reign looming, open hostilities had to be put on hold, but behind the scenes, the confrontation was uglier than ever.

Sometime in early June, Boyce met Thaksin again, and sent a cable to Washington about their discussion: cable 06BANGKOK3349, entitled “NOODLES WITH THAKSIN”. Whatever they discussed was deemed so sensitive by the U.S. embassy that it was classified as top secret, which meant it was not sent electronically: a physical copy was conveyed to the United States via diplomatic pouch. We know the cable exists because it is referenced in five subsequent leaked cables. The extreme level of secrecy suggests Thaksin shared highly sensitive information about the palace. In cable 06BANGKOK4040 Boyce references 06BANGKOK3349 after stating:

Thaksin…says that the King told him on May 19 that Thaksin could never return as PM.

Since none of the cables obtained by WikiLeaks contains a direct report of such an incident, it appears this was the focus of the top secret cable: Thaksin informed Boyce during a meal of noodles that Bhumibol had told him he could never return as prime minister. Whether Thaksin was telling the truth remains unknown, but the fact that he would make such a claim to Boyce shows the extent to which his working relationship with the king had broken down.

For the sake of appearances, such differences had to be put aside for the 60th anniversary ceremonies. But the political tensions were never far from the surface: the whole Diamond Jubilee celebration was a show of strength by the royalists, with Thais donning yellow clothing to proclaim their devotion to Bhumibol, the same colour that had been appropriated by the PAD. The royalists seem to have concluded from the scenes of adulation of June 9 that Bhumibol’s popularity far outstripped Thaksin’s and that they would easily triumph in their confrontation with the prime minister. Prem told Boyce that:

After seeing the adoring crowds on June 9, a million people in their yellow shirts who waited for hours in the heat just to catch a glimpse of their King, Thaksin should understand that he cannot rival the King for the people’s affection, Prem concluded.

And Boyce himself drew the same conclusion from the extraordinary scenes of June 9:

Thaksin recently told the Ambassador that his own popularity in the countryside is seen by the palace as threatening to the King’s popular standing. After this weekend’s massive, unprecedented display of public adoration for the monarch, however, one hopes that Thaksin has a firm enough grasp of reality to reconsider this idea.

But what the royalists — and Boyce — had failed to grasp was that most ordinary Thais did not yet feel that they had to make a choice between their adulation for Bhumibol and their support for Thaksin. Most ordinary people who strongly backed Thaksin also genuinely and instinctively revered the king. But that was soon to dramatically change, as a result of the hubris and rash overreaching of the royalist elite.

As soon as the celebrations were over, open political warfare resumed. Thaksin launched another salvo of defamation lawsuits, against the Democrat Party for calling him a “bloodsucking demon” and against three newspapers for printing the slur. Meanwhile, the judicial onslaught against Thai Rak Thai escalated, with moves to seek the dissolution of the Thai Rak Thai party for electoral irregularities gathering pace. Two of the last remaining royalists with senior government positions, cabinet secretary Bowornsak Uwanno and deputy prime minister Wissanu Krea-Ngam, abandoned ship, resigning from their posts.

On June 29, Thaksin went on the offensive once again. In a speech to assembled bureaucrats and military officers he declared that a “charismatic person outside the constitution” was plotting to overthrow him. The English translation fails to capture the nuances of the Thai phrase: the taciturn Prem was not a particularly charismatic individual in the English-language sense of the word, but the Thai word, barami, conveys the sense of being influential and of high status close to the palace. Thaksin added:

I will not allow any changes that don’t observe the democratic process. I will protect democracy. Let  me repeat: I will protect democracy with my life.

There was little doubt who he was referring to: Thaksin Shinawatra was publicly throwing down the gauntlet to his royalist nemesis Prem Tinsulanonda. The result was uproar. Even Boyce appeared shocked, in a cable that greatly overestimated Prem’s popularity:

After a brief break to celebrate the King’s 60th anniversary on the throne, PM Thaksin has come out swinging, more aggressively than ever. While his own political fortunes are still very unclear, he appears bent on fighting every step of the way, and taking everyone down with him if he goes. He may have miscalculated, however, in making a not-so-veiled attack on the very popular Privy Council President General Prem Tinsulanonda…

Thaksin’s comments have been described by various academics “an open declaration of war.” In addition to the high esteem the public feels for Prem himself, the General is regarded in many ways as a proxy for the King.

The following day, royalist conspirator Piya Malakul weighed in, with a diatribe about Thaksin full of scurrilous smears:

The Ambassador met on June 30 with Piya Malakul Na  Ayutthaya (protect), a close associate of the Queen and a very knowledgeable palace insider. Piya said that those  attending the PM’s speech had been shocked by his attack on Gen. Prem; Piya has received many calls since the speech expressing dismay and asking what should be done about the PM’s remarks…

The  Ambassador noted that Thaksin felt he was a rival of the King for the affections of the rural population. Piya agreed, and pointed out how TRT officials had sycophantically received Thaksin on his trips to the North and Northeast, swelling his ego…

Everyone is speculating on why Thaksin launched this attack. Piya claims that Thaksin is taking large doses of  Valium (28 mg) to cope with the pressure he’s under. The Democrat party spokesman suggested that Prem may be operating  behind the scenes, encouraging the Constitutional Court  justices to find against Thaksin; these efforts may have come to Thaksin’s attention, infuriating him so that he blew a gasket… Others point to Thaksin’s penchant for spouting off combined with his ingrained arrogance. Whatever the  reason, this was a reckless act, provocative to society at  large and particularly to the Army…

Whether on account of stress or hubris, Thaksin has seemingly overstepped, leaving himself exposed by firing off a salvo in the general direction of the Palace. Given the growing impatience of the King (and those around him) with prime minister, everyone is  waiting to see what the response will be to Thaksin’s upping the political ante.

Piya also told Boyce that “if the situation did not resolve itself soon, the Army might step in, in some unspecified manner”.

Prem himself shared his opinions with Boyce in a July 5 meeting. The ambassador’s cable on their discussion is remarkable for his own outraged interjections about Thaksin’s comment:

Thaksin’s comments were construed by many as an open declaration of war against Prem, all the more surprising (or foolhardy) given Prem’s stature and close relationship with the King. Meeting Prem at his  home, I joked that he seemed to be exuding charisma. Prem immediately launched into a 50 minute discourse on “what  makes Thaksin tick?” …

Prem was… shocked to hear the accounts of Thaksin’s speech last week. At first, he couldn’t believe the reports, especially when he realized that Thaksin had not been speaking off the cuff, but from a prepared speech. Prem’s  first thought was, “What does he think he’s doing?” (Comment: our question as well. End comment.)

Ominously, several senior generals also said they were horrified by Thaksin’s remarks, including army commander Sonthi Boonyaratglin. In a discussion with Boyce, Sonthi insisted however that the military had no intention of getting involved:

Sonthi was appalled by the thinly-veiled attack on Prem (himself one of Sonthi’s predecessors as Army Commander). Sonthi said that the  situation is untenable but he doesn’t know how it can be resolved. The current crisis revolves around one man — Thaksin. The PM has the ability to end the crisis by going away, but he doesn’t want to go away.

The army chief was lying: royalists and generals were already discussing military intervention. Even Boyce realized he might not be hearing the truth, commenting:

We take him at face value; that  said, one can never completely rule out the potential for  military intervention in Thailand.

What was ironic about the theatrical outrage that greeted Thaksin’s remark was that what he had said was, quite plainly, absolutely true. The prime minister had a well-deserved reputation for sophistry and deception, but it was widely accepted in Thai politics that the country’s leaders would routinely spin fairytales with little relation to reality. The reason for the horrified reaction among the royalists was that for once, Thaksin told the truth. He refused to play along with the fiction that the “good men” of the network monarchy were above politics. He dropped the pretence and said what everybody knew to be true: Prem was at the heart of efforts by the royalists to bring down his government and push him out of politics forever. Honesty, it seemed, was a much worse offence than lying as far as the elite monarchist gerontocracy was concerned.

The claim that by exposing Prem’s machinations Thaksin was blatantly badmouthing Bhumibol was also bogus. Prem was nowhere near as popular as Boyce and the Thai military appeared to believe. Not only was he viewed with considerable suspicion by many ordinary Thais, but he was also increasingly out of favour with Bhumibol himself. Prem derived his power from the assumption that he was Rama IX’s proxy, the lynchpin of the network monarchy, and that had indeed been true through the 1980s and 1990s. Many believe it remains true even today, but in fact Bhumibol has paid Prem less and less attention over the past decade, and the old general’s access to the palace has steadily dwindled. Thaksin was aware of this fact: his political adviser Pansak had (correctly) told Boyce in May that “Prem rarely meets directly with the King”. A cable by Boyce’s better-informed successor Eric G. John in 2009 made the same point:

Prem is not particularly close to the King, as it turns out. While the Embassy has seen many instances of this over the years, perhaps the most notable came during the December 2006 visit to Thailand of former President George H.W. Bush. When King Bhumibol offered to host a dinner for former President and Barbara Bush, Prem did not make the initial guest list drawn up by the Royal Household Bureau on the King’s behalf, despite having worked with the former President as Thai PM from 1980-88.

A key reason for Prem’s declining influence in the palace was that Bhumibol increasingly favoured Anand Panyarachun as his proxy. Sirikit, meanwhile, also grew less enamoured of Prem due to his obvious antipathy towards her beloved son Vajiralongkorn. But the privy council president was determined to assert his authority and protect his position at the centre of the network monarchy. And because many Thais continued to assume that Prem was the favourite of the palace — a misperception that Prem did nothing to correct — the old general was able to preserve immense influence. This was a key flaw in the network monarchy system, especially with Bhumibol increasingly detached from day-to-day politics and going into semi-seclusion by the seaside: even many senior royalists were unsure how much authority self-proclaimed palace proxies like Prem actually possessed. As Eric John said in his 2009 cable:

Even Thai relatively close to royal principals treat purported wishes conveyed by other royal associates with caution, given the tradition of self-serving “ang barami.”

Prem’s special relationship with Bhumibol was over, and his influence had been curtailed by the ascendancy of Thaksin’s rival political network, but he was still a force to be reckoned with. In particular, the upper ranks of the military tended to be deferential to him,  not least because he jealously guarded had made sure he retained a key role in deciding the annual military promotions list. His rival Anand lacked a significant support base in the military, and indeed had always been an opponent of military intervention in politics. Prem also built close business links with some of Thailand’s most powerful companies including Bangkok Bank and the Charoen Pokphand Group, despite this being frowned upon for members of the privy council. At New Year and on his birthday in August, processions of high-ranking military officers, politicians, bureaucrats and businessmen still make their way to his Sisao Thewet residence in Bangkok to pay obeisance to him.

It was, of course, convenient for Thaksin and his allies to insist that Prem was acting without Bhumibol’s blessing and that their conflict with Prem did not imply a power struggle with the palace. While the extent to which Bhumibol approved of — or was even aware of — Prem’s scheming remains unclear, the king was clearly an enemy of Thaksin  and wanted him out of politics. But singling out Prem as their prime opponent was not just a tactical move by Thaksin and his allies: it was a response to the reality that the privy council president was not always acting on Bhumibol’s instructions. He was playing his own game.

In a discussion on July 4, 2006 with Karl Jackson of the John Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies, Thaksin was scathing about Prem:

Jackson told the Ambassador that Thaksin was clearly under enormous pressure, but did not give any indication of being  under the influence of tranquilizers. He continued his attack on Privy Council President Gen. Prem Tinsulanonda, saying that Prem thought that a Privy Councillor was higher  than a Prime Minister and that the political ‘elite’ of the country think Thaksin is ‘a peasant.’ He claimed that many of his opponents are ‘living off land given them by the  palace’ and said that the courts were being used in an anti-democratic fashion. Renewing his personal assault on Prem, he referred to the “(expletive deleted) democracy from  the gay opposition.” (Note: a slur on Prem’s sexual orientation.) He hinted darkly at the threat of a coup or  assassination attempt…

Over steak during a lunch with Boyce three days later, Thaksin acknowledged that Bhumibol had turned against him, and once again denounced Prem:

Thaksin defended his lightly veiled attack on Privy Council president Prem as an effort at  transparency, i.e., revealing the “unconstitutional” palace intrigue against him.

I started out raising Thaksin’s inflammatory comments to civil servants last week, in which he described a “charismatic person” trying to overthrow the government. Although government and party spokesmen have tried to deny it, Thaksin freely admitted to me that he was referring to Privy Council President Prem. He said that he “wanted to flip on the lights and flush out the ghosts.” It was wrong, and undemocratic, for Prem to work against the PM behind the scenes. Thaksin alleged that Prem was trying  to influence various judges involved in the key cases pending, including by “dangling the prospect” of a privy council position before one of them. Thaksin again honed in on Prem’s sexual orientation to criticize him in terms not  fit for a family telegram…

I told Thaksin that he had changed Thai politics forever. His party had made promises to the poor rural  population, and then kept them, such as setting up the 30  baht health plan and the village funds. Thaksin launched into an attack on the King and his vaunted “sufficiency economy” model. Thaksin said that he was proud of his  origins as “a peasant;” he had gotten ahead by managing debt  and risk, and this was what the rural population needed to do. (Comment: Thaksin neglects to mention that it helps to have prominent relatives, marry well, and get advantageous  government concessions from your friends. End comment.) Thaksin claimed that the policies advocated by the King kept the people poor, while TRT’s policies had changed the countryside, making the people “smarter and richer” and less dependent on the King. This was part of the reason for the  King’s opposition to Thaksin…

Thaksin, without any discernible irony, lamented  the weak state of Thai institutions. He said that Thai society was “stupid” and did not understand the importance of the rule of law. Thaksin understood this because he had  studied it, and had gotten his Ph.D. in America. He extemporized on the importance of grass roots democracy, how the people tell the government what they need and the government delivers it through appropriate mechanisms. This was how TRT worked, he said, contrasting it with the old  duffers on the Privy Council and their top-down view of  government…

Thaksin Shinawatra was clearly a very angry man. He felt betrayed by Bhumibol and he harboured particular hatred for Prem. He no longer had any illusions about Rama IX’s supposed benevolence and wisdom. He was fully aware that he was on a collision course with the palace. And he did not shy away from the enormity of that. It had always been one of Thaksin’s greatest strengths and biggest weaknesses that whatever the odds, he was always ready to fight.

Boyce, however, was convinced Thaksin would lose. He commented:

Thaksin is mistaken to think that he can win a showdown with the Palace. In addition to the historical reverence for the King, the  palace is widely viewed by civil society as providing the only counterweight to the excessive power that Thaksin has accrued, in part through the clever use of his enormous wealth to distort the political system.

Thaksin also told Boyce that he was resigned to stepping down as prime minister after the election rerun, now scheduled for October.

Thaksin said he had a three stage plan. First, TRT would win the upcoming elections. Thaksin would not serve as PM, but another TRT figure would fill this position. Thaksin would remain as head of the party and MP. After about a year, Thaksin would step down from the party leadership, and about a year after that, would resign his MP slot. He would then start the “Pak Suk Niyom” — the “Hedonist”  Party.

I asked, if he was planning to step down anyway, why not announce that now, and reduce the political tensions? Thaksin answered that he might do that; he was playing it day  by day. I noted that his chances of coming back as PM in the  more distant future would probably be improved if he stepped down now. I asked whether he would like to return as PM some day. He answered that, at this time, he wasn’t particularly  interested in being PM again. He was fairly fed up. He claimed, however, that he couldn’t resign now, while the  government was in caretaker mode, under Thai law. He completely dismissed the suggestion that he could not leave politics because he needed political position to protect  against assets seizure. He said that he had not done anything wrong that would subject him to that kind of punishment. I urged him again to consider announcing soon that he would not be back as prime minister, to spare the country from the  continuing political tension.

Throughout this part of the conversation, Thaksin was quite combative, sprinkling threats to sue his opponents into his speech.

Thaksin was convinced Thai Rak Thai would win elections whenever they were held, and his confidence was well-founded. The Democrat Party under its new leader Abhisit Vejjajiva remained deeply unimpressive, unable to connect with most Thai voters. Both Thaksin and Boyce were well aware of this:

I commented that Thaksin was lucky that the main opposition party was so weak. The Democrat Party had not capitalized on the opportunities presented by the current political situation, and was not coming up with new ideas for the upcoming campaign. Thaksin agreed. He said that the Democrat Party was hidebound and hierarchical. The current leader, Abhisit, was like the previous leader, Chuan — passive and indecisive.

The incompetence of the Democrat Party was widely acknowledged both by Thaksin’s allies and his opponents. His adviser Pansak had been equally contemptuous in a conversation with Boyce in May:

He was dismissive of the Democrat Party’s ability to effectively run in a future election, and called Democrat Party leader Aphisit’s declaration that he was ready to be Prime Minister “laughable.” The Democrats had not offered any new policies and have failed to capitalize on the situation. “Their one unifying goal was to remove Thaksin, they don’t offer voters  a real alternative.”

Bhumibol’s principal private secretary Arsa Sarasin trashed the Democrats in remarks to the ambassador in July:

Asa complained that the main opposition Democrat Party was hopeless; Thaksin was keeping it on the defensive with a series of lawsuits… Asa expected Thai Rak Thai to win the majority of seats in the next parliament.

This was the dilemma the elite royalists faced. The political party that they were aligned with, and which represented the only real parliamentary opposition to Thaksin, was utterly useless. Everybody knew Thai Rak Thai would thrash the Democrats whenever an election was held. And so Thaksin’s opponents plotted undemocratic ways to remove him from power instead.

Piya Malakul’s discussion with Boyce on June 30 revealed another key development in the battle between Thaksin and the royalists. Although Bhumibol had long been contemptuous of Thaksin, Sirikit and (especially) Vajiralongkorn had been more favourably inclined towards the prime minister. This was partly because Thaksin had helped the queen and the crown prince with some of their expenses over the preceding decade. Vajiralongkorn hated Prem and the elderly royalist “good men” and was grateful for Thaksin’s financial support. Sirikit had always favoured strong leaders and had never thought Thailand needed democracy. She tended to follow the advice of a cabal of ladies-in-waiting, one of whom, Thanpuying Viriya Chavakul, was a fervent supporter of Thaksin: U.S. ambassador Eric John described her as “a prodigious fund-raiser who was also Thaksin’s chief agent of influence in palace circles”.  But after 2003, Viriya’s influence declined, and in mid-2006 Piya poisoned Sirikit’s views of Thaksin:

There was an overseas website which for months had carried scurrilous and crude attacks on the monarchy. Piya presented a convincing case that he had traced the source of the money being paid to the webmaster of this site (usdols 4000/month) to the wife of the TRT deputy secretary general Phumtham Vechayachai. He described the website as part of a program by Thaksin and his  supporters to diminish the role of the monarchy…

Piya said he had spent three days with the Queen right before the 60th anniversary celebrations earlier last month “explaining” to her what the PM was up to. He gave her hundreds of pages of printouts from the anti-monarchy website. (Comment: The Queen was long considered a Thaksin supporter in the Palace, perhaps beholden to the PM for funding and for his support for her rather unpopular son. Piya’s story corroborates what we have heard from other sources, that the Queen may no longer be a fan of Thaksin. End comment.)

Sirikit’s role in the crisis became increasingly toxic in the years that followed, doing immense damage to the credibility and sustainability of the monarchy.

Increasingly under siege, Thaksin wrote a letter to U.S. president George W. Bush on June 23, again accusing his opponents of attempting to undermine him through undemocratic and unconstitutional means:

Having failed to provoke violence and disorder, my opponents are now attempting various extra Constitutional tactics to co-opt the will of the people…

I want to assure you that I will take steps to help got the country ready for free and fair elections, and to work to shift the national debate from one that is emotionally charged to one that reasonably discusses the central questions of Thailand’s future, including whether the country’s political governance will be decided through the ballot box or in the street. The answer to that question, Mr President, will have an important impact on the future course of democracy in Asia. I know that your agree with me that the rule of law and Constitutional order in Thailand and in Asia more broadly must prevail over demagoguery and mob action.

As with his remarks about Prem, the accusations made by Thaksin in his letter to Bush were broadly true. His claims to be a supporter of democracy and the rule of law were bogus, but he did at least have legitimacy from the ballot box, unlike his opponents. But writing the letter was another tactical mistake: the Americans were not going to do anything to help him out, and when the Thai foreign affairs ministry published the text of the letter it left Thaksin vulnerable to more denunciations by the PAD.

Sondhi Limthongkul, however, was running out of steam. His weekly rally on July 14 attracted only around 1,000 people. He announced a “final effort” to unseat Thaksin due on July 19, and a U.S. cable noted that he was increasingly short of cash:

According to several journalists who work for Sonthi, this new “final effort” against the PM may be a desperation move. The media magnate has apparently failed to pay both his local and foreign staff for nearly six weeks, citing the financial drain of ongoing lawsuits against him and his funding support for PAD activities. Some senior members of  Sonthi’s staff have even speculated that if Thaksin is not out of office by September, Sonthi will have to fold his tent  and declare bankruptcy.

But now the military moved to increase the pressure on Thaksin. On July 14, the 85-year-old Prem Tinsulanonda donned his full cavalry uniform for an extraordinary speech to cadets at the Chulachomklao Military Academy in the presence of fellow privy councillor Surayud Chulanont and army chief Sonthi Sonthi Boonyaratglin. Prem told the audience:

In horse racing, horse owners hire jockeys to ride the horses. The jockeys do not own the horses. They just ride them. A government is like a jockey. It supervises soldiers, but the real owners are the country and the King. The government comes and goes.

It was an open declaration of defiance, a clear message to the military that it should be loyal to Bhumibol, not Thaksin. Just three days later on July 17, army chief Sonthi announced a military reshuffle that moved officers thought to support Thaksin — in particular his former classmates from cadet school — out of key positions in Bangkok and the northeast. It was an uncharacteristically bold move by Sonthi, who was a generally weak and unremarkable character, and a U.S. cable quoted a military source as saying Sirikit had influenced the strategy:

One Embassy military contact — in the “for what it’s worth category” — believes that the cool and careful Sonthi would never have undertaken such a “provocative” move on his own. According to this same source, it was the Queen — no fan of Thaksin’s — who directed the Army Chief to push back against the PM’s cronies in the military.

In northern Thailand — Thaksin’s strongest powerbase — the Third Army commander, General Saprang Kanlayanamit, was openly hostile to the prime minister.

These were very troubling developments for Thai democracy. The military, which had seemed to have been mostly banished from politics after 1992, was once again asserting a muscular role. The ageing Prem was openly challenging an elected prime minister. And Queen Sirikit, whose interventions in the 1970s and 1980s had been so damaging, was once again meddling in politics. But blinded by their hatred of Thaksin, most of Bangkok’s elite and middle class did not appear concerned by the way things were going.

On July 25, the three election commissioners seen as loyal to Thaksin who had refused to resign were convicted of election violations and sentenced to four years in jail. Because they were denied bail, they were automatically disqualified from their posts. As U.S. charge d’affaires Arvizu noted in a cable, their conviction was further evidence of the politicization of the judiciary following Bhumibol’s speech:

The court’s decision not to grant bail will probably be viewed harsh, and based not  solely on the law, but on the political need to sideline them in order to fulfill the King’s commission to “fix the election mess” and ensure free and fair elections in October.  In sum, the court’s ruling not to grant bail was a political decision through and through. Although in the eyes of many, the “bad guys” got what they deserved, this was no victory for judicial transparency and the rule of law.

On August 24, 2006, police discovered and defused a car bomb close to Thaksin’s residence. The car’s owner, an army lieutenant who worked for Pallop Pinmanee, was arrested. Pallop was a deeply dubious character: he had a long history of scheming, had ordered the Krue Se mosque massacre in 2004 in defiance of direct orders to end the siege peacefully and had been one of the guests at Piya Malakul’s dinner party in May 2006. He has repeatedly played both sides in the political conflict over the past decade. Pallop denied any involvement in the bomb plot, of course, declaring:

You know me. If I were behind it, I would not have missed.

As always, investigations failed to find those responsible. There were certainly plenty of people who wanted Thaksin dead. But the most likely scenario is that allies of Thaksin were behind the whole incident, to give them a pretext to launch security measures that could help thwart any coup. Following the discovery of the car bomb, Thaksin said that for his own safety he would have to re-examine some of the recent military reshuffles: in particular he wanted to appoint some of his allies from the military pre-cadet school Class 10 in key position around Bangkok including 1st Army commander and the Royal  Guard (1st Division) commander. Clearly, he was worried the military would launch a coup to topple him. A U.S. cable on the incident observed:

We still do not have enough information to reach a conclusion about who was behind the car bomb and what their goal was. The government is not doing a good job making its case that it was a serious assassination attempt. The arrested driver certainly does not sound like suicide bomber or assassin. The immediate move by the PM to seize an advantage and put his classmates in some important positions can be interpreted two ways, like most of what has happened so far. Either it’s a cynical manipulation to play up the alleged bomb to get concessions from the military the PM couldn’t get before. Or, it’s a prudent step to have friends watching his back during a dangerous time. In either case, it will exacerbate the negative view that much of the military now has of the PM, and contribute to already rising tensions.

The unfolding confrontation between the network monarchy and Thaksin was increasingly bitter and destabilizing. An atmosphere of tension and foreboding pervaded Bangkok in mid-2006. But the situation was by no means catastrophic: a major political conflict was playing out without massive violence or a collapse in governance. Key institutions still functioned, even though many were compromised to some degree. Thailand was polarized, but not paralyzed, and it had been through plenty of more tumultuous periods before. The country was not unravelling.

And yet as Ralph Boyce observed in a cable entitled “THAILAND: DIVIDED” in early September, many royalist elder statesmen were talking in apocalyptic tones about the political situation, as if it were the most baleful crisis Thailand had ever faced:

Thailand is more divided than ever in its history, according to many of post’s contacts. Former Prime Minister Anand Panyarachun articulated this publicly in a speech on August 30. “Thai society is now polarized by strong hatred. If this condition is allowed to continue, we will be living in horrifying times.” He warned that Thailand was in danger of becoming a “failed state” if the polarization continues. “The Democrat Party can’t go to the North, while Thaksin  can’t step foot in the South. What kind of country is this?” …

Privy Councillor Air Chief Marshall Siddhi Savetsila made remarks in late August at a small reception in honor of the Ambassador. He surprised the group by stating baldly that Thai society was more divided than he had seen in his lifetime.

Many media pundits, particularly Thanong Khanthong at The Nation, spoke in similar language during 2006, depicting Thailand as a country collapsing into ruin due to Thaksin’s influence. But Boyce was quite rightly dismissive of this view. The reason the elderly network monarchists were convinced the world was coming to an end was because their world was indeed dying: the traditional hierarchical feudalistic Thailand in which an unelected gerontocracy around the palace ran the affairs of state without challenge, and the uneducated peasantry uncomplainingly accepted their lowly position. Elderly relics like Prem, Anand and Siddhi were watching their influence ebb away, and an increasing number of Thais were disinclined to treat the “good men” with the deference they felt they deserved. And so, as grouchy old people often do, they dolourously declared that the country was going to the dogs:

Privy Councillor Siddhi is 86 years old, and has  lived through every coup d’etat since the military overthrew the absolute monarchy in 1932. Much of the public, like the Democrat’s Suthep, was upset by the TV images of the violence  against protesters in August, but Thai elections historically are a contact sport. (For example, we reported 25 suspicious  deaths of political canvassers in the 2001 Human Rights Report.) According to Thaksin, last month’s car bomb is not even the first time someone has tried to blow him up. In 2001, a still-unexplained explosion occurred on a Thai Airways jet minutes before Thaksin and a few hundred other passengers boarded. (There are two theories — either it was an accident involving the plane’s gas tank or a bomb placed  by Thaksin’s enemies, but the official explanation at the  time claimed that it was a bomb.) The deep concern about divisions in society voiced by our interlocutors seem to us disproportionate, given the strikingly peaceful and orderly demonstrations so far, especially when compared to Thailand’s turbulent history.

So why all the angst? Part of it is just that  people tend to forget how bad the bad times were. But part of it may stem from the way politics and Thai society have changed in just a few years. Politics tended to be a game mostly for the elite to play. In the wake of the 1992 demonstrations that toppled the dictatorship, the “People’s Constitution” of 1997, the broader access to media brought by  rising prosperity, and the populist policies of PM Thaksin — who staked his electoral success on maintaining the support of the long-disregarded rural population — politics  has been, well, democratized.  Within Thai society, being  ”krengjai” (modest, self-effacing) is no longer such a highly prized virtue; citizens more often see the importance of demanding their rights. A much broader segment of the population feels that they have a real stake in the outcome of the political battles in Bangkok, and they are prepared to  assert themselves. This does raise the overall political  temperature and make spontaneous violence between the rival  camps more possible. This may be an unavoidable by-product of a shift from a political system marked by back-room  deal-making among the elites to one more genuinely democratic. Old style pols and patricians may be spooked, but  we believe that the Thai can, in the end, manage the transition.

The elite royalists and their military allies were not really fighting to save Thailand, or even to save the monarchy. They were fighting to save themselves, and their power and privileges.

Talking to Boyce on September 5, Thaksin’s adviser Pansak Vinyaratn reaffirmed that Thaksin planned to withdraw from politics after the planned October elections, and claimed the royalists were out to destroy Thailand:

Prem and his allies hoped to get rid not only of Thaksin, but also Thailand’s democratic system, Pansak asserted. The royalist oligarchy wanted to return to a prior era in which the Palace, not democratically elected politicians, would reign supreme…

The royalists, however, feared that Thaksin’s policies, which benefited and empowered the rural majority, would erode their own standing. The royalists were against  democracy, he noted, dismissing the critique that Thaksin had consolidated power to an extreme degree…

Whatever Thaksin did or did not do, his enemies would continue coming after him; unconstrained by legal or rational justifications, these opponents would find ways to attack. Tragically, while the royalists and oligarchs were undermining Thaksin, the political landscape was bereft of credible alternative  leaders. Given the King’s age, it was imperative for the Thai population to begin preparing psychologically for the  King’s passing and for a transition to a system increasingly reliant on democratic structures rather than royal authority. The current crisis forestalled such preparation, however.  ”It’s all about Prem becoming Regent,” Pansak warned.

Two weeks later, the military unseated Thailand’s most popular ever prime minister, in the 19th actual or attempted coup in the country’s modern history since 1932. Tanks and troops from outside the capital, commanded by royalist generals, trundled into the centre of Bangkok, some getting snarled in the rush-hour traffic. They effectively checkmated any attempt to resist by pro-Thaksin Bangkok commanders before it even began. Thaksin was in New York for the United Nations General Assembly: by the time he heard that tanks were on the move, it was already too late. He managed to broadcast a partial statement on Channel 9 television declaring  state of emergency, but the signal was cut before finished. With royalist military units in control of the capital, the coup leaders were summoned to an audience with Bhumibol and Sirikit Chitralada Palace around midnight, signalling the king’s acquiescence in the military overthrow of an elected prime minister. A photograph of the audience was circulated to the media afterwards:

Sonthi told Boyce the following day that Bhumibol had been in high spirits at the audience:

I began by asking Sonthi about the audience with the King last night. Who had attended? He said Privy Council President Prem Tinsulanonda had brought him, Supreme Commander Ruangroj and Navy Commander Sathiraphan in to meet the King. Sonthi stressed that they had been summoned to the palace; he had not sought the audience. He said the King was relaxed and happy, smiling throughout.

There was nothing particularly unexpected about Bhumibol giving tacit endorsement to military coups. But what was unusual and troubling about the 2006 military takeover was the degree to which it was a royalist putsch: it was essentially a coup by the network monarchy. Above all, of course, Prem Tinsulanonda had been intimately involved, a fact that he continues to querulously deny even today. As Thongchai Winichakul wrote in comments on the coup in 2006:

This coup is not only for toppling Thaksin. It is a royalist coup with purposes. If one is not so naive, Prem’s fingerprints and footprints are all over the place for us to see…

The coup junta named itself The Council for Democratic Reform under the Monarchy. It later shortened the English-language version of the name to The Council For Democratic Reform, while leaving the Thai version unchanged. It was a clumsy attempt to avoid foreign  news coverage linking the coup and the monarchy. Krit Garnjana-Goonchorn, permanent secretary at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, insisted to the diplomatic corps in a briefing that Bhumibol had nothing to do with the coup:

Krit said that the CDRM had learned that the initial  rendering of its title (The Council for Democratic Reform under the Constitutional Monarchy) had caused misunderstandings and “wrongly suggested some role for His Majesty in the September 19 intervention.” Therefore, the official title would now be simply the Council for Democratic Reform (CDR). During the Q’s and A’s, Krit returned to  the question of the King’s role. He emphasized that the CDR had their audience with the King “after the process of the  takeover” to report what had happened. “The King had no  foreknowledge” of the coup. “He is above politics. Remember  the past year; he has been cautious not to intervene. He turned down requests to appoint a prime minister under  Article 7 of the Constitution. That was a clear indication of how the King applies his role as constitutional monarch.” He added, “We don’t want any misunderstanding about this — hence, the name change.”

As Boyce commented, the junta and its apologists were struggling with “angst over how to portray the  King’s role”:

On the one hand, the CDR wants the legitimacy that comes from the perception that the King has accepted, if not approved, the coupmakers’ actions. At the same time, they do not want to be accused of causing damage to the King’s reputation by having exposed him to international criticism.

Whatever the junta wanted to call himself, its loyalty and links to the palace were clear.

A cable by U.S. ambassador Boyce two days after Thaksin was overthrown examined “THE MONARCHY’S ROLE IN THAILAND’S SEPTEMBER 19 COUP“:

It remains unclear whether Thailand’s King encouraged or provided approval in advance for the September 19 coup d’etat by the Council for Democratic Reform Under the Monarchy (CDRM). However, the CDRM is publicly linked to the monarchy to a greater extent than previous coup plotters, and the CDRM’s September 19 royal audience sent a clear public signal of Palace endorsement. Palace endorsement likely contributed to public support for the coup…

The CDRM’s public claims that it acted to maintain peace and order, and to protect the King against acts of lese majeste, were not unexpected or atypical. The CDRM’s inclusion of reference to the monarchy in the coup-plotters’  group name, however, appears unprecedented in Thai history. (A literal translation of the Thai version is: “Council for  Reforming Governance in the Democratic System having His  Majesty the King as Head of State.”) Also unprecedented is an alleged Royal Command, published online by the Prime Minister’s Office, in which the King “appoints General Sonthi as leader of the (CDRM), and demands… all government officials follow the orders of General Sonthi.” …

Given the widespread public understanding, especially  in Bangkok, that Thaksin was increasingly engaged in confrontation with members of the Privy Council (if not with the King himself), most Thais view the CDRM as acting on behalf of the King’s interests. Almost universal Thai reverence for the King has likely contributed significantly to popular acceptance of the coup.

Ever since the 2006 coup, Thailand’s elite royalists have insisted that Bhumibol had nothing to do with it. Initially, their denials that the king played any active role were routine and half-hearted. Like Prem’s pious pretence of having no interest in politics and Thaksin’s frequent straight-faced declarations that he only wanted power so he could selflessly serve the people, the claim that Rama IX bore no responsibility for the coup was widely understood as another of the obligatory ritual incantations of Thai politics: everybody knew such statements were not literally true, but they were a traditional part of the theatrical spectacle of Thai politics, the show that the elites put on to divert attention from what was really going on behind the scenes. But as it became increasingly clear that the coup had been a disaster for the royalists and that the truth would be profoundly damaging to the monarchy, efforts to distance Bhumibol from what had happened became deadly serious.

But no amount of propaganda can alter an obvious fundamental truth about the 2006 coup: had Bhumibol wanted to stop it, he could have done so very easily indeed. For much of his reign, the relationship between the military and monarchy had been uneasy, and the ambitious generals who regularly sought to seize power were utterly insincere in their proclamations of devotion to the king. Bhumibol had to learn to pick his battles, to avoid taking a stand when he knew he could not win, to preserve royal prestige for when it really mattered. But the 2006 coup was quite different. It was very plainly an inside job by the network monarchy, planned and executed by royalists who moved in the inner circles of power around Bhumibol and Sirikit. The coup plotters were well that their success depended utterly on the king’s blessing: any word or gesture from Bhumibol to signal his opposition to their actions would have brought the whole scheme crashing down. There was no risk at all for Bhumibol if he refused to countenance a coup and ordered his acolytes to respect the constitution and the rule of law. Indeed, doing so would have cemented the reputation he had spent his entire adult life trying to build. He could have told Thailand’s people that the era of coups was thankfully over, that the country was now a modern democracy and any problems had to be worked out peacefully within the parameters of the constitution and without undermining the rule of law. His exalted legacy would have been secure. But Bhumibol failed the test.

It remains unclear exactly when Bhumibol was told that the coup was coming. Veteran royalist legislator Prasong Soonsiri, one of the core group of coup plotters, told Boyce that Prem had been formally informed six days before the putsch, and that the plotters believed that his acquiescence meant the palace did not oppose their plan:

Prasong’s claims are consistent with what we  observed before and during the coup, and Prasong’s status and background lend credibility to his account. Prasong has claimed that approximately five or six months before the  coup, he met with General Sonthi and two retired generals whom Prasong refused to identify. (He stated unequivocally, however, that Surayud was not involved in the plot; no one would have suggested bringing Surayud in on the planning, as Thais knew well his opposition to coups and preference for the military not to take on a political role.) After discussing the political situation, Prasong, Sonthi, and their associates decided to begin planning for a coup on a contingency basis.

On September 13, according to his account, Prasong and  his associates decided the situation was sufficiently urgent  that they would have to proceed with their plan for a coup. One of the unnamed Generals met with Privy Council President Prem Tinsulanonda, to seek his approval. Prasong, who was not in the meeting, did not recount Prem’s precise response,  but the group understood that Prem had accepted their decision. The group assumed that, by consulting Prem, they were assured at least that the King did not oppose their action.

In fact, the assumption that Prem was a direct proxy for Bhumibol, always acting in line with the king’s wishes and keeping him fully informed, was no longer true by 2006. The privy council president rarely saw Bhumibol, and was not one of the trusted members of the king’s inner circle. So it is conceivable — although extremely unlikely —  that Prem did not consult with Bhumibol before approving the coup, and only informed the king what was happening once it was already under way. But even in this scenario, the most favourable for the palace, Bhumibol had plenty of time to stop the coup in its tracks if he had really been against it. Prem was at Chitralada Palace from early evening to keep the king appraised of what was going on. All Bhumibol had to do was tell Prem a coup was unacceptable, and the military takeover would have been quickly and quietly aborted, with the unusual tank movements explained away as some kind of exercise. It was that simple.

The far more likely scenario is that Bhumibol was told of the impending coup by Prem around September 13, and signalled that he was not opposed to it, again via Prem. Given Prem’s formal role as head of the privy council, he was clearly obliged to inform Bhumibol of something as serious as a planned coup. Moreover, most of the key plotters genuinely revered Rama IX and would not have proceeded with their plans unless they believed they had Bhumibol’s blessing. So Thailand’s king was almost certainly given several days warning to ponder whether he should allow a group of royalist generals to seize power in his name and topple the elected prime minister. The final decision lay with Bhumibol, nobody else. He could have prevented the coup. Instead, he chose to allow the military to send tanks into Bangkok, abrogate democracy, tear up the constitution, and oust a prime minister supported by millions of ordinary Thais.

Whichever of the two scenarios is correct, the fundamental fact remains that Bhumibol Adulyadej had ultimate responsibility for allowing the 2006 coup. He knowingly permitted a cabal of royalists and generals to seize power in his name and overthrow an elected prime minister. It was the worst miscalculation of his reign, pitching the palace into the heart of Thailand’s political crisis, and it may yet lead to the demise of the Chakri dynasty.

Prem was the key link between the palace and the coup plotters. Just hours before the coup began on September 19, he gave an interview to Colum Murphy of the Far Eastern Economic Review. “An old soldier never dies,” the ebullient Prem declared, well aware of what was about to unfold. As usual, he insisted he had no interest in political power, claiming he had only agreed to become prime minister in the 1980s because Thailand’s people craved his leadership: “they wanted me to lead and so I had to lead.” He managed an even more outrageous response when Murphy asked him about the current political situation:

Please dont ask me about politics. I am not allowed by law to speak about that. But to speak about my country in terms of security is okay.

After calling Murphy “a foreigner who knows not very much about the situation in this country”, Prem patiently explained that as long as Thailand had its monarchy, it would never face serious problems:

My country is about 800 years old, and we run the country as a kingdom. We will never be a republic or be without the king. So that is the trick — the only thing that induces the people together. So as long as we have the king, the monarchy, this very, very good king we have right now, we will go ahead, either slowly or rapidly, but we will be united. So if you have a united country and the people united you have few problems to undo.

Murphy was later to write that Prem showed signs of his age during their discussion:

In the course of our conversation, the general stopped to tell me about 1969, a pivotal year in his military career. He took a scrap of paper on which to do the conversion from the suriyakati, or Thai solar calendar, to the Western one. (Normally, the equivalent year in the Western counting system can be arrived at by subtracting the number 543 from the Thai calendar.) To be fair, it is a calculation that would be taxing to most people, but Gen. Prem took two or three minutes mulling the problem, only to get the answer incorrect. An aide came to his assistance, and the general graciously conceded: “You were right. I was wrong.”

After interview, in which Prem showed he was more than a match for Thaksin Shinawatra when it came to shameless posturing and audacious hypocrisy, the elderly general headed to Chitralada Palace to keep Bhumibol briefed as the putsch got under way. When the coup conspirators were summoned for their legitimizing audience with Rama IX around midnight, it Prem who called them to the palace and escorted them in to see the king.

We know from Prasong Soonsiri that Prem was explicitly given details of the planned coup on September 13. It is possible that this was the first time he was told of the exact date and the specific plans of the plotters, but equally possible that Prasong was not telling the full truth and that Prem was in the loop much earlier and helped organize the coup. Either way, it is inconceivable that Prem could have been unaware that for several months royalist generals were gravitating towards a coup and putting contingency plans in place. Prasong’s disclosure that planning began five or six months before the coup corroborates comments by Third Army commander Saprang, who said the plot to overthrow Thaksin started to take shape early in 2006. A revealing book on the coup, Secrecy, Deception, Camouflage, published in 2008 by Bangkok Post military reporter Wassana Nanuam quotes Sonthi, the nominal leader of the coup, as denying Prem was involved but admitting that in the months ahead of the coup he met the privy council president weekly to brief him on the political situation. Sonthi was to some extent an outsider in the Thai military elite, particularly because he was a Muslim with two wives, and he owed his success and status largely to the patronage of Prem and Surayud. He had never shown a great deal of initiative. The idea that he would have masterminded the coup without the encouragement of more powerful figures — and even without their knowledge — is simply not credible. Prem may have left the detailed preparations to others and maintained a degree of distance from the conspirators for the sake of future deniability, but given his military contacts, his extensive informal intelligence network, and his constant scheming to encourage and coordinate efforts to bring down Thaksin, he would certainly have known very early on that a coup was being discussed.

Showing how little they knew or cared about what democracy meant, the junta insisted their military takeover had been somehow democratic. Sonthi told foreign ambassadors on  September 20 that:

Thailand is 100 percent democratic now; our reason for action is that we want real democracy in our country.

The establishment media heavily promoted this line, most acting as propaganda mouthpieces for the junta. As a U.S. cable reported on September 25:

Everyday, the front page of the various newspapers show pictures of smiling soldiers receiving flowers from the  public and playing with children. Today’s best public relations photo showed a smiling bride and groom in Chiang Mai, getting their wedding pictures taken in front of a tank.

Liberal royalists like Anand Panyarachun and Abhisit Vejjajiva who had long professed opposition to a political role for the army faithfully followed the same script. Clearly, their commitment to democracy was less important to them than their desperation to restore their declining relevance. Anand told Boyce the coup was necessary because Thaksin had manipulated gullible rural voters. As Boyce commented:

Interesting and not surprising was Anand’s disparaging reference to Thaksin’s manipulation of the “uninformed” electorate. This elitist point of view — shared by many  wealthy and educated Thais, especially in Bangkok — gets to  the heart of Thaksin’s claim about revolutionizing Thai politics, precisely by taking on these entrenched elites.

In May 2005, Abhisit had given a speech at a ceremony to lay the foundation stone for a memorial to the victims of Black May 1992, and declared:

While we are confident we won’t return to a time of military rule again, we must continue the fight for democracy in order to honor those who have suffered so much.

A little over a year later, he had become an apologist for the military overthrow of an elected prime minister — a prime minister who had proven far more effective and popular than the lacklustre and pedantic Democrat Party leader. As Boyce commented:

Abhisit appears to be among the many in Bangkok who see the September 19 coup as a necessary step to rid the country of Thaksin. He did not appear particularly troubled by the current limitations on civil liberties and political party activities, but he clearly anticipated that these would be relaxed in the near future…

This dishearteningly naïve and hypocritical attitude was typical of most wealthy and middle-class Thais in Bangkok. As Michael K. Connors and Kevin Hewison wrote in the Journal of Contemporary Asia in 2008:

It is clear that a large proportion of the Bangkok-based middle class, the royalist elite, a swathe of political activists, some business people and large numbers in the south believed that the military conducted a “good coup” to rid the country of the Thaksin government and to rescue them from authoritarianism.

The U.S. embassy noted the “jovial atmosphere on the streets” in Bangkok after the coup:

People are having their pictures taken with the tanks, and for the most part, getting on with their normal lives. They are relieved, not afraid…

Many of Bangkok’s opinion shapers seem willing to accept a coup and a brief period of military rule in exchange for a clean slate and a chance at new round of political reforms and elections free of the specter of Thaksin’s overwhelming wealth and power. This is a very sad commentary on the state of Thailand’s democratic institutions.

Even many Thais who considered themselves progressive insisted the coup really was necessary and democratic, and seemed convinced the army would selflessly withdraw from politics after eradicating the threat from Thaksin. They appeared convinced that the whole country shared their view. It was an assumption born from their habitual arrogance and their total ignorance of the views of Thailand’s poor. As Chris Baker and Pasuk Phongpaichit, writing under the pseudonym “Chang Noi”, said in a column in The Nation on October 2, the royalists and military were “marooned on an island”:

On one side there is a sea of international opinion, appalled at how the beacon of democracy in Southeast Asia could have bombed itself back into the political stone age. On the other is the rural mass, probably unsurprised but massively resentful at this treatment of the first political leader they had embraced as their own. Why should they ever again listen to city slickers preaching to them about democracy?

The column noted that it was a “myth… that this coup will overcome disunity”:

Reconciliation does not come out of the barrel of a gun. Unity cannot descend from above. The coup makers themselves are divided; the armed forces are divided; and the country is now divided worse than before. Moreover, things are likely to get worse.

As the royalists in Bangkok congratulated themselves for ousting their nemesis Thaksin in a bloodless coup carried out in the name of the king, most were oblivious that their actions had left millions of urban and rural poor shocked and disgusted. They believed the coup was a roaring success. They were utterly wrong. It was a catastrophe.

The royalist military coup of September 19, 2006, altered Thailand forever. It led directly to the birth of an anti-monarchist mass movement for the first time in the country’s history. Such a paradigm shift in popular opinion had seemed unthinkable to the royalists after the adoration lavished on Bhumibol during the 60th anniversary celebrations for his reign. Many Thais regard it so inconceivable that millions of their fellow citizens have turned against the monarchy that they continue to disbelieve it even now. They have retreated even further into a state of denial, clinging to fairy tales that are falling apart.

The rural poor in northern and northeastern Thailand, and the underclass in Bangkok (largely drawn from the northeastern Isaan region also) had generally adored Thaksin and unquestioningly venerated Bhumibol. They had believed the myth that King Rama IX was on their side. He represented goodness, fairness, social justice: he was their protector and guardian. But how could this be reconciled with the king’s obvious acquiescence in allowing a coup backed by leading royalists that toppled a prime minister millions of ordinary Thais credited with bringing them hope and improving their lives? How could they continue to believe in Bhumibol’s commitment to democracy when their votes had been so contemptuously overruled by the royalist elites and the king had done nothing to prevent this? If Rama IX really understood and valued their aspirations, as they had always believed, why had he failed to do anything to help them when their aspirations were trampled? It made no sense, unless what they had been taught about Bhumibol was lies.

This was what made the coup so catastrophic for the monarchy: it made millions of Thais begin to question the monarchist myths that they had always put their faith in. It was the beginning of the end of the fairy tale of Thailand’s beloved democratic dhammaraja.

As David Streckfuss says in his monumental study Truth on Trial in Thailand, the coup “laid bare the underlying dynamics behind modern Thai history”:

The coup and its aftermath caused an ideological implosion that threatens to rather unceremoniously shove Thai history out of its half-century old suspension and, perhaps, lead to its reckoning….

Thai history no longer made any sense. Or maybe better said, the illusion of a progressive, democratic movement evaporated, revealing both a core authoritarian mindset amongst the elite and intellectuals, part and parcel of a shared project to keep Thai society and history in suspension, and subject to systemmatic social injustice…

The majority of people in Thailand, who live on the other side of this political divide, have become incredulous and enraged… Tempers seethed in the North and Northeast, as it seemed that everything was being done to thwart the will of the majority. Sovereignty, apparently, was not to be with ‘the people’.

This process of profoundly rethinking everything Thais had learned to believe has become known as ตาสวา่ง — phonetically, taa sawang; literally, a brightening of the eyes. The closest English-language equivalents are seeing the light, having one’s eyes opened. Thongchai Winichakul describes it as “disillusionment” which captures not just the terrible disappointment felt by ordinary Thais who suddenly realized they had been deceived, but also the unravelling of the hyper-royalist myths and illusions. For those Thais going through this process, it is often a gradual and profoundly emotional process. As Thongchai has argued, the dominant emotion among many Thais who have lost faith in the monarchy is not anger but intense grief. People who had genuinely thought of Bhumibol as a paternal figure have had to cope with the impact of discovering the “father of the nation” was not the man they thought he was. Many now describe themselves bitterly as “orphans”.

A U.S. cable from early October reported that efforts by embassy staff to gauge opinion in the northeast were hampered by an oppressive atmosphere:

While we expected that the CDR would have tighter control of the North and Northeast, we did not expect the oppressive atmosphere that inhibited our ability to meet with  former TRT officials. Although most contacts eventually began to talk, whispered words and darting eyes were common during the meetings.

Embassy contacts in Isaan reported that “local farmers could not accept that Thaksin has been ousted”. One village head in rural Khon Khaen said “people in his village were still secretly gathering in groups of five or more to discuss their discontent”. In stark contrast to the festive atmosphere in Bangkok, the rural northeast was angry and afraid.

The U.S. consulate in Chiang Mai noted continued widespread support for Thaksin:

Thaksin’s many supporters in northern Thailand have been quieted, but hardly vaporized. A little probing often reveals the opinion that much of what the former Prime Minister and his party did was good. Although martial law and a desire to avoid conflict have dampened public discussion of the issue, many people would likely be responsive to a Thaksin return.

One episode above all captured the heartbreak and betrayal experienced by many ordinary Thais in the aftermath of the coup: the tale of Nuamthong Phaiwan. He was a 60-year-old taxi driver who painted his purple cab with slogans attacking the coup and drove it head on into an M41 Walker Bulldog tank at Bangkok’s Royal Plaza at 6 a.m. on September 30. He suffered broken ribs and serious lacerations and was taken to  Vachira Hospital. He told reporters who visited him in hospital: “I did it intentionally to protest the junta that has destroyed our country, and I painted all the words myself.”

The junta tried to play down Nuamthong’s solitary act of defiance. Police claimed there were no slogans painted on the taxi and said the collision might just have been an accident caused by reckless driving. Akkara Thiproj, a spokesman for the junta, declared: “Nobody’s ideals are so great that they would sacrifice their lives for them.”

He was wrong. On October 31, Nuamthong hanged himself from a pedestrian bridge over the Vibhavadi Rangsit road. He was dressed in a black T-shirt with a picture of the Democracy Monument. A suicide note on his body said he had rammed the tank and later killed himself for the sake of democracy:

My act is to protest against dictatorship … and let me tell you again that both incidents are calls from my heart.

Nuamthong died a few days before his 23-year-old daughter Sawida was due to graduate. She told reporters:

My father told us that the coup d’etat was wrong. He was always true to his ideology and honoured the truth. He said we should be proud of what he did because it’s the right thing… My father did not take any side in politics, and he had never been an admirer of Thaksin. He had never been bought by politicians.

After his death, the iTV channel aired an interview with Nuamthong recorded two weeks before his suicide. The broadcast of the interview was abruptly cut short after intervention from furious military officers. Soldiers were also sent to iTV to prevent any repeat.

The junta installed one of Bhumibol’s most trusted followers, privy councillor Surayud Chulanont, as prime minister. The 63-year-old retired general was also a protégé of Prem’s but less hawkish than his elderly patron, and less hungry for power. In contrast to the posturing of Prem and Thaksin, Surayud genuinely didn’t particularly want a major political role, but felt he had no choice if Bhumibol wanted him to do it. He was a less divisive figure than Prem, but his military background and links to the royal family were further proof of the monarchy’s close involvement in the coup. As the U.S. embassy said:

On the positive side, Surayud is very widely respected across the economic and geographic lines dividing the country. He is unlikely to be viewed as seeking power for himself. The negatives are just as obvious: as a retired General, he is technically civilian, but choosing a retired military officer will not be well-received by the international community. Also, Surayud, as a privy councillor, is also identified with the King, which could complicate efforts by the CDR and other Thai officials to dispel the rumors that the King was behind  the coup.

Surayud chose a cabinet of 26 mostly elderly bureaucrats, academics, judges and retired military officers. It was quickly dubbed the “cabinet of old men“. Finally, the royalists had achieved what they wanted: Thailand would be directly governed by venerable stalwarts of the network monarchy, who would selflessly steer the kingdom in the direction charted by their wise and benevolent monarch, for the good of all Thais. In a speech to the new cabinet, Bhumibol admonished them to quickly solve Thailand’s problems, and once again showed peculiar concern for the country’s image:

A lot of people who are not Thai, who are foreigners, are saying that Thailand is not good. We have to try to change that. … If we don’t, our country will lose its good name and it will be difficult for our people to live happily… Therefore, we have to try and  change what is not good, to improve matters. And that is difficult.

Bhumibol did not get his wish. The government of royalist “good men” installed by the 2006 coup was to prove one of the most abject and incompetent administrations in modern Thai history. The elderly elite royalists had been convinced that they knew all the answers for Thailand, and totally failed to understand that they were out of touch and increasingly decrepit. They were bewildered by the challenge of trying to govern a complex modern nation. Far from installing a virtuous government of experienced technocrats, the coup gave Thailand a floundering gerontocracy of lost and confused old men.

Things started going wrong almost immediately for the geriatric administration. There were tensions right from the outset between Surayud’s nominally civilian administration and the military junta led by Sonthi and guided by Prem which was reluctant to take a back seat and allow the cabinet to govern. Martial law remained in place, despite repeated promises to revoke it. The international community became increasingly exasperated. As Boyce commented on October 16:

Sonthi appears to view martial law in strictly security terms — a useful tool to maintain order and prevent potential unrest. He seems not fully cognizant of how martial law is damaging Thailand’s reputation abroad.

On October 12, Bhumibol endorsed the appointment of a 242-member National Legislative Assembly. It was packed with cronies of Prem Tinsulanonda, including his chief of staff. As the U.S. embassy observed:

Many… newspapers commented on the large number of serving military officers (35), bureaucrats, and retired military, and the absence of “grassroots” representatives, meaning mostly people from outside Bangkok. Several also commented on the predominance of “Prem’s men”: military and civilians associated with Privy Councillor Prem Tinsulanonda. (Comment: It is worth noting that Prem’s advanced age and long tenure in government (he was PM for over eight years in the 1980′s) mean that many political figures are less than six degrees of separation from the Privy Councillor. However, the observation that Prem’s former proteges and colleagues are well-represented seems fair. End comment).

As the authoritarian instincts of the new administration became clear, some of the progressive Thai activists who had supported military intervention to tackle Thaksin’s illiberal rule began to realize they had made a serious miscalculation. Among them ways Human Rights Watch researcher Sunai Phasuk, who shared his concerns with U.S. diplomats:

Human rights activist Sunai Phasuk noted that the concerns about martial law and similar issues “puts people like me in a very difficult and uncomfortable position.” He said that as a staunch anti-Thaksin activist, he was initially relieved to see the Thaksin administration forced out, and he wants to be supportive of the interim government’s effort to restore democracy in Thailand. But the failure of the CNS in responding to repeated calls for lifting martial law and restrictions on civil liberties is making it impossible for him (and people like him) who want to be supportive. He drew a parallel to the 1991 coup and the initial support for Gen. Suchinda that “disappeared overnight” when the population determined that the military planned to retain control of the government. He said that the justification offered by the CNS and the government for maintaining martial law are weak. He observed that the military could certainly contain any perceived threat from remaining Thaksin loyalists without the imposition martial law on the entire country…

Sunai … expressed concern  that, a month after the coup, the military appears to be creating a structure that will enable it to retain excessive influence throughout the coming year, and possibly beyond. He pointed to the various articles in the interim constitution placing power with the CNS, and to the predominance of military figures in the line-up of the  recently announced National Legislative Assembly…

He said that General Sonthi was “clueless” and the other military leaders around him are preparing “to sacrifice our freedoms for the sake of stability.” He found it increasingly evident that, while General Sonthi was in over his head and Surayud struggled to set an agenda and “action plan” for his cabinet,  Privy Councillor Prem is the one “pulling the strings.” …

Sunai said how deeply disappointed he was in the military. He emphasized that he was close to many officers and, in fact, taught many of them in his capacity as a guest lecturer at Chulachomklao Royal Military Academy and the Royal Thai Air Force Academy. He said that he had always held the military in high regard for their sense of honor and dedication to the country. As such, he expected that the  coup makers would hold true to the promises made in the hours and days following the coup to restore civil liberties and democratic civilian rule as quickly as possible. Now he is increasingly concerned that the military is taking steps to maintain its influence over the government for the long term.

As Somchai Homlaor, chairman of the Human Rights Committee of the Lawyers Council of Thailand, observed:

This is the nature of a military junta. At the beginning the junta made a lot of promises. Now they are in power and they are approached by a lot of greedy business people, greedy politicians, and others. Now they will seek to hold on to power as long as they can.

Progressive Thais had shown staggering naïveté in believing that a military takeover could ever make Thailand more democratic, and assuming the elderly royalists of the network monarchy were on their side. And while some, like Sunai, quickly realized their mistake, many others continued to male excuses for the military regime. Blinded by an irrational hatred of Thaksin and unquestioning adoration of Bhumibol, they failed to see the obvious: the royalists were not acting in the interests of democracy. This ideological confusion has persisted right up to the present day: both sides in Thailand’s political crisis contain an uneasy alliance of authoritarians and liberals. Many human rights organizations and NGOs continue to support the royalist cause, exonerating the abuses and oppression carried out in the name of crushing support for Thaksin. Befuddled by years of propaganda demonizing Thaksin and exalting Bhumibol, they have forgotten what they stand for.

Policymaking in the months after the coup was dominated by two objectives: eradicating Thaksin from politics forever, and governing in accordance with Bhumibol’s vague “sufficiency economy” philosophy. But the ineptitude of the administration led to one blunder after another. Economic policy, under the supervision of former central bank governor Pridiyathorn Devakula (a great-grandson of Rama IV) was particularly hapless.

As a U.S. cable warned in October 2006, following Bhumibol’s economic homilies too religiously would be damaging to the Thai economy:

Pridyathorn’s views on sound economic policy are shaped by his experience from the 1997 crisis as well as his conservative, royalist views (largely based on the teachings of Thailand’s ruling monarch)… While Thailand’s economic policies are unlikely to take a radical turn away from trade and investment openness, there will be a reduced emphasis on  growth and a heightened wariness toward “excessive” dependence on foreign capital. If Pridyathorn’s interpretation of King Bhumipol’s “sufficiency economy” is put into practice, Thailand will likely achieve only the modest expectations that are set, thereby under-performing its peer countries for years to come.

This was worrying enough for foreign investors, but many international conglomerates who had invested in Thailand had an even more pressing reason to worry. Determined to find a way to declare Thaksin’s sale of Shin Corp to Temasek illegal, the new government was focusing on the use of nominee companies in the deal to get around laws restricting foreign ownership of Thai companies. The problem was that it was commonplace for foreign firms to use this kind of arrangement in Thailand, and this had always been accepted with a nod and a wink by successive Thai governments. Suddenly enforcing the rules could have a chilling effect on foreign direct investment in Thailand, as the U.S. embassy noted in a cable in mid-October:

The new Thai leaders find themselves in a bind: under pressure to validate charges of financial improprieties against deposed PM Thaksin, the newly appointed government feels the political imperative to find legal fault with the  Shin/Temasek deal. That goal could clash with the need to reassure international investors that Thailand remains a welcoming destination. Reconciling these conflicting aims is the biggest economic challenge faced by the Thai government.

Many international companies put Thai investments on hold, and there was particular dismay and concern in Singapore, the second biggest source of FDI in Thailand.

To make things even worse, the government stunned investors on December 18 by suddenly introducing draconian capital controls designed to tackle the rapid appreciation of the baht. Demonstrating an outmoded understanding of markets and a calamitously bad communication skills, the government announced the new measures in an opaque news release available only in Thai. As foreign analysts and brokerages scrambled to decode the new policy, they quickly realized it would be a massive deterrent to new equity investments by foreigners — contrary to government claims that the capital controls would only affect speculators. There was panic selling when Thailand’s stock market opened the following day, with shares suffering a staggering 15 percent collapse, wiping out more than $20 billion of value. One analyst, JP Morgan head of research Sriyan Pietersz, described the measures as “like hitting an ant with a sledgehammer”. A U.S. cable described the fallout:

Bankers with whom we spoke were highly critical of the move. They cite the lack of coordination and consultation and the clear lack of understanding of how capital markets  would react. “They panicked and went nuclear” said one local banker. Given the foreign inventors are estimated to control about 33 percent of all shares on the stock exchange and supply around 50 percent of daily turnover, the forced absence of new foreign investors and likely departure of existing ones will continue to severely depress capital markets…

A senior official with the Thai Chamber of Commerce lamented that the damage to Thai capital markets was hardly worth the small reversal in the baht’s appreciation. “They are incompetent” he said.

After initially trying to defend the policy, Pridiyathorn was quickly forced into a U-turn, announcing on December 19 that equity investments would be exempted from the capital controls. He insisted:

This was not a mistake… Measures always have side effects. Once we knew the side effects, we quickly fixed it.

But the episode destroyed the government’s credibility on economic issues. The regime’s arbitrary and amateurish approach to policymaking appalled Thai and foreign investors alike. As the U.S. embassy observed, Pridiyathorn’s reputation was ruined:

Having cost the investing class dearly, sent shock waves through regional markets, and damaged Thailand’s international credibility, Pridiyathorn appears … thoroughly discredited.

Another cable was equally damning in its comments about the botched policy:

Many observers believe that it also displays a high degree of both arrogance (for not consulting with actual market experts as to the likely fallout) and ignorance (for not understanding the likely result himself).

This was the embarrassing reality of government by Thailand’s royalist “good men”.

As the cabinet floundered, the junta overseeing it also became increasingly uneasy and paranoid. Now calling itself the Council for National Security, the junta was hopelessly stuck in the past, unable to understand the challenge posed by Thaksin Shinawatra except as a continuation of the communist threat the military faced decades earlier. As Pasuk and Baker observe in their 2011 paper The Mask-play Election:

The coup leaders believed Thaksin’s populist policies represented a bid to seize the state and overthrow the monarchy — analogous to the communist insurgency of thirty years earlier — and hence the generals had a right and duty to deploy public money and public resources in opposition…

Shortly after the coup the CNS earmarked a budget of 55.6 billion baht and a special force of 13,625 men to root out support for Thaksin and his TRT party in core areas of the upper north and northeast. Early in their military careers, Sonthi, Surayud and other members of the CNS had been involved in the fight against the Communist Party of Thailand. This anti-Thaksin drive in the rural areas bears obvious affinities to the campaigns to wean villages away from support for the CPT in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

The generals even revived a powerful and controversial Communist-era national security agency: the Internal Security Operations Command (ISOC). Created in 1966 to coordinate the efforts of the military, police and interior ministry to combat communism, ISOC had swiftly grown and mutated to become a state-within-the-state, a military run bureaucratic behemoth with vast powers and little accountability. By the 1980s, as the threat from communism waned, the agency’s influence and importance dwindled. Now, the junta was determined to bring ISOC back to combat the threat from Thaksin, as a U.S. cable reported:

Following the September 19, 2006 coup, leaders on the Council on National Security (CNS) began to publicly propose reinvigorating the old ISOC, ostensibly to better coordinate operations in the restive South and to deter public “undercurrents;” for example, school-burnings attributed to pro-Thaksin supporters in the countryside, which GEN Sonthi has called “domestic terrorism.” Given Sonthi and his allies’ penchant for invoking the successes of the anti-Communist campaign, and the need to apply the lessons  learned back then, this made sense.

The junta’s jittery insistence on keeping martial law in force for months demonstrated how afraid the generals were of Thaksin. In a meeting with Ralph Boyce and Eric G. John on October 24, it was clear that Winai Phattiyakul, secretary-general of the junta, was feeling overwhelmed by the task ahead:

Winai turned to the Ambassador and with a sigh said, “tell me what do with a man who has 100 billion baht in his pockets.”

He tried to insist that martial law was a necessary precaution:

We just don’t want to see Thaksin and Thai Rak Thai come back too early… Please understand, we are not a dictatorship.

Asked to provide evidence that martial law was necessary, however, Winai struggled:

On martial law, Winai cited “lots of intelligence” pointing to an “underground movement.” Specific examples of this  effort include leaflets in northern Thailand blaming Privy Councilor Prem Tinsulanond for “supporting the coup.”

Winai was inadvertently revealing the problem the junta faced. They were not dealing with an organized resistance movement in the north and northeast. They were dealing with the consequences of the coup they had launched: many rural Thais were disgusted by it and were well aware that Prem had been pulling the strings. Far from being misguided and gullible, many rural people understood all too well what was happening. This was what made them so dangerous in the eyes of the panicky generals. The junta spoke in ominous tones about “undercurrents” that had to be dealt with, but they were not having to cope with an organized resistance movement. They were just facing a rural population that was increasingly seeing through the lies of the military and the rural elite.

The junta also remained petrified of Thaksin Shinwatra. As a U.S. cablenoted at the end of November:

Given Thaksin’s pervasive influence, vast wealth and famous vindictiveness, the interim government’s insecurity — which likely manifests itself in a desire to retain martial law and whatever other tools they have — is understandable.

On November 28, martial law was lifted in Bangkok and provinces considered safe, but remained in force in large areas of the north and northeast seen as Thaksin strongholds, and also in southern regions affected by the Muslim separatist insurgency.

Meanwhile, efforts to find credible evidence to charge Thaksin with corruption or other crimes were foundering, Surayud told Boyce over lunch on December 8:

Surayud commented… that it may be very difficult for the government to come up with any concrete corruption charges that would stick to Thaksin, as he had been very clever in all his business dealings.

This was one of the basic objectives of the junta, as the U.S. embassy noted in December:

Since the September 19 coup d’etat, Thai public figures have haphazardly indicated various possible grounds for the prosecution of deposed Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra. It remains unclear which of Thaksin’s alleged offenses can provide the basis for his future exclusion from political life, which some in the current administration appear to see as a precondition for returning to normalcy…

Despite public statements by various officials on the above and other offenses, such as tax evasion by Thaksin’s close relatives, the government has yet to make public strong  evidence of Thaksin’s direct involvement in illegal conduct…

Now more than three months since the coup d’etat, the  interim administration has yet to pull together a strong legal case against Thaksin. Although the former Prime Minister demonstrated a penchant for arrogant and impolitic statements, it appears he was quite clever and sophisticated  in his financial arrangements, and government sources acknowledge it will be difficult to find clear evidence of corruption.

As the year drew to a close, the junta was finding itself increasingly unpopular and far from achieving its goal of decisively banishing Thaksin Shinawatra from Thai politics. The cabinet seemed to have lost focus, failing to tackle the important issues and instead getting sidetracked by economic policy blunders and a preoccupation with secondary issues of public morality, like alcohol, gambling and the behaviour of the nation’s youth. Surauyud, Boyce said, was “a thoughtful and reasonable man grappling with an overwhelming  array of problems”.

The cabinet was given a boost by Bhumibol’s eve-of-birthday speech on December 4. The king had routinely used his annual address to lambast civilian governments, but despite the clear failings of Surayud’s administration, Rama IX considered it worthy of praise. He declared that the advanced age of the cabinet (its average age was 64) was a good thing:

The elderly are not greedy and don’t want to accumulate power for themselves.

It was another sign of Bhumibol’s support for the royalist network that had seized power.

On the last day of 2006, just as dusk was falling, several bombs exploded around Bangkok. Two people were killed, and a third was to die from his injuries the following day. Several were wounded. Shopping malls across the city shut down early, and worried Bangkok residents headed for home. The New Year celebrations, at Sanam Luang and at Central World Plaza near the Ratchaprasong intersection, were cancelled, and people were told to stay at home. Tens of thousands began streaming out of the centre of the capital, but many others, including hundreds of foreigners, elected to stay at beer gardens and streetside bars around the Central World complex, where a large digital clock was a favoured gathering point for the countdown to 2007.

At the stroke of midnight, two bombs were detonated nearby, one at the Best Sea Foods restaurant beside a pier on the Saen Saeb canal north of the plaza, and one beside a phone booth at a pedestrian overpass. At least nine people were wounded, most of them foreigners who had ignored instructions to leave the area. A bomb at another nearby tourist area, the Suan Lum night bazaar, was defused by police.

Thais were already weary and unsettled after a year of political instability that had battered the economy and dented tourism, and after the bombings a palpable atmosphere of anxiety permeated Bangkok. From the start, the government made things worse. Both Prime Minister Surayud and junta leader Sonthi quickly hinted the bombs were linked to Thaksin, even though they had no actual evidence, as junta member Winai admitted to Boyce. There were indeed some reasons to suspect Thaksin — not least the fact that his enemies had been targeted by small bomb blasts during 2006 — but it was also possible that southern insurgents were behind the attack. Other explanations were that that disgruntled hardliners in the junta had staged the blasts in order to justify a tougher crackdown, or that the bombings were the result of conflict between the army and police.

Thai authorities have a dismal record of uncovering the truth about murky violent episodes caused by conflict among the country’s elites, as Boyce observed:

Given that many previous bombings, attempted bombings, and alleged attempted bombings remain unsolved, we are not optimistic that the perpetrators — or the mastermind — will  be uncovered.

The U.S. embassy noted with alarm that the government seemed fixated with spinning conspiracy theories about the incident rather than carefully examining the evidence:

Despite having  all the tools of the government apparatus at their disposal, top RTG officials seem not to realize the need to go beyond elucidating conspiracy theories (whether accurate or not). The rush to judgment about the bombings… illustrates a lack of sophistication and, with the government’s position on the matter now public, could have serious and deleterious ramifications as further facts about the attacks come to light.

Saprang Kanlayanamit, one of the most hawkish generals in the junta, publicly accused retired general Chavalit Yongchaiyudh of masterminding the bombings on Thaksin’s behalf. His insistence on blaming Thaksin and demanding tough action led to speculation that Saprang himself could be behind the bombings, as a foreign intelligence agent told the U.S. embassy:

A high-ranking Bangkok-based intelligence official  from a friendly country on January 4 offered his perspective on the December 31 bombings. This official, with many years’ service in Thailand, admitted uncertainty about the culpable group, but leaned toward believing the perpetrators were  domestic political actors rather than southern separatists. He doubted Thaksin’s personal involvement, however, noting that Thaksin might instigate violence if pushed into a corner, but his situation had not yet become sufficiently dire to spur Thaksin to take such steps.

The official considered it plausible that Chavalit  or his associates might be involved. (Comment: Chavalit, while currently aligned with Thaksin, also has interests distinct from the former Prime Minister’s and should not be  seen simply as Thaksin’s tool. End Comment.) He also believed one of the more likely scenarios was that disaffected members of the CNS — those he termed “minority  shareholders” — orchestrated the bombings to gain greater power, or perhaps to pave the way for a second coup d’etat against Surayud and the current CNS leaders. The September 19 coup required very little manpower, the official noted, and this fact might well inspire an ambitious figure to  launch a new putsch.

Another U.S. cable recounted extraordinary bickering and tensions in the junta over ascribing the blame for the bombing. And on the evening of January 4, unusual troop movements in Bangkok sparked suspicions Saprang’s forces were launching a coup, recounted in an American cable entitled “COUP RUMORS HAVE BANGKOK ON EDGE“:

On the evening of January 4, Embassy sources from various sectors, including the police, contacted us to relay  news of unusual troop movements. The JUSMAG Chief phoned a high-ranking military officer, who assured him that ongoing troop movements were part of a regular rotation. Nevertheless, rumors were rife that Council for National Security (CNS) member General Saprang Kalayanamitr was behind the movements, due to his dissatisfaction with the current regime’s “softness” against those seeking to undermine the interim government (e.g., former Thai Rak Thai officials). People drew various conclusions, ranging from a coup against  Surayud Chulanont’s administration to a military-led crackdown against officials associated with the previous  government.

Responding to the rumors, the Defense Attache contacted Saprang, who claimed to be at home, after having had dinner with foreign contacts. Saprang also told the  Defense Attache that ongoing troop movements were part of a regular rotation; troops that had been in Bangkok since December 31 were departing, and others from Ubon Ratjasima were heading south. Saprang attributed the alarmist rumors to opposition figures (specifically, former Prime Minister Chavalit) trying to drive a wedge between himself and CNS Chairman Sonthi Boonyaratglin. Sonthi engaged in media  interviews on the night of January 4, to assure the public that there was no reason to be concerned about the soldiers’ movements.

The following day the exiled Thaksin phoned Boyce to wish him a happy new year, and the conversation turned to the bombings:

Thaksin asked inquisitively whether we knew who had carried out the attacks. I said we did not. He said he suspected southern separatists, pointing out that the modus  operandi was similar to that in recent Hat Yai attacks…

I acknowledged the devices used in Bangkok resembled those from the South but pointed out that they could be easily copied by others. Thaksin did not dispute this but  complained that Prime Minister Surayud, despite lacking evidence, had publicly accused him within hours of the bombings. Surayud had subsequently walked back his comments, I pointed out, noting that he’s not stupid, to which Thaksin quipped, “He’s not smart.”

The embassy also reported troubling circumstantial evidence that police were aware in advance about the bombings, and comments from Surayud that intelligence contacts had warned him of the bombings in advance. Several informed contacts said it seemed unlikely southern separatists were involved. Other shreds of information made the picture even murkier. A report in the Thai Rath newspaper on January 2 gave details of an ammonium fuel oil bomb packed with nails that had been found and defused on New Year’s Eve on Pattaya North Road, with a timer set to go off just after midnight. But it was never mentioned again or confirmed by officials. Was it hushed up to prevent even worse damage to tourism in the notorious beach resort, or was the report bogus?

Meanwhile, Surayud was continuing to waffle and engage in scaremongering despite having no idea who was behind the bombs. This was clear from a conversation with Boyce on January 10:

The Ambassador…  requested further details of the information that had  prompted Surayud to state at the National Legislative Assembly on January 4 that people should “get ready for a new form of threats which may occur and last for a period of  time…”  Surayud declined to flesh out his remark, saying that he had to wait until the police provided him with  further information. The Ambassador pressed whether Surayud’s warning of further attacks reflected assumptions rather than intelligence reports.  Surayud replied: “I don’t have any confirmation at all.”

Whatever the truth about the bombings — which have never been solved — they had exposed more incompetence and disunity within the junta and the government. As the U.S. embassy observed:

Regardless of who detonated the December 31 bombs in Bangkok, the attacks have heightened tension not  only between the CNS and its opponents, but also within the  ruling clique. Despite the outward appearance of calm following the September 19 coup, it seems clear that there  are important political forces which have yet to reach  equilibrium. The January 4 rumor flurry, coming on the heels  of the New Year’s Eve attacks… will likely further decrease public confidence in the current government and heighten the anxiety of top officials.

By January 2007 it was clear that Surayud’s administration was in deep trouble and that things were not working out as planned for the royalists and their allies in the military. Martial law remained in place in much of the country. The government’s poor handling of the bombings had done serious damage to public confidence. Even Boyce, who had always been sympathetic to Surayud, could see the prime minister was in over his head. As he wrote on January 10:

Surayud is increasingly disengaged on a number of  issues we believe are important. His administration is being  pummeled in the press for the lack of progress on the bombing investigation, but Surayud shows no sense of urgency. The intelligence services apparently blew off a threat warning, capricious economic decisions are hurting the Thai economy, but Surayud does not appear to feel that he needs to respond in any way or hold anyone accountable. His pledge to lift martial law is hung up on some bureaucratic glitch, and Surayud is taking a hands-off approach. This does not augur well for the interim government’s ability to steer Thailand through the very difficult months ahead. We will be raising the same points with members of the CNS and other influential figures in the coming days, in an effort to spark some sense of urgency in addressing our concerns.

Meanwhile, in direct contravention of its promises to quickly restore stability and democracy and then withdraw from politics, the junta was tightening its grip on Thailand. Asked about the the junta’s creation of a huge military task force to crack down in areas where support for Thaksin was strong, Surayud could offer only evasions. He was not even being kept in the loop:

The Ambassador … asked why the RTG in December established a new Special Operations Center, reported to be over 13,000-strong, that would report directly to the CNS. Surayud said he did not know the details of this new Center, only that it would comprise of personnel from the three military service branches and police. The concept, Surayud said, was that the Center was to operate nationwide and work with the population at the grassroots level, to assure people that the government was not carrying out purges of Thaksin supporters or eliminating popular programs for the rural areas. The Ambassador requested further information on the Center.

The same day, the junta tried to pressure the Thai media to be less critical in their coverage, a further sign of desperation. As the American embassy reported:

General Winai Phattiyakul, Secretary General of the CNS, summoned 50 editors and media executives to Army headquarters on January 10. According to press reports, Winai said the CNS wanted the media to report only “constructive” news, and a failure to comply with this request would result in stricter measures. Thai daily The Nation quoted Winai as saying “I would like to urge all the TV and radio stations to stop airing statements of the  former prime minister and executives of the former ruling party. You guys should know that if we allow representatives of the former premier to make statements every day, the public will be confused.” Winai appears to have been motivated in part by coverage of a letter in which Thaksin denied culpability for the New Year’s Eve bombings in Bangkok. The print media gave prominent coverage to objections by civil society figures to restrictions on press reporting.

The extent of the disarray within the ruling elite was revealed by Bowornsak Uwanno in a conversation with the U.S. ambassador on January 12. As Boyce said, Bowornsak had “close ties to both the Thaksin administration and the current leadership”:

A consummate insider and representative of the “Bangkok elite,” he is well-positioned to comment on the internal workings of the interim government/CNS, and we think his concerns are well-founded.

Boyce titled his cable on their discussion “COUPMAKERS’ HAUNTED DREAMS“:

Borwornsak… warned that the challenges the current leadership faces could derail the transition back to democracy. He complained that Prime Minister Surayud was too much like an “English gentleman.” The government’s economic failures had undermined its credibility, as had the lack of progress on the investigation of the New Year’s bomb attacks…

Given the political tensions and uncertainties, Borwornsak warned that a “re-coup” was possible. He said  that both Gen. Sonthi and Gen. Winai “had been approached” to  stage a further military intervention. Borwornsak did not go  into detail on what this would entail, but the idea has been circulating in Bangkok, even cropping up in the Thai press as “the only way out” of what is beginning to feel like another political impasse. Presumably, the “re-coup” would involve  some bolder members of the junta taking over, easing out the more cautious leaders, and putting in place “a new gameplan.” This would likely include a faster track in the Thaksin corruption investigations — perhaps seizing assets first, and justifying it later — and maybe dropping the constitution drafting process…

Borwornsak told the Ambassador, “the CNS is not sleeping well at night,” and we believe it.  Before the new year’s bombing, many of the coup’s early supporters were disillusioned and impatient; since the bombing, many seem angry and afraid. The government’s popularity has plummeted, as has confidence in its ability to deliver on its promises. While the idea of a “coup within the coup” seems outlandish, but there is a growing feeling that the interim government/CNS have painted themselves into a corner, are “weak,” “feeble,” and “too gentlemanly,” (to quote from some of the headlines.)  They are hemmed in by provisions of the interim constitution and the legal procedures they themselves established; now they find that they may be unable to achieve  the goal of their putsch — ensuring that Thaksin cannot  return to power again — unless they make, at a minimum, a drastic course change. Stopping the wayward ministers from wasting political capital on their pet peeves about morality issues, accelerating the anti-corruption investigations, and convincing the public they have gotten a grip on the security situation would be a start, but probably not sufficient to win back the good will they have lost through their ineffective leadership.

Such was their ineptitude and narrowness of vision, the only solution many military officers and elite royalists could envisage to fix their failing administration was yet another coup.

As the military-backed royalist government struggled to cope, King Bhumibol’s health remained shaky too. Boyce gave an update on Rama IX on February 1:

The Ambassador attended January 31 ceremonies in honor  of the recipients of this year’s prestigious Prince Mahidol Awards for outstanding achievement in the field of public  health.  In a private session with the recipients (three of  the four of whom were Americans), King Bhumiphol not uncharacteristically spoke so softly that even those close to him had difficulty hearing what he said. However, once he  began discussing soil projects and other issues of longstanding interest to him, the King was actively engaged in the conversation, which continued for an hour. He still walks shakily, with a cane, but his overall health seems stronger than when the Ambassador last saw him, in early December.

It was a poignant vignette: a fading Bhumibol, his voice scarcely above a whisper, clinging to pet subjects like soil as his kingdom sank ever deeper into crisis.

On February 5 the U.S. embassy sent a detailed cable to Washington assessing the progress made by the junta and government — or more accurately, the lack of progress — since the coup that ousted Thaksin Shinawatra. Entitled “CAN’T ANYBODY HERE PLAY THIS GAME?” it starkly set out the failings of the royalist elite:

The current leadership has so far been unable to deliver what it promised with the September 19 coup: accountability from Thaksin for his alleged corruption and hijacking of democracy, and sound leadership to reunify the country during the transition back to democratically-elected government. The government has been undercut by fractious ministers pursuing their own dubious agendas and cautious bureaucrats who want to be sure to pick the winning side in the current power struggle. The disarray in policy-making, and the lack of accountability for  officials, has had serious consequences. It has caused the CNS/government to lose much of the popular support it had immediately after the coup, alienated foreign business, and interfered with the government’s ability to resolve serious  problems, like finding the perpetrators of the New Year’s Eve bombings. Last year, some of the “Bangkok elite” questioned whether western-style democracy was really suitable for  Thailand. There are lingering concerns about the dangers of populism, but this government’s performance has helped dampen any nostalgia about the rule by the so-called “elite.”

The cable depicted Surayud as an increasingly dejected and pathetic figure:

Surayud appears increasingly detached from it all. A long-time friend of the PM recently told Econoff, “I asked Surayud if he wants to be Prime Minister, and he said no.” This is neither a secret nor a recent development; Surayud has said the same thing to us. Publicly, he has pointed that he turned down the job the first two times that coup leader Gen. Sonthi asked him. Another observer has told us that, before the coup, Surayud’s highest aspiration had been one day to replace Gen. Prem as the head of the Privy Council. It is generally believed that Surayud longs to return to his retirement house by the golf course. But the prospects of getting someone better to fill the position for the few months until elections are slim.

Boyce gave a damning appraisal of what government by Thailand’s network monarchy meant in practice:

The ruling class of the country, in short, is acting like a room full of school kids with a substitute teacher… There may be one good result from all this: last year, we heard many education contacts in Bangkok complain that western-style democracy might not be suited to Thailand. They yearned for governance by “good men,” educated and professional, who did not have to win office through the corrupting procedure of partisan elections. Well, that’s what they have now, and it clearly isn’t working out so well.

The comparison of the elderly royalist elite to schoolchildren was particularly resonant. For decades, these old men had looked up to Bhumibol as a father figure whose wisdom should steer the nation. They had looked upon ordinary Thais with immense condescension, as unruly kids who needed a firm guiding hand. They hadn’t realized the irony: it was the royalists who had grown childlike, unable to cope with or even to understand the modern world. Put in charge of the country, they were totally lost.

General Sonthi was totally bewildered, as comments to Boyce on February 6 showed:

Several times Sonthi expressed frustration with the  Thai people’s lack of seriousness, once joking that “the only problem with Thailand is the Thai people.” Soccer enthusiast  Sonthi said that the Thai people needed more discipline and suffered from the same problem the Thai national soccer team has — an inability to play like a team. (Note: The Thai national team recently lost a highly emotional match to  Singapore that drew national attention. End Note.) During the Thaksin era, he complained, the people were seduced by state-sponsored appeals to greed and rampant consumer spending. This appeal to man’s baser instincts will be hard to overcome, he noted.

In a Valentine’s Day lunch with Boyce, Anand Panyarachun lambasted the cabinet as having “no national agenda, no strategy, no management skills, and no guts”. Anand clearly felt slighted by the preponderance of Prem’s men in the administration: he complained that he had been frozen out of decision-making:

Given his own experience as a successful two-time appointed Prime Minister, Anand decried the failure of (unnamed) key administration figures to consult him until late January.

And in a telling exchange, Anand implied that Bhumibol himself was increasingly out of touch with events, and receiving bad advice:

Anand said he was less concerned about the King’s physical health than about his ability to receive objective advice and to benefit from the company of friends. Anand remarked that half the people who work at the Palace did so only to acquire status and peddle influence; only around one-third of those at the court were there solely out of  devotion to the King. He said the King was lonely and, for the most part, could not select the people with whom he spends his time. Anand considered it fortunate that the King still benefited from the company of Princess Sirindhorn every evening.

The Ambassador asked Anand about rumors that he had turned down an offer to join the Privy Council. After a long, poker-faced pause, Anand noted that if he were to accept such a position, he would have to give up his positions on various corporate boards, in order to avoid a perception of possible conflicts of interest. He also would have to accept limitations on his ability to present his views publicly. Finally, he did not feel drawn to the ceremonial aspects of such duties.

Anand’s comments contained an implied rebuke of Prem, who had obtained several lucrative corporate positions despite heading the privy council. Boyce commented that while Anand’s comments were clearly partially due to “a bruised ego”, his criticisms of the administration were nevertheless accurate.

Prasong Soonsiri, one of the original coup plotters, was equally appalled by Surayud, telling Boyce on March 16: “I don’t know what it is about this guy, but he has been an utter failure.” He said it was important to find a new prime minister soon. Boyce, increasingly disenchanted with the elite royalists he had long sympathized with, acidly commented:

In a marker of the depth of discontent with the current government, some segments of the Thai elite are returning to the idea that “we don’t know what comes next, but we’ve got to get rid of this government now.” That they cannot see this type of brilliant thinking is what produced the object of their current criticism is sadly ironic, and bodes ill for the future of Thai politics.

There was further evidence of scheming and schisms within the ruling elite after Pridiyathorn, the finance minister responsible for the capital controls debacle, resigned in February. In March, Pridiyathorn told Boyce that Saprang Kanlayanamit and Sondhi Limthongkul had been involved in a conspiracy to oust him, part of a plan to also push Surayud out and make junta leader General Sonthi the prime minister instead. Meanwhile, Pridiyathorn’s successor as finance minister, Chalungphob Sussangkarn, quickly made clear he had no intention of following Bhumibol’s “sufficiency economy” edicts too closely. Markets remained wary, and forecasts for the Thai economy became ever gloomier.

Struggling to reassert control — and perhaps as part of his plan to oust Surayud — General Sonthi announced he had requested emergency powers ahead of a protest rally against the junta on March 30 to prevent Thaksin loyalists causing “chaos” in Bangkok. According to a U.S. cable on March 29, Sonthi was worried protesters might focus on the role of Prem and Queen Sirikit in supporting the September 2006 coup. Citing a Thai academic, the cable noted:

The CNS is clearly overreacting, but they are less afraid of the size of the demonstrations than they are of what the group will say. They are particularly sensitive about discussions of Privy Councilor Prem’s role in the coup and current politics, and fear the criticism might “go beyond Prem to the King. Or the Queen. The Queen is more the target.” (Note: One recurrent rumor has the Queen and Prem quietly supporting the September coup, while keeping the King, recuperating from his back surgery, out of the picture. End note.)

A more prosaic reason for Sonthi’s anxiety was that protesters planned to publicly criticize him for having two wives:

The general was also concerned that they would publicly disclose the not-so-secret fact that Sonthi (a Muslim) has two wives. (According to one source, this violates military rules and could lead to pressure for disciplinary action against Sonthi.)

Surayud, however, refused to grant the military the emergency powers Sonthi had requested. The rift between the two men was becoming increasingly public. Several sources told the U.S. embassy that Surayud was prepared to resign rather than accede to Sonthi’s request. Tensions among the ruling elite were not helped by the continuing incompetence of the investigation into the New Year bombings, and concerns over the economic damage being caused by the regime’s plans to declare Temasek’s takeover of Shin Corp illegal. As bickering worsened, Surayud checked into hospital for a colonoscopy after feeling unwell. Things were going from bad to worse for the royalists.

In an effort to salvage the situation, junta Secretary-General Winai, Vice Chairman Chalit Phukphasuk and other leading regime figures including one of General Sonthi’s wives, Piyada, flew to Chiang Mai for an audience on April 1 with astrologer Warin Buaviratlert. Warin had been Sonthi’s favoured astrologer for years, after telling Sonthi that he was the reincarnation of one of King Taksin’s generals who had rescued Siam after the fall of Ayutthaya in 1767, and that it was his destiny to save the nation once again. He predicted Sonthi would rise to head the army — which duly came to pass — and had even declared that September 19 would be an auspicious date for Sonthi’s coup. Now that Sonthi was struggling, it seemed a good time for some of his supporters to seek further astrological help. As a cable from the U.S. consulate in Chiang Mai reported:

Sonthi has sought Varin’s advice for more than 10 years, ever since the seer foretold of a coveted military promotion Sonthi received. Other CNS members similarly depended on Varin’s guidance long before they helped oust the former government. Many see Varin as serving as an unofficial special advisor to the CNS, claiming he has provided recommendations on everything from the precise timing for staging the coup to political appointments in the new government.

A Chiang Mai native, Varin was a rural teacher and failed real estate investor before making the leap to all-knowing astrologer 20 years ago. Prior to finding fame as the CNS’s  favorite soothsayer, he struck it rich by convincing his clients to include him as a partner in their business investments. The media coverage of his services to CNS leaders has driven demand for his services even higher. But even before the coup, he had achieved notoriety, playing both sides of Thailand’s political divide by also once counseling former Prime Minister Thaksin  Shinawatra.

Belief in astrology and mysticism is well within the mainstream of Thai culture, which blends astrology and a rich mixture of Buddhism, Hinduism, animism, and elements of the occult into everyday life and decision making. However, the devotion to Varin’s wisdom expressed by some CNS officials combined with the cost of flying government leaders up to Chiang Mai in C-130 military planes, has raised eyebrows even among normally superstitious Thais.

But as the junta sought solace in the stars, renewed turbulence erupted in another celestial realm: the lofty and secretive world of the royal family.

On Bhumibol’s birthday in December 2006, Oliver Jufer spent much of the day getting drunk. In the evening, the 57-year-old Swiss resident of Chiang Mai went out to buy more beer. Told it was illegal to sell alcohol on the king’s birthday, an enraged Jufer went on the rampage around Chiang Mai with a can of black spray paint, defacing five pictures of Bhumibol. Arrested three days later, he faced up to 75 years in jail: 15 years for each count of lèse majesté. On March 30. 2007 he pleaded guilty, and was sentenced to 10 years in prison. Two weeks later he received a royal pardon — standard practice for foreigners — and was quietly deported. The Swiss advised the Americans that their strategy of dealing with the matter quietly had been crucial in securing a swift pardon:

According to Swiss Embassy Minister Jacques Lauer, who helped coordinate the Swiss response to Jufer’s arrest, the Swiss government was surprised by how rapidly the King  pardoned Jufer — a mere 13 days following his conviction and before Jufer had even filed an appeal or requested a royal pardon. Lauer indicated they had expected the King would  follow tradition and wait until his 80th birthday, eight months later, to pardon Jufer and others accused of lese majeste…

Minister Lauer credited Jufer’s speedy pardon to a Swiss decision to not antagonize Thai officials by making  public comments, an action that may have provoked a backlash due to the public adoration of the King. Lauer claimed that intense international media attention and the public clamor in Switzerland for Jufer’s release made it difficult to balance the need to avoid offending their Thai interlocutors while appearing proactive in the eyes of the Swiss public.

But while the Swiss authorities had done their best to keep the case quiet, it ended up sparking a bizarre battle between Thailand’s military-installed government and YouTube. In protest at Jufer’s treatment and the lèse majesté law, somebody had uploaded a video to YouTube that crudely mocked Bhumibol — a monkey’s face was superimposed on a photography of the king, and Rama IX was also shown with cartoon feet on his face, a great insult to any Thai, let alone the monarch. If the Thai authorities had simply ignored it, it would have garnered little attention. Instead, the heavy-handed response by the Ministry of Information and Communications Technology (MICT) caused headlines all over the world. As a U.S. cable reported:

On Wednesday, April 4, MICT added Google-owned YouTube.com to its “blocklist” after a user posted a video clip with crudely drawn markings and pictures of feet superimposed over the image of the King. An MICT officer told PDoff that, when the ministry noticed the video, MICT Minister Sittichai Pookaiyaudom contacted Google.com to ask them to pull the offending video. According to the MICT officer, Google responded that the user was using  ”guerilla” tactics — posting, pulling, and reposting his clips repeatedly — making it impossible to pull the clip. As a result, MICT decided to block the entire YouTube.com site “for a few days.”

Since MICT blocked the site, the original user pulled the clip after getting over 63,000 hits. However, at least ten additional clips commenting on the video or duplicating its content have appeared, each generating tens of thousands of hits.

Oblivious to the “Streisand Effect” — the fact that the best way to draw attention to something online is to try to block it — the Thai authorities sparked an outpouring of juvenile abuse of Bhumibol as a result of their clumsy actions. As another cable recounted:

The first controversial video clip featured the Thai king with drawings of feet superimposed over his head. (Note: The feet are considered unclean in Thailand and placing feet over a photograph of a face is a major affront. End note.) The poster of the clip identified himself as a American in his profile. MICT blocked access to the site and sought to make YouTube remove the offending video. The resulting press attention to the block apparently inspired a series of copy-cat offenders. There are currently perhaps a dozen clips disrespectful to the Thai monarchy on the site. These include one accusing him of being a pedophile, one with crudely sexual themes and allusions to “Brokeback Mountain,” and one accusing him of murdering his brother, who died under mysterious circumstances 60 years ago. MICT efforts to block access have failed, as savvy internet users inside the country set up proxies outside of Thailand to access and post messages and clips of their own, many in support of the king.

Many Thais respond to these insults to their King much the way many Americans respond to someone burning their flag. The response may even be closer to Muslim reaction to the infamous Danish cartoons. It is an emotional reaction that is not particularly susceptible to logical arguments about freedom of speech. The fact that several of these clips use profanity and sensational allegations of murder or sexual misconduct makes it that much worse. This is all a great headache for the government, which is, once again, stuck with no good options. Crack down on the offenders, and they risk international criticism for stifling free speech. Ignore the videos, and they will be accused of failing to defend the King. This is a particularly awkward accusation for the interim government; the coup leaders justified their overthrow of the former prime minister in part due to his lack of respect for the king.

The authorities eventually unblocked YouTube on August 30 after negotiations with Google. But the episode drew attention to a wider phenomenon: growing internet censorship by the Thai authorities. This was extending way beyond efforts to crack down on insults to the king. As the U.S. embassy reported, Thai censors were — tellingly — very sensitive about websites that said Prem was involved in the 2006 coup:

Thai sites critical of Privy Council President Prem Tinsulanonda have also run afoul of MICT. On Monday, April, MICT asked pantip.com to shut down its popular political chatroom “Rajdamnoen.” The Minister cited “several threads” that “undermined national security.” He did not clarify what topics had raised his concerns, and said the site could re-open when “the political  situation improves.” Before it was blocked, the room carried several discussions critical of General Prem’s involvement in the coup…

MICT has also blocked other sites critical of Prem. On  Friday, April 4, Council for National Security (CNS) Chairman Sonthi ordered police to look into pressing libel charges against  www.saturdaynews.org, which was asking for signatures to support Prem’s “impeachment.” A MICT official said they had not blocked the site, but it is not currently accessible… Likewise, sites linked to deposed Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra such as hi-thaksin.net remain inaccessible in Thailand. The anti-coup www.19sep.org has been blocked six times since the coup.

It was around this time that a video began circulating that was far more damaging to the palace than the crude images lampooning Bhumibol on Facebook. It showed a birthday party held a few years earlier by Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn for his pet while poodle Foo Foo. It had clearly been filmed with Vajiralongkorn’s knowledge. Liveried servants were visible several times during the video and a stills photographer had also been present: there were frequent camera flashes, and Vajiralongkorn showed no sign of being perturbed by the attention. Throughout the proceedings, his wife Srirasmi was naked apart from a thong, and her apparent lack of self-consciousness suggested this was by no means an unusual state of affairs in Vajiralongkorn’s palace. The video startled even Thais long used to tales of the prince’s lascivious lifestyle: it showed their probable future king and queen behaving in — to put it mildly — a rather less-than-magisterial manner.

What made the timing of the video’s release particularly interesting was that Prem, Surayud and their elderly royalist circle both loathed and feared Vajiralongkorn. Not only did they consider him unfit to become king, but they fretted that he and Thaksin had formed an alliance, partly thanks to Thaksin’s generous payments over the years to finance the prince’s dissolute lifestyle. Surayud’s dislike of the prince was clear from a February 2005 conversation with Boyce:

I asked Surayud about the heir to King Bhumhibol, Crown Prince Maha Vajiralongkorn. Surayud replied that he had tutored the Crown Prince some 20 years ago and surmised that “He’ll never measure up” to the present monarch, but “somehow the Thai people will make do.”

In May 2006, Surayud told Boyce he feared the prince and Thaksin were in cohoots:

Surayud told the Ambassador that he agreed with speculation that Thaksin might be waiting until the King dies before resuming his political career, noting that Thaksin had invested heavily in cultivating good relations with the Crown Prince.

As efforts by the junta to deal a fatal blow to Thaksin’s political ambitions foundered during 2007, the generals grew increasingly afraid the former prime minister might one day return to power and seek revenge against them. Winai admitted this to Boyce in April 2007:

CNS figures could not rule out the deposed PM returning and wreaking havoc on the country — and possibly acting vengefully against CNS members.

With Bhumibol’s health precarious, the ultimate nightmare of Prem, Surayud and their circle was that a royal succession could unravel their carefully laid plans at any time and leave them vulnerable to vicious reprisals from Thaksin in league with the new King Rama X, Vajiralongkorn. Given the extreme risks to any member of Vajiralongkorn’s staff who had circulated the video of Foo Foo’s birthday, many Thais speculated that it must have been leaked with the blessing of Prem’s circle, in an effort to torpedo the prince’s chances of ever taking the Thai throne. Around the same time, still photographs showing Srirasmi in various stages of undress also started to circulate via e-mail and bootleg compact discs.

During 2007, Vajiralongkorn abandoned his third wife Srirasmi and their young son Dipangkorn Rasmijoti to spend most of his time in Germany with a mistress who he had met when she was a Thai Airways flight attendant. He began undergoing some kind of blood-related medical treatment near Munich, leading to rumours that he was suffering from AIDS. In July 2007, he was widely (and wrongly) rumoured to have died. The nature of his illness has never been confirmed. A U.S. cable stated in 2009 that:

Vajiralongkorn is believed to be suffering from a blood-related medical condition (varying sources claim he is either: HIV positive; has Hepatitis C; is afflicted by a rare form of “blood cancer,” or some combination which leads to regular blood transfusions).

The prince’s wayward behaviour had some serious consequences in 2007: his formidable mother finally decided enough was enough. Queen Sirikit had doted on Vajiralongkorn all his life, overlooking his faults and finding excuses for his antics. She had been horrified when he abandoned his first wife, Somsawali — Sirikit had engineered the marriage in an effort to secure the primacy of her family’s branch of the Chakri bloodline — but she had managed to forgive even this. She had always remained absolutely adamant that Vajiralongkorn should succeed Bhumibol as Rama X when the king died. Bhumibol, whose relationship with his son was extremely poor, was far less convinced that Vajiralongkorn would ever be fit to become king, and during the late 1970s and 1980s he may have even considered the possibility of changing palace law to allow his trusted and popular daughter Princess Sirindhorn to become the next monarch instead. But Sirikit’s implacable support for Vajiralongkorn always prevented any alternative succession schemes from being seriously explored. But when the prince walked out on Srirasmi and their son Dipangkorn Rasmijoti to shack up with a flight attendant in Munich, and then the scandalous video of Foo Foo’s birthday party emerged, it was the last straw for Sirikit. As a secret cable from U.S. ambassador Eric John reported in 2009:

For many years, Queen Sirikit actively promoted Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn’s interests and was seen as his greatest backer in the face of widespread public opposition and open preference for Princess Sirindhorn. For instance, she was the driving force behind the Crown Prince’s 2003 trip  to Washington, which she intended as a cornerstone effort to rehabilitate his image in the eyes of the Thai people as an  acceptable future King, one who had recently remarried and  would soon produce an acknowledged male heir.

The mother-son relationship suddenly changed in 2007 for two reasons: the appearance of video and still photos of Vajiralongkorn’s wife Srirasmi in the nude on the internet/CDs then widely available in Bangkok; and a noisy row over the amount of time the Crown Prince was spending outside Thailand.

This had major implications for the royal succession dynamic. The elder statesmen of the monarchist establishment had long been petrified of what would happen after Bhumibol died, not just because they feared Vajiralongkorn would be a bad king, but also for the more selfish reason that it would be the end of their own prestige and influence. The prince loathed them and there would be no place for them in the palace inner circle once Vajiralongkorn became Rama X. But Sirikit’s rift with Vajiralongkorn gave the “good men” a beguiling glimmer of hope. Encouraged by her toxic coven of scheming ladies-in-waiting, Sirikit became convinced it was her destiny to ride to Thailand’s rescue once again, just as she had in previous incarnations as a warrior queen. Instead of entrusting the throne to Vajiralongkorn after Bhumibol’s death, she would seek to reign as regent herself, on behalf of the prince’s young son Ong Ti. Particularly to ultra-royalists in the establishment, it seemed the best solution to the succession dilemma. (Interestingly, one ultra-royalist who was less enthused about the idea was Prem Tinsulanonda. Despite his advanced age — he is seven years older than Bhumibol — several well-placed sources say Prem continues to harbour his own aspirations of ruling as regent after the king’s death. His official website information even describes him as a “soldier, statesman and Regent of Thailand“. Sirikit’s row with the crown prince was good news for Prem, but the queen’s ambitions conflicted with his own. )

The possibility of a contested succession raised the stakes immensely in the power struggle between the royalists and Thaksin. Given Thaksin’s links to the crown prince, the royalists fretted that if he or his proxies managed to return to power they would be able to decisively influence the succession, foiling any bid to prevent Vajiralongkorn inheriting the throne. As a U.S. cable observed in 2009:

The dynamics in the ultimate end game/last days of King Bhumibol would likely differ considerably depending on who was the Prime Minister, the governing coalition, the army chief, and the leading Privy Councilors at that time, and whether the King passed away suddenly or lingered in an incapacitated state for a long period of time. Various different political actors shape their short and medium-term plans accordingly.

Spurred on by her dreams of one day reigning as regent, Sirikit sailed into battle from 2007 onwards, enthusiastically resuming her old habits of partisan political meddling. She began to explicitly assume the role of champion of the royalist cause in the struggle to defeat Thaksin Shinawatra. Bhumibol was slowly shuffling off the stage, increasingly disengaged from the drama due to his semi-seclusion in Hua Hin and his fragile health. Sirikit filled the vacuum, becoming the dominant power in the palace, and her hawkish inner circle of ultra-royalist generals and courtiers began eclipsing the influence of the more moderate  monarchists who clustered around Bhumibol.

The struggle between the two competing strands of royalism — hardline militaristic monarchism versus “gentlemanly” royal liberalism — caused worsening friction between the junta and the cabinet. During April, Democrat Party godfather Suthep Thaugsuban, coup insider Prasong Soonsiri and Yellow Shirt demagogue Sondhi Limthongkul all told Boyce that General Sonthi had ambitions of replacing Surayud as prime minister. Boyce explicitly told Sonthi that the international community would regard this as unacceptable, and the general denied any such plan, although he admitted there had been discussion of a “re-coup” among the junta:

Sonthi acknowledged that there had been talk of staging a follow on coup to replace Surayud. However, he was quick to add, it was obvious that doing so would only further alienate the international community and cause the CNS to lose the domestic support of those who view the September 19 coup as an evil necessary to rid the country of former PM Thaksin Shinawatra. “What would be the point of my becoming Prime Minister,” Sonthi asked rhetorically, “if doing so undermined everything we worked for in September?” Sonthi gave every indication that he expects Surayud to remain as Prime Minister until elections are held despite the Prime Minister’s shortcomings. “If we were to replace Surayud there is no one up to the job we could name in his place,” he added.

Surayud, meanwhile, was feeling increasingly sorry for himself, as Boyce discovered in a phone call on May 4:

During a telephone conversation on May 4, PM Surayud replied to the Ambassador’s question of “how are you doing”  by saying “you should pity me.” While the PM did not explain the reasons for his low spirits, the Ambassador noted that the PM was not well-served by his ministers. Surayud agreed with this assessment.

Boyce commented:

For a man proud of his asceticism who joined the Buddhist monkhood for a time following his retirement  from the Army, to complain about his situation indicates the depths of his unhappiness. Surayud has long been a high-achiever and recipient of plentiful praise from his colleagues and superiors. Since becoming PM, he has been repeatedly accused of being a failure as Prime Minister; a  group of underperforming, competing ministers have failed to accomplish much and been a source of embarrassment; and a group of generals constantly peer over his shoulder looking  to criticize. These are all factors which have clearly taken a toll on Surayud’s spirit. Surayud has many times said that he would gladly quit his post except for his duty to see the  job through to the planned elections in December. We believe him.

In a later cable in June, the U.S. embassy said Sonthi had been close to sacking Surayud and his entire cabinet in April, but had concluded he could not get away with doing so:

Based on a wide variety of reports, including GEN Sonthi’s own admission, we believe that some CNS leaders gave serious consideration to replacing Prime Minister Surayud, and probably his entire unpopular cabinet, in the period before the major Thai new year holiday in mid-April. It appears that they peered over the edge of that abyss and, refreshingly, decided not to jump this time. A number of factors probably contributed to this restraint. If nothing else, there does not seem to be anyone to replace Surayud. GEN Sonthi may have briefly flirted with volunteering himself, but then came to his senses. It is widely believed that the Palace and Privy Council President Prem would not have supported an “incumbency coup.” It looks like the CNS  and Surayud understand that they are stuck with each other for a while longer.

But while the junta had stepped back from the brink of launching yet another coup, the administration remained in disarray, far from the unity the royalists claimed to uphold.

At the end of May, Thailand’s politicized judiciary made another intervention on the side of the royalist administration. During 2006, charges were filed against both Thai Rak Thai and the Democrat Party for electoral abuses ahead of the abortive April 2006 general election. After the coup, the junta announced that political parties that violated the law would be dissolved, with their executive board banned from holding political office for five years. A Constitutional Tribunal appointed by the junta was empowered to rule on the cases. As a U.S. diplomatic cable noted on May 29, there was little expectation that the cases would be judged purely according to the law, without interference:

Few observers seem to believe that the Tribunal will decide these cases on the merits… To illustrate: pundits repeatedly claim that, if TRT is to be dissolved, the Tribunal must show “balance” by dissolving the DP as well. One daily paper recently quoted an anonymous Tribunal member as stating “We will take everything into account: the  principles of law and political science, as well as the spirit of the (coup council).” The Ambassador’s interlocutors on or close to the Council for National Security (CNS) have for months assured him of TRT’s dissolution, as if it has been preordained. And one top Democrat Party official relayed specific rumors of substantial bribe money sloshing toward the Tribunal members.

Bhumibol gave a televised speech to judges on May 24. He told them:

You have the responsibility to prevent the country from collapsing… Whatever court you belong to, judges need to make the right interpretation, otherwise the country will be doomed… I have the answer in my heart but I have no right to day it.

Bhumibol clearly thought he was demonstrating admirable disengagement from politics, proving The King Never Smiles Wrong. But it was just posturing. Simply by making these remarks at all, and telling judges that he knew the correct decision but couldn’t say it, he was clearly interfering in the judicial process. The judges would not, of course, be told what their ruling should be via Bhumibol’s speech — that would be done by the network monarchy in the days that followed, in phone calls and meetings that would make very clear what the palace inner circle wanted them to do. On May 29, General Sonthi had a meeting with Ackaratorn Cularat, vice president of the Constitutional Tribunal. He later denied he had lobbied the judge, insisting it was purely a social get-together.

During the day on May 30, the tribunal cleared the Democrat Party of all charges. Around midnight, it finished reading a six-hour verdict on Thai Rak Thai, declaring the party had breached the law and ordering its dissolution. As the U.S. embassy observed, many aspects of the verdict were ridiculous:

The Tribunal members… denounced TRT in harsh terms as an undemocratic party, saying that TRT sought to advance the personal fortune of former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, and did not represent “a genuine party with any ideology.” (Comment: Most political parties in Thailand have been non-ideological vehicles to advance the power, prestige, and wealth of the party leaders. TRT had a clear, populist platform and did more to deliver on its promises to voters than any other party in Thai history. End Comment.)

The five-year ban on Thai Rak Thai politicians was particularly troubling because it was a penalty that had been put in place after the alleged crime was committed. The law was being applied retroactively, against all legal principles. In a briefing for the foreign diplomatic corps on June 5, Virasak Futrakul, permanent secretary at the foreign ministry, insisted that Thailand ”is a nation of laws” and offered this explanation:

Jaran admitted that this was a retroactive application of the law, but argued that, since this was not a criminal legal issue, it did not violate international legal norms…

Jaran likewise denied that the dissolution of the country’s largest party and the removal of over a hundred top political leaders would undercut the effectiveness of Thai democracy in the election tentatively scheduled for later this year. “This may be an opportunity” for Thai democracy now that a new generation of leaders and several smaller (and  in some cases older) parties have a better chance to win election.

As Duncan McCargo wrote in his 2008 paper Thailand: State of Anxiety in Southeast Asian Affairs:

The episode illustrated a growing trend towards “judicialization”, a royally promoted view that complex political problems could not be solved through electoral politics or by elected officials, but were best left to knowledgeable and highly moral judges. Such ideas were popularized in a May 2006 paper by Thammasat University academic and polemicist Thirayudh Boonmi, who had suggested that the judiciary could resolve problems relating to political reform. Yet in practice, the substance of the “judiciary” was wide-ranging: it included professional judges, judges appointed by the Senate to bodies such as the Constitutional Court, or judges appointed by the Council for National Security (NS) to the ad hoc Constitutional Tribunal. While the CNS and the government had appropriated the discourse of “rule of law”, these improvised judicial interventions had a questionable legal basis. The trend reflected long-standing conservative mistrust of political parties and elections, mistrust that had only been exacerbated by the rise of Thaksin. In its latest incarnation, judicialization was an anti-Thaksin policy. If a military coup was the blunt instrument used to oust Thaksin from office, judicialization could be seen as the means by which the monarchical network sought to manage and reorganize political power in the post-coup period.

On June 11 the authorities struck another blow against Thaksin, hitting him where it would hurt most. The Assets Examination Committee, another institution created by the junta, ordered the freezing of 52 billion baht in the accounts of Thaksin and his family. It alleged he had obtained this money via abuse of power. The irony was that the junta was abusing its own power more blatantly than Thaksin ever had.

If the junta thought that freezing Thaksin’s assets would convince him to give up the fight and quietly fade into obscurity, it was an astonishing misjudgment of his character. He responded, as always, by hitting back. Thaksin’s allies began organizing regular mass demonstrations in Bangkok and around the country, under the banner of the United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship (UDD), which would later become the Red Shirt movement.. Sometimes Thaksin himself would address the rally by videolink. He was emulating the tactics of the Yellow Shirt PAD, and challenging the incumbent government via street politics.

The U.S. embassy noted that while at least some of the protesters appeared to have been paid, this did not mean that they were not genuine supporters of Thaksin:

It may be that some of the protesters have been financially compensated for their attendance: a factory manager in the northern city of Chiang Mai, a hotbed of Thaksin support, told the Ambassador on June 14 his employees had been offered 1,000 baht (approximately $30) to attend the rallies in Bangkok. However, many, if not most, of the demonstrators appear to genuinely believe in their cause and fervently support the deposed PM.

The rallies turned up the pressure on Prem Tinsulanonda, singled out for angry criticism because of his political meddling and role in the coup. Prem continued to deny he had anything to do with the putsch, but few believed him. Attacks on the privy council president became increasingly outspoken, and at one rally in June a group of protesters held a mock funeral for Prem. On July 22, thousands of protesters marched on Prem’s house and fought with police trying to stop them getting into the compound. The clashes lasted several hours, with some protesters throwing stones and bottles; police responded with tear gas. The royalists were appalled: visiting Prem at the house two days later in a show of support, Surayud claimed that the pro-Thaksin movement had the “intention of undermining the highest institution on which the country and the public rely” — in other words, the monarchy. Any criticism of Prem, he implied, was an attack on the king.

On June 21, Thaksin bought British football club Manchester City for £81.6 million. The perennially underachieving City had long languished in the shadow of its legendary rival Manchester United, and Thaksin promised fans that he would lavish cash on the team to transform the underdogs into winners. He quickly signalled he meant business, hiring former England coach Sven-Goran Eriksson as manager and pledging £47 million for the Swede to spend on new players. Murmurs of disquiet among some fans over Thaksin’s questionable human rights record were drowned out by widespread delirium as City supporters savoured the delicious possibility of success after more than three decades without a trophy.

Struggling to pronounce Thaksin’s name, fans affectionately called him “Frank Sinatra” instead. ”I am not a dictator. I am a strong leader. I am what you call a solution-orientated person,” Thaksin assured them. “I’m quite confident that I can make Manchester City as popular as Liverpool and Manchester United in the next two or three years. It’s a big ambition. I can dream. But we need to build the club step by step. First we have to make the sleeping giant wake up.”

In truth, Thaksin had never been greatly interested in football – he was very much a golf man — and the fans he really cared about were not in Manchester, but Thailand. As McCargo observed in Thailand: State of Anxiety:

Thaksin’s purchase of a controlling interest in the British premier league football club Manchester City in June was a brilliant public relations exercise, allowing him to remain constantly in the popular eye through Thailand’s relentless television coverage of the English national game — in which he remained sublimely uninterested

The military had been pressuring Thailand’s media to starve Thaksin of publicity. Junta secretary Winai Phattiyakul had plaintively lamented in January that he wished the ousted prime minister would just “give up and go away”. Thaksin gleefully crushed such unrealistic hopes with his Manchester City deal, which ensured that even from afar he would remain the centre of attention back home. He ran rings around the wrongfooted generals, outmanoeuvring their efforts to block him with contemptuous ease. The scale of the junta’s abject defeat in the contest became humiliatingly apparent when Thaksin bankrolled a Thai-themed party for 8,000 fans in Albert Square in the heart of Manchester and triumphantly strode onto the stage wearing a blue-and-white City scarf to join the singing of team anthem Blue Moon. The reinvented Thaksin “Frank Sinatra” Shinawatra clearly had no intention whatsoever to quietly give up and go away.

By the middle of 2007, the drafting of a new constitution by an assembly overseen by the junta was complete. In an effort to show their commitment to democracy, the generals had promised a national referendum on the constitution, and this was set for August 19. If Thais approved the new constitution in the referendum, the junta said, general elections would be held by the end of the year to restore democratic parliamentary rule. If the constitution was rejected, a new one would have to be drafted, and the return of democracy would be delayed. This gave a strong incentive to vote “yes” to the constitution in the referendum, even for those who felt the charter was badly flawed. But Thaksin’s political allies publicly rejected the constitution and urged Thais to vote “no”. The referendum campaign became the latest proxy war between the network monarchy and Thaksin. As McCargo noted:

The great majority of those who took part were not really voting for or against the draft document

For most Thais, the vote had little to do with the merits of the constitution. It effectively became a popularity contest between Thaksin and the royalists. It was a referendum on the legitimacy of the junta that seized power from Thaksin in the 2006 coup.

The junta was determined to secure an overwhelming vote in favour of the constitution, and launched a massive propaganda campaign. A copy of the constitution was distributed to every household, with a bright yellow cover, a deliberate ploy to suggest it bore Bhumibol’s stamp of approval. Billboard slogans explicitly implied that Thais who revered the king should vote “yes”:

Love the king. Care about the king. Vote in the referendum. Accept the 2007 draft charter.

The revived ISOC internal security agency coordinated the campaign, with a reported budget of 10 billion baht, and using 50,000 troops to go door-to-door across the country telling people to vote “yes”. Sonthi publicly ordered 700,000 nationwide staff to “promote proper understanding of the constitution” among rural people. A mass rally was organized in Bangkok on August 12 to proclaim support for the new constitution, with Surayud leading a crowd of around 100,000 Thais from Royal Plaza to the Democracy Monument. They were dressed in yellow, the king’s colour, consciously evoking Bhumibol’s 60th anniversary celebrations in 2006, as well as the mass anti-Thaksin protests of the PAD.

The authorities also tried hard to stifle any campaigning for a “no” vote. Human rights activist Sombat Boonngamanong was arrested in Chiang Mai in July for holding a rally in which he advocated rejecting the constitution. In Bangkok, police raided the office of activist  Prateep Ungsongtham Hata, and confiscated campaign material opposing the constitution, including posters with the slogan “It’s not illegal to vote against the draft constitution.” Bangkok taxi drivers — who tended to be staunch Thaksin supporters — were warned not to display bumper stickers with the message ”I accept passengers; I don’t accept the new constitution”.

Given the huge imbalance in campaigning, the results of the referendum were extraordinary. The junta’s hopes for an impressive margin of victory were dashed. The constitution was approved, but with only 57 percent of votes cast, against 43 percent rejecting the constitution, and two percent invalid votes. Turnout was 58 percent.

What made the result particularly remarkable was that the authorities had explicitly and relentlessly linked the constitution to the monarchy. Thais were led to believe that voting “yes” to the constitution was what Bhumibol wanted them to do. Voting “no” was to defy the king and display heretical support for Thaksin. And yet this was what 43 percent of voters decided to do. It was an incredible statistic, and would have been inconceivable in any previous period of Bhumibol’s reign. It demonstrated the immense damage that had been done to the prestige of the palace by the antics of the elite royalists and especially by the 2006 coup. Less than a year after the junta had seized power, it was clear that there had been an unprecedented collapse in the number of Thais willing to unquestioningly put their faith in Bhumibol and his inner circle.

There is no way to measure with any degree of precision how many Thais still genuinely venerate Bhumibol as his reign draws to a close. An opinion poll remains unthinkable: quite aside from the problem of getting people to answer honestly, any survey would be in breach of lèse majesté legislation just for suggesting there was even the slightest doubt about Bhumibol’s popularity. In the absence of any better alternative, the best data we have for gauging royal popularity comes from the 2007 constitutional referendum. It can only provide a very approximate indication: this was not, of course, a referendum on the monarchy and many other factors also influenced the voting. But the fact that 43 percent of Thais who cast their ballots were willing to vote “no” to a constitution championed by the members of Bhumibol’s inner circle, despite being told that if they loved the king they should vote “yes”, demonstrated beyond any reasonable doubt that reverence for the monarchy was far from universal in the Thailand of 2007.

Tellingly, the number of “no” votes cast in the referendum was far higher than opinion polls and even exit polls had predicted. In other words, many of those who voted “no” were well aware of the implications of their choice and wanted to keep their views secret: they lied to the pollsters. When it came to sensitive issues like the monarchy and military, Thais were long used to telling others what they wanted to hear, and keeping critical views private.

The referendum also demonstrated the extent of regional polarization in Thailand. In the south, support for the constitution (and by implication, the royalist administration) was 86 percent. In the north, Thaksin’s home turf, the constitution was narrowly approved, by 54 percent to 44 percent. The northeast, long considered a rebellious backwater by Bangkok, was the only region where a majority of voters rejected the constitution: 62 percent voted “no”. The authorities blamed Thaksin’s malign influence for the poor results.

With the referendum out of the way, the focus turned to the elections that the junta had pledged would be held by the end of 2007 to mark the end of military rule. It was already clear that the generals faced a serious problem, and were struggling to figure out how best to deal with it: Thaksin’s new political vehicle, the People’s Power Party, was well on course to winning the most votes when the election was held, with the Democrat Party still languishing in distant second place. Despite all the junta’s efforts to destroy Thaksin’s political influence, it seemed increasingly likely that if the generals kept their promise to hold free and fair elections on time, they would end up having to hand power back to the political allies of the man they had overthrown the previous year. It would be clearer than ever that their coup had been a terrible mistake and a dismal failure.

With most of the senior figures of the old Thai Rak Thai party banned from politics, Thaksin took the decision to install veteran right-wing bruiser Samak Sundaravej as leader of the PPP, although it was clear to everyone who was really in charge: Samak cheerfully admitted he was Thaksin’s “nominee”. He was a curious choice for party leader, a divisive figure with an extremely chequered political past, including playing a key role in stirring up right-wing hysteria ahead of the 1976 massacre at Thammasat University. He was instinctively authoritarian and dismissive of human rights, and the decision to choose him as leader was further evidence of Thaksin’s lack of comprehension of what genuine democracy entailed. He was also a political dinosaur well past his prime, as an American cable observed:

Thailand has many intelligent and well-spoken political leaders… When the time comes to form  a new political party, however, the Thais are inexplicably  drawn to an old guard of grizzled political veterans who have  long, if unimpressive, resumes. The reappearance of these ancient mediocrities is one of the more depressing elements  in the current political landscape. PPP led the way with the election of Samak Sundaravej, a 73-year-old known for his  abrasive manner.

McCargo provides a summary of Samak’s colourful career in Thailand: State of Anxiety:

Samak was a controversial figure, who had first made his name as an unbeatable champion contestant on the television quiz show Tick Tack Toe. Possessing a photographic memory and a turbo-charged tongue, Samak went on to become a prominent rightist and scourge of the student movement in the 1970s. As interior minister following the Thammasat University massacre of 6 October 1976, he notoriously arrested hundreds of supposed leftists and banned numerous Marxist texts. In the years that followed, he announced that he would become prime minister in “three steps”. He took the first step in 1979, when his  small Prachakorn Thai Party swept Bangkok in a landslide election victory. But his abrasive personality, “one man show” management style, and above all his  narrow political base — he had virtually no electoral appeal outside the capital — barred him from ascending any further. After stints as communications minister and deputy prime minister in the 1980s and early 1990s, he eventually quit national politics, and was elected governor of Bangkok in 2000.

Thaksin was notoriously paranoid about political colleagues growing too popular or ambitious — he was not a man inclined to share the limelight and he expected his underlings to know their place — and his belief that Samak would be a reliably obedient puppet probably played a large part in the decision to install him as Thai Rak Thai leader. Samak had no political powerbase of his own and owed his position purely to Thaksin’s largesse, which would limit the risk of him going rogue. The obvious flaw in this analysis, of course, was Samak’s pathologically combative personality.

Samak’s reputation as an ardent ultra-royalist may also have influenced Thaksin’s decision: he probably felt the military and monarchist establishment would be more likely to allow the PPP to govern with a figure like Samak in nominal charge. In a discussion with Boyce on August 30, Samak said a top priority was improving relations between the PPP and the palace:

When meeting the Ambassador privately, Samak spoke at length in defense of Thaksin; he claimed that the former PM was the victim of slanderous allegations that he advocated reducing the status of the monarchy in Thailand so it would be on a par with the royal families in Britain and Japan…

As PPP Party Leader, one of his first orders of business, Samak said, would be to work to win support for PPP from members of the royal family. The party’s slogan, he told us, would be “For Nation-Religion-King, with People’s Power.”

But what probably appealed to Thaksin above all was that Samak was a sworn enemy of Prem Tinsulanonda. Although both men were right-wing royalists, they utterly loathed each other. Their animosity began brewing in the early 1980s, and Samak publicly asked uncomfortable questions about Prem’s behaviour during the April Fools’ Coup of 1981. Over the years that followed, Samak grew to increasingly resent Prem’s status as the king’s favourite, and according to several political colleagues he even harboured the (very unrealistic) ambition of one day heading the privy council himself. In February 2006, another row erupted between the two men after Prem gave a speech to doctoral candidates at Suan Dusit Rajabhat University based around some rather vacuous tautological homilies about leadership. Belabouring the obvious for more than half an hour, Prem proclaimed that for leaders:

Being smart and intelligent is a good thing, but if there is no morality and ethics it is not so good.

He added that leaders should be “honest in thought, speech and deeds”, “be righteous”, “have sound judgment” and also rule selflessly, shunning personal gain:

His Majesty the King has said that public administration must be performed for the nation’s stability, security and the public good, and not involve personal interests or the interests of one’s own kin or cronies.

Perhaps momentarily forgetting his own maxim on the importance of honesty, Prem told reporters afterwards that his speech was “not aimed at anybody”. But it didn’t take a doctorate in public administration to deduce that the privy council president was firing a blatant broadside at Thaksin Shinawatra and his recent sale of Shin Corp. Samak blasted back with comments on his “This Morning in Thailand” television show denouncing Prem for partisan political meddling aimed at undermining the elected prime minister. Samak’s accusations were, of course, absolutely true, but the royalist and military camp reacted with ostentatious outrage to the suggestion that Prem was not a saintly figure who floated serenely above the profane realm of politics. Amid military threats, Samak resigned from the television show, grumbling that “good guys are being chased away while bad people have won praise”. His hatred of Prem remained as virulent as ever, and this was exactly what Thaksin wanted in a proxy leader. As Chulalongkorn University’s Thitinan Pongsudhirak observed:

Mr. Samak’s paramount task in Mr. Thaksin’s service was to keep Privy Council president Prem Tinsulanonda, the alleged mastermind of the coup, at bay.

Hardline royalists within the junta and their allies in the Yellow Shirt movement, meanwhile, were busy conspiring to try to get the end-2007 elections cancelled or postponed. Aware that Thaksin’s PPP was well on course to form the next government after elections were held, the only response the ultra-royalists could come up with was a campaign to sabotage the planned return to electoral democracy, partly by engineering the resignations of several cabinet ministers. A U.S. cable summarized the political intrigue on August 30:

For the past two weeks, the interim Thai cabinet has  been under a relentless attack apparently orchestrated by hard-line anti-Thaksin elements dissatisfied with the government’s performance. These factions have long complained that the government was not taking tough enough measures to ensure former PM Thaksin could not return to power. After initial uncertainty about the exact nature of the conspiracy afoot, there is now a general and probably correct view that members of the National Legislative Assembly and of the People’s Alliance for Democracy are the chief conspirators; elements of the military that were sidelined during the recent reshuffle may also be playing a role. Their goal: to create enough chaos in the government to derail the scheduled December elections, and buy more time to reduce the influence of the former PM.

The plan failed. Surayud, who was miserable as prime minister and eager to escape as soon as possible, declared the government remained committed to holding elections before the end of 2007. In late October, an election date of December 23 was formally announced by royal decree. As McCargo noted:

While it may be tempting to impute Surayud with sound democratic impulses, one core reason he kept this promise was his own palpable lack of appetite for the job of prime minister. After leaving Government House, he admitted that he had been extremely loath to take on the position, that his happiest moments as prime minister were when he went to bed, and that if he could turn back the clock he would never have assumed the post in the first place.

Coup leader General Sonthi had repeatedly insisted he had no interest in clinging on to power, but behind the scenes he had been plotting for months to find a party he could use as his political vehicle. In mid-2007, tycoon Kajit Habananda, president and CEO of budget airline One-Two-Go founded a new party, Rak Chat, for this purpose, with the encouragement of Pallop Pinmanee. Sonthi began seeking ways to steal money to fund the party, and was widely reported to be ready to officially join it. He seems to have genuinely believed he might be able to get elected as prime minister in the December polls. The plan was revealed to U.S. diplomats by Prasong Soonsiri, one of the coup plotters who had later grown disillusioned with the performance of Sonthi and Surayud:

Prasong said that several months ago Sonthi had come to him and said that he was considering supporting Kajit Habananda’s Rak Chat Party. Sonthi determined that he would need about 2 billion baht (usd 60 million) to build the party up. The Royal Thai Army then negotiated the purchase of armored personnel carriers (APC) from Ukraine, with the deal designed to allow Sonthi to skim 2 billion baht of the inflated 4 billion baht pricetag.

The plans for Rak Chat unravelled, however, when a One-Two-GO flight from Bangkok on September 16 crashed on arrival in Phuket. The McDonnell Douglas MD-82 aircraft hit an embankment beside the runway and burst into flames, and the chaotic and inadequate response by fire and rescue services at the airport and Phuket Town compounded the disaster. The final death toll was 90 of the 13 people on board. Following the crash, investigators found systematic malpractice and fraud within One-Two-GO. The episode destroyed the prospects for the Rak Chat party.

Sonthi turned his attention to another plan instead, trying to unite various political factions that for years had hawked themselves to the highest bidder. Many of them had been absorbed into Thai Rak Thai during the years of Thaksin’s political dominance, but now their loyalty was available for hire once again. They included Snoh Thienthong’s Pracharaj faction and some small groups linked to notorious provincial criminal families, like Wattana Asavaheme‘s Paknam faction and the Khunpleum mafia family from Chonburi. Sonthi encouraged them to merge under the name Peua Pandin, or For the Motherland, and it quickly became apparent that the party had a remarkable amount of money with which to bribe factions to rally under its banner. Squabbling among the various factions scuppered plans to make Peua Pandin a major political force, and when the party was officially launched at the end of September it was built around only one faction, led by former Thai Rak Thai politician Suwit Khunkitti. Pallop was involved yet again, officially as an adviser to the party. As the elections approached more factions drifted in, lured by the money being offered, and Wattana Asavaheme became party chairman. An article in The Nation on November 16 pondered “the mystery that is Puea Pandin” and noted:

During the past month, the party has become a destination for former MPs, public figures and influential politicians… A group of military figures is said to be financially backing the party.

Boyce also reported to Washington that ”many contacts have indicated that the Motherland Party received support from someone with ties to the military”. Another U.S. cable noted that Peua Pandin was receiving a disproportionately large share of media attention.

It remains unclear whether Sonthi managed to secure funds from the corrupt Ukrainian deal in the end. Boyce thought not:

According to our sources, this APC sale was put on hold by the Defense minister, to be decided by the new government. This does not then appear to be the source of  Motherland’s unexpectedly large war chest.

However, the APCs were indeed eventually delivered, although after several years of delay. Whether or not he received the money, Sonthi’s willingness to abuse his position to steal funds to bankroll his political ambitions demonstrated the hypocrisy of the junta’s claims that Thaksin’s corruption was a major reason for the coup. And clearly someone had found a way to make Peua Pandin a very rich party indeed.

The following year, Bhumibol’s cousin Sukhumband told U.S. diplomats that:

Up until the last moment… Sonthi believed he would be able to forge a governing coalition consisting of all parties except for PPP and backing Sonthi’s selection as  Prime Minister: Ruam Jai Thai Chart Pattana Party Leader Chettha Thanacharo, a former Army Commander.

Although Sonthi’s plans had failed, Sukhumband said, the coup leader had ended up considerably richer after 2007, perhaps after making a deal with Thaksin:

We asked whether Sonthi remained active in political circles. Sukhumbhand said he thought not; he believed Sonthi had reached an agreement of sorts with Thaksin — “no war, no peace.” Sukhumbhand also guessed that Sonthi was currently  ”enjoying his wealth,” saying he believed Sonthi had become significantly wealthier after the coup.

On October 13, 2007, Bhumibol suffered a stroke and was taken to Siriraj Hospital. His principal private secretary, Arsa Sarasin, told Boyce on October 16 that “the King’s condition was improving, but he would need physical therapy for his right side”. Bhumibol was eventually discharged from hospital on November 7, wearing a pink jacket and shirt, and spurring and suddenly many royalist Thais began wearing pink rather than yellow to show their support for the monarch. Boyce noted in a cable that the fragility of the king’s health was focusing attention on the issue of succession:

The King’s public appearance and departure from the hospital will enable many Thais to put aside, for now, their anxieties surrounding the King’s eventual departure from the scene. However, while some Thais appear psychologically unable to cope with the idea of the eventual death of their revered King, many in the political class recognize that this is a looming prospect that will transform Thai politics.

The cable attempted to disentangle the various laws and constitutional edicts governing the succession. It observed that while palace law did not permit a woman to become monarch, the 1991 constitution and later charters contained provisions allowing the king to amend palace law with relative ease:

This means that the King, on relatively short notice, can make significant changes in the Succession law. This has been interpreted to mean that he could, if he liked, designate his popular daughter to succeed him, rather than his reprobate and reviled only son.

The cable also noted that while Vajiralongkorn was Bhumibol’s designated heir, it was by no means assured that the prince would succeed his father:

The Crown Prince is the designated heir. None of provisions above matter much if he is still the designated heir when the Kings dies — those provisions become relevant only if the Crown Prince is removed from contention somehow. The Palace Law on Succession does contain a loophole that could, at least conceivably, be applied to this case. Section 10 of the law states that: “The Heir who is to  succeed to the Throne should be fully respected by the people and the people should be able to rely on him happily. If he is considered by the majority of the people as objectionable, he should be out of the line to the Throne.”

This was exactly the plan that Sirikit and her circle had been hatching: they could have Vajiralongkorn declared unfit to rule, possibly using section 10 of the palace succession law, and pass the crown instead to the prince’s young son. Ong Ti would become Rama X, and until he reached adulthood, Sirikit would reign as regent on his behalf.

Boyce’s discussion of succession mechanics, 07BANGKOK5718, references another 2007 cable, numbered 07BANGKOK5522 and entitled “GOSSIP”. That cable is missing from the electronic log of cables obtained by WikiLeaks, which means it was designated top secret and not stored electronically. But the brief reference in the succession cable describes one issue discussed in the top secret despatch:

Ref A detailed reports that some in palace circles are working actively to undercut whatever support exists for the Royal Consort, and we assume that this undercurrent also has implications for the Crown Prince.

Evidently, the U.S. embassy had been given information that some of Thailand’s senior royalists were conspiring to undermine Srirasmi, and by implication, Vajiralongkorn too. It was further evidence that the succession would be contested.

The extent to which Bhumibol knew of Sirikit’s ambitions and rift with Vajiralongkorn remains unknown. Tej Bunnag, the king’s deputy personal private secretary, told Boyce in November that Bhumibol had clearly signalled that he still regarded the prince as his successor:

Tej explained that the King had very much wanted to  participate in the November 5 royal barge procession. Given his medical condition, Palace figures prepared five alternatives for his consideration. When they presented these, however, the King quickly dismissed them. According  to Tej, the King said, “I don’t need these; the Crown Prince is my representative.” (In the event, Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn took the King’s place on the Suphannahongse barge.) Tej said Palace insiders interpreted the King’s blunt decision as the clearest indication yet of his determination to have the Crown Prince retain his current status as the King’s designated successor.

Tej also revealed that there had been no planning for what would happen when Bhumibol died: the whole subject was regarded as simply too awful to contemplate:

Tej … explained there would be no advance planning for how to respond to the King’s death; the  Privy Council would determine what to do after the event. The Ambassador noted the Embassy had heard speculation of a 1,000-day mourning period after the King’s death. Tej said he simply did not know what would happen, but he was able to confirm that the Crown Prince, if he remains the designated successor, would immediately become King, although his coronation ceremony would take place after the mourning period and royal cremation.

Palace officials were so trapped in archaic tradition and so divorced from reality that no arrangements had been put in place to manage the traumatic and destabilizing impact that Bhumibol’s death would have on Thailand. It was an extraordinary attitude, particularly given that the looming succession was one of the fundamental issues fuelling the ongoing political conflict. Thaksin and Sirikit and Prem and all the rest of the key players in Thailand’s pivotal power struggle had long been strategizing their response to the end of Rama IX’s reign. Thais were acutely aware that the day was drawing closer when they would have to deal with Bhumibol’s death. It preyed on everybody’s minds. It fuelled the scheming of the elites. But, officially, it was unthinkable.

In late October, several military documents were leaked to supporters of Thaksin and posted online. They revealed the lengths the junta was willing to go to in its efforts to combat Thaksin and undermine support for the PPP in an ostensibly democratic election. One document was a memorandum sent to General Sonthi on September 14, 2007, from Colonel Chatchalerm Chalermsuk in the junta’s “News and Information Management” section, and with additional material added by Colonel Theerawat Bunyawat, director of the army’s Information Technology Division. It outlined a proposed strategy to turn voters against the PPP by planting false stories in government media alleging that key members of the party were anti-monarchist, that the party planned to introduce a presidential system in Thailand that would challenge the traditional role of the monarchy, and that Thaksin was funding articles by the foreign media that were critical of the monarchy. Some of its recommendations were:

Create news to attack the old power… Spread rumours about the connections between TRT, Singapore, PPP, and the trend towards presidential rule… Spread rumours that Thaksin paid foreign media to run articles attacking the institution.

It also proposed arranging media interviews for ostensibly neutral commentators who would say that voting for PPP would be a waste of time because it would only cause turmoil and provoke another military coup. And it suggested promoting national stability by telling television stations to produce programmes illustrating the perils of disunity, ”using examples like the loss of Ayuthaya to Myanmar”.

The most interesting of the leaked documents was a transcript of a meeting held in army headquarters on September 21, 2007, for General Sonthi’s farewell speech (he was stepping down as junta chairman to take up a position in Surayud’s cabinet). The initial speech at the meeting was given by General Prayuth Chan-ocha, commander of the First Army. Prayuth, an unreconstructed ultra-royalist and member of Queen Sirikit’s inner circle, told the assembled gathering that the struggle against Thaksin was just the latest phase of the military’s conflict with communism, a war to secure the hearts and minds of the people:

It is our duty, as soldiers of the king, to understand these matters, to understand the war for the people, both in the era of the Cold War and the era of populism… So all of us must contest with them to win the grassroots back for the king… Our most important aim is that all the masses in the territory must be ours.

Sonthi then addressed the audience, taking up the same theme and saying the military had to adopt a new strategy to ensure it won the support of the people. He concluded:

The army’s task from now on is to win over the people at every level and in every area to turn to support the army and be loyal to nation, religion and king.

It was a fascinating insight into the paranoid, outdated and simplistic thought processes of the top military leadership. General Anupong Paochinda, who took over as army commander in October 2007, admitted to Boyce that the documents were genuine.

During the year following the September 19 coup, the junta had rebuilt the defunct national security agency ISOC into a vast military apparatus operating beyond government oversight. ISOC had played a central role in the propaganda campaign for a “yes” vote in the referendum, in trying to root out support for Thaksin in the rural north and northeast, and in trying to sabotage the PPP’s prospects in the upcoming general election. With the end of official military rule approaching, the junta rushed through legislation that would preserve ISOC’s extensive powers and maintain the army’s bloated political influence even after democracy was supposedly restored. Reversing the trend of improving professionalism and depoliticization since 1992, Thailand’s royalist junta was intent upon putting the military permanently at the centre of power. As the U.S. embassy reported:

Critics have publicly labeled ISOC a power grab by the Army, or an attempt to institutionalize military governance. One subset of this criticism alleges that the new ISOC will allow the CNS to maintain control even after a democratic government is elected later this year.

The Internal Security Act, a security law formalizing ISOC’s role, was approved by the cabinet in June 2007 after a secretive drafting process, and sent to the rubber-stamp National Legislative Assembly. The U.S. embassy gave details of the proposed legislation in a June 25 cable:

The draft Internal Security Act approved by the cabinet on June 19 would significantly expand the powers of the military through its proxy, the Internal Security Operations Command (ISOC). Under this new law, the Army commander would serve as Director, ISOC, and have the  authority to order curfews, searches and seizures with little oversight…

Since the 2006  coup, senior government officials have highlighted the need for enhanced legal frameworks to cope with both separatists in the South and potential political upheaval throughout the rest of the country. Recent rallies by anti-government  demonstrators and threats of further actions by supporters of ousted PM Thaksin appear to have driven the latest push for this security law…

The expanded authorities provided to the ISOC Director are likely to generate much … controversy. While the Director of ISOC may authorize the arrest or detention of a  person who “conspires to commit danger to the internal security,” this action must be approved by a court of law. Those detained under ISOC authority can be held for a  reoccurring period of seven days, up to a total of 30 days.  Other authorities granted the ISOC Director include the ability to: — order searches (in some cases requiring judicial approval) — establish curfews — block public assembly — seize assets, documents or evidence relating to an act harming national security — place suspects into “reeducation” sessions not more than six months in length —order employers to collect and maintain biographic information on their employees — regulate the purchase, sale, or possession of “any  material…used to create a threat to internal security”

The draft security act was widely denounced in Thailand as profoundly dangerous to democracy. It languished for months as the military and bureaucrats tinkered with the draft. There was disquiet even among some senior military officers about the proposed powers that ISOC would have, and they shared their concerns with the U.S. embassy:

In addition to human rights activists highlighting concerns over the possible impact on personal and political freedoms, some in the military have told us privately that the draft Act is flawed. Lieutenant General Surapong Suwana-adth, Director of Joint Intelligence at the Royal Thai Supreme Command and one of the key players in establishing the new ISOC, told us that the original intent was to provide such a legal framework to deal with security threats. For example, Thailand needed a legal structure to respond to a terrorist attack, Surapong explained. Despite the genuine effort early on to draft a bill to provide a legal structure in times of crisis, Surapong said hardline elements in the government have hijacked the Act as a means to maintain power after elections… “Hawks” have taken advantage of the power seized in the coup to enshrine into law a permanent role for the military to influence politics, Surapong explained.

Panitan Wattanayagorn, a controversial academic who had close links with the Democrat Party and the military, and had worked as an adviser to Surayud, also conceded that the security law was an attempted power grab by the army:

Dr. Panitan Wattanayagorn; Associate Professor at Chulalongkorn University, advisor to PM Surayud, and a leading security analyst, explained to us that the Act was an attempt by the military to regain a prominent role in Thailand. The military desired a return to a more dominant position because the 1997 Asian financial crisis had caused the Thai military’s budget to be cut and Thaksin had favored  the police, Panitan explained. Now the military was in a position of control and is worried about the pro-Thaksin People’s Power Party doing well in the election.  The military wants tools to deal with the situation, Panitan said.

At the last minute, with the junta’s authority about to end, the National Legislative Assembly approved the Internal Security Act late in the evening of December 21, in one of its final actions before being dissolved. A few modifications had been made in response to criticism, but the military had achieved its aim of institutionalizing a major political role for itself and gaining extensive powers to impose its will on Thailand. As Boyce commented:

While few doubted the need for Thailand to develop a legal framework to respond to internal security threats, the manner in which the ISA passed has raised concerns about the post-election influence of the military.

Near the end of Ralph Boyce’s tenure as U.S. ambassador in Bangkok, he co-hosted a gala dinner in honour of King Bhumibol. With the king still recuperating following his stroke, Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn presided at the event, and the Preservation Hall Jazz Band from New Orleans played Dixieland classics to more than 600 high-society guests. Boyce, meanwhile, was sitting next to Vajiralongkorn’s wife Srirasmi, and struggling to make small-talk. He was probably unaware that she and the crown prince were already estranged, but he had of course seen the salacious video of Srirasmi at Foo Foo’s birthday party. And sometime during dinner, he began chatting to Srirasmi about dogs. It turned out to be an unfortunate faux-pas:

I mentioned to Srirasm that, during the state dinner hosted by the King for former President Bush in December 2006, the King had appeared most energized when discussing animals; he had spoken animatedly about his most well-known dog, Thongdaeng, and others. I mentioned having heard Princess Sirindhorn had a large dog, and I asked Srirasm if she knew the breed. Srirasm appeared immediately to freeze up; her body language changed, and she said curtly that she knew nothing of Sirindhorn’s affairs. (Comment: Her reaction was interesting, given a widespread, longstanding perception that Sirindhorn may somehow edge out the Crown Prince as  successor to the King. End Comment.)

Boyce did, however, manage to discover one interesting piece of canine information from Srirasmi:

Srirasm also confirmed that the Crown Prince’s miniature poodle, Foo Foo, currently holds the rank of Air Chief Marshal.

The snappily-dressed Foo Foo was present at the dinner, and made himself the centre of attention:

Foo Foo was present at the event, dressed in formal evening attire complete with paw mitts, and at one point during the band’s second number, he jumped up onto the head table and began lapping from the guests’ water glasses, including my own. The Air Chief Marshal’s antics drew the full attention of the 600-plus audience members, and remains the talk of the town to this day.

Boyce paid a farewell call on Vajiralongkorn at his Sukhothai Palace three days later. The crown prince was doing his best to be polite and say the right things, but some of his remarks demonstrated the emotional gulf and breakdown in communication between Vajiralongkorn and his father King Bhumibol:

We began by talking about the Embassy-sponsored Preservation Hall Jazz Band event which he and Royal Consort Srirasm had attended on  November 10. Interestingly, the Crown Prince was unaware that King Bhumibol had participated in a two-hour jam session with the band the following day (November 11). He was pleased with news of the session, saying it would have been invigorating for the King “after all he has been through” lately. He added that the King often preferred to  communicate through music rather than speech, noting that musicians have a common bond that transcends language. (Note: According to the musicians, the King was able to speak normally and showed no sign of serious impairment from his recent mild stroke. End Note.)

Bhumibol and Vajiralongkorn had barely spoken for years. Among the king’s immediate family, only Princess Sirindhorn remained close to him. His elder sister Galyani was critically ill in hospital, close to death. Lonely and ill, the old king was estranged from his wife and had a difficult relationship with three of his four children. Now, at the end of his life, the adoration of his people seemed to be slipping away too.

The December 23 general election was a stunning success for the People’s Power Party: it won 233 seats, not far short of an absolute majority, with the Democrat Party far behind on 165 seats, and Peua Pandin winning just 24. Given all the efforts by the junta to undermine support for Thaksin and pump money into Peua Pandin, it was a remarkable result. Efforts by the generals to prevent other parties forming a coalition with the PPP also failed. Once the scale of its victory was clear, several smaller parties indicated their willingness to work with with the PPP. In further evidence of his chronic meddling, Prem summoned Chart Thai leader Banharn and Peua Pandin leader Suwit to his residence for talks on the night of the election, but failed to persuade them to renounce working with the PPP, despite months of assurances by Banharn that he would never join a pro-Thaksin government. Any hopes among the junta and royalists for a grand anti-Thaksin coalition quickly fell apart.

“The coup is dead,” Samak Sundaravej jubilantly proclaimed on election night. ”I will be the next premier for sure.” As new U.S. ambassador Eric G. John commented:

After two years of uncertainty, including massive demonstrations, an annulled election, a caretaker government, a military coup, a junta, an interim government and a new constitution, we are pretty much back to where we were in 2005. There has been no resolution of the issues that provoked the crisis in the first place. The rule of law and accountability for elected officials have not been strengthened, the corrupting role of money in the political process has not been reduced, the relationship between politicians and the royal institutions, including the Privy  council, has not be clarified. After a strategic pause, the same conflicts that led to the political crisis are likely to re-emerge…

John noted that the PPP’s election victory represented a significant setback not just to the military, but also to the palace:

The 2007 election provided a useful indicator of the limits of Palace influence. Plausible rumors in the period leading up to the election claimed that Queen Sirikit sought actively to block the return to power of pro-Thaksin forces. We may attribute the failure of such efforts to divisions within the royal family, or to the lack of mechanisms to effectively convey Palace views to the public while maintaining plausible claims that the Chakri dynasty plays an appropriately apolitical role. Whatever the reason, it is clear that the monarchy carries enormous influence but, even when some of its core interests are at stake, lacks full control over the course of events. While the King likely could send blunt signals to achieve virtually any short-term outcome he desires (as in 1992, when he pushed General Suchinda from power), such intervention could transform the role of the royal family in ways that open it up to criticism and, over the long run, jeopardize its current lofty standing.

PPP’s victory in the election marked a setback for the coup leaders. But the failure to block Thaksin’s political comeback did not represent capitulation by or marginalization of the royalist oligarchy. With the return to power of a pro-Thaksin government, we may once again see a situation in which a party championing populism and drawing  its strength from the countryside moves to accumulate power and prestige at the expense of the Palace and its Bangkok-based blue-blood allies. A fundamental tension between these two camps remains, and it could lead to further bitter conflict, prompting public or private calls for military intervention.

On January 2, 2008, the palace announced the death of Bhumibol’s older sister Galyani. She had been artificially kept alive for weeks, and may have died some time before the formal annoucement. It was another emotional blow to Bhumibol, leaving him with only one genuinely close confidante left in the world, his daughter Sirindhorn. And it was another reminder to Thais that Bhumibol’s death might not be far away. John observed that the succession posed enormous problems for Thailand’s royalist elite:

For the royalist segment of the Bangkok-based political class… there is no clear path to perpetuating the monarchy’s preeminence after the King’s death.

John was still still unaware that many leading royalists were increasingly turning to Queen Sirikit as their supposed salvation, as Bhumibol’s growing decrepitude and disengagement removed him from the scene. Her rift with Vajiralongkorn and her ambitions to reign as regent after Bhumibol’s death profoundly altered Thailand’s political dynamic, and this was to become increasingly apparent as 2008 unfolded.

Samak Sundaravej and his cabinet were formally sworn in by King Bhumibol at a palace ceremony on February 6, 2008. The quality of the cabinet was depressingly low, even by Thai standards, partly because so many leading figures from the old Thai Rak Thai party were banned from politics. Everybody knew that Thaksin viewed Samak as a puppet, and little effort was made to conceal this fact. John recounted telling remarks from Foreign Minister Noppadon Pattama at a dinner hosted by the Russian ambassador with British envoy Quinton Quayle also in attendance:

In a discussion of the foreign policy structures and mechanisms of our governments, Amb. Quayle asked the FM how much direction he took from Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Commerce Mingkwan, since nominally the Foreign Minister reports to the DPM. Noppadon laughed, stating that although he and Mingkwan are longtime friends, he does not take any direction from the DPM. “I am fortunate. I am pretty independent in my work. I don’t have to take instruction from anyone, and I only report to Mr. Thaksin.” When he saw the stunned silence around the table, he quickly added “and, of course, the Prime Minister. But that goes without saying.”

But Samak’s pugnacious personality and controversial past quickly caused problems for his party. A February 8 interview with Al Jazeera was particularly embarrassing. Samak dismissed the 2004 Tak Bai incident in southern Thailand, saying the 78 young Muslim men who died had been weakened by not eating or drinking all day, adding “nobody killed them”. He attempted to dismiss the October 1976 massacre at Thammasat University too, claiming it was “dirty history” to suggest that scores of students were killed:

Only one guy died, in Sanam Luang, because somebody beat them and burned them… Nobody died in Thammasat University.

Samak became abusive towards interviewer Aela Callan when she challenged him on his outlandish claims. His behaviour illustrated how Thai elites believe they can rewrite history to serve their own ends, denying the basic facts of what really happened.

In comments to Eric John on February 12, Anand Panyarachun pronounced himself disgusted with Samak and with Thai voters:

After an  exchange of pleasantries, Anand expressed in strong terms his dismay with the December 2007 election results and with the  administration of Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej. He called this “the least trustworthy government ever,” deploring the influence of figures outside of the formal government (read: deposed PM Thaksin Shinawatra and his associates). Citing Samak’s false claim to the international media that only one person died during a period of political upheaval in 1976, Anand deplored Samak for having “no respect for the truth,” and he characterized Samak as having politically self-destructive tendencies…

Thai voters who had elected the PPP government were “gullible” and “damn stupid,” Anand despaired…

In a revealing moment, Anand quipped dismissively that  Samak’s administration’s only claim to legitimacy was that his party had won the election. Anand clearly does not  believe that Samak and his crew are capable of good (much  less wise) governance. Time may prove Anand correct, but he nevertheless should acknowledge that a peaceful transition  back to rule by elected leaders is a positive and necessary  step back toward political normalcy — even if the Thai majority’s preference differs from Anand’s.

The elderly royalist was blind to the irony that he, too, had no respect for the truth and clung to a fairytale version of Thai history. His comments were revealing, showing how little respect he really had for democracy and the wishes of Thailand’s people.

The nightmare facing Anand and the ultra-royalists worsened on February 28 when Thaksin Shinawatra returned from exile abroad, prostrating himself on the ground outside Suvarnabhumi Airport as thousands of supporters cheered and wept. As John commented, “even though Samak Sundaravej is Prime Minister, Thaksin is the political superstar”. The royalists were increasingly alarmed, and increasingly afraid.

Thaksin’s return to Thailand galvanized the forces arrayed against him, and reawakened the Yellow Shirt mass movement. At the first PAD rally since the 2006 coup, several thousand Yellow Shirts gathered at Thammasat University on March 28. Sondhi Limthongkul denounced Samak’s administration as “Thaksin’s regime in disguise” — a perfectly reasonable accusation, except that the PPP was not even bothering to disguise itself. A U.S. cable on the rally reported that:

Most protesters appeared to be middle-aged and middle-class Bangkok residents; many wore PAD-themed anti-Thaksin clothing apparently distributed at pre-coup PAD rallies.

But the 2008 incarnation of the PAD was to prove very different from the Yellow Shirts of 2006. It had become a far darker organization, increasingly extremist and violent. As McCargo wrote in Thai Politics as Reality TV in the Journal of Asian Studies in 2009:

As time went on, the PAD became captives of their own rhetoric, unable to converse with others, let alone back down or make compromises. Rather than seek to build broad support for their ideas, core leaders made vitriolic speeches —for which  Sondhi set the tone — in which they denounced anyone critical of, or unsympathetic, to their actions. Such megaphone posturing served to alienate potential  supporters, and to strengthen the PAD’s dangerous sense of themselves as an in-group of truth-tellers and savants, whose nationalist loyalties were not properly appreciated or understood. This self-presentation had distinctly cultic overtones, and Sondhi’s own language became increasingly demagogic.

One reason for the PAD’s gruesome mutation in 2008 was the growing panic and anxiety felt by Thai royalists as they struggled to cope with the wrenching realization that Bhumibol’s reign was coming to an end. The Yellow Shirts proclaimed their undying love for the king, but it was the flipside of that love that transformed them into a baying apocalyptic death cult: they were utterly petrified about what would happen once Rama IX was gone. To quote McCargo again:

Thailand was firmly in the grip of “late reign” national anxiety, which formed the basic explanation for the otherwise illegible performances and processions of the PAD.

A second reason for the PAD’s drift towards ultra-royalist proto-fascism was Queen Sirikit’s deepening involvement in the anti-Thaksin movement. In a speech in the United States during 2007, Sondhi Limthongkul had explicitly boasted of royal support, saying that he had received money and a special gift from the palace during 2006, and that afterwards royalists like Prem Tinsulandond, Sonthi Boonyaratglin and Suraud Chulanont had taken him much more seriously. The gift, according to what Sondhi told his allies, was a blue scarf given personally to him by Sirikit’s sister Busaba. It was a signal of Sirikit’s support. Also, according to a U.S. cable in April 2009:

Contacts have told us that Sondhi privately told other Thais that Queen Sirikit directly supported his efforts.

And with the queen now estranged from the crown prince, her support for a robust ultra-royalist movement in Thailand was now even stronger.

In March, Sirikit was hospitalized with bronchitis. During her time in hospital she had an angry confrontation with her son Vajiralongkorn, reported in a U.S. cable the following year:

In 2008, the Queen and the Crown Prince had a shouting match at a hospital during the Queen’s brief hospitalization, with the Crown Prince angrily berating her in front of ladies-in-waiting… Several of the key ladies-in-waiting reportedly now refuse to be present when  the Crown Prince visits the Queen.

Sirikit and her royalist allies were determined to prevent Thaksin consolidating his influence in Thailand, because this could decisively tip the balance in favour of Vajiralongkorn when Bhumibol died, and prevent Sirikit squeezing him out of the succession. With the king’s health clearly tenuous there was no time to lose. Sirikit’s circle had to strike quickly to assert their dominance. Two particularly active acolytes of Sirikit were heavily involved in stoking tensions during 2008: First Army commander Prayuth Chan-ocha and minor royal Piya Malakul. Discussing rumours that that the two men could be plotting another coup, Eric John described Piya as “a very odd character who could well be screwy enough to be drawn into a misadventure of this kind”. The royalists openly raised the spectre of a republican plot once again, claiming Thaksin wanted to destroy the monarchy. John discussed these worries in a cable on May 24:

The King himself is old, frail and ill, and the monarchal institution is weakening with him. The love for the Thai king is very  personal — fostered by a concerted effort by the Palace for  sixty years — and does not extend, at all, to his son and  presumed heir. Whoever controls political power when the King dies could be in a very strong position to sway the destiny of the country — to preserve the monarchy or to turn Thailand into a republic. For the military and the royalists, it is a cause of deep concern to have known anti-monarchists… in important government positions. Threats to the monarchy tend to provoke an irrational overreaction from the military.

In fact what worried the ultra-royalists was not that Thaksin would seek to turn Thailand into a republic, but that he would ensure the succession passed to Vajiralongkorn, a development that would decisively undercut the influence of the traditional monarchist elite. They were terrified that an unholy alliance of Thaksin and Vajiralongkorn would come to dominate Thai politics for decades to come.

On May 19, a Buddhist holiday in Thailand, Queen Sirikit paid a visit to the Wat Chana Songkram temple in Bangkok in the company of army commander Anupong Paochinda and First Army chief Prayuth Chan-ocha, one of her closest confidantes. As Eric John noted in a cable to Washington:

That temple is not the traditional venue for the royal family on this holiday, but is normally a place where people pray before going into a battle of one sort or another.

Queen Sirikit and her supporters were preparing for war.

There was no organized republican movement in Thailand, but since 2006 a growing number of Thais had been questioning the role of the palace and the behaviour of the network monarchy, in particular Prem Tinsulanonda. This was a direct result of the behaviour of Prem, Surayud, royalist generals like Sonthi and Saprang, and indeed Sirikit herself. John discussed this trend in his May 24 cable:

Although the King is genuinely beloved and respected, he and the institution of the monarchy have been subject to criticism regularly over the years. Even academics from  ”good” families and universities have gotten into trouble for their “leftist,” anti-royal views. Yet, there is a feeling  that the situation is different, and more serious, this time. In the first place, the internet and other independent media make the spread of such views so easy. The discussion of the King’s role in Thai politics has left the classroom and academic journal, and is accessible to anyone. This is dangerous both because it facilitates the gathering of support for these views, and it mobilizes opponents who are outraged to read such scandalous reports.

In response, the royalist establishment resorted increasingly to the lèse majesté law. In March, PPP cabinet minister and former government spokesman Jakrapob Penkair was accused over comments he had made about Prem and the patronage system at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Thailand the year before. Thaksin and Samak conspicuously failed to defend him and he eventually resigned on May 30. BBC journalist Jonathan Head was accused also for comments during the same event. In April, activist Chotisak Oonsong and his girlfriend were charged for failing to stand during the playing of the royal anthem before a movie screening in Bangkok in September 2007. In late April, the Metro Life 97 radio station, part of Sondhi Limthongkul’s media empire, broadcast Chotisak’s home address. As the U.S. embassy commented:

In the last six months, lese majeste complaints have been filed or threatened against  a wide range of figures, including a cabinet minister, a former Royal Thai Police Chief, a BBC journalist, and an  activist. These cases do not involve direct assaults on the monarchy; some involve slights as minor as skipping royal  ceremonies or not standing for the royal anthem in a movie theater…

Jakrapob is facing  accusations that he criticized the monarchy during an August 2007 panel discussion at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Thailand (FCCT) after his release from prison. The accusations are based primarily on his English statement about a clash between democracy and “the patronage system,” which has been interpreted by some as referring to the patronage of the monarchy.

Abhisit Vejjajiva, the Democrat Party leader (and formal leader of the parliamentary opposition), personally took up this issue, calling publicly for Jakrapob’s  resignation and saying Prime Minister Samak must take responsibility for any damage inflicted by Jakrapob’s remarks. The Democrat Party filed a motion to impeach Jakrapob. Finally, under heavy fire, Jakrapob announced on May 30 that he would resign from the government.

The Police major who filed the complaint against Jakrapob also filed a complaint against Jonathan Head, the  BBC correspondent who moderated the FCCT panel discussion at which Jakrapob made his remarks. We met on May 15 with Head … who told us that he had received word from a figure associated with the Palace (NFI) that he would not be charged with lese majeste. However, Head later told  us that, on May 27, police officers arrived at the FCCT and questioned board members about his and Jakrapob’s case; they questioned FCCT President Nirmal Ghosh for three hours, and they threatened to seize FCCT computers and documents. Head told us that the police told his (Head’s) staff that the police viewed his case as serious not just because of the panel discussion, but also because of articles about the Crown Prince Head had written for the BBC website.

Intriguingly, a later cable revealed that Anand Panyarachun had assured Head that the lèse majesté accusations against him “would go away”.

From the start, Samak’s government focused its attention on securing constitutional amendments that would strengthen its position and weaken efforts to attack Thaksin. This was initially the focus of the campaign by the Yellow Shirts to topple the government. Samak’s dismal record of undermining democracy helped the PAD cast its campaign as a struggle against dictatorship. In his book Thailand Unhinged (also published in Thai as เทวาสายัณห์: มรณกรรมของประชาธิปไตยแบบไทย), Federico Ferrara identifies the choice of Samak to lead the PPP as “one of the most damaging mistakes Thailand ever made”:

Aside from being a veteran Bangkok politician with no currency in the provinces and few of the personal qualities that made Thaksin a folk hero among the underprivileged, Samak had made his name as an ultra-conservative, having previously shilled for the military and the palace by playing an active role in support of the brutal crackdowns of 1976 and 1992. Samak’s historical ties with the military and the monarchy, however, earned the new government no sympathy from generals and palace insiders, determined as they were to destroy Thaksin and his proxies whoever they might be. At the same time, Samak’s disturbing record gave the resurgent PAD a chance to portray its campaign as the continuation of the struggle for democracy that had famously claimed the lives of hundreds of people in 1973, 1976, and 1992.

The PAD resumed street protests on May 25 with a rally at Democracy Monument attended by around 10,000 people. A few hundred opponents gathered to shout abuse, and a few threw excrement and urine at the Yellow Shirt crowd. The PAD supporters attempted to march on parliament and Government House, and after being stopped at the nearby Makhawan Bridge, they set up a permanent protest site there. It was the beginning of 193 days of continuous and increasingly disruptive protest by the Yellow Shirts. The PAD was seeking to provoke violent confrontation from the outset, and initially Samak seemed to take the bait, vowing to clear the bridge on May 31. As the U.S. embassy recounted:

PM Samak ratcheted up pressure on the demonstrators in a Saturday morning TV broadcast, in which he said that demonstrators would have to move from the site, or  the security forces would move them. The PM’s comments, made  at some length, appeared to be a response to the call by the leaders of the People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD) demonstration for Samak to resign.  The PM’s sabre-rattling provoked a predictable reaction from the PAD. Although some PAD leaders apparently supported a more temperate response, the overwrought statements by media firebrand Sonthi Limthongkul and former Bangkok governor Chamlong Srimeuang drowned out more sensible voices. Sonthi and Chamlong reportedly urged the crowd to be ready to “defend  themselves,” vowed to face death if necessary, and generally tried to spin their supporters up and raise the tension levels. News media featured pictures of the PAD guards (of which there are perhaps 100), armed (rather pathetically) with sticks and the occasional baseball bat, wearing motorcycle helmets and carrying homemade wooden shields. Reports indicated that over 10,000 demonstrators were at the site by evening, up from the few hundred that participated in the rally during the day.

In the end Samak backed down, and a long, damaging stalemate began.

Soon, the Yellow Shirts seized on another issue to stoke popular opposition to Samak’s government. On June 18, Thailand and Cambodia signed a Joint Communiqué in Paris endorsing the registration of the 9th century Khmer temple of Preah Vihear as a UNESCO World Heritage site. The clifftop temple was on disputed territory, claimed by Thailand, and although the International Court of Justice had ruled in 1962 that it belonged to Cambodia, Thailand continued to contest 4.6 square kilometres of territory around Preah Vihear. The UNESCO agreement followed years of diplomacy, during the Thaksin and Surayud adminisrations, to agree a position on the UNESCO listing that was acceptable to both countries and did not impact Thailand’s territorial claim. The Joint Communiqué explicitly stated that Thailand’s support of UNESCO status for Preah Vihear would not prejudice ongoing border negotiations with Cambodia. But the PAD saw an opportunity to attack the government by claiming — entirely inaccurately — that Samak’s administration was “selling Thai territory” to Cambodia. As former diplomat Pavin Chachavalpongpun wrote in his article Temple of Doom: Hysteria about the Preah Vihear Temple in the Thai Nationalist Discourse:

The conflict over the Preah Vihear Temple conveniently erupted at a time when the anti-Thaksin leaders seemed to be struggling to keep up the momentum of their demonstrations. The stoking of nationalist sentiment, therefore, largely stemmed from the inability of the opposition to legitimize its course of action and produce a coherent substantive political platform. Waging war with Thaksin from this vulnerable position, the PAD and the Democrat Party were too willing to play the nationalism card to strengthen their own political cause in the power game.

On June 20, thousands of PAD supporters broke through police barricades and marched on Government House. The Democrat Party demanded a no-confidence debate in parliament on June 24-25, also joining the attack over Preah Vihear. The government easily defeated the no-confidence motions, but most Thai media coverage favoured the opposition. Meanwhile, the courts once again began delivering judgments damaging to the Thaksin camp. On July 8 the Supreme Court upheld electoral fraud charges against Yongyuth Tiyapairat, a senior ally of Thaksin’s. The decision meant that the PPP could face dissolution according to the rules of the 2007 constitution. The Constitutional Court also ruled that Foreign Minister Noppadon Pattama should have received formal parliamentary approval before signing the Joint Communiqué with Cambodia. As a result, Noppadon resigned on July 10. The U.S. embassy commented ”we find the Court’s analysis questionable” and added:

This ruling will likely reinforce the impression of Thaksin supporters that the Court is ill-disposed toward Thaksin and his allies.

Nationalist Thais continued to try to escalate tensions with Cambodia, and on July 15 a senior monk and two other right-wing protesters made a deliberate incursion into the disputed territory. Both sides sent more troops to the area. Meanwhile, not content with Noppadon’s resignation, the PAD began pursuing treason charges against Samak and his cabinet.

Thaksin’s opponents also stepped up their efforts to convict him and Pojaman on corruption charges over a 2003 deal. Pojaman also faced separate tax evasion charges. On June 25, three members of Thaksin’s legal team were jailed for six months over a June 10 incident in which a court official was given a lunch box containing a two million baht bribe. In a meeting with U.S. diplomats on July 7, one of Thaksin’s main lawyers, Manida “Mickey” Zimmerman, complained of widespread judicial bias and said the bribe incident appeared to be entrapment:

Although the three members of the legal team have  denied involvement or claimed inadvertant delivery of the snack box, Micky admitted to us that the lawyers involved in the incident had provided the money as a payoff to court officials. She complained, however, that they had done so at  the request of a court official, who appeared to be part of a  scheme to entrap the team…

Micky considered the “entrapment” of these members of the legal team to be part of a wider offensive against Thaksin and his allies.

The embassy commented that the politicization of the judiciary coud have dangerous consequences for Thailand:

The courts may prove capable of marginalizing Thaksin, either by incarcerating him or by tarnishing his reputation beyond repair. It is possible that Thaksin’s  conviction in one or more cases would represent a straightforward dispensation of justice, as we believe he likely used his authority as Prime Minister to benefit himself and his cronies. However, we also note that there is an increasing perception among Thais that the judiciary has become politicized; this perception has grown ever since a watershed speech in April 2006, in which King Bhumibol called on the judiciary to take action to resolve the ongoing political crisis. While the courts currently have the requisite level of prestige and credibility to marginalize Thaksin — a goal that the Army proved incapable of achieving in the 2006-07 period — the judiciary may also suffer in the long term, as it moves beyond its traditional role and increasingly serves as a decisive instrument for shaping political life.

On July 23, Thaksin visited Eric John at his Wireless Road residence “to bid farewell”. He told the U.S. ambassador that the country was on the verge of a political deal in which Thaksin would be pardoned for any crimes and would have his frozen assets restored to him in return for renouncing politics and agreeing to live mostly abroad:

Thaksin related that King Bhumibol had received Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej for an audience on July 22. At that audience, Samak had received approval for the creation of a government of national unity, which would entail each party holding positions in the cabinet in proportion to its number of seats in the House of Representatives. Thaksin appeared to presume — but not to consider it certain —that  Samak would remain as Prime Minister. The Democrat Party —  the second largest, currently the sole opposition party — would receive some Deputy Prime Minister positions, as well as Ministerial portfolios. Thaksin estimated the new government of national unity would last up to one year; during that time, the parliament would undertake a constitutional reform process.

Soon after the government’s formation, Thaksin added, a wide-ranging pardon would be issued. This was necessary in part because Thaksin and his wife would be convicted in  ongoing court cases, most notably the “abuse of power” case. Thaksin attributed this upcoming conviction to the judiciary’s bias against him, alleging that King Bhumibol had conveyed to at least one Constitutional Court Justice during  a royal audience that the Court should, in Thaksin’s words, to do whatever was necessary to eliminate Thaksin.

The upcoming pardon would allow Thaksin to regain control over his frozen assets, Thaksin said. In return, however, he would have to renounce politics forever and focus instead on his business activities, while residing primarily abroad. Thaksin told the Ambassador he was willing to abide by these conditions. He added that, before his departure overseas, he hoped that the King and Queen might receive him for separate audiences; he said he would, on those occasions, make sizeable donations to each of them. (Note: We presume  these donations would be directed toward foundations, not to the King and Queen per se. End Note.) …

Thaksin added that he believed that he still had a good relationship with Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn. The Crown Prince, however, had explained to Thaksin (at an unspecified time post-coup) that he would be unable to meet with Thaksin for an extended period of time, because of Queen Sirikit’s antipathy toward the former Prime Minister.

It was an extraordinary tale, suggesting there had been high-level discussions between Thaksin and the network monarchy to strike a deal that would end their antagonism. As John commented:

Many key elements of the plan Thaksin outlined remain unclear to us. Would the pardon of which Thaksin spoke entail a legislative or royal act? Would it cover the 110  former Thai Rak Thai party executives who, along with Thaksin, were stripped of their political rights in May 2007? Would the threat of further party dissolutions somehow be lifted? What sort of constitution would an amendment process produce? Nevertheless, if a plan along  these lines does materialize, it may provide some valuable  breathing room and calm the current volatile and highly adversarial political environment.

We doubt, however, that either side in the long-running dispute between Thaksin and the Palace will act in good faith, or expect the other to do so. We note that Thaksin has already repeatedly pledged publicly that he has retired from politics, but he appears deeply involved in governmental affairs. It is nearly inconceivable that Thai politicians will stop consulting Thaksin, requesting his financial support, and trying to tap into his popular support for their own gain. And, if Thaksin is pardoned and has his funds released, it is unclear how the Palace would ensure that he upholds his side of the bargain.

Abhisit’s secretary Isra Sunthornvut told U.S. diplomats the Democrats were unaware of any planned national unity government and would only consider such a plan if instructed by the king:

Isra told us there were currently no plans for the Democrats to join a “government of national unity”, and it was difficult for him to imagine the formation of such a cabinet. Isra assured us that politicians would not come to such an arrangment by themselves, although, if instructed to do so by the palace, they would obey.

One sign of a possible deal was the surprise appointment of Bhumibol’s deputy principal private secretary, Tej Bunnag, as foreign minister on July 27. Tej, a palace insider, immediately travelled to Cambodia to seek to lower tensions over Preah Vihear. The U.S. embassy reported that his appointment may have been directly ordered by Bhumibol:

An Australian diplomat told us on July 29 that King Bhumibol had directed the hurried appointment of palace advisor Tej  Bunnag as Foreign Minister, and this appointment reflected the King’s serious concern over both the Preah Vihear tension and Thailand’s chairmanship of ASEAN.

But despite indications a deal could be in the works, legal proceedings against Thaksin continued and the Yellow Shirts escalated their campaign to bring down the government. On July 31 Pojaman was found guilty of tax evasion and sentenced to three years in jail. She was freed on bail while awaiting appeal. Clashes between PAD protesters and Thaksin supporters became more frequent and more violent. Samak sought a truce, as a U.S. cable reported:

During an August 5 audience with the King, PM Samak proposed a government campaign for reconciliation and political unity that would run from August 12 (the Queen’s birthday) until December 5 (the King’s birthday) and be chaired by the Crown Prince, according to press reports. The prospective impact of Samak’s initiative on public gatherings is unclear, but PAD supporters have complained publicly that the reconciliation effort is a partisan ploy to put political pressure on PAD to stop its demonstrations.

During August, Thaksin and Pojaman travelled to China for the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games. Instead of returning to Thailand at the end of their visit, they flew to London and on August 11 Thaksin faxed a handwritten statement to the Thai media declaring he would not return to face legal proceedings he denounced as unfair. Thaksin Shinawatra was officially on the run. If there was ever a serious prospect of striking a deal with the royalists, it appeared to have collapsed. The U.S embassy commented:

Thaksin alleged that the Thai judiciary was treating him unfairly, complained that Thailand remained under the influence of the “dictatorship” that took power after the  2006 coup d’etat, and cited threats to his physical safety. He also professed loyalty to the royal family…

The recent tax evasion conviction of Potjaman reinforced a widespread perception among the Thai political class that the courts, with encouragement from the palace, were determined to marginalize Thaksin, and that he would likely be convicted in his ongoing abuse of power trial. (Comment: We have not sought to assess the merits of these cases, and we … do not mean to second Thaksin’s assertion that the courts are biased; however, many Thais might assume that Thaksin and his lawyers have sought to influence the  judges and that it would take special determination to rule against the Shinawatras, even if the evidence supports conviction. End Comment.) Thaksin had previously refused to  return to Thailand during the post-coup Surayud administration, claiming at that time that it was impossible for him to receive a fair trial prior to the restoration of a  democratically-elected government. His refusal to submit to the courts’ judgment under current conditions may strike some Thais as suspect, although there may be few who do not already hold strong views, pro or con, about the polarizing former Prime Minister.

In response, arrest warrants were issued for Thaksin and Pojaman, and the authorities announced their extradition would be sought.

Back in Britain, Thaksin’s ownership of Manchester City was running into serious problems. The club had climbed as high as third in the English Premiership in November 2007 but had since fallen back after a poor run of form. In April, Thaksin told club manager Eriksson he would fired at the end of the season, provoking a mutiny among players and fury among City fans. It emerged that Thaksin had only come up with about £12 million of the £47 million promised to Eriksson to buy new players, and had ceased funding the club. Thaksin’s football venture was falling apart. Eriksson was scathing about Thaksin’s leadership in comments after their falling out:

In the beginning it was good with Shinawatra, but he didn’t understand football – he hadn’t a clue. He thought beating Manchester United twice in one year was normal. ‘Tell the players they must be more aggressive’, he said. When we won he invited me for dinner. When we lost he didn’t even say hello.

The royalist campaign against Thaksin was provoking a growing backlash. On July 22, activist Darunee Charnchoensilpakul, known as “Da Torpedo”, was arrested on charges of lèse majesté over speeches she had made at anti-PAD rallies on July 18 and 19. As the U.S. embassy noted, some of her comments breached the most sensitive taboos:

She implied that King Bhumibol was involved in the unusual death of his brother, King Ananda Mahidol; urged Thailand to follow the example of Nepal in abolishing the monarchy; and suggested that the aging King relied on Privy Council President Prem Tinsulanonda to make his decisions.

While Darunee’s remarks had been particularly inflammatory, the sentiments she expressed were increasingly common in Thailand, as Thaksin ally Jaran Ditapichai and PAD leader Somkiat Pongpaiboon told U.S. diplomats:

UDD activist Charan, a former communist who has expressed his distaste for monarchies in a controversial book on the French revolution, told us he was surprised by what he perceived as an increasingly open expression of anti-monarchy  sentiment, such as Daranee’s.  He said “many Thais are like  her now… online, in coffee shops, and on community radio.” The King, he said, is being heavily criticized in public, by the public, for the first time in modern history. He claimed  to have heard many community radio programs in which people  phoned in to complain that the monarchy had supported past coups, and many callers viewed the monarchy as an obstacle to democracy in Thailand. PAD co-leader Somkiat also told us he had noticed a proliferation of anti-monarchy websites,  starting in 2005, and he also referred to the widespread  availability of video discs that show the Crown Prince’s  Royal Consort, Srirasmi, semi-nude.

On July 29, union activist Jittra Cotchadet was fired by underwear manufacturer Triumph International for alleged disrespect to the monarchy: in an appearance on a TV talk show to discuss abortion rights she had worn a T-shirt designed by Chotisak Oonsong with the slogan:

Not standing is not a crime. Thinking differently is not a crime.

Jittra was widely denounced in Yellow Shirt media. After Triumph fired her, three thousand of the firm’s five thousand employees walked out in protest, and set up a protest camp outside the factory gates.

The anti-monarchist feelings unleashed by the 2006 coup were spreading, and were being expressed with increasing openness. As Jaran said, it was an unprecedented phenomenon in Thailand’s modern history.

On August 31, a 41-year-old Australian working as a university lecturer, English teacher and freelance writer in Chiang Mai became the latest Westerner to fall foul of the lèse majesté law. Harry Nicolaides had self-published a novel in 2005, entitled Verisimilitude: Is the truth, the truth? He printed just 50 copies, of which only seven were ever sold. In one passage, the novel related the sexual shenanigans of a Thai prince, unnamed but clearly based on Vajiralongjorn:

From King Rama to the Crown Prince, the nobility was renowned for their romantic  entanglements and intrigues. The Crown Prince had many wives major and minor with a coterie of concubines for entertainment. One of his recent wives was exiled with her entire family, including a son they conceived together, for an undisclosed indiscretion. He subsequently remarried with another woman and fathered another child. It was rumoured that if the prince fell in love with one of his minor wives and she betrayed him, she and her family would disappear with their name, familial lineage and all vestiges of their existence expunged forever.

Nicolaides was arrested at Bangkok airport while trying to leave the country to return to his native Australia. He was denied bail, and held in Bangkok Remand Centre awaiting trial. There was widespread surprise that Nicolaides was detained over a paragraph in a book that almost nobody had read. It seemed a curiously counterproductive move.

Back in Thailand, efforts to defuse tensions over Preah Vihear were damaged by some aggressive Thai troop movements. Clearly, not everyone wanted the situation peacefully resolved. As Nick Nostitz wrote in volume one of Red vs. Yellow:

Nationalist polemics dominated the debate. One Thai Ranger lost his leg from stepping on a mine, another lost his life in a later confrontation with Cambodian troops, and several Cambodian soldiers were also killed as well. Yet this Cambodian border episode appeared to be only a tool in the real battle — what was to be fought over was power in Bangkok, and who would command the future direction of Thailand.

At the end of August, Eric John sent a cable to Washington entitled “THAILAND PROTESTS: A PAD PRIMER“. He billed it as “a guide to PAD, its leaders, and motives”. The cable discussed two linked issues in particular: the creeping extremism of the Yellow Shirts, and their increasing association with Sirikit rather than Bhumibol:

The People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD)  behind the ongoing street protests against PM Samak’s government first surfaced in 2005 in reaction to growing discontent over the alleged corruption of then-PM Thaksin. It largely disappeared following the September 2006 coup that ended the Thaksin administration, only to reemerge in Thai politics on March 28 with the same leadership but fewer supporters and a more radical agenda. Since then, it has  been an active, occasionally aggressive, daily force on the Thai political stage.  The last 90 days of protests have halted Bangkok’s infamous traffic on numerous occasions, temporarily seized a media outlet, and even displaced the  Prime Minister on several occasions from his office…

Before the aggressive actions launched August 26 which led to arrest warrants for its leadership and left its future uncertain, PAD appeared to be transforming itself from a movement whose purpose was to combat Thaksin and his  allies whenever they were perceived to be untouchable, to a political party with a simultaneous populist and royalist-nationalist bent, with megalomaniac Sondhi  Limthongkul using it as his personal vehicle, much as Thaksin did with Thai Rak Thai. PAD’s 2008 reincarnation largely abandoned its origins as a wide, loose coalition of the working class, royalists, and middle class Bangkokians seeking justice and increased transparency in government in a shift to anti-democratic principles and increasing association with the Queen’s circle rather than the King alone…

In the latest round of protests, PAD supporters have also started wearing armbands and other items in light blue, a color associated with the Queen, seen by many in Thailand to support a more nationalistic approach on issues like the  south and a more aggressive opposition to the Thaksin camp, including if necessary with military involvement. Stories that the Queen personally donated 50,000 baht ($1,700)  recently to the PAD are running through the Bangkok rumint  mill. Arsa Sarasin, the King’s Personal Private Secretary, emphatically rejected this link in an August 29 conversation with Ambassador; while acknowledging the protesters were attempting to associate with the palace, he stated: “It is not true. The King and Queen are not involved.”

Arsa’s denial was unconvincing, given the obvious links between leading royalists and the Yellow Shirts. As McCargo wrote in Thai Politics as Reality TV:

Indirect monarchical support for the antigovernment movement took place largely behind the scenes. Among the supporters and backers of the PAD were various MRs and MLs (minor princes and princesses), along with relatives of privy councilors and big-name bankers. Preeda Tiasuwan, jewelry trader and former leader of the group Businessmen for Democracy, was a key financier  of the PAD — and a close personal friend of Anand Panyarachun. Piphop Thongchai, one of the core leaders of the PAD, was a member of the Anand-Preeda inner circle. In a remarkably bold statement at a public meeting on September 6, one member of this circle declared that the extraordinary actions of the PAD were justified in the special “late reign” circumstances that prevailed.

It was another hint of the centrality of the succession to the political conflict. Eric John’s cable also noted that in PAD’s 2008 incarnation:

The numbers of participants remained a fraction of what they had been in 2006, however, with a narrower and more aggressive agenda driven by Sondhi and Chamlong.

Sondhi Limthongkul’s anti-democratic beliefs were made clear when he began openly proposing a philosophy of “New Politics” in which 70 percent of parliament would be appointed by the network monarchy and only 30 percent directly elected.

Nostitz, who spent more time than any other foreign journalist among the Yellow Shirts and their UDD opponents, wrote in volume one of Red vs. Yellow that:

The new PAD was now martial in its appearance, and resembled more a militant cult than a protest group. Over the following months opponents were viciously attacked in vitriolic speeches from the stage, even former members who had distanced themselves from the post-coup PAD received such treatment. Protesters and guards were kept on constant alert and in a state of paranoia by purposely spread misinformation about attacks that were supposedly about to be immediately launched by either police or UDD…

Journalists who had published critical articles or worked for news outlets that were deemed unfriendly by the PAD were threatened, followed and photographed by PAD protesters. The PAD could no longer attract the same number of supporters as before the coup… But what they lacked in quantity, they now replaced with radical fanaticism.

On August 26, the PAD escalated the political crisis once again, storming and occupying Government House during a day of coordinated provocations aimed at forcing Samak’s administration into forcing a violent response. As the U.S. embassy reported:

In the latest twist in Thailand’s on-going political drama, the Peoples Alliance for Democracy (PAD) staged a mass demonstration in Bangkok and strategic points around the country in a what some  press sources are reporting as a last bid show-down with the Peoples Power Party (PPP) led government of Samak Sundaravej.  Kraisak Choonhaven, Democrat party MP and deputy party leader, told us that  the PAD leaders had laid out their intentions to him late August 25; the PAD hoped to provoke clashes with the police, leading to enough violence and government overreaction to spark military intervention/another coup…

The day’s activities got off to an unexpected start early on  August 26 when some 80 to 100 PAD supporters attempted to take control of the government-run NTB television station between 0430 and 0530. Although Royal Thai Police units responded and arrested a large number of the demonstrators (press reports indicate between 60 and 80), control of the NTB compound and the quality of the  transmission varied throughout the day.

In the end, it appeared the NTB showdown was only the first incident in a series of determined PAD attempts to provoke PM Samak and security forces into a direct confrontation. With surprising efficiency, the PAD executed simultaneous marches on the Ministries of Education, Finance, Agriculture and Transportation, as well as the  Government House compound which is the formal seat of the PM and the  government. By 1500 they had occupied these ministries and the Government House compound.

Samak did not take the bait, although this was partly because he knew he could not count on the support of army commander Anupong Paochinda. Anupong was a man with split loyalties: he was part of the Queen’s Guard military clique and had joined the 2006 coup plotters, but he was also in Thaksin’s Class 10 military network. During 2008, he seems to have attempted to remain genuinely neutral in the worsening political conflict, but this meant that he failed to offer Samak the military support that the prime minister would have needed for a robust response against the Yellow Shirts. Aware of this, Samak did not declare a state of emergency and refrained from pushing for a serious crackdown, although the police did issue arrest warrants for the PAD leadership. As the U.S embassy commented:

While there is little doubt that PAD had hoped to provoke conflict, the Thai government and police have so far pursued a passive posture with the apparent intent to avoid confrontation.

On August 29 the Yellow Shirts raised the stakes yet again, forcing the shutdown of several provincial airports including Phuket, Krabi and Hat Yai, and blocking key railway services. Thousands of Thais and foreign tourists were left stranded. Police moved to clear protesters from the streets around Government House and set up a cordon around the compound. Nostitz, who was present, reported that:

The orders were that the police were to use minimal force, and they complied amazingly well. There was very little usage of batons, and no excessive force that I could detect. There was a bit of pushing around with protesters. A few bloody heads. Most of the injured I could see were older people who simply lost consciousness. One collapsed directly next to me.

The police took care to paste copies of their court orders at every tent, saying they were being confiscated by the state, before they dismantled the structures. The police confiscated a weapons cache from the PAD guards — countless clubs, swords, machetes, iron bars, golf clubs, several dozen bullets, and an empty gun holster. The police also found one large sack of “Bai Kratom”, an illegal drug that the PAD guards and “Naclop Srivichai” (Srivichai warriors — the elite PAD bodyguard unit) were accused of having indulged in for its stimulating effect.

The police operation was a success, but suddenly unravelled after high profile visits to the PAD camp by Democrat Party leader Abhisit, thirty senators led by Rosana Tositrakul, and a senior military officer, General Pathompong Kesornsook, in full military uniform. They appeared intent of finding evidence of police brutality. The PAD protesters then took advantage of police hesitancy to surge out of Government House and retake the area that had been cleared. Police retreated, and the court orders demanding PAD leave the area were later withdrawn. An attempt by police to restore order and clear protesters occupying Government House had been undermined by leading royalists. Nostitz describes the incident in Red vs. Yellow as heralding “the destruction of lawful society”.

As September began, violence flared in Bangkok between the PAD and the UDD, provoked this time by the pro-Thaksin side. On the evening of September 1, thousands of UDD supporters, many of them wearing red, gathered at Sanam Luang, and a plan was hatched for them to march on Government House and confront the PAD. After midnight, a disorganized UDD mob headed down Rajadamnoen Avenue. Straits Times journalist Nirmal Ghosh was on the scene:

The pro-government crowd, many wearing red shirts and red headbands, marched quickly towards the Makkawan bridge and was met by a double row of police in full riot protection gear but without batons.

The police let the crowd through. Then they simply walked away, watching from a distance as the almost medieval battle erupted.

Some in the crowd, armed with two by fours and rods and slingshots, began to run towards the PAD’s sparsely guarded outer perimeter. The PAD guards manning the perimeter ran and the crowd chased them, throwing aside metal barriers. The men were screaming with rage as they ran at the PAD…

But as the few dozen young men in the vanguard of the pro-government crowd neared the PAD just after 1am, the close ranks of the PAD suddenly roared and came running out in a full charge, plowing into the pro-government crowd who were not only outnumbered but also ill-equipped to defend against the charge.

Simultaneously a volley of gunfire erupted from the PAD…

A pitched battle ensued where the two rival mobs met, with many at the rear of the pro-government crowd running helter skelter as they realised the PAD had the upper hand and heard the gunshots.

After an initial shot, more shots were heard at random intervals as the struggle surged back and forth for about two or three minutes. The shots were clearly coming from the PAD ranks…

Bullets zinged into the trees above me and another journalist from Bloomberg; we were the only foreign journalists there…

The street was strewn with rubble from the battle. Broken glass and flower pots crunched under my boots.

The pro-government crowd appeared stunned at being shot at by the PAD. ‘We brought sticks and knives to a gunfight,’ one man said.

A U.S. cable summarized the events of that night:

An eye-witness told us that police put almost no resistance when the UDD group, armed with metal pipes and traveling via truck and motorcycles from their initial Sanam Luang rally point, approached two lines of police that separated them from the PAD’s Makkhawan Bridge rally point. Media eyewitnesses identified several MPs from the ruling PPP party coordinating movements of the UDD group. PAD supporters, with wooden… clubs and other weapons, then converged on the UDD once they had passed through the police lines. The witness told us that the UDD demonstrators retreated once gunshots were heard; both sides later denied they were responsible.

One UDD supporter, 56-year-old Narongsak Krobthaisong, was killed in the violence, and more than 40 people from both sides were wounded. In response, Samak finally declared a state of emergency. Anupong, however, declared the military would use emergency powers sparingly and did not seem inclined to clear the PAD out of Government House. A coup seemed unlikely, despite efforts by the Yellow Shirts to provoke one by deliberately stoking violence, but the military was failing to give full assistance to a democratically elected government.

Meanwhile, leading network monarchists were plotting Samak’s downfall. Privy councillor Siddhi Savetsila told Eric John on September 3 about a secret scheme he was planning to present to King Bhumibol to remove Samak (and Thaksin) from politics:

Privy Councilor ACM Siddhi Savetsila made clear to Ambassador Sept. 3 that he viewed Thaksin and, by extension, PM Samak as an existential threat to the Thailand he  supported, centered on the monarchy. Samak had lost his  legitimacy, beset by multiple court cases and the violence in  the streets of Udon Thani and Bangkok against civilians. The  only way out of the current political impasse was for Samak  to resign or the House to dissolve.  But Samak refused to  leave; he had lied to coalition partners about his August 30 audience with the King, had dismissed Opposition Leader Abhisit’s suggestion during the August 31 parliamentary debate to call new elections which pro-Thaksin forces would win again, and had even rejected his own wife’s and daughter’s prostrate entreaties to resign for the good of the  country. Samak therefore had to go.

Stressing that Ambassador was the only foreigner he would share the information with, Siddhi laid out a scenario which he said he would present to King Bhumiphol later in the day in an audience for the Privy Councilors in Hua Hin. The  solution was not by using force but to rehabilitate Thai  democracy. The same Constitution would remain, amended to allow outsiders (non-MPs) to serve in the Cabinet. The House  and Senate would stay. Universally respected former PM Anand should serve as the leader of the “project,” which would involve respected, “honest” ex-military and Ministry of Interior officials, academics, one or two PAD members, and perhaps some Democrat Party figures. The mandate would be to initiate a wide array of reforms in the economic, social, and political sphere. That in turn would “weed out” the bane effects of Thaksinism from the system. Army Commander Anuphong would have to deliver the message to Samak; no one else could.

Siddhi said that a group of prominent figures had approached him with the plan, more than could fit in his  modest living room. The only one he named was Pramote  Nakorntab, a retired respected professor and political scientist from Chulalongkorn University; others included a high ranking Air Force officer and a Constitutional Court Judge. Since, as a Privy Councilor, he was not supposed to be involved in politics, only in advising the King, Siddhi agreed to meet “as a former military leader” ready to do his  best for the country. He was willing to push forward and present the project to the King in part to shield Privy Council Chair Prem Titsulanonda, who had been heavily and unjustly criticized for backing the PAD and trying to promote a Democrat Party-led government. The stakes were high; it  was essential to rehabilitate the democratic system in Thailand. “If we lose, Thaksin will come back, and if Thaksin comes back, the monarchy will be lost,” Siddhi explained.

Siddhi acknowledged that neither Anand nor Anuphong were on board yet.  Anand said he would need to review a  proposal in detail before accepting. Even though Anuphong  thought Samak must go, Siddhi said Anuphong was reluctant to  push in part because he disliked the PAD, especially leaders  Sondhi and Chamlong. Siddhi said he had challenged Anuphong — was he prepared to lose his principles in support of the monarchy because he did not like 3-4 people? Most  importantly, it was up to the King to indicate what he thought of the plan. Siddhi would brief; the King would stay aloof, but provide his reaction. “What will happen will  happen.”

It was a remarkable insight into the working of the network monarchy, with elite figures scheming and conspiring in private and then seeking a signal of support from the king. The plan was yet another variant of “Thai-style democracy” — suspending genuine democracy and replacing it with the rule of appointed royalist “good men”. Siddhi was an 89-year-old political dinosaur who had been close to Phao Sriyanond’s clique in the 1940s and 1950s and served as a foreign minister under Prem. The very fact he believed he had a right to meddle in politics and advocate the overthrow of an elected government demonstrated how out of touch and deluded senior royalists had become.

Anand Panyarachun told U.S. diplomats that Samak was likely to be forced from power: “I cannot rule out regime change, but it would not be a traditional coup d’etat.” He confirmed he had been in contact with the plotters:

Anand acknowledged he had been listening to the group for the past week, but refused to get involved directly in anything before the plan was put into  action. If the plan went forward, he was prepared to meet with them at that point. It was imperative to ensure the least impact on the contents of Thai democracy; even in the case of non-elected persons of supposed quality, care needed to be taken. Anand claimed that “I’m always my own man,” and that he had turned down many positions offered when he thought others sought to control him.

Ambassador underscored the critical importance of developments in Thailand staying within the framework of the constitution and rule of law; if that did not occur, the U.S. would respond accordingly. Anand replied that he had  disagreed with the U.S. reaction to the 2006 coup and frequently disagreed with western views of what constituted democracy in various countries.

The bureaucracy and judiciary were playing their part to help. On September 2 the Election Commission voted to seek the dissolution of the PPP due to vote buying by Yongyuth Tiyapairat. On September 3, Tej Bunnag resigned as foreign minister. Samak hung on, though he was increasingly isolated. At Government House, the number of PAD protesters began dwindling, as the U.S. embassy reported:

The PAD siege of Government House continued despite deteriorating living conditions at the site; the weekend rains turned the trampled grounds of Government House compound into a sea of mud. In an effort to ward off the increasingly unsanitary conditions, and diminish what the Thai press called the prevailing stench of urine, protest organizers began sprinkling white “disinfectant” powder over the stinking muddy ground. Protesters jokingly said they could bear the stench better than they could stand the government.

On September 9, the judiciary intervened again as part of the concerted network monarchy effort to topple Samak. The Constitutional Court ruled that the prime minister had violated conflict-of-interest rules by continuing to appear on a TV cookery programme, Tasting and Grumbling, even though he received at most only nominal payments. As the U.S. embassy explained:

The Constitutional Court ruled that PM Samak had violated the constitution’s conflict of interest provisions in Article 265 barring the Prime Minister from having outside business interests. Six judges considered Samak to be the  ”employee” of his cooking show; three others considered Samak to be a business partner of the studio — both are not allowed by the constitution. While there was no evidence that Samak benefited greatly in financial terms from the cooking show arrangement (Samak claimed he rejected payment for the shows once he became PM, and the producer only paid  for Samak’s driver and the food used in the show, reportedly between $60-$150 per show), the justices spoke forcefully on the constitutional principle of preventing conflicts of interest.

It was a bizarre and clearly partisan decision (expertly dissected by Verapat Pariyawong in his Harvard thesis Three Course Recipe for the Court’s Cookery) and it widened Thailand’s divisions even further. It was clear to Thaksin’s supporters that the judiciary had become a tool of the royalist elite to thwart the democratic will of the majority.

Samak had to resign as a result of the decision, but parliament could opt to renominate him as prime minister. Instead, however, Thaksin and his allies decided it was time to drop Samak. As Eric John noted, they had “realized that Samak is now a far greater liability than asset”. Instead, Somchai Wongsuwat was nominated as the next prime minister. A quiet man whose main career had been as a judge, he would have been an inoffensive choice except for one major issue: he was Thaksin Shinawatra’s brother-in-law. This made him totally unacceptable as far as the PAD was concerned. Somchai became prime minister on September 18.

In a meeting with John after resigning from the PPP, Samak was scathing about Sirikit:

Samak described to Ambassador the political pressure against him during his seven months in office. He showed disdain for Queen Sirikit, claiming that she had been responsible for the 2006 coup d’etat as well as the ongoing turmoil generated by PAD protests. He alleged the Queen operated through Privy Council President Prem Tinsulanonda who, along with others presenting themselves as royalists, worked with the PAD and other agitators. Citing his own regular meetings with King Bhumibol, Samak claimed he — rather than his opponents — was sincerely loyal to the King and enjoyed the King’s support. In his discussion of the monarchy, Samak made no mention of the Crown Prince.

It was further evidence that Bhumibol and Sirikit had differing agendas and that the network monarchy was increasingly following the dictates of the queen, not the king. A U.S. cable on September 19 also discussed possible links between Sirikit and the Yellow Shirts:

An expatriate with close ties to the Queen’s circle assured us on September 17 that the PAD had “handlers” (presumably people with royalist sympathies) who, with relative ease, would be able to direct an end the PAD’s rallies at the appropriate time.

Bhumibol’s principal private secretary, Arsa Sarasin, meanwhile, insisted to John that the protesters were “not backed by the King at all” but did not comment on Sirikit’s behaviour.

On September 28, PAD and UDD supporters fought each other in Chiang Mai with fists, clubs and slingshots. Somchai attempted taking a more conciliatory approach with the PAD and Prem, and the PPP brought in another aged political relic, Chavalit Yongchaiyudh, as a deputy prime minister wo could negotiate with the Yellow Shirts. But the ultra-royalists around Sirikit were in no mood for compromise.

On October 3, fighting erupted between Thai and Cambodian troops around Preah Vihear. The same day, police detained one of the PAD leaders, Chaiwat Sinsuwong, and two days later, arrested key Yellow Shirt figurehead Chamlong Srimuang. The arrest of Chamlong appears to have been a carefully laid trap, possibly involving Prem Tinsulanonda. The government was led to believe that the palace approved the arrests. And Chamlong was aware he was about to be detained: as in 1992, he was using his treatment by the authorities as a way of stirring up his supporters. As the U.S. embassy reported:

Chamlong appeared to have anticipated his arrest; he had left a letter to be read to protestors at Government House at 9:00 a.m., describing the anti-government demonstrations as a patriotic duty, and instructing the remaining PAD leaders to break off negotiations with the government after his arrest…

Protests at Government House had become less energetic and poorly attended in recent weeks; on one mid-day, mid-week  visit in late September, we counted no more than 250 protesters. Many supporters stopped coming to Government House in person, opting to watch the speeches via the pro-PAD Asia Satellite Television (ASTV). Chamlong’s arrest in particularly appeared to energize PAD sympathizers. On October 4, visiting INR analyst estimated roughly 1,000 supporters were inside the Government House compound. According to media reports, the crowd at Government House grew substantially after Chamlong’s arrest, and PAD supporters from other provinces are moving into Bangkok. A senior police official told us on October 6 that more than 10,000 PAD supporters were at Government House on the night of October 5. This official anticipated approximately 5,000 additional people to join October 6 rallies at the site.

As John commented in a later cable:

In retrospect, it appears that PAD leader Chamlong Srimuang sprung a perfect trap by consenting to be arrested October 5. Chamlong’s arrest gave renewed vigor to an increasingly dispirited PAD protest, at a time when a possible government-opposition agreement to form a commission to review possible constitutional changes threatened to take the winds completely out of the PAD sails.

It was part of the PAD’s strategy to provoke violent confrontations with police on October 7, when new Prime Minister Somchai was required to deliver his policy statement to parliament. Royalist tycoon Chutinant Bhirombhakdi of the Singha beer dynasty had dinner with a senior Yellow Shirt leader on October 6 who explicitly admitted this was the PAD plan. As Eric John reported in a November cable:

Chutinant believed PAD continued to aim for a violent clash that would spark a coup. He asserted that he had dined on October 6 with a leading PAD figure (NFI), who explained that PAD would provoke violence during its October 7 protest at the parliament. The unnamed PAD figure predicted (wrongly) that the Army would intervene against the government by the evening of October 7. Chutinant asserted to us that PAD remained intent on a conflict that would generate at least two dozen deaths and make military intervention appear necessary and justified.

On the night of October 6, the Yellow Shirts marched from Government House to the nearby parliament building, erecting barricades with razor wire and booby traps. PAD guards with slingshots, metal bars, golf clubs, ping pong bombs and clubs patrolled the perimeter. Their aim was to prevent Somchai’s policy statement the following day.

The stage was set for the deadly confrontation of “Black Tuesday”, October 7.

At around six in the morning, police began their effort to disperse the Yellow Shirts. Nostitz recorded the events of the day in a detailed photo-essay:

Police had one of their loudspeaker lorries and first issued a warning that protesters should disperse as they would be attacked, and teargas would be fired. Police constantly mentioned that in this conflict nobody could possibly win, that they were all Thais, and should not fight each other.

The protesters did not disperse and soon after the attack started with a barrage of teargas grenades.

It started from both Ratchawithi Rd. and Pichai Rd. (where I was). I saw teargas grenades blowing up with strong explosive power when they got caught in the tires of the barricades. Some tires even flew a few feet into the air. Protesters quickly ran off, and I followed police in just after the first lines. There was a bit of hand to hand fighting, nothing too severe, a few handheld teargas grenades were thrown (I guess so, I am not an expert on such things) by police. Also the few remaining PAD protesters threw some explosives, maybe firecrackers or their own ping pong bombs. In all the rush and the smoke it was very difficult to see exactly what was going on; biting teargas blinded nearly everyone.

Also very few police officers had proper masks, and were just as affected. During all the time the loudspeaker from the police asked protesters to stop fighting. Soon after the protesters stopped, and sat down on the road, and police achieved their goal of opening the gate.

That was when I was made aware of the badly injured protesters. One man was sitting, with his left leg blown away at the knee, folded beside him just held by a few strings of skin. He was surrounded by shocked police officers; some tried to comfort him. There were two or three other badly injured protesters around.

Soon ambulances picked him and the other injured people up. In Government House was an injured radio journalist, his back partly exposed, bleeding and heavily burned. A Border Patrol Police officer comforted him.

Things then calmed down. I spoke with several police officers over the injuries. They were all shocked. The grenade squad explained that under certain circumstances the grenades can have high explosive power; when, for example, people are tightly packed close to each other.

The police action allowed the prime minister to begin his policy speech, but the cost had been high, with several people wounded by exploding tear gas canisters, and perhaps also by PAD explosives. As a U.S. cable recounted:

The RTP morning operation resulted in over 70 protesters being admitted to hospital, mainly with tear gas symptoms, but media reported a handful of more serious  injuries, including one protester who lost a leg and a second  who allegedly suffered shrapnel wounds. By mid-afternoon, after the mid-day clashes, hospital personnel confirmed to us that the number of admitted had risen to 101, that most but not all of the injuries were consistent with tear gas and trampling injuries, and that one protester had lost a leg. Several police were reported injured in the mid-day clashes.

Police COL Suwat, deputy Commander of the Metropolitan Police for Demonstrations/Intelligence, told us the police had only used tear gas and flash bangs in the  morning operation.  The RTP believed a crude homemade  pipebomb with black powder, similar to fireworks and likely in a metal container, had exploded, perhaps accounting for  the more seriously wounded. One woman had lost a leg when the bomb exploded; the RTP believed the bomb belonged to the  PAD.

In mid-morning, the Yellow Shirts suddenly counterattacked, trapping politicians and officials inside parliament:

Police… inexplicably let down their guard while PM Somchai was speaking, and a secondary PAD effort reestablished the blockade. Media reported that PAD  protesters used sticks to drive off the police from the main entrance into the parliamentary compound, then commandeered police vehicles to barricade the entrances, trapping MPs, Senators, and for a time PM Somchai inside. House Speaker Chai Chidchod then suspended the policy debate and canceled the session planned for October 8. At 1700, PAD allowed civil servants and journalists to leave the parliamentary compound but attempted to keep MPs, Senators, and Ministers inside.

Street battles raged throughout the afternoon and into the evening. PAD protesters attacked police with sticks, ping pong bombs, and slingshots firing iron ball bearings and marbles. Some Yellow Shirts even had firearms. Protesters tried to ram several vehicles, including a lorry, into police barricades. One policeman was deliberately run over by a Yellow Shirt in a pickup truck, who then reversed back over him.

During the afternoon, an explosion destroyed a stationary Cherokee jeep some distance from the fighting, killing Methee Chartmontri, a former police lieutenant colonel who was head of the PAD guards in Buri Ram and brother-in-law of PAD leader Karoon Sai-ngarm. Methee’s body was blown apart by the blast: one leg was still inside the vehicle, most of his corpse was blasted out of the wrecked jeep, and his hands were never found. The only convincing explanation for his death is that he was transporting explosives and they detonated prematurely, probably while he was handling them.

The second fatality on Black Tuesday was Angkhana Radappanyawut, nicknamed “Nong Bow”, a 28-year-old business administration graduate from Bangkok’s Assumption University and the eldest of three sisters. She had joined the protests that day with her family, all supporters of the Yellow Shirts. She died near the corner of Royal Plaza, in the thick the battle, the left side of her chest torn open by a blast that lacerated her heart, stomach, spleen, left kidney, and liver, and broke her left arm and all her ribs on the left side. She was dressed in a yellow PAD T-shirt and jeans, with a wristband in the red, white and blue of the Thai flag. Nostitz described the scene in the first volume of Red vs. Yellow:

Another injured woman was lying in the midst of a heap of debris on the street. At first I did not even realize there was a person there; it was only when army medics attended to her that I realized it was a woman. Not until one month later was I able to confirm that this was… Angkhana Radappanyawut… one of the two people that died that day.

It remains unknown how Angkhana died: the two possible scenarios are that she was hit by a tear gas canister which then exploded, or that she was killed by a PAD bomb, which she may have been carrying unwittingly. As Nostitz reported:

The death of Angkahana Radappanyawut became a huge issue over the following days and weeks. She was portrayed by the PAD as an innocent protester who was simply walking back to Government House when the police attacked and killed her. A cult of martyrdom and hero worship was created around her death. The UDD called her a naïve person who was being used to  carry explosives that went off and killed her.

From the location where she died, there are doubts about her non-involvement in the fighting. She died at the front line of the fighting, and not at the back of Royal Plaza where there were no  hostilities. and which would have been the closer and more logical route for a protester to follow when walking back to Government House from Parliament…

The debate about Angkhana continues, and will probably never come to a satisfying conclusion.

Besides the two deaths, hundreds of people were wounded. Three police suffered gunshot wounds and two were stabbed with flagpoles. Some protesters were badly maimed by tear gas explosions. The death toll was lower than the two dozen the PAD had hoped for, but they had succeeded in ratcheting up tension and bitterness.

Coverage of the unrest, in Thai newspapers especially, was heavily slanted in favour of the PAD, denouncing the alleged brutality of the police. But in fact, the PAD had deliberately provoked and exploited the violence, as a U.S. cable made clear:

Despite headlines filled with pictures of injured PAD demonstrators, the reality of the October 7 clashes is that both sides initiated action. For most of the day, it was the PAD attacking police formations, not the other way around. The police reported that PAD demonstrators utilized pistols, knives, and metal pipes during the clashes and also had gasoline-filled pingpong balls, essentially mini-Molotov cocktails.

On October 9, the Appeals Court threw out the most serious treason charges against the nine core leaders of the PAD. Chamlong was freed on bail. The same day, the Administrative Court ordered police to use less forceful crowd control methods.

Several royalists insisted the only way out of Thailand’s worsening political strife was royal intervention. Prasong Soonsiri was quoted in a U.S. cable:

Democrats, many Senators, academics, and Army Commander Anupong favor dissolution with  new elections. However, elections would almost assuredly  return similar results, if anything strengthening the showing of whatever post-Thaksin political force competes; Thaksin confidently predicted a landslide to Ambassador September 23. Such results would lead Thailand back into a  balance of forces similar to the current one. Prasong  Sunsiri, a co-leader with Chamlong of the May 1992  anti-military protests and the primary drafter of the 2007 constitution during the military-installed interim government, told the Ambassador in a October 9 meeting that  the same “cast of characters” would return to power if a new election were held…

Prasong suggested during the meeting with the Ambassador that, as in May 1992 following a violent military clampdown against anti-military demonstrators, intervention by King Bhumibol may be necessary in order to lift Thailand out of the current political stalemate. Prasong admitted that was it was very difficult to predict what would happen in the coming days and weeks but projected that an extraordinary event could likely be the only way out  of the conflict.  Others, citing Queen Sirikit’s increasingly transparent patronage of the PAD cause, have suggested she too could send a signal to PAD to declare victory and vacate Government House; there is no indication she plans to do so.

Sirikit indeed had no plans to try to promote harmony. Her next move shocked Thais. It was an undisguised declaration of war.

On October 13, 2008, Queen Sirikit abandoned any pretence of being above politics, and paraded her partisan colours by presiding over the funeral of slain Yellow Shirt protester Angkhana Radappanyawut. The U.S. embassy described it as an “extraordinary step” and “the strongest public signal to date of her support for the  People’s Alliance for Democracy”, noting that “the Queen almost never attends funerals of commoners unless they have rendered extraordinary services to the monarchy”.

Thousands of Yellow Shirts at the funeral chanted “Long Live Her Majesty”. Afterwards, Angkhana’s father Jinda wept as he told reporters: “Her Majesty said my daughter was a good woman since she had helped the nation and preserved the monarchy.”

Besides Sirikit, the funeral was attended by Princess Chulabhorn, army commander Anupong, Democrat Party leader Abhisit and PAD leader Sondhi. The October 14 funeral rites of Methee Chartmontri, the PAD guard leader blown up in his jeep by his own bomb, were presided over by Anand Panyarachun, who the royalists were hoping to instal as an unelected prime minister, with Abhisit also in attendance.

The stellar royalist presence at the funerals was a remarkably open display of contempt for the electoral choices made by Thailand’s people and for the rule of law. The queen of Thailand, the head of the army, the leader of the parliamentary opposition and the man angling to become an installed “national unity” premier were all publicly aligning themselves with a movement ready to use any means necessary to undermine the legitimate government of the country.

It was nothing less than an open declaration of war.

The Yellow Shirts seized on Sirikit’s gesture as proof of explicit royal backing for their cause. As the U.S. embassy observed, the queen’s deeply divisive intervention put the palace itself in serious potential danger:

Once the Queen signaled her willingness to preside over the cremation ceremony of Angkhana, an extraordinarily unusual development, the PAD had every incentive to let that event dominate the news cycle, which strengthened the PAD’s claim to be supporting (and supported by) palace elements. In overtly embracing the PAD, the Queen risks politicizing the monarchy in a manner which may prove especially unwise at a time when challenges associated with royal succession are looming.

Palace sources provided conflicting accounts of what Bhumibol thought about his wife’s  antics. Privy councillor Siddhi Savetsila, by now ardent apologist for the PAD, claimed  the king was fully in favour of the move, in a conversation with Eric John:

Siddhi viewed PAD as providing essential support to  the monarchy. “If we lose PAD, we lose the battle,” he said. He related that he and Prem had advised the King to show  support for the PAD after the October 7 clash, and he claimed  the King had supported the Queen’s appearance at the funeral  of one of the PAD supporters killed in the incident. The King subsequently thanked Siddhi for his advice (according to Siddhi). Siddhi said he and Prem were the only Privy Councilors advising the King and Queen on the political standoff.

Piya Malakul, another confidante of the queen, had a different story, telling the ambassador that Sirikit’s decision had been an unfortunate blunder. He lamely tried to claim it did not signal any political partisanship on Sirikit’s part, but it was clear that much of his account was fabricated in an effort at damage limitation:

Ambassador met privately at the Residence on November 4 with Piya Malakul, a close advisor to Queen Sirikit who in  the past has also served as a confidant of the King. Piya  remarked that he regretted the Queen’s October 13 appearance  at the funeral of a PAD supporter. He claimed the  Queen had been emotionally affected when she learned that one victim of the October 7 violence was a young lady about to be  married, and that she had told her father she was going to  the protest to defend the monarchy. Initially, the Queen had wanted to send Princess Chulabhorn to the funeral. It was only at the request of Chulabhorn and Chulabhorn’s companion,  Chaichon Locharernkul, that the Queen decided to go herself. Piya said there was no intention for the Queen to involve either herself or the monarchy in political matters, but, unfortunately, some members of the public could interpret the funeral appearance differently. Piya said the Queen later reached out to seriously injured police officers in an attempt to show her neutrality, but this signal went largely unnoticed.

A third version came from Singha tycoon Chutinant Bhirombhakdi, who told John that Bhumibol had indeed been against Sirikit’s decision to preside at the funeral:

We also met on November 5 with Chutinant Bhirombhakdee, the well-connected scion of a wealthy family with close palace ties. Chutinant had a leading role in the Constitution Drafting Assembly established by the leaders of the 2006 coup; his wife, Piyapas, has the royal title of “Mom Luang” and works closely with the Queen. Chutinant agreed that the Queen’s appearance at the October 13 funeral had highly negative ramifications, saying that even politically neutral Thais felt she had inappropriately brought the monarchy into politics. He also acknowledged increasing semi-public criticism of the monarchy, focused on the Queen. Chutinant stated with confidence that the King had sought to deter the Queen from attending the funeral by questioning the wisdom of that plan, but had stopped short of forbidding her to do so.

The violence of October 7, and the overt support shown to the Yellow Shirts by Sirikit and the royalist establishment at the PAD funerals on October 13 and 14, left Thailand more bitterly divided than at any time since the tumultuous 1970s. The royalists had failed to land the knockout blow they hoped for, but remained determined to engineer the overthrow of Thailand’s legitimate elected government, by fair means or foul.

An eruption of hostilities on the disputed border with Cambodia on October 15, with Thai and Cambodian forces fighting an artillery duel around Preah Vihear, heightened the ominous atmosphere of impending conflict. The same sense of looming menace permeated Thai politics. While the army appeared reluctant to launch another coup, the royalists were exploring other methods to topple the government, as Anand Panyarachun told U.S. charge d’affaires James Entwistle on October 16:

Anand offered assurances that there “would not be a coup in the traditional sense of the word,” but said the next three weeks were perilous for Thailand, which “never in history had been so deeply divided.”

Like most of the royalists, Anand appeared to believe Thailand’s troubles could be solved by somehow making Thaksin go away:

Anand professed not to know a clear path which could resolve the crisis, but he clarified remarks he made publicly October 14 after the funeral of a PAD supporter killed on October 7: ex-PM Thakin held the key to dissolving the crisis. Thaksin could gracefully accept fate/legal judgment for his transgressions, stop directing and funding political activities, and allow the country to move forward. The problem, stated Anand, that Thaksin did not want to give up either money or (indirect) power.

Meanwhile, key members of the network monarchy were suddenly unreachable as U.S. diplomats tried to contact them to caution against a coup, suggesting that feverish plotting was afoot:

Privy Council President Prem Tinsulanonda and Privy Councilor Siddhi Savetsila, both seen as connected to efforts to bring down the Somchai government, declined to meet/talk to us October 16. Prem’s assistant, a Vice Admiral, told us that Prem did not feel comfortable meeting with foreign diplomats at the current “delicate” time, adding that Prem had declined a similar request from the British Ambassador. Siddhi’s secretary simply told us Siddhi was not available this week. Privy Councilor (and former Prime Minister) Surayud Chulanont, upcountry in Khorat, deferred receiving a phone call from the Charge until the evening of October 17, after he returns to Bangkok. (Comment: We believe that the Privy Councilors could guess the purpose of the requested meetings and that they most likely made a deliberate decision not to engage.  End Comment.)

Army commander Anupong explicitly called on the prime minister to resign in a speech on October 16, declaring: “No one can stay in a pool of blood.” And on October 17, Anuporn “Joe” Kashemsant, a palace official on Sirikit’s staff, echoed Anand’s hints that the royalists were exporing various strategies for bringing down the government, in comments to U.S. diplomats:

Anuporn Kashemsant, a foreign liaison officer for the Queen in the Principal Private Secretary’s office, remarked to us October 17 that various political maneuvers were ongoing. He said “a coup like what happened September 19, 2006 is not one of the options” for resolving Thailand’s  political crisis, because the military had proven it was  incapable of running the country. His qualification evoked  the remark of former Prime Minister Anand Panyarachun on October 16 to Charge that there would not be “a coup in the traditional sense of the word.” Anuporn hinted that significant developments likely would take place in the coming days, but refused to predict what might occur, beyond saying there were two possible paths forward.

The royalist offensive against Thaksin’s influence would indeed follow a two-pronged attack strategy — judicial intervention and escalating disruption by the Yellow Shirts.

Supreme Court judges made Thaksin a convicted criminal on October 21, sentencing him to two years in jail for corruption over his wife’s purchase of land from a government agency in 2003. His prospects of returning to Thailand seemed more distant than ever.

Thaksin himself was incandescent, and vowed revenge, as he told U.S. ambassador John by telephone:

After the verdict, Thaksin phoned the Ambassador. He denounced the verdict against him as “the fruit of a poisoned tree,” emphasizing that the court had relied on material  prepared by the Asset Examination Committee, which was  composed solely of ardent foes of Thaksin. With slight sarcasm, Thaksin said he was happy to have been convicted, as his opponents in the political class would only face larger problems as a result of treating him unfairly.

Another cable gives more details of the telephone call from Thaksin, including talk that Sirikit was agitating for another coup while Bhumibol was adamant the military should not intervene this time:

In a  rambling but spirited exposition of his views, Thaksin recalled how his Thai Rak Thai party had won the 2005  election in a landslide, only to be evicted by the 2006 coup d’etat. Thaksin affirmed that he remained popular and said  ”my party” (now the People’s Power Party, but presumably he also referred to any subsequent incarnation) would continue to win elections by a significant margin.

Thaksin said he had sent a message to Army Commander Anupong Paojinda that the Army should not seize power. Thaksin said he could guarantee that a coup in current circumstances would not resemble General Sonthi Boonyaratglin’s 2006 coup — it would not be peaceful, and Anupong would regret it, Thaksin said.

Thaksin told the Ambassador that Anupong did not want to launch a coup, but Queen Sirikit was pressing him to do so. Thaksin also asserted that Anupong knew that King Bhumibol did not favor a coup. Thaksin highlighted that, at the same time when the Queen presided over the funeral of a PAD protestor, the King granted an audience to PM Somchai, sending a more positive public message than the Queen’s. Thaksin added that he had been on the verge of releasing a letter in response to his conviction, but his staff had discouraged him from doing so, saying his tone would have been too angry and negative toward the monarchy. Thaksin said one item on his agenda (and presumably in his draft letter) was the need to remove lese majeste provisions from  the criminal code; Thailand could not rightfully claim to be democratic so long as there remained a threat of prosecution for lese majeste.

Hounded out of the country by royalist efforts to eradicate his political influence, facing jail if he ever returned home, Thaksin was increasingly angry and embittered. But even at this stage, he retained some respect for King Bhumibol. His disdain for Queen Sirikit and her military allies was clear. And his warning to the military that another coup would not be bloodless shows he was already thinking about strategies of resistance and confrontation. Always a fighter, he was even prepared to take on the army, if he had to.

One of Thaksin’s top allies, former parliament speaker Yongyuth Tiyapairat, told Eric John on October 28 that KIng Bhumibol was out of touch and exploited by belligerent ultra-royalists to further an agenda that would end up damaging the palace:

Yongyuth said with dismay that Thailand claimed to have a constitutional monarchy, but  in reality it often seemed Thailand had an absolute monarchy,  with the Palace vetting appointments to high-ranking military  and civil service positions, and the King was treated “like a god.” The King was generally inaccessible, and those around him often provided him with inaccurate information. Many people (e.g., PAD) tried to harness the influence of the Palace and to direct popular anger at their opponents by claiming they were not loyal to the monarchy. These circumstances were unhealthy for Thailand, and also detrimental to the long-term interests of the royal family, Yongyuth said.

An extraordinary episode during October, never properly reported by Thai or international media, would demonstrate just how isolated Bhumibol had become, and how he had lost control of an increasingly extremist and aggressive royalist movement.

During October, following the divisive violence of October 7, King Bhumibol sent a clear signal that he wanted the ultra-royalists to cease their strategy of confrontation and violent disruption. It was time for the long Yellow Shirt occupation of Government House to end. As usual, he did not say so directly, but instructed three of the most trusted members of his inner circle to convey the message.

The first messenger was Bhumibol’s favourite among his four children, and the only one of them who remained close to him: Princess Sirindhorn. During a visit to the United States, Sirindhorn gave a news conference on October 9. This was very unusual: foreign press access to the princess is usually strictly stage-managed, and she generally prefers to keep a low profile on her international visits. She strenuously avoids being drawn into discussion of politics. But, as the Associated Press reported, this time Sirindhorn made some unexpected remarks about the Yellow Shirts:

The princess of Thailand said Thursday that she does not believe protests in her home country are being staged to benefit the monarchy.

Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn talked about the importance of public service Thursday at the Choate Rosemary Hall prep school in Wallingford. She later headed to the University of Pennsylvania for a U.S.-Thailand education discussion.

Her visit came amid the worst political violence in Thailand in more than a decade. Thousands of protesters have camped at the main government office complex to demand electoral changes and an end to corruption in Thai politics.

In violent clashes on Tuesday, 423 protesters and 20 police were injured, Thai medical authorities said. One woman was killed, and a man died in what appeared to be a related incident.

It was the worst political violence since 1992, when the army killed dozens of pro-democracy demonstrators seeking the ouster of a military-backed government.

The princess was asked at a press conference following her talk whether she agreed with protesters who say they are acting on behalf of the monarchy.

“I don’t think so,” she replied. “They do things for themselves.“

Asked why the king has not spoken out, she said, “I don’t know because I haven’t asked him.”

Protest leaders have called for the prosecution of people who insult the monarchy. One leader wants to abandon Thailand’s popularly elected Parliament for one in which a majority of members would be appointed.

Some academics have said the plan would enhance the power of the country’s military and monarchy at the expense of the poor.

“There are a lot of political problems,” the princess said. “I told my friends, colleagues just to do what is their duty.”

The story was ignored by most of the Thai media, with Khao Sod the only mainstream newspaper to report Sirindhorn’s comments. Sondhi Limthongkul gave a ranting rebuttal, saying the U.S. journalists who had asked the question and written the article had been bribed by Thaksin, and claiming wrongly that Sirindhorn’s comments had been mistranslated.

Within days, the queen sent a very different signal. Sirikit, who had never been close to Sirindhorn, overtly aligned herself with the PAD by presiding at Angkhana’s funeral. She must have been aware of her daughter’s comments and she chose to contradict them. This in itself was startling: despite decades of infighting, the leading royals have usually been extremely adept at maintaining a public pretence that everything is harmonious. For Sirikit and Sirindhorn to send opposing messages was a sign of serious discord in the palace.

Later in the month, Bhumibol again signalled his opposition to continued Yellow Shirt disruption, via public comments by two more of his closest confidantes: Sumet Tantivejkul, secretary general of the Chaipattana Foundation which has administered Bhumibol’s royal projects since 1988, and Disathorn Wathcharothai, chair of the Rajaprajanugroh Foundation, a palace-sponsored disaster-relief organization. Both men are named as key members of the king’s inner circle in Eric John’s 2009 analysis of palace power politics, “CIRCLES OF INFLUENCE INSIDE THE INSTITUTION OF THE MONARCHY IN KING BHUMIBOL’S TWILIGHT“:

Those few whose counsel the King has sought in recent years, according to various sources, are neither household names nor political players, but associated with his charitable development foundations or his closest staff. These include the sharp-tongued Thanphuying Butrie Viravaidya, his deputy Principal Private Secretary (DPPS) and wife of NGO activist Meechai “the Condom King” (Butrie is currently ensconced at Siriraj Hospital); Wud Sumitra, another DPPS; Sumete Tantivejkul, head of the Chai Patana Foundation; Disathorn Watcharothai, Chair of the Rajanukhrao  Foundation and son of the Lord Chamberlain; and Pramote Maiklap, former director of the Royal Irrigation Department. The Privy Councilor closest to the King is likely Air Chief Marshal Kamthon Sidhvananda, former long-time head of State Electricity Giant EGAT, whom the King credits for electrifying much of rural Thailand. His most regular social interaction in recent years came in weekly late-Saturday night jam sessions with his pick-up jazz band, whose geriatric members have played with the King for decades.

Another U.S. cable recounts the interventions of Sumet and Disathorn in October 2008:

In late October 2008, the King directed two of his proxies to carry his water for him, Sumet Tantivejakul, the Secretary-General of the King’s Chai  Pattana Foundation, and Disathorn Wathcharothai, Chair of the Rajanukhrao Foundation. Speaking October 26 before a group of academics closely associated with the yellow shirt movement laying siege to Thailand at the time, supposedly in defense of the monarchy, Sumet called on protesters to “stop violence and secure peace via dialogue.”

Disathorn was even more direct three days later, on October 29 at a seminar in Chumphol. “No matter whether the PAD or UDD, I wish to say that if we love the King, please don’t go farming at Government House. Don’t go to show forces anywhere…. If you love the King, go back home. Showing your power over there makes no benefit at all. Worse, it just creates disunity. I dare to say it here because I am a real man and a real voice. I carry the King’s message.”

Their message was unmistakeable, and Disathorn even went as far as explicitly stating that he spoke with the king’s authority. Bhumibol was making clear that he did not support the Yellow Shirt occupation of Government House, and indeed that the PAD did not have his backing despite its constant claims to be acting in his name. The king was telling the Yellow Shirts that enough was enough. He wanted Thailand to step back from the brink, instead of plunging deeper into internecine conflict.

Piya Malakul confirmed to Eric John on November 4 that Bhumibol wanted the Yellow Shirts to end their protest and go home:

King Bhumibol explicitly told Army Commander Anupong Paojinda not to launch a coup, Piya Malakul, an advisor to Queen Sirikit, told Ambassador November 4…

Piya’s claim that the King instructed Anupong not to conduct a coup is the strongest account we  have heard to date about the King’s opposition to a coup and  his communicating this to Anupong; it would explain why Privy Counselors Prem and Siddhi, both seen as opponents of the current government, gave recent assurances to the Ambassador that there would not be a coup. While Piya did not specify how he heard of this exchange, the purported instruction does appear consistent with Anupong’s actions, other high-level military assurances to the Ambassador, and reporting in other channels…

Piya remarked that King Bhumibol was highly irritated by PAD’s occupation of Government House and other disruptions caused by the anti-government group, but the King was unsure how best to ensure PAD would vacate the compound. Piya said the King had instructed two of his loyalists to convey his desire that PAD leave Government House…. Piya considered  PAD co-leader Sondhi Limthongkul to be obstinate, however, saying Sondhi had become obsessed with his own sense of  mission.

The Yellow Shirt leadership and their ultra-royalist establishment allies failed to follow Bhumibol’s clearly expressed wishes. Adding insult to injury, Sondhi Limthongkul denounced both Sumet and Disathorn from the PAD stage at the Makhawan bridge near Government House, where he gave regular vitriolic speeches to inspire his increasingly fanatical followers. A U.S. cable from 2009 describes Sondhi’s response:

In the late 2008 political crisis caused by the occupation of Government House, and ultimately Bangkok’s airports, by the yellow-shirt PAD activists claiming to be defending the monarchy, both Sumete and Disathorn joined Princess  Sirindhorn in October 2008 in publicly stating that the King did not consider the yellow-shirts to be acting on his behalf. Disathorn went so far as to tell a seminar: “if you love the King, go home.” Instead, PAD leader Sondhi Lim denounced both men from the PAD stage with curses; Sondhi repeated his criticism of Disathorn at the November 15 PAD rally.

Sondhi Limthongkul was knowingly and explicitly defying messages from three of King Bhumibol’s most trusted allies. He must have been well aware that in doing so he was publicly defying the king. And yet he didn’t stop there: he cursed and insulted them. In one speech, using his usual apocalyptic and messianic language, he said Thailand was divided into two: the righteous, and the unrighteous. Sondhi said contemptuously of Sumet that: “Instead of siding with the righteous, he preached unity.”

It seems inconceivable that Sondhi could have behaved with such swaggering insolence towards King Bhumibol Adulyadej, the monarch he claimed to revere, unless he was very confident that he had the backing of Queen Sirikit and her ultra-royalist allies in the establishment and military. The palace had long been divided, with the king and queen maintaining rival networks of influence, and sometimes disagreeing over governance and succession, and after 2006 onwards a clear rift reopened between Bhumibol and Sirikit. Perhaps sensing the damage that the coup had done to his legacy, and eager to pretend that he remained above politics and committed to constitutional rule, the king made it known that he would not support another coup, and that he disapproved of the PAD disruptions of 2008. His frail health also reduced his ability and inclination to actively intervene in events. Sirikit, on the other hand, had always been more activist and aggressive than her husband, and her ambitions of reigning as regent after Bhumibol’s death now made her an even more determined player in Thailand’s power games. Supported by a clique of royalist generals from the Queen’s Guard who had come to dominate the military hierarchy, and by elderly royalists like Prem and Anand who wanted to prevent Vajiralongkorn becoming king, Sirikit openly sailed into battle, to Bhumibol’s dismay. And so two competing signals were sent to the network monarchy from the palace in October 2008. King Bhumibol distanced himself from the PAD, told the military not to mount another coup, and sent a message via his trusted proxies that the Yellow Shirts should end their campaign of provocation and go home. Sirikit signalled that the PAD had her full backing, and that her network was fully committed to the battle against Thaksin. It had never been clearer that there was discord in the palace and Thailand’s king and queen were at odds.

It was also very clear that the marital power struggle was won with ease by Queen Sirikit. Bhumibol was not only ignored, he was humiliated. When Sondhi Limthongkul denounced Rama IX’s messengers from the PAD stage, he too was sending a signal to Bhumibol and the king’s inner circle: their time was over. Sirikit was calling the shots, and she would not be swayed by the entreaties of her husband, even if he was the king. The ultra-royalists were unwilling to call a halt to their crusade against the government even though that was clearly what Bhumibol wanted. Instead, within a month, the PAD was to launch a dramatic escalation of its campaign of disruption, proclaiming a “Final War” involving operations codenamed Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and storming Bangkok’s airports. As Eric John observed:

Instead of responding positively to the King’s message… PAD leader Sondhi Limthongkul denounced Sumet and Disathorn’s “meddling.” Three weeks later, the yellow shirts escalated their activities by seizing the airports.

Like Shakespeare’s King Lear, who gives away his crown and his kingdom in the hope of a peaceful and contented retirement but instead becomes a helpless and tormented old man raging impotently at forces he no longer has the power to master, Bhumibol had found himself suddenly marginalized and irrelevant, ignored by royalists who claimed to revere him, and mocked and insulted by a clown like Sondhi Limthongkul.

The immense power he once wielded through simple words and gestures and hints was suddenly gone, melting away as his death neared and much of the network monarchy shifted its allegiance to Sirikit. Once his reign had unmistakably entered its dying years, with the prospect of royal succession now a looming reality rather than a feared but far-off time of turmoil, even those elite Thais who claimed to revere Bhumibol became focused on positioning themselves for his demise. Bhumibol was a fading old man, and he could offer the royalist establishment no protection after his passing. Sirikit was now the undisputed power in the palace, and many royalists fearful of the future ahead of the looming trauma of royal succession saw the queen as their best (and only) hope. Bhumibol could not protect them from Thaksin’s vengeance, but perhaps Sirikit could. And so, after 2006, the network monarchy danced increasingly to Sirikit’s tune. She had no interest in emulating the caution and compromise that had been defining characteristics of Bhumibol’s reign: Sirikit believed she was the reincarnation of a warrior queen who charged into battle on an armoured elephant. Elite royalists consumed by apocalyptic end-reign anxiety regarded her as their guardian angel.

At the end of his life, Bhumibol was learning another lesson on the fragility of his power.   As his vitality and health waned, so too did his influence. Thailand’s elites were increasingly preoccupied with positioning themselves for the looming succession. Their focus was on the tumultuous time that would follow Bhumibol’s death, not on honouring his wishes in the last years of his life. Millions of Thais claimed to love the king so much they would die for him, and yet Bhumibol was unable even to persuade the royalist Yellow Shirt protesters occupying Government House to disperse and go home. Their T-shirts and headscarfs and wristbands were festooned with slogans proclaiming their loyalty to the king, but they were unwilling to do the one thing he asked of them. The frenzied hyper-royalism that Bhumibol had fostered during his reign to preserve the prestige and primacy of the palace had grown so monstrous and fierce that the king could no longer control it. He became another victim of the forces he had unleashed.

As Thailand’s royalists grew ever more militant, extremist and inflexible, their nemesis Thaksin Shinawatra and his supporters also adopted an increasingly hardline and confrontational stance. A grenade attack on the Yellow Shirt encampment around Government House in the early hours of October 30 wounded 10 PAD guards, two of them seriously. The body of another man was found the same night near the camp, shot and beaten, probably by the PAD guards; police had seen the man walking drunkenly towards the Yellow Shirt camp earlier. Bombs exploded outside the homes of two prominent judges, one on October 21 and the second on October 30. As the U.S. embassy noted:

Both judges are viewed by the Thaksin-camp as royalists connected to one of the Privy Councilors trying to engineer the downfall of the Somchai administration.

On November 1, some 90,000 Thaksin supporters rallied at Bangkok’s Rajamangala Stadium. They were overwhelmingly dressed in red, which was to become the colour signifying support for Thaksin in Thailand, just as yellow had been adopted by the rival royalist PAD mass movement. Addressing the huge crowd by telephone from an undisclosed location abroad, Thaksin denounced the coup and his corruption conviction, and very deliberately raised the stakes once again in his battle with the royalists by making a calculatedly incendiary comment:

The only things that can bring me home are royal mercy or the people’s power.

Thaksin’s comments were intended to be ambiguous but potentially menacing, containing an implicit threat that unless he received a royal pardon and the monarchist establishment ceased its hounding of him, he could only return by mobilizing the people against the palace. As The Nation reported:

The statement and its possible underlying meaning have triggered strong criticism by his opponents, who viewed the remarks as a probable attempt to “pressure” the monarch.

A U.S. cable dated November 3 discussed the remark:

Thaksin’s statement is controversial, and rightly so. He appears to be urging the King to act on his behalf, although convicts generally request a royal pardon after they begin serving their sentences, not when they are ensconced abroad to avoid incarceration. Also, raising “the people’s power” as an alternative to “royal mercy” could make it seem as though Thaksin is disputing the Palace’s supremacy, or trying to drive a wedge between the Palace and “the people.”

A later cable carried further analysis of the comment, including comments by wealthy royalist Chutinant Bhirombhakdi and evidence that Thaksin had crafted the phrase with great care:

Chutinant discussed former Prime Minister Thaksin’s statement in his November 1 address to supporters that either “royal mercy or the people’s power” could allow  his return to Thailand. Chutinant said this juxtaposition, which he viewed as highly strategic, had the predictable effect of energizing Thaksin’s opponents in the royalist camp. This reaction allowed Thaksin to demonstrate publicly that many palace figures were aligned against him, thereby eroding the prestige that the palace derived from its status as an institution above politics. (Separately, after Thaksin’s remarks, a member of Thaksin’s legal team told us that the sentence in question was part of a “very refined product” and that she had heard this sentence “four or five  times” in Thaksin’s rehearsal of the speech.)

What made Thaksin’s comment so subversive was that it suggested that the palace and the people were not united in Thailand — contrary to the official fairy tale of a harmonious kingdom where the monarch was selflessly devoted to his adoring people — and that it was Thaksin, not the monarchy, who had the support of the masses. Like all of his most provocative remarks, it contained a great deal of truth. For the first time in Thai history, ordinary people were turning against the monarchy in significant numbers.

If the 2006 coup had been the catalyst that caused many Thais to begin questioning everything they thought they knew about the monarchy, Sirikit’s attendance at Angkhana Radappanyawut’s funeral was the last straw that confirmed their worst fears. They had been deceived and betrayed. The palace was not their protector, it was their enemy. Particularly in the pro-Thaksin strongholds of north and northeast Thailand, ordinary people began openly abandoning their reflexive support for the monarchy. Most had been instinctive royalists until the 2006 coup, and had undergone a profound ideological shift, not because they were incited towards republicanism by political leaders wanting to challenge the palace, but because it became impossible to ignore the dissonance between the fairy tales they had been taught to believe and the reality they could see for themselves increasingly clearly. For many, Sirikit’s sponsorship of Angkhana’s funeral was what finally shattered their faith in the monarchy beyond repair.

In a cable entitled “QUESTIONING THE UNQUESTIONABLE” the U.S. embassy discussed the consequences of the queen’s conduct:

After Queen Sirikit presided over the October 13 funeral of a People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD) protestor killed during an October 7 clash with police, public criticism of the Queen increased notably. Thanapol Eawsakul, editor of left-wing Same Sky Magazine, told us that critical online comments posted to his website spiked, and overall traffic to his site increased from 10,000 hits per day to  30,000 hits.

Thanapol, who has been charged with lese majeste for  material previously published in Same Sky, told us he  spent much of his time cleansing his website of content that could lead to further lese majeste accusations, such as: nude photos of the Crown Prince’s consort, including video clips of an infamous birthday party; multiple postings ranting about the Crown Prince’s lewd sexual behavior; photos (that Thanapol suspected to be digitally edited) of the Queen wearing what appears to be a famous stolen Saudi blue diamond; and multiple links to other sites with purported evidence linking the royal family to the stolen Saudi jewelry. To his surprise, people even posted comments speculating about King Bhumibol’s involvement in his brother’s death, some going as far as to suggest that Bhumibol shot then-King Ananda. Posters also drew upon Forbes magazine’s recent report claiming the King’s assets topped $35 billion, decrying the monarchy’s wealth as a result of generations of extortion, and calling the upcoming royal funeral of the King’s elder sister as a waste of  taxpayer money.

Prachatai, one of the few news organizations in Thailand that makes an effort to do serious journalism on issues related to the monarchy, reported a similar leap in interest, the U.S. embassy said:

Prachatai.com Executive Director Chiranuch Premchaiporn told us that after the 2006  coup d’etat, daily online visitors to Prachatai increased from 1,000 to 10,000, and that the October 7 clash between PAD protestors and Thai police drove an increase from 15,000 to 30,000 visitors. The surge in posted comments, similar to what SameSky experienced, required significant additional hours of “eye-ball” scans to purge their  sites of potentially offensive comments.

Thais used simple codewords to refer to the royals in online discussion:

Articles on the Same Sky website utilized the moniker “XXX” to refer to the King, “Mama Blue” for the Queen, alluding to her rumored ownership of a stolen Saudi blue diamond, and “O” to refer to the Crown Prince, drawing from  the Thai word for his official title. Thanapol believed such thinly veiled references kept him on the safe side of a fine line that United Front of Democracy Against Dictatorship  (UDD) supporters have crossed in recent public comments. “UDD publicized in speeches, without self-censorship, what has been spoken privately for years,” Thanapol added, saying  that he would delete any UDD speeches posted to his site.

Prachatai Executive Director Chiranuch indicated she also relied heavily on shifting euphemisms to retain a  modicum of ambiguity/deniability. References to Queen Sirikit “went from ‘Queen’ to ‘Q’ to ‘Mama Blue’ to ‘Fat’ and now ‘Jie’ (from the Chinese word for older sister),” she explained.

Criticism of Sirikit was not just confined to the internet. In private, growing numbers of Thais were swapping gossip and complaints about her behaviour. In pro-Thaksin neighbourhoods, villages and districts, particularly in the northeastern province of Isaan with its long history of resentment towards Bangkok rule, distaste for the queen was surprisingly open, according to a BBC correspondent quoted by the U.S. embassy:

BBC reporter Jonathan Head, subject of an ongoing lese majeste, spoke with us on November 3 from the northeastern province of Udon Thani, where he said people raged publicly against the Queen in a manner he had never witnessed before. “The Queen ripped up the rule book when she attended the (PAD) funeral,” he said, adding that he remained uncertain how to incorporate recent interviews into future BBC reporting without becoming the subject of additional lese majeste investigations.

Shocked and alarmed by the surge in online attacks on Sirikit and the rest of the royals, the military took an increasingly hard line against lèse majesté, despite lacking a constitutional mandate to do so. As the U.S. embassy noted, top generals in the Queen’s Guard clique took the lead in the battle:

Army Commander General Anupong Paojinda warned Thai citizens of the dangers associated with criticizing the monarchy in a televised press conference on October 27. According to an English-language daily, Anupong said, “There must be no cases of contempt or disrespectful acts toward the  monarchy. The Army will take action using every means against any person or group acting in contempt of or being disrespectful toward the monarchy.” Anupong’s remarks appeared to be a direct response to the recent increased criticism of the monarchy.

Note: The Thai criminal code outlaws lese majeste, but there is no legal basis for the Army to take action against those committing that crime. The Constitution specifies, however, that the King concurrently holds the position of head of the Thai Armed Forces. The Internal Security Act does provide that the Internal Security Operations Command (ISOC), an interagency body headed by the  Prime Minister with the Army Commander as his deputy, is supposed to, among other tasks, “encourage people to be aware of their duty in upholding nation, religion, and King.”

UDD co-leader Charan Ditthaphichai claimed to us that most lese majeste investigations involving UDD supporters resulted from the Internal Security Operations Command (ISOC)  Task Force 6080, which focuses on offenses against the  monarchy, reporting cases to Anupong, who then forwarded them  to the police.  Charan stated that Army Chief of Staff  General Prayut Chan-Ocha, a close associate of the Queen, manages Task Force 6080 by virtue of his role as Secretary of  ISOC.

Government ministries also began making greater efforts to keep criticism of the royal family contained. The U.S. embassy detailed some of the steps being taken:

The Information and Communications Technology (ICT) Ministry and the Ministry of Interior (MOI) joined recent Army and Police efforts against lese majeste in late October. The ICT Ministry sought the cooperation of website editors in self-censoring content and announced an effort to create an expensive gateway to filter anti-monarchy postings. The MOI directed provincial governors to monitor leaflets and community radio stations for anti-monarchy material…

Comment: The recent move by the ICT Ministry to  further scrutinize anti-monarchy Internet chatter reflects a government response to perceived more widespread criticism of  the royal family, particularly of the Queen. Operators of websites and other online media are increasingly concerned about measures the RTG might take against them and are self-censoring site content to pre-empt future lese  majeste charges. As a result, critics of the monarchy are finding less open space to voice their opinions, even anonymously — precisely what defenders of the monarchy intend through more aggressive implementation of lese majeste. End Summary and Comment.

But heavy handed repression of open debate about the monarchy and the succession could prove counterproductive and provoke more questioning of the appropriate role of the palace in Thai society, the embassy warned:

The Army Commander’s statement indicates that lese majeste offenses are not viewed simply as criminal acts but as a threat to Thailand’s supreme institution. The rise in high-profile lese majeste cases, the frequency of online remarks bordering on lese majeste, and the seriousness of the authorities’ response indicates that some segments of society are highly dissatisfied with the behavior of some members of the royal family, if not the institution itself. If the authorities were to harshly repress critics of the monarchy, this could prove counterproductive, as quiet discourse in many circles could shift from mere gossip about some royals’ distasteful behavior to a more weighty questioning of the monarchy’s role after the death of widely-beloved King Bhumibol.

Years of bitter political conflict between the traditional royalist elite and the populist political juggernaut built by Thaksin Shinawatra had ripped open an ideological fissure between those Thais whose paramount loyalty was to the king and the growing number who believed sovereignty resided with the people

cracked torn open

Thaksin’s appeal to “royal mercy or the people’s power”

(TO BE CONTINUED)

A political analysis cabled to Washington in early November made the same point even more strongly: Queen Sirikit, departing from the example set by King Bhumibol over decades, has dragged an ostensibly apolitical monarchy into the political fray, to the institution’s probable future detriment… Sirikit … made a bold political statement practically without precedent in  presiding over the funeral of a PAD supporter from humble roots who died during the October 7 clash between PAD and the police. Even some figures close to the Queen have expressed their private unease at the overtly political act, since it seems to erode the concept, which the King has long sought to promote, of an apolitical monarchy. After the Queen’s funeral appearance, there was a notable increase in public complaints about acts of lese majeste, with many seemingly targeting the Queen; PPP-affiliated politicians have expressed a combination of fear and loathing for the Queen in private conversations with us in recent months. Such politicization of the monarchy at this time appears to create extra uncertainty around the eventual royal succession, and it could well boomerang on royalists when the time comes to redefine the role of the monarchy after the King’s passing.

I  • II • III • IV • V

IV. 

Tragedy, according to Aristotle’s famous definition 24 centuries ago, is the spectacle of a noble and admirable protagonist who drags himself and those around him into disaster “brought about not by vice or depravity, but by some error or frailty”. Watching a good person brought to ruin by a tragic flaw or mistake, we feel the emotions of pity and fear: we are reminded that even the best among us are only human, and that we forget this at our peril.

When Prince Bhumibol Adulyadej pulled the trigger of his brother’s Colt .45 automatic pistol in King Ananda Mahidol’s bedroom on the morning of June 9, 1946, he thought no harm would be done. He had removed the magazine that contained the pistol’s bullets. All except one. He forgot that there was a single round still in the chamber, and he shot and killed his brother by mistake. It broke his heart.

When he agreed to lie about what had happened, and hide his own complicity, again he thought no harm would be done. He thought it could do some good. He had made one small mistake, with unfathomably terrible consequences: the death of a beloved brother, the regicide of King Rama VIII of Siam. There is evidence that at first he wanted to tell the truth about what had happened, and take responsibility for what he had done. Two key witnesses, royal page But Pathamasarin (executed in 1955 for a crime he did not commit) and longtime Mahidol family physician Dr Nitya Vejjavivisth, reported hearing Bhumibol arguing with his mother in the hours after Ananda was shot; But Pathamasarin heard Sangwan tell him: “Whatever you want to do, do it.”

For Bhumibol, lying about what he had done was not a way of shirking responsibility. Quite the reverse: his failure to confess was in many ways a profound sacrifice. Had he told the truth about the death of Ananda, he could have escaped back to Switzerland for a very comfortable life as a playboy prince, albeit a notorious one. Instead, he lied, and accepted the crushing burden of kingship, a role that he had never wanted. He resolved to devote himself tirelessly to royal duty for the rest of his life. It probably seemed the only way he could even begin to make amends. He was not to know that the noxious consequences of his decision would lead to so many more people being killed, and would disfigure Thailand so disastrously for the whole of his reign.

But choosing lies over truth was Rama IX’s tragic mistake, the trigger for a toxic chain of events that caused terrible damage to Thailand. As Kobkua Suwannathat-Pian wrote in Kings, Country and Constitutions:

The King’s death profoundly affected contemporary Thai politics and politicians. The most outstanding victims of the fallout from the royal death were Pridi and his political supporters who were completely and effectively blotted out of Thai politics. Though Pridi had never been formally charged with a crime connected with the King’s death, he was so totally discredited by the ongoing smear campaign conducted by the 1947 Coup Group and the trial of regicide that he had lost most of his popularity with the people at large. In fact until his death, Pridi found it impossible to return to Thailand to defend his good name. The political demise of Pridi and the liberals and the ideals that they represented made it that much easier for the military and conservatives, each in turn, to mould the country’s political system to their own tastes and requirements. With their anti-Pridi credentials, both were able to assume the role of protectors of the monarchy especially against wayward leaders in cohort with national enemies such as the communists. The public apprehension of leftists and communists had repeatedly been whipped up to serve the political objectives of the post-1947 ruling élite, often at the expense of democracy and individual basic rights, and, most ironically of all, against the best interests of the Throne itself…

It is almost futile to try to second-guess history: what would have happened had Ananda not met with his untimely death? … Could or would he have prevented the ascendancy of the military in Thai politics? What would have been the fate of Pridi and the liberals in this political situation? What would have been the role of the monarchy if Ananda could have pulled off this supposed coup? Whatever the answers to these questions, there can be no denying that the young King’s untimely demise did change the course of Thai political history.

The aftermath of his brother’s death was intensely traumatic and emotionally damaging for Bhumibol. He had to perform archaic death rituals on his brother’s corpse. Some of Ananda’s bones had to be broken to fit him into the funeral urn. And for weeks afterwards, Bhumibol and his mother went to sit quietly by the urn in the late afternoon every day, meditating on the disaster that had befallen them.

A cable from British ambassador Geoffrey Thompson on August 17 describes the impact on Bhumibol:

His Majesty looked ill and depressed. Only by a supreme effort on our part could he be be induced to speak and the audience was painful.

Back in Lausanne, Bhumibol repeatedly delayed his return to Thailand for his brother’s cremation. William Stevenson, who discussed this period with Bhumibol, wrote about his anguish in The Revolutionary King:

As the months passed, Lek drifted back into his old identity, but life was more difficult without Elder Brother. To make things easier, Lek pushed aside the memories of Bangkok… The press saw him as yet another dispossessed playboy royal and soon lost interest. Thrones were toppling, empires dissolving. Back in the snug privacy of the only real home he’d had, Lek could go out and do as he pleased, see anyone, speak freely. He relaxed back into the certainties of western classrooms. In Bangkok, he’d had to cope with an elite whose long names were hard to remember and kept changing, so that he would think he was dealing with several different personages until they turned out to be one and the same. It had been equally hard to get a grip on places, institutions and beliefs: the names were slippery, and the gods switched faces and purposes. Here at university, everything was concrete: information stayed the same from one lesson to another.

Jazz was the only activity which had saved his sanity in Siam… Now, jazz connected him with the Elder Brother of the old carefree days. How baffling those brief months in Bangkok all seemed. He had to go back. But what did he have to offer?

The Princess Mother suffered mental depression of a kind that would destroy a lesser person. Adding to the trauma of seeing her son die was a palace environment from which cruel gossip was relayed to the ordinary people for whom she had real respect. It was being said that she thought her first son was weak; that she wanted to be founder of a strong new line of kings; that she had attended to Nan’s body inhumanely with cool detachment. The truth was that her simple Buddhist faith taught her death was only a door we all had to pass through. She tried not to search for some mistake she might have made leading to the tragedy, and concentrated on practicalities.

Rumours were rife that Bhumibol would abdicate. Several times, according to reports by American and British diplomats, he was on the verge of doing so. Had he confessed the truth, even at this late stage, he could have averted Thailand’s unfolding tragedy.

The royalists raced to find a suitable wife for Bhumibol, hoping this would help overcome his dejection. As Time magazine reported:

Many mammas of the Siamese nobility got the idea that the climate of Lausanne would be good for their daughters. Quite a “court” developed around Phumiphon. Winner of the tournament was the Princess Sirikit Kitiyakara, who also likes music.

In an interview for the 1980 BBC documentary Soul of a Nation, Sirikit recalled their first meeting in Paris, where her father was Thai ambassador:

It was hate at first sight… because he said he would arrive at 4 o’clock in the afternoon. He arrived at 7 o’clock, kept me standing there, practicing curtsey, and curtsey.

According to a Life magazine article in February 1950, Bhumibol and Sirikit also argued about music that day:

It was music … that led to the king’s engagement. Dining at the Siamese embassy in Paris two years ago, he met Princess Sirikit, then a budding 15-year-old with some odd ideas. For example, she had acquired a strong taste for bebop. The king, a confirmed antibebopist, argued patiently with her all through dinner but got nowhere. At the end he asked her father, Prince Mom Chao Nakkhatmongkol Kitiyakara, for permission to take her out, let her listen to a few orchestras and discover what he meant. When the princess came to Lausanne to attend high school at the Pensionnat Riante-Rive there were opportunities for more talk and personal demonstrations by the king on the piano. They never did settle the question, the princess holding firm to her bebopist convictions, but they did settle other things. Last July the king called Prince Nakkhatmongkol to Lausanne [and] asked for the hand of his daughter.

Sirikit was beautiful and feisty. Bhumibol’s car crash in October 1948 was to prove decisive in bringing them together, as she told the BBC:

It was love… I didn’t know that he loved me, because at that time I was only 15 years old and planned to be a concert pianist. He was gravely ill in the hospital… He produced my picture out of his pocket, I didn’t know he had one, and he said: “Send for her, I love her.” I thought of being with the man I love only. Not of the duty, and the burden of becoming queen.

Sirikit moved to Lausanne, officially to help Bhumibol with his convalescence. They were engaged on July 19, 1949, to widespread joy in Thailand.

But among global media, Bhumibol’s reputation as an absentee playboy monarch was becoming more pronounced.

John Stanton’s Life article in 1950 was full of scorn for Bhumibol’s Lausanne lifestyle:

When his brother died, it was felt that the new king should switch his educational emphasis from architecture, which he was then studying, to law. Dutifully Phumiphon attended a law course at Lausanne University, but because of his auto accident studying gave him such a headache that he has not been back since. Since then, however, he has shown his regard for the law by the pleasant little ceremony with which he greets each new day: awakened by one of his twin aides, he takes from him a law book along with his coffee and croissants. Occasionally the king looks at the book. Other times he uses it as a prop for his pillow and lies back to contemplate the ceiling. In these restful moments his thoughts generally wander to music, more specifically to Johann Sebastian Bach. Bach, the king has declared, “is the daddy of us all.”

After a suitable period of such reflection the king (so each of his Lausanne days has usually gone) rises and proceeds to his gadget-cluttered study. Here he smilingly confronts a piano (with organ attachment), desk, movie screen, movie projector, film-editing machinery, radios, wire recorders and models of ships of the Siamese navy. Amid this disarray King Phumiphon attends to the mail from Bangkok. Mostly the mail is light, a fill-in on the local situation from his uncle, Prince Regent Rangsit of Chainad, or a few bills to be paid. Then the king lunches with his mother and spends the afternoon out taking pictures if the weather is good, indoors working over his musical scores if it rains. Evenings he spends chatting with his mother, reading the Bangkok magazines and technical books on photography or, occasionally, touring the local nightspots. About once a week a group of boys come in for their jam session.

Stanton treats Bhumibol’s behaviour as evidence that Siam’s king was a spoiled and idle young man. But there is another credible explanation for Bhumibol’s listlessness, his long solitary periods lying in bed or alone in his study, and his decision to drop out of university. All of this behaviour is highly consistent with depression.

In early 1950, Bhumibol finally boarded the diesel liner Selandia to return to his kingdom with his 17-year-old fiancée Sirikit. It was a long journey, via the Suez Canal, Aden, Colombo, Penang, Port Swettenham, Malacca and Singapore. The last time he had been aboard the Selandia was as a boy 11 years before, on his way back to Switzerland, with his protective and assertive mother Sangwan and his brother, King Ananda. Now Ananda was dead, and Sangwan was unwell and could not make the trip. Bhumibol had plenty of time to think about what lay head of him, and to feel afraid.

He was heading back to a country roiled by political intrigue, and a region where the U.S. battle against communism was increasingly dominating events. As John Stanton wrote in Life:

Siam wants its King back. Siamese diplomats complain that a big backlog of kingly business has jammed up during the monarch’s prolonged absence…

More important are the political fires blazing all around Siam. Siam, as Asia goes these days, outwardly seems snug and insular, with that oddly idyllic quality that led British soldiers during the last war to dub it “Toyland”. It is rich and not overcrowded. Its food production is more than enough to keep everyone well fed. It boasts a balanced budget, a favourable trade balance and a low price level. Its people, from the wealthiest noblemen to the lowliest tappers in the rubber plantations, are happier than in almost any Asiatic country these days. But the Communist ring is getting tighter around Siam and there are three million Chinese in the country, presumably susceptible to Communist infiltration. In such circumstances, the government feels that its hand may well be strengthened by the presence of the king, even though, of course, his constitutional ministers rule for him. Despite his long absence, Phumiphon is extremely popular in Siam. His songs, Love and My Heart and ‘Tis Sundown, are hits in Bangkok; and whenever His Majesty’s picture appears on a Siamese movie screen, the audience rises and applauds.

In an article in Life‘s sister publication, Time magazine, Stanton had also mocked the king’s long sojourn in Lausanne before finally returning to Thailand:

Three times … the young (22) King had been rumored on the way home from the villa in Lausanne, Switzerland to which he went two months after his brother’s death. Three times something (a Siamese coup, an automobile accident or a mere change of plans) had interfered. Meanwhile, as the King spent his days going to school, organizing a swing band, tinkering with his cameras and driving his cars from Switzerland to Paris, royal duties piled up in Bangkok.

Last week gangling, spectacled Phumiphon was on the Red Sea in the steamship Selandia, with his pretty fiancée, 17-year-old Siamese Princess Sirikit Kitiyakara at his side. In Bangkok’s downtown dance halls, where Siam’s hepcats curve their fingers backward and dance the rumwong, the hit of the week was a song composed by the royal jitterbug Phumiphon himself:

The little bird in a lonely flight
Thinks of itself and feels sad . . .

But Bhumibol had overcome his doubts about ever going back at all, and now he was on his way. Sirikit probably had a lot to do with this. The extent to which Bhumibol deferred to his mother had been often noted, but both of them had been heartbroken and adrift after Ananda’s death. Now another strong and determined woman was in Bhumibol’s life, and the king had finally summoned up the courage to return.

During his long sea voyage, Bhumibol received a letter from Francis Sayre, the son-in-law of former U.S. President Woodrow Wilson and a foreign policy advisor to King Prajadhipok, Rama VII:

Do not let yourself become discouraged. The Thai people themselves have great qualities. They yearn to have back in their midst their King and leader. They will be loyal and true to you… [Economic] problems which menace so many countries do not beset Siam. The country’s greatest dangers lie in other directions than these.

To meet such problems your own course will be clear. You will follow the pathway which your father always followed, the pathway of selfless service for his country and its people. Your ideals like his must be kept untarnished and shining, and your constant compass if you would avoid shipwreck must be utter goodness and integrity of character. Nothing else will so surely win your people’s hearts and strengthen your reign.

Bhumibol’s doubts and fears are clear from his poignant reply, posted from Singapore as the Selandia neared Bangkok:

You know Siam much better than I do. I shall try not to get discouraged, although sometimes I nearly got discouraged even in Switzerland. But I know I must hold on [to] what I think is the right thing to do, and I can assure you I shall try my best.

Part of King Bhumibol’s tragedy is that he really did try his best. In the six decades that followed he strove to do his duty, and struggled to do what he thought was right for Thailand. The malign consequences of the accidental killing of his brother poisoned his reign, but his devotion to duty is unquestionable. At the start of a long hagiographic summary of his reign in the introduction to King Bhumibol Adulyadej: A Life’s Work, Rama IX is described as “extremely disciplined, meticulous and imbued with a great sense of duty following the death of his brother”. It is a rare moment of insight in a book largely bereft of it. But the book fails to say, of course, that the sense of duty that drove Bhumibol was fuelled by his feelings of guilt for killing Ananda.

Bhumibol’s life was utterly changed by Ananda’s death. It robbed him of his only real friend, and unhinged his mother, and of course it made him king, but its impact went much further even than that: the calamity was fused into the DNA of the Ninth Reign. It profoundly shaped Bhumibol’s behaviour and choices as King Rama IX, and blighted Thailand’s destiny, tipping the balance of fate away from democracy and towards prolonged militarism.

Bhumibol himself acknowledged the extent to which Ananda’s death moulded his reign, in comments to William Stevenson:

When my brother died, I became my brother. I did what he wished to do.

Stevenson says Bhumibol was not speaking metaphorically: he meant it literally. Bhumibol believed Ananda’s soul had been melded with his own and became part of who he was as Rama IX. Several times in his discussions with Stevenson recounted in The Revolutionary King, describing events long after his brother’s death, he mentions Ananda was with him:

When I became my brother, we shared a schoolboy innocence. A great asset. I try to keep his clarity of vision, but I am the brother that everyone sees, and I have to be pragmatic. Half of me is him, and half of him is me. So, if anything, I’m really Rama Eight-And-A-Half.

Ananda’s death impacted Bhumibol’s reign in fundamental ways. Firstly, it left him broken and emotionally stunted. The goofy and awkward schoolboy who loved tinkering with gadgets and playing practical jokes was frozen within him, locked inside his new identity: the unsmiling, determined, distant dhammaraja, King Rama IX. Although Stevenson’s book is risible as a factual historical document, The Revolutionary King contains plenty of psychological insight, much of it accidental. One of the insights comes right at the start of the prologue:

Some said he was a god and others said he remained a western schoolboy.

Both personalities are part of Bhumibol’s complex character. He is worshipped as a semi-divine monarch who transcends human frailties and weaknesses, a superhumanly wise and virtuous king, but trapped inside him remains the gauche, gangling 18-year-old boy who never wanted to be king. Famously, after Ananda’s death Bhumibol’s whole demeanour altered. As Handley wrote in The King Never Smiles:

As the palace plunged into shock, suddenly, life changed prodigiously for Bhumibol. Within hours, the bright, often smiling and joking prince, more interested in European cars and American jazz than anything Thailand had to offer, would be named king of a country in which he had spent less than 5 of his 18 years. He would almost never be seen smiling in public again.

Secondly, Ananda’s death pushed Bhumibol headlong into the antiquated rituals and mysticism of Thai royalism, a world previously totally alien to him. He consciously and comprehensively reversed the modernizing approach to royal ritual in place since the rule of King Chulalongkorn, Rama V. A profile of Bhumibol in Britain’s Observer newspaper in 1950 described him as “master and slave of tradition”, and over the decades since he has immersed himself ever deeper in ancient sacral tradition and left his previous Swiss-educated rationalist self further and further behind. Stevenson says this change in Bhumibol began with Ananda’s death, and this is psychologically plausible: one way to cope with his grief, and make sense of the terrible mistake he had made, was to see his ascent to the throne as destined, and to view himself as uniquely special. Bhumibol was of course encouraged in this by those around him who were forever extolling his greatness. A driving theme of many classical tragedies is the hubris of the hero who becomes convinced that he is more than human. Bhumibol began to believe in his own myths and fables, and increasingly lost sight of reality as his reign progressed.

Thirdly, the shame he felt about Ananda’s death gave Bhumibol a consuming need to be loved. He wanted the adulation of his kingdom’s people. He hungered to be praised, absolved, worshipped, and this has been a hallmark of his reign.

Fourth, an underlying paranoia and panic has always been palpable in the palace under Rama IX. There is no doubt that at times Bhumibol’s position was difficult and even dangerous. But this does not fully explain the extent of the anxiety and sense of impending doom that has always hung over him. He knew that the secret of his responsibility for Ananda’s death had the potential to destroy his reign, and it haunted him. Many of his actions over the years only make sense in this context.

Bhumibol began hammering home his warnings of disaster from the earliest years of his reign. His New Year message in 1951 told Thais:

History has told us that nations are annihilated when their people lack unity, when they divide into factions which try to take advantage of each other. I enjoin upon the Thai people to recall with gratitude how our ancestors worked with unanimity and were ready to bear sacrifice for the good of the nation.

The same theme has been one of Rama IX’s core messages ever since. He does not merely tell Thais that unity and a sense of common purpose will be beneficial for the country’s development and prosperity. He insists that without unity, Thailand will face a cataclysm, worse even than the apocalypse that destroyed Ayutthaya; the country will be wiped off the map, and will sink beneath the sea, a shattered and forgotten wreck. Thais listen politely to these regular doom-laden warnings, and the media praises Bhumibol for his immense wisdom and foresight, but in private many people have long questioned whether the king’s scaremongering is justified.

Fifth, this sense of paranoia helps explain the royalist terror of the truth that has become such a crisis in 21st century Thailand, with increasingly rabid enforcement of the lèse majesté law. Bhumibol’s reign was built on lies — about what had happened in 1946 and who was to blame — and the king and those around him are well aware of this. They simply could not allow the kind of open discussion and debate about the monarchy that was commonplace during the reigns of Rama VI and Rama VII. Thailand was dragged backwards, because going forward would have meant allowing freedom of information and freedom of speech that could destroy Bhumibol. Even now, more than six decades after the king shot his brother, Thailand remains cursed by the consequences.

King Bhumibol arrived back in Siam on March 24, 1950. He had been gone for nearly four years. He had been free from the ponderous and suffocating rituals of the Grand Palace and away from the bloodied memories of the Barompiman Hall. Now he had to face his fears and his shame, and cremate his brother’s corpse.

On his arrival, vast crowds turned out to welcome him to a country that had never been his home but had become his kingdom. Dazzled by the scene, Time correspondent Stanton shed some of his scepticism:

Bangkok’s newspapers appeared in odd-colored inks to mark the day — red, blue, green, and a raspberry known locally as impulsive red. Instead of news stories they carried long columns of verse. At 5 a.m., a navy radio station began to broadcast the proceedings. It was a most discreet broadcast, failing to mention that when the King was transferring by PT boat from the liner Selandia to the Sri Ayuthia, he did a good-humored dance to the buffeting of the waves.

As the Sri Ayuthia came up the Chao Phraya river, thousands of sampans rushed out to greet him, and radios blared recordings of Anchor’s Aweigh and the King’s own musical compositions. By noon of a blistering day, crowds jammed all Bangkok vantage points. At 3 p.m. a landing stage at the Memorial Bridge collapsed, pitching a hundred people into the water. Since all Siamese seem to be born swimmers, no one was drowned. Since all Siamese are born cheerful, all came up grinning.

Along the broad King’s Walk, behind whose fashionable modern apartment buildings lurk some of its best-advertised houses of prostitution, Chinese merchants set up hobbyhorse displays and giant paintings of the King. Incense candles were made ready to be lighted and to waft pleasant smells (very important in Siam) when the King arrived. A youngster got tired of waiting, climbed up into a tree and went to sleep. Passers-by tickled the soles of his feet. He went on sleeping. Police wormed their way through the crowd notifying property owners that a police order issued the day before had been a big mistake: contrary to the order, people were allowed to watch the procession from rooftops.

The Royal Guards, in their red coats, black pants and spiked helmets, stood as stiffly as guards at Buckingham Palace. But there was a difference. In Siam there is always a difference. Water boys stood by the guards, watching them closely. When they saw a soldier close his eyes and sway, they would rush up, slosh water down his neck and give him a whiff of smelling salts.

When at last the King came ashore, three small airplanes circled overhead dropping parachutes with bunches of flowers and spraying puffed rice (the gift of greeting) over the town. In a pavilion near the landing stage, the King sat down on his throne and his uncle, the Prince Regent, turned over the powers of the state to him. The King took up the sword of state and thanked the regent. Then, glancing at the Master of the Royal Household to make sure it was all right, the King walked over and exchanged a few words with the British and U.S. ambassadors. He spoke a few words into a golden microphone and stepped into his Daimler, which started with a jerk.

Associated Press estimated that half a million Thais out of a population of 18 million had jammed the streets of Bangkok to welcome the “trim, rather diffident” Bhumibol home:

As Life magazine foresaw, Bhumibol was stepping into a totally different world that would utterly change his life, and end up changing his whole personality too:

For the pomp-starved Siamese, the Arrival, the Coronation and the Cremation will be great events. But for young King Phumiphon they will signal the beginning of a new and strange life in Bangkok, where neither the saddest laments of the saxophone nor the lustiest blast on the trumpet can summon to the palace the lost delights of sweet Lausanne.

On March 29, King Bhumibol cremated Ananda’s remains. The ceremony followed ancient traditions, described by H.G. Quaritch Wales, the British scholar of Thai royal rituals, in his book Siamese State Ceremonies. Quaritch Wales explained how according to the prescribed ritual, a funeral pyre is built, to symbolize Mount Meru — the mythical peak at the centre of both the physical universe and the metaphysical spiritual cosmos according to Hinduisim, Buddhism and Jainism. On the day of the cremation, the urn containing the corpse of the king is opened, and the crown, gold ornaments and lavish clothing removed. “Only the bones remained,” said Quaritch Wales, “and these, if they fell to pieces, were rearranged in the form of a human skeleton.” A lavish, carefully ordered procession carries the body to the pyre; Quaritch Wales noted that similar processions can be seen carved in the stone bas reliefs of the beautiful Bayon temple of the Khmer in Angkor, built nearly a millennium ago. The whole ceremony is designed to emphasize that while the king’s physical body may have died, his spirit — and, crucially of course, the monarchy — survive:

It is particularly important that a Royal Cremation should be celebrated with the greatest possible pomp, because death is the greatest danger that the idea of divine kingship has to combat. It strikes right at the roots of the whole conception, and instills doubt into the minds of a people who, until recently, had not dared even to contemplate the possibility of a king suffering from any mortal infliction; and now, with the spread of western education, modern scepticism, and the shadow of communism, the Royal Cremation plays an even bigger part than formerly in impressing on the people that the king is not dead, but has migrated to a higher plane, where he will work out his destiny as a Bodhisattva for the good of all beings. The mixture of Brahmanism and Buddhism is fortunate: the former lends itself more to the exaltation of the kingship, while the latter emphasises the royal protection of the people’s religion and enables them to enter into the spirit of the ceremonies…

Around 5 p.m. Bhumibol lit a symbolic fire in the funeral pyre, and then after 10:30 p.m., in a private ritual, the king returned with close family and priests to ignite the flames that finally consumed his brother’s remains.

In an analysis for the New York Times, Tillman Durdin wrote that the vast crowds that greeted Bhumibol’s return and watched the cremation ceremony, and the obvious emotion that the king inspired in them, proved the continuing hold of the monarchy over Thais:

Bhumibol told William Stevenson years later that he had been dubious about the archaic cremation ceremonies, but Prince Rangsit convinced him of their value in demonstrating the greatness of royalty to ordinary Thai people:

Lek had to have explained to him the reason for the elaborate rituals Uncle Rangsit had prepared…

The people believed the rising flames lifted a dead king to an invisible throne among the gods. The long delay before this Spiritual Coronation had made people apprehensive. It was essential to make it the celebratory occasion it was meant to be. It summoned up beliefs grounded in the early magic of an agrarian society. The living king wondered grimly if Nan’s spirit would go anywhere until the King’s Death Case was properly closed…

Little Brother Lek saw what Uncle Rangsit meant about using this magic to keep an upper hand. The ebullience of the crowds was intoxicating. The new king walked in intense heat behind his brother’s body in the procession on foot to the pyre. Western diplomats complained of the ordeal, but Lek’s first impulse when Elder Brother died had been to give him a ‘decent burial’, and he had to go through with it. At the auspicious hour calculated by the Royal Astrologers, Lek lit the first candle. Flames leapt high. The Gongs of Victory beat a tattoo to signify the dead king’s ascension.The gold mask of a god, covering Nan’s face, vanished forever.

That night, hundreds of thousands of Siamese stayed with the ashes. Lek, unrecognized in open shirt and loose trousers, came back secretly to look at the glowing embers. Food vendors gave spicy sweetmeats to poor children, and hethought of his own mother when she had been a child with no money. He had madea vow before and he made it again: he would make kingship serve these people. But how was he to do this without… becoming a slave to superstition?

This attempt to rationalize his embrace of ritual and mysticism is typical of Bhumibol. He has always been uncomfortable about allowing foreigners to see this aspect of him too clearly. In her groundbreaking 1986 PhD thesis Thailand: The Soteriological State in the 1970s, Christine Gray notes how the issue of “antinomy” — the clash of Western and Thai cultures — has bedevilled the Thai monarchy since the 1800s:

Since at least the nineteenth century, Thai-Buddhist kings and their political successors have faced an endless variety of situations in which their performance of traditional legitimating activities delegitimates them in the eyes of their Western audiences, and their adoption of Western ideologies and modes of behavior delegitimates them in the eyes of their indigenous audiences…

Born of the colonial experience and decades of East-West dialogues and confrontations, the antinomy problem comprises a major structural principle of modern Thai history. It has had many manifestations over the course of modern Thai history: recurring conflicts over the king’s harem, his performance of lavish state ceremonies, and the sources and nature of the royal income.

For this reason, Bhumibol does his best to present his rational Westernized self to foreign audiences, while reserving the arcane mysticism for domestic consumption.

In late April, Bhumibol married Sirikit in a simple ceremony. And on May 4-5, he formally crowned himself king.

Stevenson claims Bhumibol was still deeply ambivalent about traditional rituals and that at his coronation he felt “trapped in an exhibition of the supernatural”. But for the sake of his supposedly primitive people, he had to get on with it, otherwise they might fall victim to the dangerous lure of communism:

He could see long years stretching ahead when he would have to do this for hours, days, weeks and months…

He sent his mind back to schooldays when he might have laughed with Elder Brother at all this. The situation wasn’t really funny. If he forgot these rituals, Siam would go the way of China, its dynasty ending with the abandonment of ceremony, disorder creating fiefdoms run by a score of warlords, until finally Mao had imposed absolute power…

Bhumibol appears to believe that royal ceremonies and reverence for the king are essential for maintaining social order. And so, Stevenson says, he “rationalised the use of superstitious ritual”. He quotes Bhumibol as telling him:

I thought, well, the Whisk of the Yak’s Tail originally grew out of people’s imaginations. The Sceptre was the thunderbolt of Indra and sprang from minds poetic. Our Golden Tablet of Style and Title derived from a creative act of ancient times. I had to restore the old to invent the new. You become a king. The people respond differently. The nobles approach and want to get closer. You take advice but the decisions are yours and you are terribly alone. Everything has changed.

A confidential cable from British ambassador Thompson recounts the festivities. It is interesting for the insight it gives into Anglo-U.S. rivalries during this period, and its grumbling about the journalism of Time and Life correspondent Stanton. It also shows the misgivings of the British and Americans about the fact that although he had only just arrived back in Thailand, Bhumibol was not planning to stay long:

Diplomatic efforts to try to persuade Bhumibol to stay came to nothing: he and Sirikit left on June 6, 1950, three days before the anniversary of Ananda’s death. The official reason was that Bhumibol had to complete his university studies, but in fact he never returned to Lausanne University and never received a degree.

As before, the king’s long absence and the lack of clarity on when he would return were a source of unease in Thailand. When it was announced that Sirikit was pregnant with the couple’s first child, the government of Field Marshal Phibun Songram once again petitioned Bhumibol to return:

But Bhumibol and Sirikit remained in Switzerland, Thailand’s absent king and queen. Finally, in June 1951, they declared they were ready to come home:

A letter from the Thai embassy in London to the British Foreign Office in October 1951 explained the arrangements for Bhumibol’s return:

Twice during 1951, the swaggering and shamelessly corrupt police chief Phao Sriyanond was sent to Lausanne to try to pressure Bhumibol into giving up some of the powers the royalists had won for him in the 1949 constitution. The king had contemptuously refused, and in retaliation Phao had dropped hints to European media about Bhumibol’s involvement in the death of Ananda. On November 29, 1951, with Bhumibol aboard the Meonia a few days away from Bangkok, the junta moved decisively to curtail his influence. In the so-called “Silent Coup” or “Radio Coup”, the ruling generals announced they were suspending parliament, abrogating the 1949 constitution, and returning to the 1932 version. As the New York Times reported:

It was a carefully planned strike at Bhumibol, launched when he was about to arrive in Thailand and it was too late for him to turn back to Lausanne. The whole purpose of the coup was to deflate the king’s powers, as U.S. charge d’affaires William Turner wrote in a confidential cable to Washington:

As Kobkua says, it was the beginning of a new battle between the monarchy and the military:

To the royalists, both the coup and the manner in which it was launched implicitly implied an affront to the young King who returned to take up permanent residence in his kingdom. Prince Dhani, President of the Supreme Council of State, was ‘bitterly ashamed’ of the Silent Coup…

As a result of the Silent Coup, King Bhumibol began his personal reign amidst a most intense political struggle. At stake was the question whether the Throne would reverse its position to that of a non-entity, being dependent totally depending on the executive and Parliament even for its personal requirements, as it had been compelled to be after the abdication of King Prajadhipok. Or would it be independent in its non-political attributes from the scrutiny and control of the two branches of the government? Since the King was of age and was forced to assume the kingly responsibility thrust upon him the moment he reached Bangkok, it was left to the young and inexperienced King to resolve the political crisis with the ruling clique, to the best advantage of the Throne.

On December 2, Bhumibol, Sirikit and their infant daughter Ubolrat arrived in Bangkok, transferring from the from the Meonia to the Thai naval sloop Meklong for the final stage of the journey down the Chao Phraya river. Rama IX stepped ashore an emasculated, humiliated monarch to be greeted by the smooth and smiling Field Marshal Phibun.

A cable from new British ambassador G.A. Wallinger records his return:

Over the following years, Bhumibol discovered the extent of his political weakness. Phibun and Phao treated him with barely disguised contempt. After the 1951 coup, Bhumibol’s job became purely ceremonial — as a constitutional monarch’s role is supposed to be. Kobkua writes that:

Between 1951 and 1957, King Bhumibol suffered a hard time, being a non-entity ruler in the affairs of the nation. According to the 1932 Constitution amended in 1952, the monarch was in fact a figurehead whose duty it was to symbolize the nation through parts played in various religious and traditional rites and ceremonies. 

Ceremonial kings can sometimes use their position to offer advice to the government, which can be heeded or not, depending on the respect that the monarch has earned from politicians. But Phibun’s junta showed little respect for Rama IX. Nobody wanted his advice. To quote Kobkua again:

During the first decade of his reign, more out of the political situation than choice, Bhumibol spent the greater part of his time fulfilling his personal responsibilities: raising his young family; honing his knowledge and understanding about his kingdom and its problems and politics; updating his talents in music, art and photography; and fulfilling his religious obligations by entering the Buddhist monkhood in 1957. Much of his time was spent away from the oppressive atmosphere of the capital at the Hua Hin Summer Palace, at times for as long as six months a year. 

As Bhumibol himself later told Barbara Crosette of the New York Times:

When I’d open my mouth and suggest something, they’d say: “Your Majesty, you don’t know anything.” So I shut my mouth. I know things, but I shut my mouth. They don’t want me to speak, so I don’t speak.

After that, I do some things that are within my rights and then they see that it is something that is all right. So they begin to understand that I am doing things not for my own enrichment or my own interest. It is for the whole country.

According to William Stevenson, Bhumibol told him he deliberately kept silent in order to wrongfoot the junta and conceal his great intelligence and wisdom:

He had settled upon silence rather than the role of the stammering fool, still with the purpose of concealing his growing wisdom. People read into his silences more than was there… The pose had a curiously intimidating effect on even the most cunning intriguers, at least when they were in the king’s presence.

In fact, Phibun and Phao do not seem to have been greatly intimidated by the unsmiling young monarch. The junta pressed ahead with drafting a new constitution that would formalize the reduction in Bhumibol’s powers. There was little the royalists could do to stop them, but Bhumibol tried to resist. At times palace officials used the threat that Rama IX might abdicate unless he won concessions. As Kobkua says:

He could employ as a last resort the ‘abdication card’ which would plunge the county into the political abyss. Without his signature, the Government set up by the Silent Coup and the coup itself were illegal.

But the military rulers had a nuclear option of their own — threatening to expose Bhumibol as his brother’s killer. Things came to a head in March 1952. Paul Handley described what happened in The King Never Smiles:

The princes now openly threatened the king’s return to Lausanne and abdication. Phibun and the generals calmly retorted that they could name their own king, mentioning Prince Chumbhot. The showdown took place when the government asked for a date on which the king would promulgate the constitution. Bhumibol didn’t answer, and, as he returned to Hua Hin, the cabinet scheduled the morning of March 8. When by March 7 it became clear that he wouldn’t return, the ceremony was canceled. The state radio announced only that the king felt promulgation should not be rushed.

That afternoon Phao led a group of officers to Hua Hin to confront Bhumibol.  Several hours later, they returned to Bangkok, ushering the king along with them.  At 11 the next morning in the Ananta Samakhom throne hall, to the braying of conch-shell horns, Bhumibol promulgated virtually the same constitution his uncle Prajadhipok had signed thirty years earlier. Premier Phibun stood by to countersign.

It was an extraordinary event. Bhumibol had just made his first determined attempt at political intervention, the deployment of the powerful royal prestige he had been told so often was in his crown and his blood. He failed resoundingly. Precisely how the venomous Phao intimidated the king remains secret. The general belief is that, if he didn’t threaten the king’s life, he threatened to expose Bhumibol as Ananda’s killer and to force him off the throne.

A cable from December 1953 discusses efforts by British ambassador Wallinger to encourage better relations between Phibun and Bhumibol. Wallinger told Phibun that the king “seemed to be overcoming his shyness”. Phibun brushed him off politely, saying that Bhumibol was “surrounded by a barrier of antiquated custom”:

But Phibun did make some efforts to improve relations with the king, to little avail. Bhumibol was deeply resentful at his lack of political influence and the lack of respect shown to him by the junta. A British embassy cable from January 1954 noted that the outgoing ambassador and his wife had discerned “a continuing coolness” in the attitude of Bhumibol and Sirikit towards the government. Bhumibol referred to them as “ces gens-la” — equivalent to dismissively calling them “those people” — which as the cable’s author Archie Mackenzie wrote, was “hardly the term one would expect from a constitutional monarch speaking of his own Government”:

But despite the distaste with which he viewed the government, Bhumibol did make overtures to many of them, to try to raise his standing and his influence. He made particular efforts to ingratiate himself with the man he despised most: Phao Sriyanond. According to Handley, “the palace made a special effort to befriend Phao”, partly via Bhumibol and Sirkit’s support of the Border Patrol Police:

In 1953 the king presided at major police ceremonies, granting Phao and other police generals special ranks and decorations and conferring the promotions of senior officers. Bhumibol also presided over the investiture of Phao’s personal brigade of aswin, or knights, actually the thugs who ran Phao’s drugs and protection rackets. The key to this relationship became the BPP. As the CIA client for anticommunist operations, the BPP was better trained and armed than the regular army. Its training center was next to the king’s Hua Hin palace. As he used the BPP airfield, and they served as his local escort, a special relationship blossomed. The king frequently visited the camp, joining the BPP soldiers in sports and shooting. When in 1954 the BPP began building a rural Volunteer Defense Corps of 120,000 men across the country, the king became their patron, presenting flags to corps units.

This special relationship was encouraged by both Phao and the CIA. Eventually, noted a study, the BPP “came to view themselves as holding special responsibility for protection of the Thai nation and the king.” This suited the palace because the relationship transcended Phao, and could function in Phao’s absence, or if he ever challenged the throne. Phao evidently relished the king’s attention, telling diplomats that the palace favored him while disliking Phibun. 

This assiduous courting of Phao was, of course, linked to the police chief’s awareness of Bhumibol’s role in the death of his brother. And in 1955, Phao repaid Bhumibol, executing the three men falsely accused of complicity in killing Ananda. As Handley says:

In 1955, [Phao] did the throne perhaps the most important favour ever: he wrapped up the Ananda death case. It wasn’t pleasant, but it was final.

The executions made Bhumibol’s position, and his secret, safer. But three innocent men were dead as a direct result of Bhumibol killing his brother, and then lying about it at the trial. The two pages had served Bhumibol and Ananda since they were young children. The king’s conscience must surely have been troubled that his actions had now caused the deaths of three more people. But he made no effort to spare their lives, ignoring petitions for a pardon. He could have saved them, and he chose not to do so.

In his 2001 study Monarchy in South East Asia, Roger Kershaw notes that Bhumibol was in a precarious political position during this period and perhaps felt too weak to intervene:

It might be said in defence of King Bhumibol in relation to the execution of innocent men that the situation had become very difficult for him because he had already begun to pit his prerogative against the ruling military clique over the coup-legitimizing Constitution of 1951-52.

Yet this is insufficient to excuse Bhumibol’s actions. Allowing But Pathamasarin, Chit Singhaseni and Chaleo Pootomros to be put to death for a crime he knew for certain they did not commit is perhaps the most morally troubling decision of his entire reign. This is part of the tragedy: once Bhumibol had made up his mind to conceal the truth, then he too became tarnished and demeaned by the consequences of his dishonesty. He had to tell more lies, and to sacrifice others to save himself, and he did so without flinching. He was morally diminished. He became a less honourable and less admirable man.

Bhumibol’s ascent to extraordinary political power and and influence in Thailand began in earnest in 1957. Suddenly his role was transformed. Phibun and Phao, who had marginalized and ignored the king, were overthrown in a coup led by army chief Field Marshal Sarit Thanarat, another of the junta leaders and a longtime rival of Phao for control of the illegal opium trade.

By early 1957, both Phibun and Phao had become increasingly determined to limit the influence of the royalists. Both made overtures to Pridi Banomyong, with a view to discussing his return to Thailand. As a a U.S. cable from January 1957 states, Phao had privately told several people that Pridi had nothing to do with King Ananda’s death. All of this greatly alarmed the palace, and royalists were complicit in Sarit’s coup.

Handley describes Sarit as:

A cinematic picture of the Third World generalissimo: a smiling, generous man of the people, a heavy drinker, an opium trafficker, a vain womanizer, and a ruthless dictator who summarily executed criminals and political rivals to scare others. None of that was important to the princes. What they appreciated was that, never having studied abroad, Sarit subscribed to the idea of a grateful and obedient peasantry under the traditional monarch and his loyal government. 

Sarit viewed the king not as a dangerous potential rival for political influence, but as an invaluable partner whose popularity could be usefully harnessed. Finally Bhumibol had what he had craved: he was treated with respect by the ruler of the kingdom.

Sarit redefined the relationship between the monarchy and the military. As Bruce Lockhart, associate professor at the National University of Singapore, wrote in his 2009 paper Monarchy and Constitution in Recent Thai History:

Sarit cultivated a close relationship with the King and Queen and took great pains to heighten the monarchy’s public role while also restoring some of the prerogatives removed under earlier regimes. His years in power are widely regarded as a watershed in the history of the Thai monarchy and as laying the foundations for the expansion of its prestige and authority in the decades to come. For much of [the period 1957-1973] there was no functioning parliament or constitution… The king maintained a relatively low profile in political terms, with little overt intervention in national affairs, but the “restoration” initiated by Sarit enabled him to gain the moral authority which would undergird his more active role after 1973.

Whatever his own personal morality — or lack thereof — Sarit was obsessed with imposing order and discipline on Thailand. And this has always been an objective central to Bhumibol’s philosophy too. The two men became firm allies. In August 1959, Time magazine reported on Sarit’s drive to make Thailand a more ordered and less chaotic society:

Sustaining himself on a diet of nuts and oranges (he had quit drinking) and working until all hours of the night, Sarit became not only Premier but the nation’s chief fireman, policeman and garbage collector. He commanded housewives to hang their laundry out of sight, abolished pushcarts, opened sheltered markets, dispatched dredges to the silted canals, bought 60 new garbage trucks for Bangkok, ordered pedicabs off the street. When a rash of fires broke out in the business district last winter. Sarit raced to the scene one night, ordered four Chinese merchants shot on the spot — a brutal but effective reminder that the annual custom of burning down shops to collect insurance for the Chinese New Year celebration was thenceforth taboo. Fortnight ago, prowling La Guardia-style about the streets of Bangkok in his chauffeur-driven car, Sarit drew up behind an automobile in which a woman sat eating fruit and throwing the peels out the window. The Premier characteristically took her license-plate number, ordered the police to pick her up and fined her 100 bahts ($5) for littering.

As Thak Chaloemtiarana argued in his seminal 1979 work on the period, Thailand: The Politics of Despotic Paternalism, it was the beginning of a partnership between Bhumibol and the military that was to dominate Thailand’s postwar history.

Sarit may have been an alcoholic and a shameless womanizer (Thak writes that “practically no-one was immune to his overtures — beauty queens, movie stars, night club hostesses, university and secondary school students, the young and not so young”) but he was an ideal ally for the young Bhumibol. Thak writes that:

On the one hand, he was seen as the completely dedicated leader, a firm and decisive person who made great personal sacrifices for the people… He was remembered as a doer and not a talker, whose firmness reduced the frequency of arson, got roads repaired, cleaned up the cities, improved communications, and advanced the economy.

On the other hand, Sarit was also seen as a nakleng, a person who was not afraid to take risks, a person who “lived dangerously”, kind to his friends but cruel to his enemies, a compassionate person, a gambler, a heavy drinker, and a lady-killer. In short, he was the kind of person who represented one central model of Thai masculinity. (The word nakleng itself has ambiguous connotations, but in male circles it is desirable to have friends who are nakleng at heart, for they will be loyal and trustworthy at times of need.) …

The heroes of Thai folklore are often just such persons, who combine daring, courage, compassion, cruelty and gentlemanly debauchery. Thais seem to enjoy a gentleman crook.

From the time Sarit seized power until the rumblings of discontent that led to the student uprising of 1973, the alliance between the military and monarchy appeared to have brought stability to Thailand. As Thak says:

Up until the late 1960s, paternalistic despotism seemed to have worked — there was stability both politically and economically — in part thanks to the Indochina policy of the United States.

Bhumibol did not appear to feel that Thailand needed more democracy. He has consistently shown himself to be comfortable with authoritarian military rule. In comments to Life magazine in 1967, he said dictatorship was preferable to communism:

Communism is impractical. Life is not each to his needs. The one who works today should get the money and the goods, not the one who doesn’t work. Communism can be worse than the Nazis or the fascists. In fact it is more terrible than a dictatorship. If, however, a dictator is a good man, he can do many things for the people. For a short while, Mussolini did many good things for the Italian people.

Authoritarian rule was fine with the United States too. Washington regarded the development of democracy and the rule of the law in Thailand as far less of a priority than ensuring a tough pro-American regime that was willing to crack down on communism. In a secret diplomatic cable in October 1959, U.S. ambassador Alexis Johnson referred without any sense of irony to the State Department’s view that “authoritarianism will remain the norm in Free Asia for a long period”. He continued:

We need not… feel self-conscious about our support of an authoritarian government in Thailand based almost entirely on military strength… Aside from the practical matter of Thailand’s not being ready for a truly democratic form of government, it can be pointed out that the United States derives political support from the Thai Government to an extent and degree which it would be hard to match elsewhere. Furthermore, the generally conservative nature of Thai military and governmental leaders and of long-established institutions (monarchy, Buddhism) furnish a strong barrier against the spread of Communist influence.

The “paternalistic despotism” of Field Marshal Sarit after he seized power in 1957 and ruled Thailand in a symbiotic alliance with King Bhumibol was another version of Thai-style democracy. It involved scrapping the old constitution, abolishing parliament, suspending elections, banning all political parties apart from his own, arresting hundreds of people who disagreed with him, and imposing severe limitations on free speech. In other words, it was flagrantly anti-democratic. But not in Sarit’s view: he insisted that his form of democracy, while admittedly a little unconventional by Western standards, was ideally suited to Thailand. To quote Kobkua:

Sarit’s basic assumption was that the Western model of democracy was out of touch with the fundamental socio-political needs of Thailand simply because it was born and developed to suit the political and social climate in the West. Because of this inherent defect, the various adjustments made to the system were simply political exercises in futility.

Sarit confidently proclaimed to the people of Thailand: “My Government hereby confirms that we will administer the affairs of the state in accordance with the democratic principles and uphold human rights.”

In reality, as Kobkua says, Sarit’s special Thai-style democracy “for all its virtuous intents and purposes was in practice the rule of military dictatorship”.

Bhumibol benefited enormously from Sarit’s rule, and in public always showed him the highest respect. But in private, he expressed contempt for the prime minister. In November 1957 he told British ambassador Sir Richard Whittington and special envoy Malcolm Macdonald that the field marshal was “corrupt and uncouth”. He added that he thought:

The present type of military regime was unhealthy, but saw no alternative to it for the foreseeable future. 

The British, meanwhile, did not see much potential for Bhumibol to expand his influence. An embassy cable in 1958 argued that:

The King is intelligent, reasonably interested in politics, and follows developments with a discerning eye. There is, however, no constitutional role which he could play in politics at least until he reaches the elder statesman phase, a development which is still remote.

Sarit was only 55 years old when he died in December 1963, his liver and kidneys ravaged by decades of alcoholism. A few months later, a public dispute between his second wife and his sons over their inheritance brought the epic scale of Sarit’s corruption out into the open. Forced to investigate because of the public outcry, Sarit’s successors announced they had uncovered assets of more than $140 million that had been amassed over just 11 years, since he had become chairman of the state lottery board in 1952. Sarit had stolen tens of millions of dollars belonging to the state to invest in business and maintain dozens of mistresses around Bangkok, many of whom were given a house, car and salary.

Thais were staggered by revelations about the sheer number of mistresses on his payroll, and the amount of wealth he had amassed. As the New York Times reported in 1969, at the end of the long legal battle over his will:

Thai newspapers listed the names of more than 100 women said to have been involved with Sarit. He had become so notorious for preying on finalists in the annual Miss Thailand beauty pageant — not just the winners, but also many of the runners-up — that the event had to be suspended after 1954. It was only resumed a year after his death, with 17-year-old Abhsara Hongskul crowned Miss Thailand in December 1964.

The Bangkok Post report on her victory noted enigmatically that:

The popular annual contest was stopped 10 years ago for reasons of proprietry because improper attentions had been allegedly pressed on beauty finalists by a member of the Government.

Abhsara went on to win the global Miss Universe title in 1965.

Despite the scandalous revelations that emerged after Sarit’s death, Bhumibol declared an unprecedented 21 days of mourning in the palace for the wayward field marshal and approved ceremonial honours fit for a prince — Sarit’s body lay in state for 100 days in a gold urn under a five-tier royal umbrella. Bhumibol and Sirikit presided at the cremation on March 17, 1964, with Thailand already agog at news reports about Sarit’s stunning accumulation of wealth and women.

Bhumibol’s role and reach were transformed forever during Sarit’s premiership. Phibun had restricted the king’s travel around Thailand, well aware that in rural areas most Thais revered the monarch and that his popularity was a threat to the junta. Sarit gave his blessing to trips around the country, and in late 1955 Bhumibol visited Isaan, the Lao region colonized by the Chakri kings in the 19th century. Bhumibol was the first Chakri monarch ever to visit the province. He was greeted by adoring crowds.

Sarit also encouraged Bhumibol and Sirikit to travel abroad, and they quickly became the world’s favourite fairytale royal couple. A visit to the United States in 1960 was a roaring success, with Time magazine sparing no superlative — or King and I stereotype — in its coverage:

The King of Siam, as any heart-wrung fan of The King and I knows, is likely to be a fellow whose love for Thailand is matched by a thirst for the best of the West. The reigning King, grandson of Anna’s princely Chulalongkorn, comes by it naturally: he was born in Cambridge, Mass. 32 years ago while his father was studying medicine at Harvard, and slakes his thirst with a special passion for clarinet and sax. Last week King Bhumibol Adulyadej (pronounced Poom-i-pon A-dool-ya-date), who looks half his age, and his almond-eyed Queen Sirikit, who looks like mandolins sound, landed in Manhattan on their four-week swing through the U.S. And all the ticker-tape parade, the ride in the subway, the view from the Empire State Building faded into nothing when His Majesty went to dinner with the King of Swing Benny Goodman (and 94 others) at the suburban estate of New York’s Governor Nelson Rockefeller.

For 90 minutes after dinner, Bhumibol and Benny led a foot-stomping, starch-melting jam session. Next day the King toted a sax up to the 22nd-story roof garden above Benny’s Manhattan House apartment for the fulfillment of a jazzman’s dream. With Bhumibol and Benny were Gene Krupa on the skins, Teddy Wilson on the piano, Urbie Green on the trombone, Jonah Jones on trumpet, Red Norvo on vibes. The King stood them toe-to-toe for two hours, paid his royal respects to The Sheik of Araby (in 17 eardrumming choruses), savored Honeysuckle Rose, swung low On the Sunny Side of the Street. Near session’s end, Benny decorated him with a new Selmer sax. The King will use it in his own dozen-man modern band, in which he stars (with a onetime Thai Premier and minister to Washington as sideman) in U.S.-style swing sessions that are broadcast from the palace over the Thai radio every Friday night to his 22 million subjects.

The King’s romance with jazz is pleasantly tolerated by Queen Sirikit. For one thing, Bhumibol is monogamous, unlike most of his celebrated ancestors (his father was the 69th child of King Chulalongkorn). “He doesn’t need any more wives,” Sirikit once said with a smile. “For him, his orchestra is one big concubine.”

In 1962, Time magazine ran an exuberantly chauvinist photo-feature on nine “Reigning Beauties”: the most attractive wives of kings or presidents around the globe besides America’s own Jackie Kennedy. Sirikit, of course, was on the list:

The first First Lady by tenure is Thailand’s exquisite Queen Sirikit, 29, who has been on the throne since 1950 and once even ruled the country during her husband’s retreat to a monastery. A dark-eyed, diminutive (5 ft. 3¾ in.) porcelain beauty with upswept blue black hair and lotus-petal skin, shapely (34½-23-36½) Sirikit was placed again in the world’s best-dressed women list this year—after Jacqueline Kennedy and her sister, Princess Radziwill. She almost always wears traditional Thai gowns, and has influenced most other fashionable Thai women to forgo their preference for Western clothes.

Sirikit, whose father was a prince and Thailand’s Ambassador to Britain, was schooled in Europe, where she met King Bhumibol Adulyadej, the only reigning monarch in the world to have been born in the U.S. (at Harvard, where his father was studying medicine), and a great-grandson of the reformer — King Mongkut, who was Anna’s King of Siam. The Queen, mother of four children, is given much of the credit for her husband’s transformation from an insecure, taciturn youth into a serious, socially conscious monarch. Sirikit, by contrast, is supercharged with sanouk, as the happy-go-lucky Thais almost reverently call the joy of living. Once, when asked why he never smiled, Bhumibol waved to his Queen. Said he: “She is my smile.”

Sirikit’s favourite designer was France’s Pierre Balmain, and the two became friends. A typically eccentric news release from Thailand’s Public Relations Department in 2005 said that the incident that had most impressed Balmain was when he somehow squeezed in between Bhumibol and Sirikit in a two-seater sports car driven by the king in rural Thailand. The statement proudly declares:

He said that the look of villagers toward Their Majesties the King and Queen made him shiver. It was the look of total adoration, so powerful that he could not forget it all his life.

In 1965, the magazine wrote that “one of the best advertisements for Thailand’s soft, nubby silk cloth is the country’s delicately beautiful Queen Sirikit, who has her gowns designed by Balmain”; in 1967 it reported that she was spending half a million dollars a year on Balmain alone.

By this time, the United States had decided that Bhumibol had an essential role to play in the fight against communism in Thailand. Using and boosting his image became an integral part of U.S. strategy, as Time reported in a 1966 article:

Seen on a soft spring night, the luminous spires of the Temple of the Emerald Buddha seem to float over Bangkok scarcely touched by the blare of traffic, the neon slashes of bars and the ragged hurly-burly of mainland Southeast Asia’s largest city. So too does the Kingdom of Thailand, proud heir to virtually seven centuries of uninterrupted independence, seem to soar above the roiling troubles of the region all around it.

Neighboring Laos is half in Communist hands, Cambodia hapless host to the Viet Cong, Burma a xenophobic military backwater. The Chinese talons are less than 100 miles away, North Viet Nam a bare 20 minutes as the U.S. fighter-bombers fly from their Thai bases. Everywhere on the great peninsula, militant Communism, poverty, misery, illiteracy, misrule and a foundering sense of nationhood are the grim order of the Asian day.

With one important exception: The lush and smiling realm of Their Majesties King Bhumibol (pronounced Poom-ee-pone) Adulyadej and Queen Sirikit, which spreads like a green meadow of stability, serenity and strength from Burma down to the Malaysian peninsula – the geopolitical heart of Southeast Asia. Once fabled Siam, rich in rice, elephants, teak and legend, Thailand (literally, Land of the Free) today crackles with a prosperity, a pride of purpose, and a commitment to the fight for freedom that is Peking’s despair and Washington’s delight.

The meadow inevitably has its dark corners, notably the less fecund northeast, where Red insurgency is struggling for a foothold. But the military oligarchy that rules Thailand in the King’s name is confident the Communists will not succeed. So is the U.S. For Thailand is that rarity in the postwar world: a nation avowedly antiCommunist, unashamedly willing to go partners with the U.S. in attacking its problems – and its enemies…

Rarer and more precious than rubies in Southeast Asia, however, is political stability and its sine qua non: a sense of belonging to a nation. The Thais have both. Though various ruling officers have come and gone since a 1932 coup gently displaced the King as absolute ruler, Kings and soldiers have combined, in a typical Thai equilibrium of accommodation, to provide a smooth chain linkage of government.

The Thai sense of nationhood is partly the result of never having felt the trauma of colonial conquest. Even more, it resides in the charisma of the throne, reinforced by the nation’s pervasive Buddhism. In Buddhist theology, the King is one of the highest of reincarnations, rich in his person in past accumulated virtue. Even in remote parts where spirit-worshiping peasants may never have heard of Thailand, they are likely to know — and revere — the King.

In an age when kings have gone out of style and the craft of kingship is all but forgotten, it is the good fortune of Thailand – and of the free world – that the present occupant of the nine-tiered umbrella throne, ninth monarch of the 184-year-old Chakri dynasty, not only takes the business of being a king seriously but has taken it upon himself to mold his emerging nation’s character.

In the musical five-tone Thai tongue, his full name rings like the roll of monsoon thunder on the Mekong: His Majesty the Supreme Divine Lord, Great Strength of the Land, Incomparable Might, Greatest in the Realm, Lord Rama, Holder of the Kingdom, Chief of the Sovereign People, Sovereign of Siam, Supreme Protector and Monarch…

Nearly every Thai household boasts a picture of the King. American information officials in Bangkok long ago concluded that USIS funds could not be better employed than in spreading the likeness of His Majesty.

The Time item on Sirikit’s vast spending on designer gowns sparked an anxious exchange of U.S. cables ahead of another visit by Bhumibol and Sirikit to America, in 1967. Clearly, reports about the queen’s excessive spending were damaging to the Thai monarchy’s ability to win hearts and minds both at home and abroad:

Despite his close working relationship with Sarit, Bhumibol remained suspicious of military rule. The indignities he felt he had been subjected to during Phibun and Phao’s regime still rankled him. As David Morell and Chai-anan Samudavanija wrote in their 1981 study Political Conflict in Thailand:

Especially after Field Marshal Sarit seized power in 1957, a definite symbiotic relationship emerged between the military elite that ruled Thailand and the royalty that reigned over it. Each needed the other for continued pursuit of its own objectives. Neither fully trusted the other, but each had by necessity found ways to accomodate the other’s fundamental requirements. Most directly, the military’s continued control over the political process — as exemplified in its periodic seizures of power — could not succeed without explicit or implicit support from the palace. At the same time, the palace has depended increasingly on the military as the guardian of national security and the continuity of the throne itself.

Following Sarit’s death, the relationship between the palace and the military government grew spikier, and Bhumibol grew more confident and assertive in expanding his influence. To quote Morell and Chai-anan again:

The king began to express more openly his interest in the nation’s political affairs. Such indications took a variety of forms, from private discussions with military leaders and businessmen to public statements and increasingly frequent visits to rural areas. In a variety of ways he managed to influence the course of events.

Sarit’s successors at the helm of the ruling junta, field marshals Thanom Kittikachorn and Praphas Charusathien, shared his flair for corruption on an epic scale, but lacked his ability to mostly charm rather than repel Thailand’s people. As Kobkua observes:

Field Marshals Thanom Kittikachorn and Praphat Charusathien, proved no different in terms of corruption and nepotism. They were, to make matters worse, of a definite lower calibre of leadership, and eventually were forced out of office.

Moreover, the massive influx of U.S. cash and troops had a fundamentally corrupting effect on Thai society. By the late 1960s, as Benedict Anderson wrote in his seminal essay Withdrawal Symptoms:

the huge American presence was generating serious social problems — rampant prostitution, fatherless mixed-blood babies, drug addiction, pollution, and sleazy commercialization of many aspects of Thai life.

Bhumibol used his growing influence to curb some of the excesses of military rule. He was troubled to discover during his trip to the United States in 1967 that the Thai junta had a serious image problem abroad: a preoccupation with how Thailand is viewed by Westerners has been a recurring theme of his reign. As Handley recounts in The King Never Smiles:

The king … returned from Washington, apparently, a reborn believer in democracy and good government… The American press portrayed Thailand, after two decades and a billion dollars of U.S. aid, as led by corrupt, inept and dictatorial generals who presided over an uninhibited narcotics trade, a booming sex industry, and unremitting poverty. In Congress the antiwar senator William Fulbright branded Thailand as undemocratic and not worth supporting. The message from President Johnson, too, was that Thailand had to clean up its image, first by getting Thanom to restore the constitution and democratic elections.

The king pushed Thanom and Phrapas to promulgate a constitution, pointedly telling Thammasat University students in 1968 that it would be the last year the country would be without one. Sure enough, a constitution was duly introduced by the junta in 1968, with great fanfare. Time magazine described the event:

As it is for all major public events, the exact time was chosen by astrologers. They proclaimed 10:29 a.m. to be the most auspicious. At that precise moment, trumpets blared and a gold curtain in Thailand’s National Assembly chamber parted to reveal King Bhumibol Adulyadej seated on a special golden throne beneath the traditional nine-tiered umbrella. The King, wearing a white military dress uniform, sat silently while a court official read the royal proclamation. Then he slowly signed three copies of the document, handwritten by official scribes and stamped with the royal seal. As he did so, a 21-gun salute sounded outside, planes of the Royal Thai Air Force dropped flowers, rice and popcorn, and the gongs and drums of dozens of Buddhist temples reverberated across Bangkok.

Thus last week, after ten years of firm though benevolent military rule, Thailand promulgated a long-delayed new constitution and took the first, if hesitant, step toward a return to representative government. Like the ceremony itself, the constitution is more show than substance: it does not necessarily mean the end of the military regime or, for that matter, even of martial law, under which Thailand has been ruled for a decade. Only the day before the ceremony, General Praphas Charusathien, 55, strongman of a regime in which he holds the posts of Deputy Premier, Interior Minister and army commander, had announced that martial law would remain in force, the new constitution notwithstanding; he also warned that any resumption of political activity could only benefit Communist subversion, which Thailand is fighting in several areas.

Politicians and intellectuals, insisting that the new constitution automatically does away with martial law, were upset by Praphas’ announcement. Said the Bangkok newspaper Siam Rath: “Thailand would be a most extraordinary country if we were to maintain this double standard.”

Bhumibol’s pressure for improved governance encouraged progressive Thais to feel that the palace was on their side, and that the king was championing the cause of democracy. By the late 1960s, Bhumibol was frequently criticizing the government for its corruption, and holding regular dialogues with students, and this in turn emboldened others to speak out against the junta.

The irony was that Bhumibol had no intention of pressing for real democracy. He firmly believed in order, hierarchy and enlightened elite leadership, and regarded the messy imperfect world of democracy with distaste. He didn’t want to abolish authoritarian rule, he just wanted the government to do its job better (and to listen to him more). He acquired his reputation as a democrat by accident. As Handley says:

Apparently much to his chagrin… Bhumibol’s criticisms struck liberal Thai politicians, students, and workers as a direct attack on the government. After being repressed for more than a decade, they thought he was blessing a people-power movement…

A whole generation of students had grown up indoctrinated in Chakri mythology, understanding that the monarchy alone had given the country democracy and constitutionalism and was committed to the people’s rights and aspirations. Bhumibol’s criticisms showed them that their aspirations were aligned with royal virtue, increasing their righteousness…

This placed the king in a compromising position, for he continued to support the military-dominated government. The military and the government were the throne’s primary protectors, and he personally liked Thanom, although he didn’t care much for Praphas. With emboldened students, labor, and politicians growing more noisy by the day, Bhumibol seemed to realize in 1970 what had been unleashed. Changing his language and message, he exhorted students to curb their passions, not to imitate their counterparts abroad, and remain patient. Their duty was to study now and change society later, when they were employed. Meanwhile, they should let authorities do their jobs.

Bhumibol wanted honest and competent governance, but was fundamentally against popular sovereignty. In his view, sovereignty and legitimacy resided with the monarch, not with the unenlightened masses.

Bhumibol seems to have feared that his pressure for better governance could put him in danger. As the Far Eastern Economic Review reported in 1974, a strange sense of insecurity continued to stalk Rama IX, even though his political position was well established and secure:

On Sarit’s death in 1963, his successors, generals Thanom Kittikachorn and Prapas Charusathiara  continued to use the monarchy to legitimise their regime, but by now its prestige had grown to such an extent that the military leaders were thought to be envious, and relations between them and the throne were not always good. The King reportedly disliked Prapas in particular, while having a kinder opinion of Thanom. Sources who had access to the palace in those years report a persistent underlying fear there of a move against the King. For whatever reason, royal invitations to visit India and Sri Lanka… were never taken up during the Thanom regime.

In fact, it is most unlikely that the throne was in danger during those years. The military rulers needed the royal imprimatur too badly. 

In the five years after his brother’s death, Bhumibol had appeared deeply reluctant to return to Thailand. Now, he seemed afraid to leave. The king’s last major foreign trips were in 1967. Since then, he has only spent a single night outside his country, in 1994, when he travelled just inside the borders of neighbouring Laos.

In 1971, the military dictators overthrew their own government in a coup, dissolving the cabinet and parliament and imposing martial law. Bhumibol made no objection. The move only served to deepen animosity towards the regime, and the junta’s position was further weakened by a faltering economy and double-digit inflation. The behaviour of Thanom’s son Narong, who had married Praphas’s daughter, was a particular focal point for popular anger: Thanom, Praphas and Narong became known as the “three tyrants”. The tipping point for the Thai democracy movement came in October 1973: the arrest of 13 student activists brought unprecedented numbers of protesters onto the streets. Up to half a million people packed the area around the Democracy Monument and parliament on October 13, by far the biggest mass demonstration in Thai history. The regime denounced the protesters as communists and republicans, but in fact they were overwhelmingly royalist.

Behind the walls of Chitralada Palace, as protesters rallied in the streets outside, Bhumibol met Thanom and Praphas to try to resolve the crisis and later gave an audience to student representatives. The king believed an incremental and orderly solution would suffice: he extracted from the junta a promise to produce a new constitution within a year — hardly a major concession — and he told the students to get off the streets and end their struggle. But the situation span out of control the following day. On October 14, clumsily aggressive policing provoked violence in sections of the crowd, and then the junta ordered military units to open fire on the protesters. Narong himself fired into the crowd from a helicopter. Students commandeered buses and fire engines and tried to ram them into tanks. At least 70 people were killed in the violence.

Desperately trying to escape the bloodshed, some students clambered over the walls of Chitralada Palace. They were given sanctuary by the royal family. Thongchai Winichakul describes what happened in Toppling Democracy:

Probably the most important act that symbolically defined the monarchy in Thai politics was on the morning of 14 October when demonstrators who were beaten by police in the street beside the palace climbed over the fence seeking refuge inside the palace ground. Then, the royal family in informal dress came out to meet and expressed sympathy to students. By the evening, the military junta had been forced out, thanks to a rival faction within the military that gained the upper hand, and — it is said — to an agreement between the junta and the palace. A grim-faced King Bhumipol appeared on television and declared 14 October “the Most Tragic Day”, and appointed as prime minister the President of his Privy Council. 

The “three tyrants” fled Thailand. It was a watershed moment in the country’s history: a popular uprising had succeeded in forcing political change. Bhumibol had never wanted such a radical outcome and had been wrong-footed by events, eventually deciding to help engineer the departure of Thanom, Praphas and Narong to prevent further bloodshed. Yet he won immense adulation for his perceived support of democracy. The protesters had forced the change, but Bhumibol got the credit.

Handley describes how the events of October 1973 became a seminal moment in terms of fostering Bhumibol’s image as a “democratic” monarch who ruled for the good of the people:

October 14 has ever since taken on legendary proportions, in Thai consciousness and in Bhumibol’s own record. To the students of that and succeeding generations, it was an unprecedented people’s uprising against tyranny…

In official histories, however, it was the king who had single-handedly restored constitutionalism and democracy. Rather than credit the popular uprising, later books and articles overwhelmingly emphasized King Bhumibol’s intervention against the dictators, saving the country from disaster.

However it was characterized, the October 1973 uprising marked a new zenith in the restoration of the throne’s power and grandeur.

The brief democratic interlude that followed was fractious, unruly and unstable. It made King Bhumibol deeply uncomfortable. As was to be expected in a country getting its first taste of democracy for decades, the political atmosphere was chaotic and immature, and the dismal economic situation added to the ferment. Emboldened students and labour leaders held frequent protests and strikes. Bhumibol’s natural inclination towards order and hierarchy left him perplexed and appalled by the pace of change and the forces that had been unleashed. As Morell and Chai-anan argue in Political Conflict in Thailand:

When the October 14, 1973, uprising occurred, it was not at all surprising for the king to intervene to end the bloodshed and order Thanom and Praphat into exile. Lacking the king’s support, the armed forces fell from power. However, those who believed that this meant that the royal institution had shifted its support away  from the military to the people — and, more particularly, to the students, who had led the people’s uprising — they were soon to discover that they had been sadly mistaken. Instead, the palace stood squarely for law and order, for conservatism in Thailand’s many traditional institutions and values.

Bhumibol’s unease was exacerbated by the communist insurgency flaring in Thailand’s deep south and northeastern Lao regions. The disorder reawakened his tendency towards paranoia and insecurity. A mysterious incident at the end of 1973, recounted in secret U.S. cables, illustrates the extent of anxiety in the palace. In December, Bhumibol suddenly became so afraid about something that he abandoned at the last minute the celebrations planned for his birthday in Bangkok and fled to a remote immigration department rest house in Kanchanaburi province. No sensible explanation was ever given. U.S. ambassador William Kintner cabled the news to Washington on December 4, 1973:

After making checks, Kintner remained baffled. In a cable the following day he noted that the king was strangely troubled by the political situation:

WE HAVE KNOWN AND REPORTED FOR SOME TIME THAT KING BHUMIPHOL IS GRAVELY CONCERNED WITH THE CURRENT UNREST IN THAILAND. WHILE THE LABOR AND STUDENT STRIKES ARE NOT YET IN ANY WAY A SERIOUS THREAT TO THE ECONOMY OR TO THE GOVERNMENT’S STABILITY, THEY GIVE AN UNCOMFORTABLE IMPRESSION OF TURMOIL AND UNREST WHICH FEEDS THE FEARS TO THOSE, WHICH MAY INCLUDE THE KING, WHO BELIEVE THAT DIABOLICAL “THIRD HAND” FORCES ARE STIRRING UP TROUBLE IN THE KINGDOM.

Several more cables from this period show that even the Americans — who themselves were in the grip of considerable paranoia over the spread of communism, and hardly inclined to underplay the threat — were perplexed by Bhumibol’s chronic anxiety.  U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger asked the embassy several times to see if Bhumibol would accept an invitation to visit the United States once again. Kintner replied each time that Rama IX was still refusing to travel. During 1975, Charles Whitehouse took over from Kintner as U.S. ambassador. On his first meeting with Bhumibol, the king was full of prognostications of doom:

THE KING WELCOMED ME TO HIS COUNTRY AND SAID THAT I WAS ARRIVING AT A PARTICULARLY DIFFICULT AND DANGEROUS MOMENT NOT ONLY IN THE HISTORY OF THAILAND BUT IN THE BROADER CONTEXT OF WORLD AFFAIRS.

I GAINED THE IMPRESSION FROM THE KING’S MANNER, AS WELL AS FROM HIS REMARKS, THAT HE IS PROFOUNDLY CONCERNED OVER THE EXTERNAL/INTERNAL MENACE HE PERCEIVES TO THE SECURITY OF THE KINGDOM. 

As Benedict Anderson observes in Withdrawal Symptoms, the palace and conservative royalists were in a state of “genuine cultural-ideological panic”. The traditional ordered and hierarchical Thai cosmos appeared to have been turned upside down. Students were lecturing their elders. Workers were demanding their rights. New ideas were everywhere. All the old certainties were suddenly up for debate.

Vientiane, Phnom Penh and Saigon all fell to communist forces in 1975. In December, the Laotian monarchy was abolished and King Sisavang Vatthana formally signed his abdication. Bhumibol was horrified. As Robert Kershaw says: “The abolition of the ‘sister monarchy’ of Laos in December 1975 was traumatic to an extraordinary degree.”

During this period, the king increasingly became aligned with extreme right-wing groups. In particular, the palace developed ties to a shadowy group called Nawapol, which was set up by the military’s anti-communist counterinsurgency task force ISOC. It was a secretive cabal of senior members of the military, bureaucracy, judiciary, Buddhist sangha and business elite. A confidential U.S. cable from 1975 described the organization and gave a prescient warning of the potential dangers it posed to Thailand:

THE WORD NAWAPHON TRANSLATES BOTH AS “NINE FORCES” AND “NEW STRENGTH”. IN A MORE ESOTERIC INTERPREATION, IT WOULD ALSO MEAN “PROTECTOR OF THE NINTH CHAKRI KING”, THE PRESENT REIGNING MONARCH. THE GROUP ITSELF TRANSLITERATES THE WORD AS “NAWAPHOL” FOR ENGLISH USE AS AN UNGRAMMATICAL ACRONYM FOR “NATIONS AROUND THE WORLD AND PEACE OF LOVE”. NEW STRENGTH REPRESENTS A CONSERVATIVE RESTATEMENT OF TRADITIONAL THAI VALUES UPHOLDING THE NATION, RELIGION, AND THE MONARCHY. RELIGION FOR NEW STRENGTH LEADERS MEANS BUDDHISM, AN EMPHASIS THAT COULD CREATE ANTAGONISMS WITH OTHER RELIGIOUS MINORITIES IN THE COUNTRY.

NEW STRENGTH ORGANIZES ITSELF ON A CELL BASIS. THIS HAS ALLOWED THE ORGANIZATION SOME MEASURE OF SECRECY AS IT HAS BUILT ITSELF UP…

NEW STRENGTH HAS… IMPLIED THAT IT HAS THE BACKING OF THE ROYAL FAMILY…

IF NEW STRENGTH SUCCEEDS, THE CONSERVATIVE ELITE MAY FIND THAT IT HAS ENCOURAGED A PHENOMENON THAT IT CANNOT TOTALLY CONTROL…

NEW STRENGTH AIMS TO BE THE PARAMOUNT CONSERVATIVE ORGANIZATION IN THAILAND. ITS EMPHASIS ON THE CONSERVATIVE TRIUMVIRATE OF NATION, RELIGION AND MONARCHY, HOWEVER, HOLDS CONSIDERABLE DANGERS FOR THAILAND. THERE IS A DISTINCT POSSIBILITY THAT NEW STRENGTH’S EMPHASIS ON KING, NATION AND RELIGION COULD DRAG THE MONARCHY AND THE BUDDHIST HIERARCHY INTO THE POLITICAL FRAY. IT THIS HAPPENS, THE ORGANIZATION WILL HAVE CONTRIBUTED TO THE WEAKENING OF THE MONARCHY AS A FACTOR FOR POLITICAL AND SOCIAL STABILITY, TO THE ULTIMATE COST OF THAILAND.

Queen Sirikit played a central role in incubating the paranoia and extremism that infected large sections of the Thai elite during this period. Her views were far to the right even of Bhumibol’s, and she had become the dominant personality in the palace.

From her childhood years, Sirikit sometimes dreamed of ancient battles, charging into the fray on the back of an elephant. She came to believe that in a previous life she had been another famous warrior queen, Suriyothai. Sirikit believed it was her destiny to defend Thailand against the communist menace. In The Revolutionary King, a clearly smitten William Stevenson describes the martial bearing she acquired after becoming queen:

Sirikit still returned in her dreams to what she believed was her earlier incarnation as a warrior queen. She consulted her own informants, who were full of stories about plots to bring down her husband. She shot at cardboard targets, saying bluntly that Buddha sanctioned the destruction of evil. Her targets represented live enemies. She was not squeamish… Photographs show her with lustrous black hair tied back, bracing herself against the sandbags, her long slim fingers supporting the rifle or curled around the trigger. She looks like a legendary Siamese woman warrior with a white ribbon around her head.

By the 1970s, the palace was split into two main factions: Bhumibol and his loyalists who favoured a more conciliatory and inclusive approach to stabilizing Thailand, and Sirikit and her circle who wanted aggressive action to crush their perceived enemies. During the fraught years in the middle of the decade, Sirikit’s camp was in the ascendant, and the weaker Bhumibol was pulled along with them.

Another reason for the split in the palace was conflict over the royal couple’s wayward son Maha Vajiralongkorn. When he turned 20 in 1972, Vajiralongkorn was formally designated as crown prince and heir to the throne. His erratic behaviour was already a cause of concern to his father, while Sirikit doted on him and excused his faults. This was to become an increasing source of tension in the royal family in the years ahead.

Many of the leading figures in Nawapol were particularly close to Sirikit, including supreme court judge Thanin Kraivixien. The royal family also played a central role in fostering another far-right movement: the Village Scouts. Nawapol mobilized the elite rightists, and the Village Scouts mobilized the masses. Both movements exalted the sacred triumvirate of nation, religion and king. Bhumibol personally blessed the maroon kerchiefs worn by the Village Scouts, and wrote their code of conduct. The king and queen, and also Bhumibol’s mother Sangwan, were heavily involved in overseeing induction ceremonies for the group in the mid-1970s.

Rituals of National Loyalty, a study of the movement by Katherine Bowie, one of the few foreigners ever to witness the militia’s initiation rites, describes the surreal world of the Village Scouts:

At first glance [the movement] was an unlikely candidate to succeed in the serious business of combating communist insurgency. The main criterion for membership was participation in a rite of initiation that involved five days and four nights of entertainment interspersed with a few didactic lessons. Participants performed skits, sang lighthearted songs specially written for the movement (such as “Holiday in America” and “Smile! Smile!”), and danced such moves as the bump, then popular in the United States, and the duck-waddle dance (ram pet), a unique dance to the Village Scouts that mimicked a ducks waddle. And yet the Village Scout movement succeeded in becoming the largest right-wing popular organization ever fabricated in Thai history.

The movement spun its magic by drawing on the aura of the Thai monarchy. Intoning the nationalist rhetoric of loyalty to Nation, Religion, and King, the counterinsurgency spin doctors deployed the mystique of royalty. A rumour circulated that King Naresuan, a famous sixteenth century monarch who had been victorious against the Burmese, had appeared in a dream to the queen of Thailand, telling her that “Thailand would fall unless the people were united, and that the Village Scouts was the means to unite them”. Combining royal majesty with village beliefs in sacred amulets, the Village Scout designers developed a magical folklore centering on the scout kerchiefs. Worn by all Village Scouts, these maroon kerchiefs were the most obvious feature distinguishing them from the population at large. The kerchiefs, given to each initiate at the close of the five-day initiation rite, were a special gift from the king of Thailand. They were portrayed as having mystical powers. During the course of the initiation scout instructors told of fires in which householders lost their homes and all their possessions except the sacred scout kerchief; amazing the residents retrieved their scarves completely intact from the burning ashes.

These tales, once deployed, fused with existing lore about sacred amulets that protected their wearers from misfortune. The stories developed a life of their own. Scouts also told various anecdotes about villagers who lost their kerchiefs and met with sundry calamities. For example, I heard frequent variations of a story about a man who had left his kerchief on the dashboard of his car. While he was driving, the royal scarf slipped to the floor near his feet. Because the foot is the most vulgar part of the body, he immediately went berserk. His car came to a stop and he ran about the road, hysterical, until some passing villagers found his scout scarf on the car floor. As soon as they picked up his scarf, he recovered his sanity. In some versions the victim ran about naked; in other versions the kerchief fell to the floor in the house. So engulfing and plausible was the realm of ritual magic that the Thai state had created that a participant committed suicide, apparently because he had lost his kerchief, on the first night I attended a Village Scout event.

The Village Scouts were trained to worship Bhumibol and Sirikit like gods, and to show no mercy to alleged enemies of the palace:

In the course of this five-day ritual, initiates were transformed into sobbing masses of humanity, overwhelmed by their new-found love of the Thai nation and their intensified love of the monarchy. This love of nation rendered initiates capable of hysterical hatred, never made clearer than in the murderous participation of Village Scouts in the atrocities against university students on October 6, 1976.

Nurtured in magic, the movement peaked in mayhem.

The royalists also created a largely urban street movement, the Red Gaurs, to act as muscle and intimidate leftists. As with Nawapol and the Village Scouts, ISOC played a key role in setting up and overseeing the movement. Its members were mainly former soldiers, street thugs and criminals.

The withdrawal of U.S. forces in 1976 seemed to worsen the worries of Rama IX and Queen Sirikit. A cable from U.S. ambassador Whitehouse in July, classified “secret”, clearly shows the ambassador’s puzzlement and exasperation about the climate of fear. He recounts a visit from Bhumibol’s private secretary Thawisan Ladawan and Sirkit’s brother Adul Kitiyakara. Both men seemed shaken and said the king was greatly concerned by some unspecified looming danger. Whitehouse was baffled:

I TOOK THE BULL BY THE HORNS AND TOLD THAWISAN THAT UNLESS THERE WAS SOME PRECISE INTELLIGENCE OF WHICH I WAS NOT AWARE, I COULD NOT UNDERSTAND WHY SUPPORTERS OF THE GOVERNMENT AND OF THE KING HAD WORKED THEMSELVES INTO THIS STATE OF ANXIETY. IT SEEMED TO ME THAT THERE WAS NOTHING OF IMMEDIATE CONCERN AND THAT APPEALS FOR CALM AND TV APPEARANCES BY GOVERNMENT LEADERS CREATED AN ATMOSPHERE OF CRISIS WHEN THAILAND SHOULD TRY TO RADIATE CONFIDENCE AND CALM. IT WAS HARD TO BELIEVE THAT A HANDFUL OF LEFTWING STUDENTS AND A NON-ISSUE LIKE THE U.S. WITHDRAWAL WARRANTED ALL KINDS OF RED GAUR/VILLAGE SCOUT/TROOPS ON STANDBY/ POLICE ON FULL ALERT/ETC TREATMENT…

I AM CONVINCED THAT THE PALACE HAS WORKED ITSELF INTO A STATE OF NERVES AND HOPE THAT THAWISAN’S VERSION OF OUR CONVERSATION WILL BRING SOME PERSPECTIVE INTO THE PALACE GROUP, WHICH BY ITS RECENT ACTIONS HAS TENDED TO POLARIZE PUBLIC OPINION RATHER THAN INSPIRING THE CONFIDENCE WITHOUT WHICH CONDITIONS IN THAILAND CAN ONLY GET RAPIDLY WORSE.

Disastrously for Thailand, Bhumibol did not manage to overcome his paranoia, and conditions in Thailand indeed got rapidly worse, with the appalling slaughter of students at Thammasat University on October 6, 1976.

The royal family was intimately involved in the machinations that led to the massacre: exiled former military ruler Thanom returned to Thailand in September with palace support and was ordained as a monk at Wat Bovornives, regarded as the personal temple of the Chakri dynasty ever since King Mongkut had been abbot there. Red Gaur henchmen provided a cordon of security around the temple. Prime Minister Seni Pramoj — the ardent royalist who had done so much damage to Thailand in the 1940s and who had since reinvented himself as a self-declared liberal democrat — tried to pressure the disgraced dictator to leave, and on September 22 parliament ordered Thanom’s expulsion. A day later, the palace showed its true colours: Bhumibol and Sirikit visited Thanom, accompanied by several senior Nawapol members. It was an extraordinary provocation, a virtual declaration of civil war.

As expected, students responded with several mass rallies. By early October, thousands of protesting students had gathered inside the walled campus of Thammasat University on the Chao Phraya riverside north of the Grand Palace. On October 5, photographs of a mock hanging staged by protesting students inside the campus were published in some Thai newspapers; it was alleged this had been intended to represent the hanging of Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn, although in fact it had been a protest over the murder of two trade unionists by police in Nakhon Pathom a week earlier.

Spurred on by hysterical radio broadcasts accusing the students of lèse majesté and urging “kill them, kill the communists”, thousands of royalist paramilitaries had massed outside the campus by evening.

Shortly before sunrise on October 6, the massacre began. A report in Time magazine describes what followed:

By dawn, an enraged mob of 10,000 rightists armed with rifles, swords and clubs began attacking Thammasat. They were met by M-16 gunfire and grenades. Then the troops moved in. Spearheaded by a dump truck that smashed through the main gate, Thai paratroops, border guards and marines rushed in. Peppering the buildings with small arms fire, grenades and anti-tank shells, the soldiers swept through the campus. The toll: 41 dead (only two of them police) and 180 injured. “They were out for blood,” said one Western newsman who had covered the war in Viet Nam. “It was the worst firefight I’ve ever seen.” Huddled in terror on the central soccer field, student captives were stripped to the waist and kicked around by swaggering soldiers. Shoes, watches, eyeglasses and golden Buddha medallions were confiscated. The wounded were left to bleed – drawing flies in the noonday sun, while military doctors awaited “instructions” from their commanders. A few desperate students managed to escape by the Chao Phya River at the rear of the campus. Others who ran for the streets were set on by the rightist mob. Several were beaten close to death, then hanged, or doused with gasoline and set afire. One was decapitated. The bodies of the lynched victims strung up on trees were mutilated by rioters, who gouged out their eyes, slit their throats and lashed at them with clubs and chains.

Newsweek’s report included a quote from a taxi driver who had been among the spectators cheering on the massacre: “I don’t care how many died. They deserved it for insulting the monarchy.”

Prime Minister Seni Pramoj was deposed by the military the same day. The forces he had empowered with his lies and scheming back in the 1940s had consumed him too, and he became a victim of extremist royalism. An overflattering biography of Seni published in 1989, Alone on the Sharp Edge by David van Praagh, briefly records his thoughts on Bhumibol’s role in his downfall:

That brings Seni to the role of the King, over which he like many other Thais has clearly agonized.

After due reflection during one year of being sick, he says in measured words, “I came to realize that if his majesty had not intervened, the country would have gone into anarchy. Due to him — he dared to intervene — the country is not in anarchy.”

On King Bhumiphol switching from support of democratic forces in October 1973 to support of renewed military rule three years later, Seni asserts: “The King didn’t turn about — he was always for law and order. The end result (in both 1973 and 1976) was law and order.”

This is, of course, an absurd reading of the events of 1976: the king had disregarded the law and the constitution, flouted the wishes of parliament, and enabled the terrible crimes against humanity perpetrated at Thammasat University on October 6. But Seni’s comments are correct in one regard — Bhumibol was never in favour of democracy. His priority was always preserving the primacy of the palace, maintaining the social hierarchy, and preventing radical change.

In Political Conflict in Thailand, Morell and Chai-anan discussed Sirikit’s role in provoking the massacre:

The growing influence of Queen Sirikit may also help explain the monarchy’s actions in 1976. Some close associates of the king argue that His Majesty was, in fact, manipulated by the queen’s close advisers, mostly extreme rightists. Reliable sources suggest that the king had preferred not to get involved in dealing with the return of Praphat and Thanom, but that the queen, for her own reasons, had initiated these moves and finally implicated the king in the situation. After the October 6, 1976, coup, several leaflets distributed in Bangkok argued that the Sanidwong family (the queen’s family) was maneuvering to force the king to abdicate in favor of the crown prince, who was said to be under his mother’s influence. According to this source of information, the palace was divided into two factions: the moderates (the king and his close advisors, such as Kukrit Pramoj and Police Major General Wasit Dejkunchon), and the extreme rightists (the queen and her closest aides, including Thanin Kraivichien, Colonel Uthan Sanidwong, and Deputy Interior Minister Samak).

It’s worth adding that the king’s circle was only “moderate” in comparison with the extremists around the queen; both groups were deeply reactionary and fundamentally opposed to democracy.

Sirikit’s influence was also clear in the wrongheaded palace interventions that followed the massacre. Her acolyte Thanin Kraivixien was installed by the palace as prime minister. He proved to be one of the most extreme, incompetent and unpopular premiers Thailand has ever had, as Benedict Anderson observed in his essay Murder and Progress in Modern Siam:

Thanin… a Sino-Thai jurist of eccentric and extremist views, had no political base of his own, and represented no substantial group or institution. His appointment as Prime Minister reflected the conflict between the palace and the generals. The royal family, panicked by the recent abolition of the Laotian monarchy to which it was related, wanted a strong anticommunist, but also a civilian (since it never fully trusted the military). The generals, even more interested in power than in anticommunism, wanted the installation of one of their own. The palace soon prevailed, but not for very long. Ridiculous in its rhetoric, so that it soon became popularly referred to as the Clam Cabinet, the Thanin government quickly alienated almost everyone by its incompetence and ideological extremism.

 The reason for the “Clam Cabinet” nickname, Anderson explains, was that:

In an early speech Thanin foolishly compared his government to a tender mollusc needing the protection of the hard, thick shell provided by the military, the palace, and the proliferating right-wing vigilante groups.

The royalists were determined to restore traditional hierarchical authority and rid society of the dangerous perversions of democracy. A statement from the Public Relations Office on November 6, 1976, a month after the massacre, sums up what Thailand’s new government thought about the brief period of political freedom:

Our culture, upheld by our ancestors and customs, was neglected, considered obsolete and regarded as a dinosaur or other extinct creature. Some had no respect for their parents, and student disregarded their teachers. They espoused a foreign ideology without realizing that such action is dangerous to our culture and did not listen to the advice of those who have much knowledge of that ideology. National security was frequently threatened over the past 3 years. Anyone who expressed concern for the national security was mocked and regarded as a wasted product of the bureaucratic society by those who labeled themselves as progressive-minded.

During the dark years after the massacre, thousands of students fled the cities to join the communist insurgents in the jungle. There was a sense of terrible betrayal. Many had thought Bhumibol supported their aspirations. They had been very wrong. A poignant interview with an unnamed activist leader by Paul Handley in The King Never Smiles illustrates the disillusionment and shock felt by the students as they realized by early 1976 that the king was not on their side after all. What makes it particularly interesting is the parallel with the experience of Red Shirt activists who have lost faith in the monarchy in the 21st century:

What we learned is that the king was not above politics; that he was just another political player. We discussed the king’s differences and alliances with the military; and that he could be corrupt. We saw the king as his own player in changing alliances. The more we learned, we understood the issue of the monarchy being overthrown in 1932 and then trying to restore itself into power for its own interests… We discussed feudalism and the sakdina system. We saw the king as a remnant of all this… We saw the king as an obstruction to either democracy or socialism, a force of absolute conservatism. We knew we could not talk about this in public… No one would follow us [and] we hardly ever discussed what to do about it.

In order to bolster support for the palace and preserve social order, the royalists realized, force and intimidation were not enough: they had to redouble their efforts to exalt the monarchy and convince all Thais of its benevolence and greatness. And so 1976 not only saw the beginning of unprecedented political interventionism by Bhumibol and Sirikit: it also marked a dramatic escalation of the effort to put the monarchy at the centre of an idealized myth of Thai national identity, which has continued ever since. As Michael K. Connors writes in Democracy and National Identity in Thailand:

From the lowliest office to mega-ministries, images of the King and royal family appear on bulletins, walls and calendars. The King’s aphorisms circulate in memos reminding kharachakan (the king’s servants) of their duties. His statements lay the basis for thousands of royal projects. This king’s apparent omnipresence has intensified since 1976, whereafter all state agencies have complied in propagating the ideology of ‘democracy with the king as head of state’. This idea had, in principle, informed previous constitutions; after 1976 it became part of public pronouncements to delineate the specificity of Thai democracy. The deployment of the term pointed to prestigious gains made by the monarchy after its rehabilitation under the Sarit dictatorship and its subsequent mediating and crisis-management roles in the events of 1973 and 1976. For those in the know, the term also resonated with Bhumiphol Adulyadej’s newly acquired political power as king. This power had grown as a result of his relatively unscrutinized and shrewd political interventions. If, in the mid-1970s, the fate of the monarchy seemed uncertain, within less than a decade even progressive liberals could not conceive of the Thai nation without its wise king. The divine-like status of Bhumiphol is not part of the family treasure, but something that hundreds of officials in the palace and other agencies have contrived to create…

In constructing and deploying a renewed national identity in the post-1976 period, state actors addressed the people as specifically ‘Thai’, the attributes of which were exemplified by the king… Building a disciplined self/nation was the aim of national ideology.

This intense escalation of royalist propaganda has continued unabated ever since 1976; Thongchai Winichakul describes it as “hyper-royalism”. It required a full-scale retreat from reality. In place of the truth, Thais were relentlessly indoctrinated with fairy tales and falsehoods. To enforce adherence to the fictional official narrative, the lèse majesté law was tightened and imposed increasingly harshly. As Handley explains:

Before October 1976, a lese-majesté conviction carried up to seven years’ imprisonment. This gave judges great leeway, and many people who were accused got off lightly, with suspended sentences or a few months in prison. Many judges understood that lese-majesté had become a political tool used by the right, often without justification. Two weeks after taking power, though, Tanin had the penal code amended to assign a minimum of three years’ imprisonment and a maximum of 15 years for lese-majesté. There was a surge in arrests. In 1975, 10 people were arrested for  lese-majesté; in 1976, 21; and in 1977, under Tanin’s tough regime, 42. One man was accused of royal desecration for wiping a table with a royally-bestowed Village Scout scarf.

it was not just within Thailand that Bhumibol was desperate to rehabilitate the image of the palace. He was extremely concerned about how the savagery at Thammasat had been reported abroad, and fretted that foreigners would now have a poor impression of the Thai monarchy. Shortly after the massacre, U.S. ambassador Whitehouse met the king’s private secretary, who told him that this was an issue weighing on the king’s mind. In a secret cable, Whitehouse reported their talk:

THAWISAN SAID THE KING HAD ASKED HIM TO GET MY ADVICE ON HOW THAILAND COULD OVERCOME THE FALSE IMPRESSION WHICH HAD BEEN GIVEN IN EUROPE AND AMERICA OF RECENT EVENTS HERE. HE SAID THE KING HOPED THAT THERE WAS SOME WAY BY WHICH THE U S COULD EXPLAIN THAT THE CHANGE OF GOVERNEMENT HAD BEEN BROUGHT ABOUT AS A RESULT OF THE WEAKNESS OF THE SENI GOVERNMENT AND THE PROVOCATIVE ACTIONS OF COMMUNIST-INSPIRED STUDENTS.

I SAID THAT FRANKLY I COULD SEE NO WAY OF OVERCOMING THE WORLDWIDE IMPACT OF THE PHOTO AND TELEVISION COVERAGE OF THE EVENTS OF OCTOBER 6TH AT THAMMASAT UNIVERSITY. FRIENDS OF THAILAND COULD ONLY HOPE THAT THE KIND OF ADMINISTRATION WHICH THE NEW GOVERNMENT WOULD PROVIDE AND THE SORT OF LEADERSHIP IT WOULD GIVE THE COUNTRY WOULD ERASE THE IMAGES OF BRUTALITY WHICH HAVE BEEN SO WIDELY PUBLICIZED. THAWISAN AGREED THAT THIS WAS PROBABLY THE ONLY REASONABLE COURSE TO PURSUE.

One way Bhumibol sought to restore his saintlike image and wipe away the stains of the bloodletting at Thammasat was by cooperating with a BBC documentary broadcast in 1980. Very occasionally during the preceding decades, Bhumibol had given special access to chosen foreign journalists, who tended to dutifully churn out hagiographic feature stories afterwards. The BBC film, Soul of a Nation, was an evolution of this approach: journalist David Lomax and a camera crew were given unprecedented access to the king and also interviewed Sirikit.

BBC documentaries are supposed to follow strict guidelines of impartiality, and interference in the editorial process by outside interests is supposed to be robustly resisted. But this was to be no ordinary documentary: secret cables in the National Archives in London show that the British embassy in Bangkok was heavily involved in setting the tone of the film, working closely with producer Bridget Winter in contravention of the BBC’s code of ethics. The film was shown to Bhumibol and Sirikit ahead of broadcast and they were given the opportunity to suggest changes, again contrary to standard journalistic practice and media ethics. Lomax, who did most of the reporting for the film, travelling to Isaan province with the king and interviewing him in his palace in the Phuphan mountains, was later removed from the documentary team because — as a genuine journalist — he wanted to give a balanced picture and include discussion of important but sensitive issues like the crown prince’s unpopularity. Winter was appalled at the thought and shut him out. Frustrated, Lomax wrote an article for the Sunday Telegraph expressing his view that the documentary would fail to present a complete and honest portrait of the royals. This caused some worried cable traffic between the embassy and the Foreign Office in London; according to the cables, Winter was so outraged by Lomax’s behaviour that she lodged an official complaint about him with the BBC.

Peter Tripp, the British ambassador in Bangkok, clearly relished the special access to Bhumibol and Sirikit that he obtained by acting as a go-between for Bhumibol and the BBC. In a secret cable in January 1980, he recounted a visit to Chitralada Palace the day before to hear the opinions of Bhumibol and Sirikit about their advance screening of the two-hour film. Bhumibol sent warm thanks to BBC producer Bridget Winter, and made a special request for Tripp to find out what “a cross section of ordinary people in Britain” thought about him after viewing the documentary. He told Tripp: “Please ask your friends to look at the film and let you know so that you can tell me.” It was a strangely abject request for a nation’s monarch to make, and once again it betrayed Bhumibol’s anxiety about his image abroad and what people thought of him.

Queen Sirikit was unreservedly approving of the documentary but Bhumibol objected to one paragraph in the script. The details of this paragraph have been censored out of cables in the British archives; a fragment of one cable suggests it may have been a reference to his revival of the archaic rajasap royal language. But aside from this, he was pleased.

The key cable detailing the king’s reaction is below, complete with Tripp’s rather bumbling instructions to London on how to poll some acquaintances of his about their views of the royals, and his hapless request to be sent a copy of the film for himself. The reason the cable is printed on green paper is because it is a censored copy, and paragraph 2 has been blacked out. It is likely this paragraph referred to the contentious passage in the film.

A later cable from Tripp said Sirikit was so delighted with the film that she wanted it to be shown in U.S. movie theatres during her forthcoming two-month private visit to America. Specifically, she wanted it shown in each of the cities she would visit a few days before her scheduled arrival there. As with the king’s request for an informal opinion poll, Tripp dutifully relayed Sirikit’s rather fanciful wishes to London, adding that he thought it was an excellent idea. The British ambassador had been reduced to acting as an informal public relations man for the Thai palace.

Unfortunately for Sirikit, her U.S. trip in 1980 turned out to be a PR disaster. Handley recounts what happened:

Her image plunged further with the spread of a damning underground account of her early 1980 trip to the United States with Prince Vajiralongkorn. The CPT was presumed to have issued the report, in which the author characterized the trip as “67 days, 100 million baht ($5 million), and had enough insider information and accurate details to be wholly believable. The book alleged that the primary reason for the trip was plastic surgery, with a second reason being to collect more money for her personal needs in the name of her charities, and a third to stash palace wealth abroad in case the monarchy was forced to flee the country. It described the queen’s four large fund raisers in different American cities, reaping hundreds of thousands of dollars. Then it detailed her subsequent purchases of two homes in exclusive southern California neighbourhoods for her children, luxury cars for her son’s consorts, and a $200,000 ring for herself. The authors cited meetings with specific New York banks as evidence that the royals were putting assets offshore.

Sirikit’s antics were in stark contrast to the description she had given the BBC’s Lomax of the great strains of queenship. During her Soul of a Nation interview she told him:

Kings and queens of Thailand have always been in close contact with the people. Really. And they usually regard the king as the father of the nation. That is why we do not have much private life, because we are considered father and mother of the nation. We are all the time with the people… We are an underdeveloped country. So the task of mere visiting the people as a conventional duty of the head of state is nonsense. If we cannot participate in helping to alleviate the misery of the people, then we consider it a failure…

To give, not to take, only to give; to love, so that is the reason my husband and I can work, year after year, day after day. We have been ill. But we know that when it is time to die nobody can escape. So it’s better that we contribute as much as we can to society, and reserve some small limited time for us.

Soul of a Nation has interesting parallels with William Stevenson’s book The Revolutionary King and, of course, with the latest royalist propaganda tome, King Bhumibol Adulyadej: A Life’s Work. All three are hagiographies disguised as serious journalistic or biographical projects, produced by cooperative foreigners who were quite happy to toe the official line and avoid digging too deeply into uncomfortable truths. And very tellingly, all three endeavour to lay to rest the suspicions over Bhumibol’s role in his brother’s death. None of them succeed. Bhumibol told Lomax in his Soul of a Nation interview that Ananda had been murdered but that the details were a mystery, hardly an adequate response. Stevenson’s outrageous attempt to pin the blame on a nefarious Japanese spy disguised as a monk was predictably disastrous, and raised embarrassing questions about what on earth Bhumibol had been thinking: didn’t he realize this explanation would never fly? KBAALW went back to portraying the whole thing as a baffling mystery, making a pretence of giving a detailed account of the facts of the case while deliberately steering readers away from the real story. Bhumibol’s obsession with his image, and his repeated efforts to silence suspicions about 1946, reveal his deep insecurities and guilt about what happened. He was tormented by the idea that people might think badly of him. He wanted to be revered.

The Thammasat massacre only accentuated these tendencies. Bhumibol was already haunted by the death of his brother, and the executions of the three men who were falsely accused of plotting to kill Ananda. Now he had even more blood on his hands, and his response to the guilt was to to follow the example of royalist propaganda, and retreat from reality. Bhumibol became an increasingly distant and imperious figure. He started to believe the myths that he was smarter, and better, and wiser, than everybody else. He seems to have dealt with his traumatic mistakes by telling himself they were not his fault. He fought his shame by convincing himself he was superior to other people. And he was consumed by the need to protect his image, to try to ensure that nobody blamed him for what he had done. It brought out some of his less admirable traits: vanity, deceitfulness, a hunger for praise and adoration. He started to believe that because he was a special human being, dedicated to a higher purpose, ordinary ethical codes of behaviour did not apply to him. It was an easy trap for him to fall into because of course, as the king of Thailand, it was literally true: he was above the law.

Bhumibol was becoming more and more morally compromised as his reign wore on, but he believed he was doing the best he could for Thailand. He genuinely cared. He truly wanted to improve the lives of ordinary people. He was convinced that the best way to do so was to preserve the traditional hierarchy and order of Thai society and strive to make incremental improvements to help the poor better support themselves.

During the 1960s, the king’s approach to tackling the communist insurgency was clearly more progressive and useful than the incompetent and counterproductive military strategy pursued by the ruling generals. Bhumibol understood the importance of making genuine improvements in the lives of the poor, and of winning hearts and minds. Particularly with regard to the impoverished hill tribes in northern Thailand and the rural poor near Prachuab Khiri Khan, where a Chakri summer palace and the training centre for the Border Patrol Police were located, Bhumibol showed an interest in implementing practical policies that could win the loyalty of the locals, rather than simply intimidating them into submission through force. The “royal projects”, as Bhumibol’s developmental activities became known, made a real difference in some areas, and they allowed the king to escape the claustrophobic confines of palace life, travel his kingdom, and meet ordinary people. Those he met were often profoundly moved, even more so when they realized their monarch was trying to help their communities. Bhumibol, too, was moved and inspired by the unconditional adulation he received.

But the royal projects have never been more than a fig leaf to make the systematic social injustice and incompetence of Thai governance seem somehow more acceptable. Whatever good that was done must be weighed against the immense damage that most of Thailand’s poor have suffered as a result of the persistent failure to allow genuine democracy and accountability, and the lack of comprehensive and coherent development programmes. Instead of fixing the system, Bhumibol always preferred to work within a corrupt and failing system, so that he could present himself as the sole saviour of Thais. It always had to be about him: he was the source of goodness and largesse. The villages that happened to catch his attention benefited, but across Thailand thousands of other villages remained neglected and impoverished, praying for royal help that never came.

There was always a fundamental amateurishness about Bhumibol’s efforts to help the poor. He was proclaimed to be an immensely wise monarch with a brilliant grasp of science, agriculture, hydrology and development economics. Disastrously, he came to believe that this idealized portrayal of him was literally true. But Bhumibol was just an emotionally damaged and socially awkward Thai aristocrat trying to do some good. In many ways, he was still the gauche and heartbroken Swiss-educated schoolboy who had accidentally become king of a country he barely knew.

In its clumsy efforts to eulogize Rama IX, King Bhumibol Adulyadej: A Life’s Work only succeeds in demonstrating the inadequacy of his development methods. On pages 248-9, in a chapter devoted to extolling the alleged brilliance of the king’s strategy, the book discusses Bhumibol’s working methods and his collaboration with two key members of his inner circle — irrigation bureaucrat Pramote Maiklad, and Sumet Tantivejkul, who has managed the royal projects since the 1980s (both men are on the KBAALW advisory board):

Trips were arranged at short notice, often only a day in advance, sometimes just hours. “The king doesn’t like to make a fuss, setting up tents and preparing,” explains Pramote. On one occasion, Pramote’s team received three hours’ notice and rightly guessed that the king wanted to visit a village on the other side of a stream. They quickly built a makeshift bridge. “The king was surprised because there was no bridge on his map,” Pramote recalls. “I had guessed he would need this to get to the village.”

Many trips and projects were inspired by petitions. Petitioning the king was a traditional form of communication that allowed a monarch to hear grievances and engage with the problems of ordinary people. The Office of His Majesty’s Principle Private Secretary, which receives the petitions, would pass on those related to potential development projects to Sumet’s office. After an assessment of the problem, information might be sent to the king. If needed, the king would prepare a 1:50,000-scale map and carry out initial research before travelling to the petitioner’s area. In Bangkok, he would spend hours in his study at Chitralada Villa, surrounded by teleprinters and communication devices, poring over materials spread across the floor, using his radio to talk to officials, day or night, using his personal call sign. Every day he would receive weather forecasts from the Department of Meteorology. This was his operations centre — and pages were under strict instructions not to tidy up. Nobody but the king was allowed to throw anything into the bin.

The king would often drive himself to the location and walk through the farms, to get a feel for the place and also to show moral support to the farmers. Sumet’s team helped collect information at the site. The king then held a public hearing on the spot — an approach that came to be known as “rapid rural appraisal”. Sometimes people rejected the initial proposal and alternatives were considered. Once an agreement was reached with the villagers and local officials, the king would then turn to Sumet, who managed funding, and say, “Tung ngoen (Moneybags), do you agree?”

This passage displays many of the flaws of Bhumibol’s approach. It was utterly ad hoc and unprofessional: destinations were decided at the last minute, limited research was done, and there was no overarching strategy at all. The description of Bhumibol sitting alone in his Chitralada Palace study listening to radio chatter and surrounded by a chaotic mess of papers is both poignant and damning: it recalls John Stanton’s account of the teenage Bhumibol in his Lausanne playroom, tinkering with gadgets, in the aftermath of Ananda’s death. This kind of personalized, inefficient and unstructured approach is no way to manage a nation’s development. It is the way a precocious but immature schoolboy might try to manage the task.

Bhumibol’s painstaking efforts to make hand-drawn maps of the places he would visit (using pencils that KBAALW adoringly tells us he sharpened himself) illustrate his lack of understanding about how to formulate a genuine development strategy or truly empathize with the people he was trying to help. KBAALW tries to make this sound like a virtue:

On a tour of a project in 1992 with French journalist Jean-Francois Mongibeaux iof Le Figaro magazine, the king spread his handmade maps on a table and explained his approach. “I draw these maps myself. Thus I know the names of all the villages I visit. One has to be simple. Simplify all things. If one entrusts a project to experts, they write up big files, which no one understands. Us, we like to go on the ground, to speak with people, to know about their problems.” Thai society has a strong tradition of hierarchy and patronage, and this working method tended to bypass the traditional order of doing business and contrasted with the way the government ran their ministries and departments. This hands-on work in the fields and highlands also contrasted dramatically with his formal duties in the capital, where the king, during some years, presided over more than 800 ceremonies and official engagements in a year. While court officials in Bangkok would normally speak to the king in the ancient royal language of rajasap, farmers and other commoners were free to talk to the king in whatever dialect of Thai they spoke. The king himself had a good memory for names and faces. In an effort to create a sense of shared experience with people, the palace would send back photos of royal visits to the villages for people to hang on their walls. The visits helped increase a sense of attachment to the monarchy. For most farmers, like many others, an encounter with the king was considered a lifetime highlight.

This passage makes clear the essential theatricality of what Bhumibol was doing. It was all for show: the long trudge through fields and up mountains by the king and members of the royal family, his studied informality, his supposed disregard for bureaucracy and hierarchy, and his banter with his “moneybags” sidekick Sumet. But what KBAALW fails to say is that Bhumibol has always fought to preserve, not undermine, the hierarchy of Thai society. It was Bhumibol who reintroduced the use of rajasap and prostration in formal settings. This was central to his vision of how Thai society should work. He never tried to change the system: it was essential to his mythmaking. He wanted to be seen as a modern monarch who would circumvent the system to benefit the poor and powerless. That meant he needed the system more than anyone.

Bhumibol never seems to have understood that the map is not the territory. His little hand-drawn diagrams demonstrate not the depth of his understanding, but its shallowness. The same is true of his many hours alone in his room listening to shortwave radio sets, and sometimes contacting people via radio with his royal call sign. Daily royal news broadcasts regularly showed the king in a gadget-cluttered study or operations room, poring over maps spread out in front of him or twiddling dials on outdated radio equipment, as if this proved he had his finger on the pulse of what was going on in the country. The Public Relations Department website carries an article by Police Major General Suchart Phueaksakon entitled “The Talent of His Majesty King Bhumibol Adulyadej the Great in Communication”:

His Majesty was deeply concerned and wished to be promptly informed of the real living conditions of his people, so as to be able to provide support and assistance accordingly and in the most timely manner. He realized that radio communication was the best medium at hand.

As His Majesty the King studied basic principles of radio transmission, he came to grasp one very important point, namely the antenna. His Majesty remarked that transmitting or receiving would never work effectively without an antenna or with an inferior antenna, even if a powerful transmitter and a very good receiver are acquired.

His Majesty asked several questions about the properties of the antenna, such as its proper length, and the type and the amount of metal needed. In fact, his remarks led to real development of antennas in the country.

Later, I presented him with two FM-5 radio transmitters, and a book of radio calling codes, or the list of “Wo” codes used in the police service, so as to strengthen his knowledge and experience in radio communication, and accorded him the call signs “Ko So 9″ and “Ro O 3.” His Majesty has since used the two transmitters and communicated in the National Police network, where he was known as “Pathumwan.”…

Through these police radio networks, His Majesty has been constantly informed of events as they happen, such as crime reports, fire incidents, and the traffic situation. When His Majesty traveled from the royal residence to perform various functions, traffic was blocked along the route for quite a long time beforehand, causing inconvenience to road users. His Majesty therefore commanded the aide-de-camp to coordinate with the Police Department and allow local police personnel to communicate directly with the Royal Thai aide-de-camp Department on the exact time of His Majesty’s departure and the route to be taken, so that the blocking of traffic could be made for the shortest time possible, so that the general public would not suffer.

This kind of propaganda, with its forlorn suggestion that Bhumibol’s banal comments about radio antennae are somehow profound, and that he cleverly used technology to be aware of what was going on outside the archaic bubble he was trapped in, just demonstrates that he was never really in touch with what was happening in Thailand at all. As Clifford Geertz wrote in his essay Centers, Kings and Charisma: Symbolics of Power, a recurring element of the theatrics of monarchy through the ages has been “the ceremonial forms by which kings take symbolic possession of their realm”:

When kings journey around the countryside, making appearances, attending fêtes, conferring honors, exchanging gifts, or defying rivals, they mark it, like some wolf or tiger spreading his scent through his territory, as almost physically part of them.

Bhumibol’s travels around Thailand for his royal projects, his hours spent monitoring radio chatter, and his pseudo-scientific rainmaking efforts, are all part of a ritualistic, theatrical display by a monarch of his supposed mystical connection with his kingdom and the cosmos. Anybody with genuine understanding of development economics or communications can see that the effort is purely symbolic: Bhumibol could never hope to actually comprehend Thailand this way. But Bhumibol and his circle came to believe their own propaganda. Sumet wrote in Leaders magazine in 2006 that: ” It was soon discovered that His Majesty knew every inch of his land and every detail of his people.” The line between reality and fantasy had become blurred.

Besides the propaganda value, and Bhumibol’s need to feel he was doing something good and important, there was another reason for the way the king approached his royal projects: it was his escape from the suffocating embrace of royal ritual and his unravelling family life. Striding through rural Thailand on his way to assess another project, Bhumibol could feel free for a few hours. His evenings alone making crude hand-drawn maps and listening to radio chatter allowed him the solitary time he needed to cope with the burdens of kingship and his guilt about the past. Fiddling with technical gadgets (or playing with loyal pet dogs) was so much easier than having to deal with the messy complexity of real people and politics. He clung to his maps and his radio sets. It was his way of coping.

The BBC’s David Lomax homed in on this issue in his interviews of Bhumibol for Soul of a Nation. In an Isaan village towards the end of a royal visit, Lomax asked the king about the villagers they had met:

Lomax: Do they have any particular problem?

Bhumibol: No — no problem. They were very happy. And I asked them what temple they were going to, and they said the name… Looking at the map, there is an old temple here, and they did not remember the name.

Lomax: They seem to be impressed with your geographical knowledge.

Bhumibol: Because they are very happy when somebody comes and knows about their village.

Lomax: But you go everywhere with this map, I notice. Not this particular map, but there is never a map far from your hand.

Bhumibol: I try to have a map so that I know where I am going and they are happy when they know that the official map … their village is on the map.

Lomax: Are there some occasions when people live in villages that aren’t marked on the map?

Bhumibol: That is what happened now. There is a village that has no name and I put a name on it.

Later, with Lomax and Bhumibol both seated on the floor of his study in his Phupan Mountain palace in Isaan, surrounded by maps, radios and telex machines, the BBC journalist returned to the same theme:

Lomax: Could you explain what you are doing with these maps please?

Bhumibol: If I see something… you see circles there — places that can be developed. You can see a place there with a red thing. It is for damming and making a small reservoir. Then… the irrigation engineers, I can ask them if it practical to do that. And sometimes they go an inspect the place and have a survey on the spot.

Lomax: Why do you have all these radio sets here — all these receivers, transmitters, telexes? What are they all for?

Bhumibol: Well, communication. I think you should know that a radio is for communication. I don’t have television here.

Lomax: I have heard people say that this is your personal intelligence network.

Bhumibol: I wouldn’t say intelligence, but sometimes it is very… very useful. Sometimes, when you know about the news of some disaster hitting somewhere, you can help them very… very quickly. And then speed is the most important factor. So I get the news via the telex or the radio. Most of what you hear here doesn’t concern me. Sometimes there is a murder somewhere, Sometimes news that they have caught a caravan of heroin, something like that. It is better than broadcasts or other things.

Lomax: When you sit here by yourself for several hours every evening, looking at your maps and listening to your radios, is that because you are a lonely man or because you need to have some time by yourself after all the public side of your life outside?

Bhumibol: That is a question that can be answered in many ways. I am not lonely and I have work to do, so I have to do work. The way of doing work is to have some concentration and some peace and then one can think more clearly. It is a way of preparing myself to be able to do whatever circumstances will have me do. I gather information by listening. I gather information by looking at the maps. or reading, or thinking, and then when the time comes, I have the material in my head.

These are not the responses of a supremely wise and talented monarch with a deep mystical understanding of his people and his kingdom. Quite the reverse. Bhumibol’s unsophisticated answers demonstrate the extent to which he was lost, adrift and uncomprehending, however many maps he drew or radios he tuned into.

Meanwhile, Bhumibol’s domestic life was unravelling further. Tensions between the king and Sirikit over their children were becoming increasingly acrimonious. Bhumibol had been devastated when his favourite daughter Ubolratana had renounced royal life to marry an American in 1972. In the years that followed, the failings of his only son Vajiralongkorn became more and more apparent. Yet Sirikit indulged the prince, and formed a strong emotional bond with him, in stark contrast to the coldness between the Vajiralongkorn and Bhumibol. The dreadful political events of 1976 demonstrated that the queen Sirikit had the upper hand in the palace, and in an effort to bolster the influence of her line of the royal family, she persuaded Vajiralongkorn to get engaged to Sirikit’s 20-year-old niece, Soamsawali Kitiyakara. They were married on January 3, 1977.

One of the many underreported aspects of Thailand’s royal family is the scheming and hostility between different Chakri bloodlines. Many of those in Sirikit’s circle told her she was more royal than Bhumibol: his mother had been a commoner, while both Sirikit’s parents had impeccable lineage. And Sirikit became determined to advance the interests of her branch of the family. Pressuring Vajiralongkorn to marry his own cousin from Sirikit’s family seemed like an ideal way of doing so.

The prince had grown close to the daughter of a Thai diplomat while living in Australia, and discussed the possibility of marriage. But Sirikit was determined that Vajiralongkorn marry Soamsawali for the sake of her own dynastic ambitions. As Handley says:

The prince didn’t like her. He preferred beautiful, clever and forthright women. At 19, Somsawali was plain, dull, timid and not well educated or hugely intelligent. Totally inexperienced with men, she had none of the spark that the prince liked in women. Still, he obliged his mother.

William Stevenson quotes an unnamed royal, a descendent of Rama IV, as saying of Vajiralongkorn:

Queen Sirikit stopped him from marrying a girl with whom he was very much in love. He was a victim of the whole, rotten age-old system of the royal court. He would come and see me and bare his heart. He could not understand why his mother interfered. He became bitter and difficult.

Later in 1977, Bhumibol struck back in his domestic struggle. On the morning of his birthday in December, he elevated Princess Sirindhorn to a higher status that would potentially allow her to succeed him as monarch one day. To some extent, this was an effort by the king to shore up the shaky dynastic position of the monarchy in the event that something were to happen to Vajiralongkorn. But the king’s decision also fuelled popular support for Sirindhorn to succeed him — in contrast to the widespread loathing of the crown prince. This tension persists to the present day, and the controversy still hangs over the royal succession as Bhumibol’s life nears its end.

Sirikit’s plans were ruined when Vajiralongkorn abandoned the pregnant Soamsawali in 1978. He moved in with Yuwathida Pholprasert, an aspiring actress, and was often seen in the company of wealthy godfathers who made their fortunes at the intimate nexus of crime, politics and business in Thailand. Thais began to refer to him as “Sia-O”, a combination of the word for a Chinese-Thai gangster and the sixth syllable of the prince’s royal title. Soamsawali gave birth to a daughter in late 1978, and then in August 1979 his lover Yuwathida gave birth to a son, Vajiralongkorn’s only male heir at that time. Sirikit was appalled.

The attempt by Bhumibol and Sirikit to install a royalist “dhammocracy” in Thailand by appointing Thanin Kraivixien as prime minister was another disaster. The royal family found itself far to the right not only of most ordinary Thais, but crucially also far more extreme than mainstream military thinking. In 1977, the military deposed Thanin amid widespread disgust about his authoritarianism and extremism, and installed pragmatic professional soldier Kriangsak Chomanan as prime minister. It was a startling rebuke to Sirikit’s hardline stance and Bhumibol’s weakness in going along with his wife. During this period, Bhumibol and Sirikit began to place their hopes in a cavalry officer called Prem Tinsulanonda. Dhammocracy had failed. It was time to try Premocracy.

Prem Tinsulanonda was born in the city of Songkla in southern Thailand in August 1920. He like to joke that he spent his childhood in prison, according to his vanity biography, Prem Tinsulanonda: Soldier and Statesman, by longtime Thai resident William Warren:

“I spent most of my childhood in jail,” Prem often tells people, enjoying their reaction, then goes on to explain that this was literally true: his father was warden of the Songkhla prison and the family lived within its high walls. 

During the 1933 attempt by royalists led by Prince Bowaradej to restore the absolute monarchy by force, King Prajadhipok fled to Songkla. He was there for a month, and one day visited Prem’s school. Warren says the 13-year-old Prem was deeply impressed by the royal visit:

“I was the smallest boy in my class,” Prem recalls, and perhaps because of that I sat in the front row so that I could see better.” It was probably also for that reason that King Prajadhipok, who was accompanied by Queen Rambhai Barni, selected Prem’s notebook as one to examine during the inspection tour. On the cover of the book, the 13-year-old boy had noted the various parts of the body, as dictated by his teacher, and these the King read aloud. “He said nothing to me,” Prem says, “he just read my notes. But of course it was a great honour and something I have never forgotten.”

Prem entered Thailand’s military academy in 1938 and graduated two years early in 1941: training was shortened because the outbreak of World War II had emboldened Phibun to try to recapture Laotian and Khmer territory that was part of French Indochina. Prem fought as a cavalry officer in the 1941 Indochina War against French troops, although Warren says that he was “not in the front lines with the infantry but in charge of reserve troops at the rear”. After Phibun declared war on the United States and Britain following the Japanese invasion of December 1941, Prem was sent to join the northern campaign to wrest the Shan States back from British-ruled Burma. He was based in Kengtung from 1942 until 1945, and developed close ties with Sarit Thanarat, then a colonel. Prem’s career really took off after Sarit seized power in 1957 and promoted him to colonel in 1959. Under the Thanom and Phrapas regime Prem was elevated to major-general in 1971. Prem also served as a royal aide-de-camp in 1968 and 1975 but spent most of this period based in Isaan dealing with the communist insurgency, where his relatively enlightened approach towards winning the support of the population won widespread praise. His relationship with the royal family deepened after they built a palace in Sakon Nakhon in 1976 which Bhumibol and Sirikit used as a base for several months each year. Prem and Bhumibol developed a close working relationship. As Warren writes:

It was undoubtedly during these meetings that Their Majesties the King and Queen came to appreciate Prem’s unusual qualities of dedication and leadership. Certainly they would prove among his most valuable supporters during the events that lay ahead.

In October 1978 Prem was appointed commander-in-chief of the army, leapfrogging many officers with greater seniority, and in May 1979 he became minister of defense too. Finally, in 1980, with Kriengsak’s administration struggling, Bhumibol engineered Prem’s ascent to the premiership, thwarting the ambitions of Kukrit Pramoj. Handley describes what happened:

On February 28, Kriengsak and Prem flew to Chiangmai to see the king. The next day Kriengsak resigned without dissolving parliament, and a frustrated Kukrit was pressed by Bhumibol to organize the legislature to endorse Prem as prime minister. The change appeared to be democratic, but in fact it was a royal coup. When Prem ritually declared that his coalition was the “government of the king” as he was sworn in on March 3, the statement held a much deeper truth than ever before. He would stay on “reluctantly” for eight years, closely protected by the king’s hand…

Prem… was firm, disciplined, and showed no appetite for wealth and no pleasure in power. He understood that Bhumibol was uninterested in day-to-day administration but wanted someone to act when he issued instructions or voiced opinions. The two shared a belief in a natural Thai hierarchy and the value of social and public order, established and enforced first by example and then, when necessary, by force, not law. During the 1980s Prem fostered a new era of adulation for the throne, a real second revival, with the weight of the military and the private sector behind him.

Once in power, Prem always behaved towards Bhumibol and Sirikit with the utmost obsequiousness. To quote Handley again: 

Prem spared no effort to promote the king and royal culture. It began with his own exemplary obsequiousness. He consulted the king at least once a week, in the court fashion of a century earlier, prostrating himself and speaking in a humble whisper only when spoken to. While his predecessors had worn military uniforms and Western suits, Prem made a fashion of a Thai silk, Nehru-collared button-down jacket called the royal suit, chut prarachathan… After Prem’s model, bureaucrats, politicians, and businessmen sought to also consult the king and queen and adopted the chut prarachathan as their work dress. High-society Thais and ambitious climbers competed ever more to be seen donating funds and participating in royal events. They sought to take part in a full-fledged court society fostered by Prem, centered in part in the Dusit Thani Hotel. The Dusit became the site of regular royal charity balls, its restaurants preferred by Sirikit, Prem, and their circle of royally decorated ladies. It became the place for businessmen, politicians, generals, and their wives to be seen and do business.

Prem accommodated the royal family in almost every area possible. He obliged their increasing requests – especially from Queen Sirikit – for promotions of palace favorites in the military and civil service, as well as recommendations for government contracts. Meanwhile, using the state budget he built several more palaces for the royal family, including a massive mountaintop chalet in Chiangrai for the king’s mother, Sangwal, who only in the late 1980s abandoned Switzerland for a permanent home in Thailand.

It was a another symbiotic relationship: Bhumibol installed and then protected Prem, and in return Prem treated Bhumibol and Sirikit with reverence and indulged their every whim. As Kobkua says in Kings, Country and Constitutions:

The premiership of Prem… saw a return of the close King-Premier co-operation and the unassailable position of the King as the supreme and ultimate source of power and legitimacy. In Prem, the King had evidently found his Prime Minister. Prem was famous for his incorruptible reputation and ability to overcome communist subversion in the Northeast. Most important he was known to the King and Queen personally and his credentials as the King’s general preceded him. Prem’s premiership would go down in the country’s political history as the time King Bhumibol willingly overstepped the political boundary of a constitutional monarch and became directly involved in politics on the side of the Prime Minister. It was the time when the King put into practice his own interpretation of constitutional monarchy and re-emerged victorious.

Kobkua’s view that the political interventions by Bhumibol — and Sirikit — represented a “victory” is very questionable: in many ways, the monarchy’s unabashed efforts to protect Prem were to have a damaging impact on the prestige of the palace.

After taking power, Prem issued a decree empowering the military to build a “truly democratic” Thailand. Parliament was given a subordinate role: the armed forces were given legal status above that of the parliament and constitution. Handley explains:

Prem was not all that clear what to do with this power. Beyond the palace-military hierarchy, he had no particular plan. He spent much of this first four years just protecting his job, for which he depended heavily on the king….

The Bhumibol-Prem partnership attempted to institutionalize the idea of a king’s government, and formalize it constitutionally as a palace-army hierarchy. Ideally, the king’s man would sustain the system by promoting similarly loyal professionals into the leadership ranks of the armed forces, and these virtuous generals would become the new princes. Instead, Prem’s rise fueled more corrupt competition for the palace’s favor, and military factionalism and indiscipline only increased. It ironically made Prem-era politics highly unstable, at times violently so. Yet the palace took that as a vindication.

Besides failing to control chronic power struggles amongst competing cliques of military officers, Prem was unable to stamp his authority on parliament. Instability was heightened by Queen Sirikit’s favouritism of some generals, most notably Arthit Kamlang-ek, who had ambitions to succeed Prem as head of the army, and perhaps eventually as prime minister. Palace interventions such as allowing Prem to stay on as army commander past the retirement age of 60 (a move which also suited Arthit’s ambitions) infuriated some of the more professional military officers, who had coalesced into a clique known as the “Young Turks”. In 1981 they launched the “April Fools’ Coup”, an event which once again exposed the extent of royal machinations.

On the evening of March 31, some of the leading Young Turks called on Prem at his residence. They told him they fully supported him continuing as prime minister, but wanted to free him of needing to rely on the support of parliament, which they believed was contributing to corruption and instability. They wanted to get Prem’s support for a coup against his own government. Troops under their command at the Kampuchean border, meanwhile, were advancing on Bangkok.

According to several of those present at the meeting, Prem initially appeared to consider the proposal, then prevaricated, then said he would have to phone Chitralada Palace to discuss the matter. After a short conversation he handed the phone to coup leader Colonel Prajark Sawangjit, saying Queen Sirikit wanted to speak to him. And while the rebellious colonel was on the phone to the queen, Prem sneaked out of his house and headed for Chitralada. With Prem having made his escape, the coup plotters needed another figurehead. They turned to General Sant Chitpatima, whose hopes of promotion were being thwarted by Arthit’s machinations and Prem’s disinclination to retire as army chief. He agreed to lead the coup.

After Prem had reached the safety of Chitralada, the coup plotters were summoned to the palace for an audience with the king. They did not come, fearing arrest. As coup troops seized Radio Thailand, Channel 9 television and other strategic sites, Prem persuaded the royal family to come with him to Korat, 160 miles to the northeast, the headquarters of the Thai Second Army which he had commanded. They arrived there around lunchtime on April 1. Prem began broadcasting from Radio Thailand’s transmitter in Korat, denouncing the coup and declaring that the royal family was with him at the army camp. Thais realized that, for once, Bhumibol was resisting a coup.

The coup leaders, increasingly worried, accused Prem of hijacking the royals. In a broadcast on Radio Thailand, General Sant declared:

General Prem Tinsulanonda, with a wicked and woman-like heart, has taken shelter in the graciousness of the institution of the monarchy, thus involving His Majesty the King in politics. It will be noted in Thai history that a Thai officer has taken part in sabotaging the institution of the monarchy.

Prem hit back with a radio announcement saying these accusations were “tantamount to outright lèse-majesté”, and attacking the coup leaders for ignoring the summons to meet the king. A statement from Queen Sirikit was also read out over the radio, calling for unity. The royal family’s clear signals of support for Prem left the coup plotters increasingly isolated. Some defected to the royal camp. On April 2, planes from Korat air base dropped 200,000 leaflets on Bangkok setting a 3 p.m. deadline for rebel soldiers to return to barracks.

Early on April 3, troops loyal to Prem left Korat to advance on Bangkok, reaching the capital around dawn. They killed one civilian with a stray bullet as they entered the city. That was the only bloodshed. By 10 a.m. it was all over.

What followed was a concerted whitewash by all concerned to obscure key details of what had happened. While the coup plotters were stripped of their military posts, they were all granted an amnesty by the king within a month. Prem and the palace seemed extremely worried about what information could come out if the coup leaders ever faced trial. As Handley says: “Many details about the April Fools’ coup have been obscured by the palace and the participants, mainly to protect the reputations of Prem and Queen Sirikit.”

In particular, suspicion hangs over what happened when Prem went to Chitralada Palace on the night of March 31. Several politicians, including belligerent right-wing royalist Samak Sundaravej, alleged Prem had initially wanted to support the coup, as long as he could get royal assent. But Sirikit, largely because of her affection for Arthit, who would be frozen out by a coup backed by the Young Turks, refused to countenance the plan. It was further alleged that it was Sirikit who was the driving force deciding how the palace reacted to the crisis, in alliance with Arthit; Bhumibol and Prem just did what the queen told them to.

Comments by Arthit about what happened that night support this view: he later said he had sought Sirikit’s support to foil the coup and ensure Prem did not give it his backing. As the Far Eastern Economic Review reported on April 30, 1982: “Arthit went to see Queen Sirikit in order to block the coup attempt. Arthit himself admitted that the queen summoned the coup group in order to get Prem into the palace.”

An extraordinary account of the coup from Sirikit herself in the U.S. People magazine, also lends credence to this scenario. Sirikit is, of course, often prone to embellishment, but she clearly regarded herself as having played the most important role in defusing the crisis:

Queen Sirikit of Thailand was vexed at the interruption of her two-hour evening prayer ritual in Bangkok’s Chitralada Palace last spring. She reminded her retainer in no uncertain terms that it was 11 p.m. If the general on the telephone wanted to talk to her, he could very well ring back in the morning. Minutes later the retainer returned, saying that the caller was insistent. Her Majesty let half an hour pass before she picked up the phone and discovered that a segment of Thailand’s army had captured the Prime Minister and was bent on forming a new government. Troops loyal to the Prime Minister were ready to march on Bangkok, said the young general, if only the palace would give the word.

The response was a difficult one in Thailand, where the monarchy is excluded from politics by law. In any case, the decision properly belonged to her husband, King Bhumibol. But the country’s religious tradition gives the King the status of a demigod; mere mortals are loath to approach him directly. So Sirikit took the Prime Minister’s release into her own hands. Just after midnight she phoned his residence and talked with one of the colonels behind the coup. She told the officer he had 30 minutes to release the PM. If he didn’t, the Queen warned, she would come and free him herself. He was released straightaway and the next day joined the King and Queen in the garrison town of Korat. Later a brief statement from Sirikit, calling for national unity, was aired by a provincial radio station — and within 24 hours the revolt collapsed.

The “April Fool’s coup,” as the New York Times called it, was a dramatic instance of the poise of Queen Sirikit and of the power of the 199-year-old Chakri dynasty of which both Bhumibol and his distant cousin, Sirikit, are members. Peasants fall to their knees when either the King or Queen enters a village. Portraits of them are everywhere. A military coup half a century ago placed constitutional limitations on the monarchy, but the royal family still wields astonishing power. Even in jaded Bangkok, a metropolis of five million, the monarchy is held in such lofty awe that it is often referred to as “the Sky.”

It is also significant that it was Arthit who formally led loyalist troops as they moved in Bangkok, and that they were wearing blue neckerchiefs: the queen’s colour.

Samak demanded the full truth from Prem, declaring: ”He was the one who held the secrets in his hands. He went into the palace. I did not know what was said. I wanted him to say that from the beginning he refused to lead the coup.” But with the coup plotters hastily amnestied and a veneer of harmony restored, the truth never emerged. A full-blown attempt by rebel troops to overthrow the government was hastily consigned to history as if it had all just been a minor disagreement.

The whole episode caused boiling resentment in some sections of the military who felt  systematic favouritism was being shown by Bhumibol and – especially – Sirikit and Prem. The palace aligned itself with favoured officers and – as in the 1970s – with some sinister groups on the far right. As Handley writes:

The military leadership enjoyed special access in the court as Sirikit surrounded herself with police and military generals, their wives serving as ladies-in-waiting. The most frequent guests at palace parties were military officers, and the generals would take their turns dancing with Sirikit and singing while the king played his saxophone. Politicians and businessmen were rarely invited.

Meanwhile, the government continued to brand its critics as enemies of the state and communists. When at the end of 1982 students held small protests over economic issues, both the Red Gaur and the Village Scouts were mobilized to face them down. Village Scouts were implicated in the murder of a student in Prachuab Khirikan who led a protest against bus-fare rises.

Bangkok was rife with rumours after the failed coup that disgruntled military factions planned to assassinate Prem and Arthit. Prem began getting around in an armoured Cadillac.

Further evidence that problems lurked behind Thailand’s facade of harmony and reverence for the palace was a December 1981 article in the Asian Wall Street Journal by Michael Schmicker, a former United Nations official in Thailand. It had the provocative headline Can Thailand’s Monarchy Survive This Century? Schmicker wrote that Thai monarchists lacked understanding of what was happening in their country and consistently overreacted to pressure for democratization from idealistic student activists, seeing it as dangerously subversive. As a result, the royal family was needlessly alienating more progressive Thais:

They are unwisely being forced to choose between their conscience and their king by misguided monarchists unable to distinguish a sincere cry for social change from an attack on the throne… The royal family is clearly committed — critics say overcommitted — to the preservation of the status quo.

Schmicker also noted that the royal’s family’s actions during the April Fools’ Coup had wrecked their ability to credibly portray the palace as impartial:

The coup collapsed, along with the monarchy’s credibility as an impartial mediator between contending military cliques within the armed forces. The royal family is now dangerously identified with one faction and must accept the sizable risks that come with choosing sides.

He also pointed out the shortcomings of the crown prince:

Since his investiture nine years ago, 29-year-old Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn has struggled to meet the public’s expectations of a future King. He appears to lack the intelligence, charisma and ‘common touch’ necessary to secure the affection of the Thai people for the Chakri dynasty and reputedly enjoys lukewarm support within the Thai military. His image as a Don Juan also has damaged his reputation and allowed critics to poke fun at the monarchy.

The prince’s “Don Juan” image was given global prominence after Sirikit repeatedly raised the issue with journalists during a trip to the United States in late 1981. Horrified that her dynastic plans were in danger of being wrecked by Vajiralongkorn’s abandonment of Soamsawali, the queen took the extraordinary step of issuing public rebukes — and veiled threats — to her beloved son via the American media. At a news conference in Texas, she said:

My son the crown prince is a little bit of a Don Juan. He is a good student, a good boy, but women find him interesting and he finds women even more interesting… If the people of Thailand do not approve of the behaviour of my son, then he would either have to change his behaviour or resign from the royal family.

She told a Dallas Herald-Times reporter that the prince’s family life “is not so smooth”. And two weeks later, when asked in an interview with CBS whether Vajiralongkorn was ready for the throne, she replied:

In his job as a career military man, he’s doing quite well, but for the crown prince of Thailand, not so well, because I think he does not give enough time to his people.

We do not have Saturdays or weekends, you see. And he demands his weekends. Well, he is quite handsome and he loves beautiful women so he needs his weekends.

Once again she warned that he might not be chosen as Bhumibol’s heir:

[The Thai people] know what they want, what kind of leader they want. And if they don’t like such-and-such a character, well, they won’t choose him or her.

This was an incredible way for a family to manage its disagreements. Instead of trying to keep these sensitive issues private, Sirikit was publicly shaming her son.

Meanwhile, General Arthit’s role in suppressing the April Fools’ Coup and his strong backing from Sirikit propelled him up the military hierarchy with unprecedented speed. By 1983, the Far Eastern Economic Review was declaring: “Arthit Kamlang-ek is sometimes referred to as the most powerful man in Thailand”. In March, Prem and Arthit enlisted Bhumibol’s help to circumvent provisions in the 1978 constitution that would have prevented active duty military officers holding political office after April 1983.

In 1983 an English-language treatise about the monarchy, The Chakri Dynasty and Thai Politics 1782-1982, was circulated among academics in Thailand. It was unsigned but widely known to be written by Sukhumband Paripatra, himself a grandson of Rama V and cousin of Bhumibol and Sirikit. It included some incisive criticism of Bhumibol’s leadership:

The monarchy, once a beacon of hope for many in the days of military authoritarianism, is in danger of being perceived as factional, retrogressive and reactionary… The paradox is that by seeking power to guard against disorderly change , the palace may in the end help to precipitate this very change itself… The monarchy is attempting to act as both a symbol of national unity and a power seeker, without realizing that the two roles may be inherently and fatally contradictory… Gone is the pragmatism and flexibility which had been the hallmark of the Chakris.

Sukhumband quite rightly pointed out that while Bhumibol had been perceived as a progressive influence and an ally of the people during the years of military dictatorship up to 1973, he had increasingly become the opposite.

Watts wrote that authoritarian elites in alliance with Prem and Arthit’s faction of the military were trying to strangle the country’s democratic development:

Against all the trends, General Arthit and his Bangkok-based officers are moving Thai politics a stage backwards. The prospect of more democratic rule is steadily receding as the entrenched elites try to defend their positions against the shift of real power to the merchant class…

Those in authority in the past 50 years since the overthrow of absolute monarchy have rarely been able to understand that conflicts are a normal facet of democracy in action. Democracy has been confused with chaos, but in recent years it is the military which has been most responsible for the instability. The public have been mere bystanders at arguments between sections of the military vying for power.

Thailand has never been given a chance to develop a democratic system properly. This time, it appears, will be no different.

Watts went further still. He reported the widespread belief that Sirikit was increasingly out of control, the real power in the palace rather than the otherworldy Bhumibol:

The Queen, her entourage of generals and a few civilian advisers are effectively governing Thailand today through regular dinners at which the King does not participate. The King, weakened by recent illness, has been told by his doctors to take greater care of his health. “The King doesn’t care two hoots about power, but he does want to avoid conflict,” says Kukrit.

Queen Sirkit’s influence and support for General Arthit has been manifest since the general was instrumental in crushing the April 1981 coup. She was a highly visible participant in the traditional bathing ceremonies following the death of General Arthit’s wife from a brain tumour. As one Bangkok wit put it, “We live in Camelot with the Queen and her knights.”

Bangkok high-society was increasingly scandalized by Sirikit’s behaviour too. She thrived on the company of officers in the Queen’s Guard, who were frequent guests at her parties. One of them in particular became a constant companion, ostensibly as her bodyguard: Colonel Narongdej Nandha-phothidej. This became the subject of feverish gossip. Narongdej was later sent to work in the United States, a move widely believed to have been ordered by Bhumibol to remove him from Sirikit’s court.

By the middle of 1984, with the Thai economy entering recession, Prem was coming under increasing attack in the media, parliament and from the military. His health significantly worsened, adding to the sense of uncertainty. Factional struggles in the military, particularly between the Class 5 clique and the Class 7 “Young Turks” led to a series of plots and intrigues. The royal family repeatedly intervened to try to resolve tensions and to signal their continued backing for Prem. In a highly unusual intervention on August 17, the United States also signalled its backing for Prem:  ambassador John Gunther Dean issued a statement praising the prime minister for his “moderate, commonsense leadership”.

Instability worsened in 1985, both in Thailand and within the royal family. In May, Colonel Narongdej died in the United States. The official explanation was that the 38-year-old colonel had suffered a heart attack while jogging but it was widely believed, including by Queen Sirikit herself, that he had been murdered. As Handley says, the extent of Sirikit’s public grief over Narongdej damaged her image further:

Supposedly he had a heart attack, but the queen pursued rumors that he was murdered. Her mourning became an embarrassment. For his funeral, which all top officials in the military and government had to attend, she issued a commemorative volume bearing photographs of the two together. Afterward a glorifying television documentary was made on Narongdej, and it also conveyed their special relationship…

In September 1985, Thailand was shaken by another abortive coup attempt by disgruntled military officers in league with Akeyuth Anchanbutr, a brash self-proclaimed financial whizzkid whose Charter Investment ponzi-scheme fund had collapsed following a government crackdown. At least 10 civilians, including two foreign journalists, were killed in sporadic fighting in Bangkok before the coup was swiftly crushed.

Sirikit’s despair over the death of Narongdej was worsened by her realization that Vajiralongkorn would never return to Soamsawali. The prince had fathered four sons by his lover Yuwathida. Sirikit’s hopes of bolstering the dynastic dominance of the Kitiyakara clan were in tatters. She suffered a a psychological collapse, discussed by Handley in The King Never Smiles:

At the end of the year she had a massive breakdown, entering the hospital for what was called a “diagnostic curettage”. She disappeared from public view for six months, reportedly isolated by Bhumibol personally from her courtiers and held to a healthy diet. Gossip spread that she was terminally ill, or might even have died. She finally emerged in July 1986 for the consecration of the new Bangkok city pillar. Somber and unsteady, she disappeared for another three weeks, even skipping her birthday celebration. Instead, Princess Chulabhorn went on television to praise her as a woman of supernatural dedication. “Since her majesty underwent an operation in 1985, she has been getting much better. Now she constantly exercises and even though I am 25 years her junior, I can hardly keep up… If the people are going to get angry because of her disappearance from the public view, it is us [her children] who should be blamed since we always insist that she rests instead of making public appearances… Normally everybody has holidays, but her majesty never had one.” The queen wakes up at 10 or 11 a.m. each day, Chulabhorn added, and works more than 12 hours a day, “If she can’t go to sleep, she will continue working until the next morning… [R]ight after waking up, she never has time for anything else but work…. I have never heard her say that she is tired.”

The princess used the occasion to address some of the long-festering stories and the popular picture of a dysfunctional royal family. Denying rumours that the queen controlled the palace, she insisted: “We all work for his majesty because of our loyalty towards him. Nobody in our family wants popularity for themselves. Everybody is sharing the work and we work as a team… But again, there are people who say that our family is divided into two sides, which is not true at all.”

Despite Chulabhorn’s denial, it was quite clear that the royal family was divided, and that the divisions were widening. There had long been two competing circles in the palace — the king’s and the queen’s. They had disagreed over whether Vajiralongkorn was fit to become Rama X, and over politics, with Sirikit more interventionist and extreme than the deeply conservative but innately cautious Bhumibol. Now they were completely estranged. They have never been reconciled, although they continued to appear together for official events.

As U.S. ambassador Eric G. John wrote in a secret cable in November 2009:

Prior to mid-2008, the King and Queen had lived most of the past 20 years largely apart, joint public appearances excepted. This unpublicized reality started after the Queen disappeared from public view in 1986 for about six months to recover from emotional exhaustion, in the wake of the King dismissing her favorite military aide de camp. Their social circles diverged sharply from then on, with very few figures spanning both camps…

As his family life became more difficult, Bhumibol appears to have begun seriously considering abdication. He shocked the nation on his 59th birthday in December 1986 by hinting that he would soon step aside to make way for Vajiralongkorn to rule Thailand:

The water of the Chao Phraya must flow on, and the water that flows on will be replaced. In our lifetime, we just perform our duties. When we retire, somebody else will replace us…

One cannot stick to a single task forever. One day we will grow old and die.

Palace officials confirmed Bhumibol might retire to a monastery some time after national celebrations planned for July 1988 when he would become the longest reigning monarch in Thai history. Tongnoi Tongyai, a semi-official spokesman for Bhumibol, set out the likely scenario in comments to the Far Eastern Economic Review:

The king will never abdicate, if by abdication you mean leaving his duties behind and retiring… Once his majesty sees the crown prince reaching a more mature age and ready to take over all the royal functions, he may enter a monastery… It does not mean that he will remain a monk. The important thing is that he will continue to be there, behind the throne, and help his son solve any problems.

Many Thais were aghast at the prospect of Bhumibol’s reign coming to an end so soon. In an article for the Far Eastern Economic Review, Sukhumband wrote that “everyone regards rumours about abdication with great apprehension”. But as a strategy for safeguarding the power and prestige of the Chakri dynasty, and coping with the problems posed by his son’s dismal failure to win the hearts and minds of Thailand’s people, Bhumibol’s plan made a great deal of sense. Vajiralongkorn could be eased into the job over a period of years, under the supervision and tutelage of his father, and most Thais would be enormously reassured by the knowledge that Bhumibol would still be working behind the scenes as the kingdom’s ultimate troubleshooter, now overseeing not just Thailand’s political and economic development but also his son’s elevation to the role of monarch. Bhumibol was painfully aware that everything he had striven to achieve during his reign could be wrecked by the shortcomings of his only male heir. By giving up the throne, he would at least gain some control over what came next, and the chance to protect his legacy. Given the circumstances, it may have been the most sensible solution to the predicament of the palace. What remains unknown is the extent to which Sirikit may have forced the decision on him.

In any event, it never happened. Bhumibol changed his mind sometime during 1987. All the available evidence suggests that, for a while at least, he had been serious about stepping aside. The palace has always sought to meticulously stage-manage every aspect of Bhumibol’s reign, and it is inconceivable that a decision as momentous as abdication would be announced without months of careful consideration and discussion, and without drawing up a detailed plan for how the transition would unfold. There are signs that an image management campaign was under way to rehabilitate the crown prince’s reputation – the glossy Dichan magazine owned by palace public relations guru Piya Malakul published two lengthy and sympathetic interviews with Vajiralongkorn, in August 1986 and July 1987, and the prince also spoke to international journalists representing the Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand at a special audience in June 1987. He used these media appearances to present himself as a man whose youthful indiscretions were behind him but who remained misunderstood and a victim of malicious gossip.

He acknowledged to Dichan that he was disliked by many Thais, unfairly in his view:

When there is a traffic jam, people immediately say it is because of the Crown Prince’s procession. They say so even if they haven’t left home or are abroad.

Asked by the magazine if he was hurt by his mother describing him as the black sheep of the family, he replied:

Sometimes black sheep serve a purpose, one of helping others. Black sheep help those not-too-white ones seems whiter.

On suggestions the king intended to abdicate soon, Vajiralongkorn insisted he neither knew nor cared about any such plan. His sole focus was serving the country and the king:

I have never heard this talk, and I don’t want to know about it. Any matters about the king are very high matters, higher than me. I am a servant of the king and as such will do my very best to do what he tells me… We should feel lucky to be born in this country. We should be satisfied enough to be close to the feet of the king.

Meanwhile, Prem’s government and the Thai military and bureaucracy were busy planning more than a year of organized nationwide adulation of Rama IX. Events in honour of Bhumibol’s 60^th birthday were slated to start many months in advance, and then the country would switch immediately to the build up to July 1988 when Bhumibol would overtake Chulalongkorn as Thailand’s longest reigning monarch. Prem announced that the king would be granted the title of maharaja, officially making him Bhumibol the Great. Only three previous kings in Thailand’s history had received such an honour. The stage was set for Rama IX to bow out in a blaze of glory in the second half of 1988 after a prolonged and massive national celebration of his rule.

But events in 1987 did not go according to plan. In September, Vajiralongkjorn was sent on a state visit to Japan. It was a chance to demonstrate he possessed the necessary maturity and gravitas to stride out onto the world stage with confidence. Given the stakes, things could hardly have turned out any worse. Ahead of the trip, he demanded that Yuwathida accompany him in an official capacity instead of his wife; the Japanese refused for reasons of protocol. Once he arrived, things went from bad to worse, as Barbara Crosette reported in the New York Times:

A diplomatic storm blew up between Tokyo and Bangkok over what Thai-language newspapers reported as ”slights” to the Crown Prince, a pilot and army major general who commands his own regiment, during an official visit to Japan.

A Japanese chauffeur driving the Thai Prince’s car apparently stopped at a motorway tollbooth to relieve himself – Japanese officials say the man felt ill and had to be replaced. On other occasions, the Prince was said to have been given an inappropriate chair to sit on and to have been forced to reach down to the floor to pick up a cord to unveil a memorial. The prince came home three days earlier than scheduled, leaving a diplomatic crisis in his wake.

Worsening the diplomatic damage, members of the right-wing nationalist Village Scouts militia rallied at the Japanese embassy in Bangkok demanding an apology, and Prem dutifully felt compelled to make a formal protest to Tokyo for insulting the prince and the monarchy, despite being well aware that Vajiralongkorn’s claims were totally bogus. Bhumibol finally persuaded his son to make a public statement a few days later calling on Thais to end their criticism of Japan. In the weeks that followed, diplomats and politicans on both sides quietly cleaned up the mess. If this was a taste of how things would be under King Vajiralongkorn, then the people of Thailand clearly had ample reason to be alarmed about Bhumibol’s abdication. By the end of 1987, the notion that Bhumibol could hand over the throne but still steer events from behind the scenes and keep his wayward son under some semblance of control seemed like wishful thinking, doomed to failure.

As Bhumibol marked his fifth cycle 60th birthday, the palace found itself unexpectedly under attack. Leaflets full of scandalous allegations and scurrilous gossip about the royals were circulated widely in Bangkok and across the country, in an obviously organized campaign. Bhumibol and Sirikit were criticized in some of the leaflets but the main target was Vajiralongkorn, who was said to be corrupt, depraved, in thrall to the whims of his highly unsuitable mistress, and generally unfit to ever be king. The authorities were sufficiently alarmed that on December 8, television and radio broadcasts were interrupted by a special announcement by the military and police, which denounced the leaflets as the work of “a group of enemies of the nation belonging to a movement bent on undermining the monarchy”. In fact, supporters of Vajiralongkorn’s abandoned wife Somsawali played a central role in the leaflet campaign, in an effort to fight back against the prince’s efforts to marginalize her and have his mistress Yuwathida officially recognized as queen.

Meanwhile, Prem’s premiership was as precarious as ever, and his government eventually collapsed over several major corruption scandals. In January 1988, Sukhumband wrote another article for the Far Eastern Economic Review warning of dire consequences if Vajiralongkorn were to inherit the throne. He used the usual elaborate circumlocutions that had to be employed in the media to express the fact that the crown prince was a catastrophe:

In post-1932 Thailand, the monarch performs various functions as head of state, but his primary duties are considered apolitical — his role is above politics. But popular acceptance of the monarchy as an institution and of the king as a person, combined with the latter’s role as the catalyst of development, makes royal involvement in politics more or less inevitable.

At the present juncture, the monarchy directly or indirectly, intentionally or otherwise, plays a number of roles which have become integral to the Thai political system.

One is that of the symbol of national unity, essential for a society which, though relatively homogeneous, has its share of cleavages. In this connection, the monarchy also acts as the factor of continuity, when conflicts occur in other political institutions. Since 1932, the kingdom has gone through 13 constitutions, 16 coups and 46 cabinet changes. The monarchy has also become a force of national reconciliation, when extreme political polarisation takes place, as evident from the royally initiated development projects at former communist strongholds.

The second major role is that of the last-resort conflict manager when the stresses and strains of the system reach a point of crisis. On several occasions since 1973, the palace has intervened to restrain military groups which would have toppled the government, caused bloodshed or precipitated unpredictable crises. In turn, this role creates a balance — precarious at times to be sure — among the power groups: military, bureaucracy, political parties and business interests…

Given the monarchy’s role in Thailand’s political and economic development, as well as its place in the hearts and minds of the populace, any uncertainty regarding the future of the monarch inevitably causes a great deal of apprehension. Doubts continue to be expressed, mostly in private but now increasingly in the open, about the crown prince’s capacity to evoke the kind of intense political loyalty from the people and the major domestic political groupings that his father is able to do. Doubts also persist as to whether the crown prince can match his father’s subtle and mediatory role in politics.

All men and institutions go through processes of change and transformation. Bhumibol has achieved a great deal for his country and for the institution he inherited without forewarning, but by doing so, he has set perhaps an impossibly high standard of attainment for his successors. Should the leadership provided by the monarchy become less effective for one reason or another in the future, there will be grave political consequences.

The precarious balance among the major political groups and factions would certainly be destroyed… This vacuum is one which only the military would be capable of filling, given its monopoly of coercive power, organizational cohesion and control of the media and grassroots politics. For many Thais this ultimately is the root of their apprehension.

By early 1988, it had become clear that Bhumibol had abandoned his plan to abdicate. Palace officials spread word that Rama IX would not be stepping down. No reason was ever given to explain why the situation had suddenly changed. By first raising and then dashing his son’s hopes of soon becoming Rama X of Thailand, Bhumibol can only have worsened the conflicts and rivalries within the royal family.

During 1988, Bhumibol completed work on a personal project – an English translation of a Thai version of the story of Mahajanaka, one of the Jātaka tales about past incarnations of the Buddha. It was an allegorical story about Mahajanaka’s quest to reclaim his rightful throne in the land of Mithila from an evil uncle and his subsequent achievement of enlightenment, in which Mahajanaka repeatedly proves his determination and wisdom. Ignoring his mother’s warnings of the dangers and difficulties ahead, he sets sail for foreign lands to raise funds to recapture his kingdom, only to be stranded alone in the middle of the ocean when his ship founders. Refusing to give up — in contrast to all the other passengers who get bloodily devoured by fish and turtles — Mahajanaka swims for seven days in search of land. He is rescued by the goddess Mani Mekhala, whose job it was to protect all those who have done good deeds. She takes him back to his kingdom where he finds his evil uncle has died, leaving the way clear for him to become king. He rules wisely for 7,000 years and eventually attains enlightenment with the help of two mango trees. When he first encounters them, both trees are healthy, but one bears no fruit while the other is laden with exceptionally sweet mangoes. Some time later, he returns to find the fruit tree has been stripped bare and uprooted by greedy hordes who descended on it to eat its mangos, while the barren but healthy tree remains unscathed. Mahajanaka realizes that worldly possessions bring only sorrow and problems and it is better to have nothing. Now enlightened, he gives up his kingdom and his wife, shaves his head and disappears into the wilderness to be a wandering monk.

Bhumibol made two very deliberate changes to the story. In his version, the encounter between Mahajanaka and Mani Mekhala became an extended paean to perseverance. On his seventh day of swimming, Mahajanaka hears a voice asking him what he is doing. He looks up to see the goddess hovering above the ocean, and replies:

O Goddess, we have reflected upon the worldly behaviour and the merits of perseverance. Thus, we conclude that, even though we do not see the shores, we still have to persist in our swimming in the wide ocean.

The two of them exchange more homilies extolling perseverance, with Mahajanaka still bobbing around in the water after seven days without rest. Eventually, convinced that the prince has shown true determination, the goddess tells him:

Anyone who is so full of righteous patience will never founder in the vast ocean that has no bounds. With this manly perseverance, you will be able to go wherever you wish.

Lifting the prince out of the ocean, Mani Mekhala flies him to Mithila, and before departing she urges him to share his wisdom with others:

O Wise One, thy meaningful words should not be lost in this empty wide expanse. Thou shouldst share with others the boon of enlightened wisdom that come from thy lips.

Bhumibol’s second major change was King Mahajanaka’s reaction to the lesson of the mango trees. As in the original, he realizes that a life in retirement, free from the worries that come with power, would be far more pleasant than the dangerous, anxious life of a king:

That tree is still beautifully green, because it has no fruit, but this tree has been cut down and uprooted because it bore fruits. This throne is like the tree with fruits; peaceful retirement is like the tree without fruits. Danger lurks around the one with worries and does not menace the one without worries. We will not be like the tree with fruits; we will be like the one without fruit.

Having apparently resolved to retire and free himself from the tiresome burden of kingship, however, Bhumibol’s King Mahajanaka suddenly has second thoughts, remembering what Mani Mekhala had told him as he struggled to stay afloat in the ocean many years before:

The King could not remember the exact words, for he was exhausted and drowsy from the seven day swimming in the briny water, but he knew she had said he would not find the path to absolute happiness without sharing the wisdom he had found in the ocean. Mani Mekhala had told him to establish an institute of higher learning… Once he had fulfilled this mission he could find the path to peaceful retirement.

King Mahajanaka’s realizes his work is not yet done. He is on a mission from the goddess:

The Great Being thought: “Each one, may he be a trader, a farmer, a king or a priest, has his duty to do. Anyway, before anything else, we have to find a way to revive the fruitful mango tree.”

The original Mahajanaka had been able to spend the rest of his life in peaceful retirement far from the worries of office, after relinquishing his throne, leaving his wife, shaving his head, and abandoning the capital city to meditate in the wilderness – just as Bhumibol had once hoped to do upon his planned abdication in 1988. Bhumibol’s Mahajanaka has no such luck. Because of his indomitable perseverance, and the fact that his calling in life is to share his wisdom with others, retirement will have to wait. First, he has to restore the ravaged mango tree, and cure the people of Mithila of their uncouth stupidity. Then, perhaps, he can take a bit of a break.

The mango tree destroyed by ignorant greed is, of course, intended to symbolize modern Thailand. And at this point in the book the prose lurches into a very different style, from the incantatory language of religious allegory into the attempted bonhomie of a hectoring, practical-minded modern monarch trying to patiently but urgently impart some knowledge to a group of slightly dim-witted subjects. Mahajanaka summons a monk and a couple of disciples to the wreckage of the uprooted mango tree, so he can start getting things organized and give everybody their instructions on what they should be doing:

Udicchabrahmana Mahasala promptly came, along with two disciples, Charutejobrahmana and Gajendra Singha Pandit. Of these two, the first mentioned was an expert in planting, the second one an expert in uprooting. The moment they arrived, Gajendra Singha Pandit threw himself at the feet of the King and said: “Your humble servant is at fault; when the courtiers asked me to pick mangoes for the Viceroy, I used my new automatic fruit harvester, unwitting that it would uproot the mango tree. Your majesty!” The King said: “Do not despair, my good inventive man. The mango tree is down already. Now the problem is: how to restore the mango tree to its former state. We have nine methods for this; some of these could be usable. First: culturing the seeds; second: nursing the roots so they grow again; third: culturing (cutting) the branches; fourth: grafting on the other tree; fifth: bud-grafting on the other tree; sixth: splicing (approach grafting) the branches; seventh: layering the branches; eighth: smoking the fruitless tree, so that it bears fruit; ninth: culturing the cells in a container. Brahmana Mahsala, pray order your two disciples to study the problem and do the implementation.” Udicchabrahmana acknowledged the royal order by saying: “Your Eminent Majesty. Gajendra Singha will immediately bring the machine to raise the tree to its upright station. And Charutejo will collect the seeds and the branches to act according to the royal initiative.” The King ordered the two to hasten on their way, but bade the Brahmana Mahsala to stay on for further consultation.

This is an extraordinary passage because Bhumibol is now explicitly portraying King Mahajanaka as a version of himself. With his practical and knowledgeable instructions on how to repair the tree, Mahanajaka is a mirror-image of Bhumibol implementing his royal projects, full of scientific wisdom. The image of the kindly king lecturing some loyal and eager subjects on the intricacies of horticulture — or urban traffic dynamics, hydrological management, rural economics, whatever theory is relevant — is instantly recognizable to Thais. It is vintage Bhumibol.

But Bhumibol unwittingly also exposes the inadequacy of his schoolboy understanding of what wisdom and knowledge involve. The list of nine horticultural techniques is clearly intended to impress, presented as invaluable specialist knowledge that will solve everything. But it is merely an inventory of methods, bereft of any real explanation of how some or all of them are going to help revive the mango tree. It is rote-learning disguised as knowledge, lacking any analytical content.

Other aspects of Bhumibol’s personality are also on display here: his tendency to belabour the obvious as if he has made some revelatory insight (the key issue here is how to fix the mango tree), and his habitual condescension to those he is lecturing which again often involves belabouring the obvious (the tree is down already, my good man). Compare the 22-year-old King Bhumibol’s comments on the difficulty of taking photographs at royal events, reported by John Stanton in Life in 1950:

Some people think that because smoother-riding open automobiles have largely replaced bobbing elephants on official occasions in Siam, photography has become easier for the king. I suppose that this is, in a way, true, but it hardly touches the core of the problem. The core is that at an official function you cannot very well open a camera and start shooting back at all the people who are shooting pictures of you. Besides, in the king’s pictures there would be no king. Someone once suggested that I might wear a Contax next to my skin and have a little hole in my uniform through which the lens could poke, looking just like another decoration, but this, I think, is impractical. I have tried to solve the problem in two ways. First, I figure out the pictures I want before the function, preset the camera and then ask a friend to point it and push the button at the right moment. This, however, few friends ever do correctly. Secondly, I carry a Contax in my pants pocket and, when a band suddenly blares or something happens to cause the crowd to look away from me, I whip it out, shoot a picture and stuff it back into my pocket again. But it is very unsatisfactory.

It’s the same voice: pompous, finicky, slightly querulous, obsessed with technical minutiae, attempting humour that doesn’t quite work. His homilistic speeches follow the same very recognizable tone, belabouring some points with pedantic thoroughness before meandering off in another direction. The audience is usually baffled, but — like the courtiers in the parable The Emperor’s New Clothes — invariably full of flattery for something that isn’t really there at all, praising the king’s wisdom, wit and knowledge.

The seven-year old Bhumibol came second in his class in Lausanne in annual exams, according to an Associated Press story from 1935:

One can imagine the precocious young Prince Bhumibol impressing his teachers with his ability to reel off a list of facts he has memorized. Decades later, his understanding of wisdom had never really progressed. He could belabour a subject in excruciating detail without offering any real analysis, unable to see the wood for the trees. He could regurgitate from memory voluminous amounts of raw information, detailed itemized lists, technical jargon and statistical data, without exhibiting insight into what they actually meant. He could draw his handmade maps and tinker with his gadgets. It was the showy but superficial intelligence of a bright schoolchild, the second-cleverest boy in class.

Bhumibol lost sight of his limitations. He believed that like King Mahajanaka, he too was a Great Being, a superior soul. He looked down on everybody. His contempt for the country’s uncouth generals, incompetent politicians and avaricious bureaucrats helped make him immensely popular among ordinary Thais, who generally loathed them too. But Bhumibol was equally condescending in his views on ordinary people: he regarded them as feckless, lazy and stupid. He cared about their welfare, he wanted to improve their lives, but he had no respect for them.

The conclusion of The Story of Mahajanaka shows how Bhumibol saw his subjects. Having organized a royal project to restore the maimed mango tree to bountiful health, thanks to his decisive leadership and impressive knowledge of the range of horticultural techniques most relevant to the endeavour, King Mahajanaka’s work is almost done. But one item remains on the agenda. As the story ends, the king announces that in fulfilment of his pledge to Mani Mekhala, he will establish “an institute of high learning” to share his wisdom with the people of Mithila:

We are sure that the time has come to establish that institute. In fact, it should have been established many years ago. Today’s events have shown the necessity. From the Viceroy down to the elephant mahouts and the horse handlers, and up from the horse handlers to the Viceroy, and especially the courtiers are all ignorant. They lack not only technical knowledge but also common knowledge, i.e. common sense: they do not even know what is good for them. They like mangoes, but they destroy the good mango tree.

Bhumibol had so little faith in the intelligence of others that he didn’t even trust their ability to discern the message of his allegorical tale, which was hardly subtle or complex. So when it was published in 1996, eight years after it had been written, the king added a preface in which he painstakingly explained what was already blindingly obvious. First, he informed the reader that the story illustrated the perseverance of a selfless monarch:

King Mahajanaka practised ultimate perseverance without the desire for reward which resulted in his gaining a throne and bringing prosperity and wealth to the city of Mithila by the strength of his qualities.

He then explained the key change he had made to the original tale, to make absolutely sure nobody missed the moral of his story:

Upon arriving at the text concerning the mango trees, His Majesty the King was of the opinion that King Mahajanaka’s desire to leave the city on a quest for supreme tranquility was not yet opportune nor timely because Mithila’s prosperity had not reached an appropriate peak, because everyone “from the Viceroy down to the elephant mahouts and the horse handlers, and up from the horse handlers to the Viceroy, and especially the courtiers all live in the state of ignorance. They lack wisdom as well as knowledge in technology, they do not see the essence of what is beneficial, even for their own good. Therefore, an institution of universal learning must be established.” Moreover, King Mahajanaka also had to advance his thoughts on how to revive the mango tree with nine modern methods.

Bhumibol was telegraphing the fact that because of his selfless devotion to duty and his great perseverance he would nobly continue his solitary struggle to save the country. He believed Thailand would be lost without his wisdom. Like the people of Mithila, the Thais did not even know what was good for them. They depended on him utterly. Or so he believed. Thailand’s king had become bewitched by his own fairytales. He thought they were true. And so, dutifully and wearily, Bhumibol kept going. He couldn’t see the shore he was trying to reach. All he could do was just keep on swimming.

In the end it was not Bhumibol who stepped down during 1988, but his staunch ally and political proxy, Prem. Never deigning to stand for election, he had been Thai premier for eight years of “guided democracy”, in which a fractious parliament and intermittent elections gave a veneer of popular participation in decision making when it fact, the monarchy, military and bureaucracy were firmly in charge. In his “farewell address” to the nation on August 5, 1988, broadcast on television and radio, Prem adopted the same tone of world-weary disinterest in power as Bhumibol (and later, Thaksin too), portraying his years in office as a great personal sacrifice for the sake of the Thai people which he was glad to be able to bring to an end:

As for myself, I have always been modest. I have had no political ambition. I never entertained the ambition of being premier. Being a premier is no fun and tiring. But when I was given the responsibility, I was ready to be tired and devote myself to the work, facing all problems with courage and patience.

In fact, Prem was far from ready to step down as prime minister. He had been all set to carry on as Thailand’s unelected premier until scandals, setbacks and growing pressure for greater democracy persuaded him — and the palace — that it would be prudent to retreat. He had achieved little despite years in office, as Sukhumband witheringly argued in his Far Eastern Economic Review article of June 1987.

After seven years in office, the premier has yet to demonstrate that he has it in him to be a statesman and to silence charges that self-survival is his only concern. Distrustful of democratic practices, he has repeatedly refused to run in any election and to entrust major ministerial portfolios to elected MPs. The substance of his accomplishments consists of balancing one military group against another to maintain his own position. His style of leadership is one of maintaining a royalty-like aloofness from all major political problems and ensuring that criticisms against him are contained at their sources, usually by his military supporters, or diverted towards his subordinates, even those who have given loyal service in the past…

The prime minister’s motto seems to be “The Buck Never Stops Here” and while helping him to remain in office, it has devalued the premiership in many people’s eyes.

Two disasters in particular contributed to Prem’s downfall. His years in office had been marked by widespread corruption, but probably the most egregious scandal erupted in late 1987 when it emerged that for at least a decade, a corrupt cabal of officials had been selling cut-price knighthoods and other royal honours. The scam involved several crooked monks and senior bureaucrats in Prem’s Cabinet Secretariat.

Royal decorations were a crucial tool for keeping palace finances healthy: a donation of $2,430 to a royal foundation could buy a Silver Medal (Seventh Class), while $1.2 million would make the donor a Knight Grand Cross (First Class) of the Most Noble Order of the Crown of Thailand. But the scammers forged documentation to allow Thais wanting a royal bauble to procure one for less if they greased the right palms. Officials up to the level of deputy prime minister were implicated. On December 22, 1987, Chalermchai Buathong, a 54-year-old senior Cabinet Secretariat official who had been interrogated in the investigation, shot himself in the head with a .38 pistol. His suicide note read: “I have been blamed too much. I can’t live.” As Handley says:

The episode revealed just how debased royal decorations and the throne’s magic circle of merit had become. It also revealed how unconcerned Prem, the king’s virtuous premier, had been over corruption.

Yet more humiliation was heaped on Prem and the military by Thailand’s stunning defeat by its tiny neighbour Laos in a border war that erupted in late 1987. Thai troops occupied the disputed border village of Ban Romklao near Phitsanoluk, only to be driven out in a nighttime offensive by Pathet Lao forces. Thailand’s military was heavily involved in logging in the disputed area, and this played a major part in sparking the conflict. In the fighting that followed, more than 1,000 soldiers were killed, most of them Thai. Two Thai aircraft were downed, and Thai planes also accidentally bombed their own troops. A ceasefire was eventually agreed in February 1988. Although Laos had received military help from Vietnam, which maintained tight control over the Vientiane regime, it was a painful reminder that Thailand’s military, while adept at political meddling and shady business ventures, was grossly incompetent when it came to combat.

Bhumibol made sure that Prem was richly rewarded for his faithful service. He was immediately installed as the effective head of the privy council, awarded membership of the Ancient and Auspicious Order or the Nine Gems, and also given the usefully ill-defined title of Senior Statesman. He continues to meddle actively in Thai politics, freed from the exhausting chore of having to be transparent and accountable to the public for his actions. But the era of Premocracy had come to an ignominious close.

Prem’s replacement as prime minister was Chatichai Choonhavan. He was hardly a poster boy for democracy. His father, Field Marshal Phin Choonhavan had been an ambitious and unscrupulous army leader who helped spearhead the 1947 coup that cemented decades of military dominance of Thai politics; his sister had married Phao Sriyanond. During the brutal and corrupt rule of Phibun, Phao and Phin in the 1950s, Chatichai had been made the youngest general in Thai history, and a cabinet minister to boot; the Sarit coup of 1957 led to him being sent into virtual exile as Thai ambassador to Argentina. He returned to Thai politics in the 1970s and served a spell as foreign minister. The New York Times described him as a “flamboyant public figure with his cigar, his glass of wine and his Harley-Davidson motorcycle”. Upon becoming prime minister, Chatichai told reporters: “From now on, you must not call me playboy.” He was also an enthusiastic golfer, as a report in the Far Eastern Economic Review in November 1990 showed:

British journalists were less than impressed with Thai Prime Minister Chatichai Choonhavan during his recent visit to London. At a press conference after his meeting with his counterpart, Margaret Thatcher, Chatichai gave only oblique replies to most of the questions he was asked about such issues as Cambodia and Asean. However, he gave a quick, direct reply when asked about his country’s position on the Gulf crisis. “Yes,” he said, “I will be playing golf this afternoon.”

But the Chatichai premiership heralded radical change in the balance of power and influence in Thailand, from established military and bureaucratic elites to politicians. Suddenly a new cadre of elected politicians, many of whom had links to provincial criminal networks, had control of awarding contracts worth billions of dollars to Thai businessmen for the construction of the infrastructure needed to sustain the country’s dramatic economic boom and rapid urbanization. Chatichai’s ministers quickly became known as the “buffet cabinet” for the unabashed enthusiasm with which they helped themselves to the spoils of office. The government sold dozens of massive new concessions, maximizing the opportunities for rent-seeking by dividing projects among an ill-defined tangle of competing agencies and regulatory bodies. Thailand had — and continues to have — an exceptionally inefficient governance structure, allowing those running the country to maximize the amount of wealth they could extract for themselves at the expense of the population as a whole.

The unexpected shift in political ascendancy from Prem to Chatichai shook the delicate balance of power between the monarchy, military and parliament. Although Chatichai was the scion of a military dictator and had been a general himself, his government wrested power — and, crucially, the vast opportunities for personal enrichment that come with power in Thailand — away from the military and into the hands of a newly emboldened cabal of civilian politicians and businessmen. The generals were incandescent.

Bhumibol made his displeasure with the prime minister clear. In his traditional birthday inspection of the palace guard in December 1990, he praised the armed forces, saying: “The military has done a good job in upholding the liberty and sovereignty of the country.” The following day, in his birthday speech, he was highly critical of the performance of Chatichai’s government.

In Angels and Devils, his account of Thai politics during this period, David Murray describes how parliamentary politicians had traditionally only been permitted to operate within strictly defined boundaries, on the implicit understanding that they would not challenge the prerogatives of the palace and the military:

Although theoretically a constitutional monarchy since 1932, little had changed in the power sharing arrangements. Because Thailand was never conquered by a foreign power, the traditional structures, particularly those of the monarchy, the Buddhist religion, and the military and civil bureaucracies have remained undisturbed… Also, the overthrow of the absolute monarchy was not the result of a ground swell of public demand, but merely the result of dissatisfaction within the ranks of the then existing power sharing elites. Thus, although the coup of 1932 saw the balance of power altered, the ascendancy of the monarchic elites was merely replaced by military and bureaucratic elites. Since then too, the role of the monarchy has been reactivated to return to the power sharing triumvirate. The basic political structure did not need to change to accommodate modernisation and to satisfy the elites. The mass of rural dwellers, too, could be satisfied, as long as the land resource base could absorb continued population growth, and industrialization could provide urban employment for a surplus rural labour force. To add a veneer of political legitimacy to the power structure, from time to time political parties and a parliamentary system of government have been allowed to operate, usually under prescribed conditions whereby politicians and parliament have been relegated to the position of a bit player on the margins of central decision making. As soon as the politicians have overstepped the bounds placed on their role, the armed forces have mounted yet another successful coup and the country has lapsed yet again into a period of undemocratic government. The process has become known as the “vicious cycle” or “vicious circle” of Thai politics.

The Thai military uses the coup as a mechanism to regain or consolidate its own position in the power sharing arrangements with the bureaucratic elites…

Under these conditions, a parliamentary and political system has not had the opportunity to flourish, political parties tend to have few clearly distinguishable differences in policy and no identifiable class-based constituencies, and all important decisions have basically been left in the hands of the bureaucratic and technocratic elites.

The military, increasingly resentful of its diminished clout, issued repeated threats against the government. And, almost inevitably, the generals soon decided it was time for another coup. In February 1991 a junta fronted by Supreme Commander General Sunthorn Kongsompong although actually led by General Suchinda Kraprayoon seized power and arrested Chatichai. Suchinda had long cultivated links with Prem and Sirikit, and was backed by a cadre of loyal classmates from the Chulachomklao Military Academy. Suchinda came from Class 5, which Paul Handley describes as “the most cohesive, ambitious and corrupt class the school had ever produced”

The junta gave the traditional justifications for their coup: government corruption, “parliamentary dictatorship”, and most importantly, fabricated threats to the monarchy. The real reason, of course, was that they resented the fact that elected Thai politicians had the temerity to think they had the right to run the country. As Murray argues in Angels and Devils, “the basic failure of the Chatichai government was that it had tried to break up the balance between the traditional elements in the Thai political system”:

In short, the Chatichai government was accused of retaining more of the “spoils of office” than was considered acceptable, and of becoming so strong that it felt it could take over decision making functions from the civil service and ignore the military, sacking all those who stood in its way – be they civilian or military.

This was a moment for Bhumibol to make a stand in support of democracy. He could have refused to endorse the coup, as he had done in the 1980s to protect Prem. But the king meekly assented. Once again, Thailand was under military rule.

Suchinda promised to clean up Thai politics and then return power to the people — a common theme in successive Thai military coups. But as Federico Ferrara, assistant professor of politics at the City University of Hong Kong, writes in  Thailand Unhinged: The Death of Thai-Style Democracy: “The events that followed offered a poignant demonstration that coups in Thailand have nothing at all to do with restoring democracy.”

The junta gained some measure of credibility by appointing Anand Panyarachun, a businessman and former diplomat with a deserved reputation for honesty, as prime minister. It was a decision they would come to regret — he proved far more independent than they had expected. But it quickly became clear that, despite explicit promises to the contrary, Suchinda and his cronies in the military intended to maintain a prolonged grip on power. An investigation into 22 former ministers alleged to be “unusually wealthy” — a key justification for the coup — quickly became compromised as the generals realized they needed the support of corrupt politicians to perpetuate their power. As Murray said:

So much for stamping out corruption… what began as a righteous quest ended in the usual political horse trading between the various groups within the elites, which is part and parcel of Thai politics. In the process, as usual, honesty, integrity, and justice were compromised.

The military was also overseeing the drafting of a new constitution after scrapping the 1978 charter. Its proposed new rules were a severe setback for democracy, with several clauses designed to perpetuate military dominance of politics even after elections were held. By the autumn of 1991, the proposed constitution had become the key political battleground between supporters and opponents of Suchinda’s junta. In November, a front page editorial in the Bangkok Post denounced the draft charter:

Ever since the military overthrew the oppressive civilian regime of Tanin Kraivixien more than a decade ago, we have cherished the hope that never again would our country slide back into such a dark age. Never again, we told ourselves, would the Thai people be treated with such disdain and their democratic aspirations taken for granted by the military elite.

The Post noted that the coup leaders had promised “a new political era under which the next election would be free and fair, politicians would be less corrupt and, above all, a fully democratic parliament would emerge”.

This now appears to be a cruel delusion…

One might question whether it is worth the taxpayers’ money to hold an election which could turn out to be meaningless anyway as the electorate will be spoonfed a ready-made prime minister and a subservient, emasculated parliament, little able to perform its crucial check-and-balance role.

On November 19, more than 70,000 people rallied at Sanam Luang in protest against the proposed charter, the biggest mass demonstration since 1976. A group of students began a hunger strike. A survey in December by the Campaign for Popular Democracy found 98.8 percent of 312,357 people polled were against the draft constitution. Popular momentum was building to demand more democracy.

But then, in his 1991 birthday speech on December 4, King Bhumibol made it abundantly clear that he disapproved of opposition to the junta’s deeply unpopular charter. In a typically rambling hour-long speech he argued that no political system was flawless, and that for a poor country like Thailand, compromise and unity were far more important than trying to create an idealistic constitution based on unworkable ideals about democracy imported from abroad. “If unity is not practiced today,” he said, “there is no tomorrow.” Thais should cease their divisive opposition to the junta’s draft charter. As far as he was concerned, while the proposed constitution may not have been perfect, it was perfectly adequate, and if there were any serious problems with it they could always be fixed later:

If it works well, then stick with it; if it doesn’t work well, doesn’t work smoothly, it can be changed… and opening the way to change it is not difficult.

Three days later, Thailand adopted the junta’s constitution. Bhumibol had once again shown himself to be blind to his people’s aspirations for democracy.

The generals had won the battle, but this did nothing for their popularity. The first anniversary of the coup was a spectacular embarrassment, as Murray describes:

As the anniversary of the coup approached, it was announced that the NPKC would mark the day by publicising a list of its “achievements”. But on the day… Sunthorn led a group of NPKC leaders to offer food to the Supreme Patriarch and senior Buddhist monks. Perhaps they were safer there than anywhere else. There was no television appearance, no public announcement. When asked why a proposed television speech to the nation had been postponed, Sunthorn replied: “The speech is not necessary since we don’t regard today as important.” The NPKC had nothing to say. As the Bangkok Post editorial headline declared, it was “an anniversary best forgotten”.

This deafening silence was followed by the revelation that two days before the anniversary, military aircraft had been used to fly officers and their families… and a band of musicians and entertainers to Surat Thani, some 600 km south of Bangkok, for a reunion party for top generals who had graduated from Chulachomklao in 1957 – the all powerful Class 5. One hotel had its 232 rooms booked out for the event, and 12 Thai Airways International hostesses were on hand to act as “honourary receptionists” at the sumptious affair… The party itself had not been a great success. The joyous mood turned sour when Suchinda’s wife made a public scene when she thought that her husband had become too friendly with one of the entertainers, a former beauty queen.

Elections were set for March 22. In another disaster for democracy, the junta’s proxy party Sammakitham along with three other opportunistic pro-military parties, Chart Thai, Social Action Party and Prachakorn Thai, won 191 of the 360 seats in parliament. Flush with cash, the parties had purchased the loyalty of swathes of Thailand’s professional political class, and used vote-buying networks to great effect. Suchinda remained the effective leader of the ruling bloc, but he had repeatedly insisted he would not seek to become prime minister, and so the winning coalition nominated a pliant puppet, Narong Wongwan, a former agriculture minister under Prem. This plan soon fell apart when the sheer scale of Narong’s criminality became apparent: not only had he been linked to an illegal logging scam, but U.S. officials confirmed he had been denied a visa due to suspected involvement in heroin trafficking. This gave Suchinda the excuse he needed to complete his breathtaking volte-face. He announced that he would step in to save the nation, portraying his move as a great personal sacrifice. In a speech on April 8 to military officers, Suchinda theatrically wept as he told his comrades he had been forced to go back on his word in order to “save the country”.

Suchinda proceeded to name a cabinet filled with cronies, shady politicians with links to criminal godfathers, and several politicians who the junta had only recently investigated for unusual wealth. Duncan McCargo memorably summarizes the odiousness of the entire affair in his paper Populism and Reformism in contemporary Thailand:

Here was parliamentary dictatorship in its ultimate form: a parliament whose election had been orchestrated by a dictatorship, which then presented the premiership to a dictator. The greatest shock of all came when Suchinda announced his cabinet. The very same politicians he had decried a year earlier as ‘unusually rich’ were now sitting around his cabinet table, in a scene strongly reminiscent of the final pages of Orwell’s Animal Farm.

Bangkok’s middle class and the business community were outraged. Most newspapers denounced Suchinda; the Nation said he had achieved “a standard of hypocrisy that is hard to surpass”. The Thai stock market went into freefall; the SET index, around 830 points when Sunchinda became prime minister, collapsed below 700 in mid-May as political turmoil worsened and a pro-democracy protest movement emerged, led by Chamlong Srimuang, an ascetic and eccentric retired major general and former secretary to Prem Tinsulanonda.

Chamlong had been a member of the “Young Turks” from Class 7 of the Chulachomklao Military Academy, but had avoided getting embroiled in the clique’s coup intrigues in the 1980s. He was a committed follower of the ascetic Buddhist Santi Ayoke sect — in accordance with their precepts he and his wife slept on the bare floor without a mattress, ate only one meal a day (vegetarian of course), and abstained from sex. In 1985 he had resigned from the military to run for the governorship of Bangkok, and won.

The first mass demonstration against Suchinda’s government came on April 20, when 70,000 people rallied in Royal Plaza. Rattled, Suchinda appealed to Thais to “play by democratic rules”, seemingly unaware of the hypocrisy of his words.

On May 4, 80,000 people massed at Sanam Luang, and as opposition lawmakers savaged Suchinda in a parliamentary session on May 6, tens of thousands rallied outside. The protesters were denounced by Suchinda and his cronies as communists, anti-monarchists and enemies of Buddhism. They were anything but. Most were staunch royalists and many were from the newly affluent middle classes. As Murray observes:

They were nicknamed “mob mua thue” (the mobile phone mob), “mob hi-tec”, “mob rot keng” (the sedan mob), “mob picnic”, “mob nom priew” (the yoghurt-drink mob) and the “yuppie mob”… Many demonstrators brought with them their own provisions. Instead of bullet proof vests and gas masks, they came armed with bags of drinks and snacks, portable stereo sets and mattresses.

Bhumibol was totally out of touch with the mood in Bangkok. He was staunchly on the side of Suchinda and the military. Handley notes that Piya Malakul, a minor royal and informal PR adviser to the king, devoted his media resources to trying to undermine the protests:

The government tried to stifle Chamlong’s challenge by censoring media reports. Television reported only on cabinet ministers and a senior monk criticizing Chamlong’s behaviour as destructive to nation, religion and king. The king’s media adviser Piya Malakul had his Jor Sor 100, the capital’s popular talk-format radio station, run a barrage of denunciations of Chamlong and protesters. Callers who criticized the government were cut off.

Everybody could see the similarities to October 1973, when mass street protests had been met with a massacre by the military. There was widespread fear that history could repeat itself. Opposition parties, academics and business groups urged the king to intervene to prevent bloodshed. On May 8, Bhumibol had an audience with Suchinda and the leaders of the three armed forces. He told them not to use force to end the demonstrations, but did not press for any concessions from them. He did not meet with any representatives of the protest movement. That evening, 150,000 people massed at Sanam Luang and Bhumibol began intervening more actively: members of the king’s network pressed the government parties to agree to amend the constitution. They announced that they would, but without giving details or any timeframe for the changes they would make.

On Sunday May 10, Princess Sirindhorn was due to travel down Ratchadamnoen Avenue in a motorcade to Sanam Luang for a ceremony to launch Buddhism Protection Week. Following his audience with Bhumibol, Suchinda announced that the area would have to be cleared by protesters ahead of this event. The protesters complied, clearing the avenue and mounting pictures of Sirindhorn, Bhumibol and Sirikit along the route to show their loyalty. But Sirindhorn’s convoy never came. It drove a circuitous route to Sanam Luang, and Piya Malakul’s Jor Sor 100 radio broadcast falsely that demonstrators had blocked the princess’s route. The royals were actively conspiring with Suchinda and the military to undermine the protests and depict them as disrespectful of the monarchy.

Over the week that followed, the pro-democracy movement awaited news of the government’s promised constitutional amendments. They never materialized: it was clear the government and military had no intention of making concessions. The protests flared anew.

On May 17, some 200,000 people filled Sanam Luang. At around 8:30 in the evening, Chamlong led them on a march towards Government House; they were blocked by razor wire barricades at the Phan Fa bridge. Scuffles broke out, and scores of protesters and around 20 police were wounded. Two fire trucks that had been hosing water on the protesters were set ablaze. In the early hours of May 18, the government declared a state of emergency. As the violence worsened, soldiers fired M-16 assault rifles directly into the crowd. Several people were killed; protesters refused to disperse and defiantly raised their hands in the air to show they were unarmed.

In response to government censorship, several newspapers defiantly left blank spaces in their pages. The Bangkok Post was among them:

Early in the afternoon of May 18, Suchinda appeared on television to declare the government had no choice but to use whatever force necessary to quell the violence. Troops moved in to secure the area. But the protesters still refused to give up. Murray recounts the events of that day:

About 10,000 protesters remained milling around outside the Public Relations Department. By 6:00 p.m. there were also 20,000 outside the Royal Hotel. They booed and jeered the troops, waving bloodied clothing and challenging the soldiers to open fire. The troops fired repeated volleys over their heads. By 8:30 p.m., the crowd had swollen dramatically, buses were commandeered to block [Ratchadamnoen] Avenue, vehicles were set on fire, and large cement flower tubs lined up as barricades. The crowds continued to jeer, shouting anti-Suchinda slogans. Troops and demonstrators clashed in battles to control the area in front of the Public Relations Department. At 8:40 p.m., troops opened fire on about 30,000 protesters, and again at 10:20 p.m. On both occasions the firing was for sustained periods, and more than 30 were feared killed. Demonstrators covered the bodies of the dead with the national flag. In a video tape recording, an officer was heard to instruct the troops to shoot at will. The same footage showed a demonstrator who was running away cut down in a hail of automatic gunfire. The number of unarmed civilians killed in the rally remains unknown.

Around 5 a.m. on the morning of May 19, troops stormed the Royal Hotel, which was being used as a makeshift medical centre to treat wounded protesters:

Murray describes the scene:

The whole world (apart from Thailand) saw this “heroic” military action on television. Unarmed demonstrators on the pavement outside were ordered on their faces, and some were trampled on. As the soldiers burst into the lobby of the hotel. everybody was ordered to lie down, and those who were a little slow to respond to the command were beaten to the ground. Bodies were kicked and stomped on. At least 1,500 demonstrators, stripped to the waist, with hands tied behind their backs were carted away in military trucks at 5:40 a.m. A further 1,000 male protesters in the small groups of resistance that remained were rounded up and trucked out by 8:30 a.m. The resistance in Rachadamnoen Avenue had finally been crushed.

The Avenue was deserted. Smoke still curled from the shells of the government buildings that had been burned. Thousands of sandals were scattered about. The scorched, wrecked bodies of cars, pickup trucks, three petrol tankers and seven buses littered the street. The pavements and roadway were strewn with glass.

The world was waiting for Bhumibol to do something. Thais were certain he would step in to try to resolve the situation before the violence got worse. But the palace was silent.

Even after the bloody clearing of Ratchadamnoen Avenue, the protesters refused to be broken. In the evening of May 19, they rallied at Ramkhanghaeng University in the east of the capital. By midnight, 50,000 people were gathered there. Despite attempts to shut them down, some Thai media defied restrictions to bravely report what was happening. More — and far worse — carnage seemed certain.

The Nation newspaper’s front page on May 20 was bordered in black, with a quotation from William Shakespeare’s The Tragedy of King Lear:

Across Thailand and around the world, Bhumibol’s failure to intervene seemed increasingly troubling and incomprehensible. It was widely assumed that the military must be holding him incommunicado and preventing him from speaking out. As Time magazine reported:

Bangkok… was no longer a capital of prosperity. It was a city in shock – numbed by tumult, appalled at wholesale death in the streets and raging at a Prime Minister who had become the most hated man in Thailand. Throughout those three days, people looked imploringly to Chitralada Palace and the one figure capable of intervening decisively. Their long wait had begun to convince many Thais that King Bhumibol… could not risk squandering his moral authority when words might not matter. Soldiers were at war with civilians. Both sides were digging in. A nation that had been basking in the sunlight of economic success looked headed for eclipse in further nights of the generals.

Finally, on May 20, the palace acted. At 6 a.m., Princess Sirindhorn, the most beloved royal after Bhumibol himself, appeared on television pleading for the killing to stop. Her intervention made the front pages of afternoon newspapers. At 9:30 p.m., Bhumibol summoned Chamlong and Suchinda. What happened next became the stuff of legend.

With Suchinda and Chamlong kneeling submissively on the floor, Bhumibol lectured them in a soft but stern voice, telling them to stop their confrontation and settle their differences peacefully. A partial translation of his comments appears in KBAALW:

It may not be a surprise as to why I asked you to come to this meeting. Everyone knows how confused the situation is and that it may well lead the country to complete ruin. I would request especially the two of you, General Suchinda and Major General Chamlomg, to sit down and consider together in a conciliatory manner and not in a confrontational manner, a way to solve the problem, because our country does not belong to any one or two persons, but belongs to everyone. Therefore, we must cooperate with one another and not confront one another, because the danger is that when people get in a state of blind fury and act in uncontrolled violence, they will not even know what they are fighting about or how to solve the problem. They will only know that they must win.

But can there ever be a winner? Of course not. It is so very dangerous. There will only be losers — that is, everyone is a loser, each side in the confrontation is a loser… If a great destruction occurs in Bangkok, then the country as a whole is also destroyed. In such a case, what is the point of anyone feeling proud to be the winner, when standing on a pile of ruins and rubble?

The footage was shown on Thai television at midnight and broadcast around the world. The effect was immediate. Soldiers returned to barracks and protesters returned home. Suchinda and Chamlong announced they would work together to resolve the situation without further bloodshed.

Bhumibol’s intervention in 1992 is widely regarded at home and abroad as the defining proof of his greatness, and it remains the most enduring single memory of his reign. In the words of Maurizio Peleggi, associate professor at the National University of Singapore, in his paper Semiotics of Rama IX:

By the early 1990s signs of Rama IX’s incipient apotheosis were aplenty, but none more eloquent than the televised royal audience on 20 May 1992… Fifty million TV spectators watched Suchinda and Chamlong kneeling at the king’s feet… and humbly receiving the royal admonition to take a step back and stop the violence in the streets.

In an editorial the following day, the Washington Post was effusive in its praise:

Who will soon forget the remarkable picture of the military ruler and the opposition leader together on their knees before the king of Thailand? Summoning up the impartiality and sense of national essence that he has cultivated for 42 years on an otherwise powerless throne, King Bhumibol Adulyadej was able at least to ease the immediate confrontation between Suchinda Kraprayoon, the general who is prime minister, and Chamlong Srimuang, the former general who leads the opposition. At once Thailand’s boiling crisis was moved from the streets to the political bargaining table.

Like so many other highlights of royal folklore, however, the official story of Bhumibol’s dramatic intervention fails to give an accurate account of what had happened. The king had been supportive of Suchinda and the military throughout, and had used his 1991 birthday speech to undermine demands for a more democratic constitution. His repeated insistence that the charter could always be changed later if there were problems was naive and unrealistic. He had failed to gauge the public mood in Bangkok, and failed to put any genuine pressure on Suchinda to act more honourably. When protests flared again in April and May, Bhumibol was aghast, and his ally Piya Malakul had campaigned to smear and undercut the pro-democracy movement.

Bhumibol had also remained silent for three agonizing days after May 17 as civilians were massacred on the streets of Bangkok. The official explanation has always been that Bhumibol could not risk acting too early: he had to wait until he could be sure that his intervention would succeed. Kobkua Suwannathat-Pian, for example, writes in Kings, Country and Constitutions that: “Job well done rather than job hastily done appeared to be King Bhumibol’s principle of royal operation.” Yet this view is, at best, very questionable. While we have the luxury of hindsight that the king did not possess at the time, was it really necessary to wait until the death toll had risen so high to improve the chances his intervention would work?

Bhumibol’s comments to Suchinda and Chamlong on May 20 made clear that he regarded the protesters, not the military, as primarily to blame for the bloodshed. He said the military had already agreed that the constitution could be amended, implying that the democracy movement had been provocative and irresponsible for failing to trust Suchinda. He only referred to democracy once in his comments, calling it “so-called democracy”.

Just as in 1973, Bhumibol had been firmly committed to propping up a despised government, and hostile to popular pressure for political change. Just as in 1973, he found himself unwillingly forced to intervene after the military threw off all restraint and began gunning down civilians in the streets. And just as in 1973, he found himself exalted as the defender of Thai democracy when in fact that had never been his intention at all.

Suchinda initially believed he could continue as prime minister. It was only after further public outcry that he finally stepped down on May 24, after securing an amnesty for all those involved in the violence. Even then, the coalition parties stubbornly held their ground, announcing they would nominate Air Chief Marshal Somboon Rahong as prime minister. Somboon was another crony of the Class 5 coup leaders, and would have made a dangerously divisive prime minister. But his parliamentary allies refused to compromise on another nominee. The palace stalled for time, delaying official acceptance of the nomination, and using Prem and others to press for another candidate. But by June 10, the decision could be delayed no longer. Confident of becoming the next prime minister, Somboon invited hundreds of friends and Chart Thai members to his house, dressed in their white official uniforms, with champagne on ice, ready to celebrate. Shortly after 7 p.m., the phone rang. Somboon’s face crumpled. The king had named Anand Panyarachun as interim prime minister. Murray describes the scene:

The party members were hushed and grim faced. To add to their embarrassment, when the reporters present heard the news, most clapped their hands and shouted for joy. Somboon claimed he was “relieved”, and went upstairs to change into normal clothes. The party was over.

Anand was a highly popular choice, despite the fact that in neither of his terms as prime minister was he actually elected. The king’s intervention to get him installed left the military and allied politicians fuming, but helped steer Thailand away from another round of confrontation and towards political reform. It also, however, raised more questions about his role and powers. Bhumibol’s dramatic intervention in May could be seen as the king exercising his right to advise political leaders — advice that they are free, in theory, to ignore if they choose. But in June he overstepped multiple constitutional bounds by actually overruling parliament’s choice of prime minister and picking his own. The constitutional niceties were taken care of through the pretence that it had been the idea of parliament’s speaker to submit Anand’s name in place of Somboon’s, as he was in theory entitled to do, and that Bhumibol had merely approved the nomination. Everybody knew the reality was different. And even Bhumibol’s staunch royalist supporters realized that things would have to change.

As his reign had progressed, Bhumibol had sought to impose his authority on Thailand by ruling via proxy prime ministers who he trusted to do his bidding — first Thanin Kraivixien in 1976-77 and then Prem Tinsulanonda in 1980-88. But given popular aspirations for democracy, and the palace’s pretence that it supported them, a more subtle system was needed. The more extremist royalists in Sirikit’s circle never accepted this, of course, believing that the palace could and should openly dominate Thai politics. But key members of Bhumibol’s circle favoured an approach in which a network of loyal royalists would govern on the kings behalf, using their positions of authority to shape Thailand in accordance with Rama IX’s wishes. In his seminal 2005 paper Network monarchy and legitimacy crises in Thailand, one of the most illuminating and influential analyses of contemporary Thai politics, Leeds University professor Duncan McCargo describes the evolution of Bhumibol’s thinking:

The royal family continued to display an excessive partiality for the military, rather than promoting reconciliation and unity. Nevertheless, the King gradually learned an important lesson: network monarchy had to involve pragmatic compromises with sleazy politicians, had to employ a degree of structural violence, and had to involve the politics of alliance building. However, building these alliances was no job for a royal head of state. The King needed a proxy who could manage his network. Indeed, there was no need for the monarch to have much direct involvement in the running of the country. With the right manager in place, the network would run itself; the monarch need only intervene personally in times of crisis, or when he had a particular message to communicate…

From 1980 onwards, the manager of Thailand’s network monarchy was in place: Prem Tinsulanond, handpicked by the King as army commander and later prime minister. His installation as prime minister might have appeared democratic, but was actually a ‘royal coup’. Prem could never replace his beloved Sarit, yet the King trusted Prem absolutely, seeing him as an incorruptible figure who shared his soft and understated approach, but who was a skilled alliance-builder and wielder of patronage. For the next twenty-one years, Prem served effectively as Thailand’s ‘director of human resources’, masterminding appointments, transfers and promotions. Prem’s power was never absolute, though it was always considerable. He served as prime minister until 1988, then immediately became a privy councillor and senior statesman, succeeding to the presidency of the Privy Council in 1998.

McCargo describes the defining features of “network monarch” as follows:

The monarch was the ultimate arbiter of political decisions in times of crisis; the monarchy was the primary source of national legitimacy; the King acted as a didactic commentator on national issues, helping to set the national agenda, especially through his annual birthday speeches; the monarch intervened actively in political developments, largely by working through proxies such as privy councillors and trusted military figures… At heart, network governance of this kind relied on placing the right people (mainly, the right men) in the right jobs…

Network monarchy is inherently illiberal, because it advocates reliance on ‘good men’, and the marginalization of formal political institutions or procedures. Low priority is given to democratic principles such as the rule of law and popular sovereignty …

During Chatichai’s government of 1988-91, the royal network found itself with limited influence, and this helps explains Bhumibol’s backing for a reimposition of military rule. But when Suchinda’s government collapsed amid popular fury in May 1992, it was clear to more progressive members of Bhumibol’s inner circle that the system would have to be reformed to reduce the king’s reliance on the military. As McCargo argues:

While the May 1992 protests were clearly not scripted by the palace, the belated and fuzzy royal intervention that ended the bloodshed and led to Suchinda’s resignation was subsequently mythologized into a triumph for the monarchy. The three-day delay in the king’s actions was never explained convincingly… Despite the general view that the violence of May 1992 signalled it was time to stop relying on the military and monarchy, and highlighted the need for a process of thoroughgoing constitutional and political reform, all the evidence suggests that the King himself failed to understand this…

The violence of May 1992 had left the King in an apparently strong position. He emerged as the supreme political referee, following a superficially successful intervention to solve the crisis. Yet the intervention also marked the high watermark of his authority. His consistent support for the military reflected an obsolete understanding of the Thai political and social order.

There were other pressing reasons to reform the political system. Bhumibol was getting old and frail, and his son Vajiralongkorn had shown no evidence that he would be able to reign as a judicious and respected monarch. Thailand’s more far-sighted royalists realized that if they wanted their influence to survive the king’s death, they needed to create a system that relied less on the personality of the monarch, and more on the network of “good men”. McCargo makes this point in his paper Alternative Meanings of Political Reform in Contemporary Thailand:

One explanation of the political reform movement of the 1990s was that — at least in the minds of the élite — it was primarily concerned with pre-emptive crisis management, with firming up the political system, so as to make it better able to withstand the calamity of a succession crisis. Since at some time in the future the wise guidance of the King would no longer be available, Thailand needed to attain greater political maturity, and attain it fast. By firming up the political system, the reform process would strengthen the political order – and, of course, the institution of the monarchy. In other words, just like King Chulalongkorn’s political reforms in the late nineteenth century, the ultimate aim of the political reform movement of the 1990s was to shore up the long-term position of the throne. Reformism was essentially a supporting act for the main attraction, monarchism. Though hailed as a ‘people’s constitution’, the 1997 Thai constitution could also be seen as a palace constitution.

Moreover, Thai politics remained rotten to the core, dominated by corrupt professional politicians and avaricious military officers, allied to provincial mafia bosses. Many gangsters served openly as members of parliament, or even cabinet ministers, and bought seats for their wives and children too. To quote McCargo again:

By 1997, there could be little doubt that the Thai political order was in need of substantive reform. At the heart of the problem was a crisis of confidence in electoral politics. The rise of vote buying and other forms of electoral corruption meant that the electoral process was becoming increasingly exclusionary, controlled by an unholy alliance of so-called ‘professional politicians’, provincial crooks and hoodlums, unsavoury business interests, large companies, and third-rate ex-soldiers and bureaucrats. These groups had been beneficiaries of the ‘inadequate’ 1991 constitutional arrangements, under which they had thrived and flourished.

Two of Bhumibol’s more progressive acolytes, Anand Panyarachun and social activist Prawase Wasi, began the groundwork for pushing through political reforms that would clean up Thai politics, entrench governance by “good men”, and withstand the traumatic death of King Bhumibol.

Estranged from her husband, with her once fabled beauty gone forever, Sirikit remained a troubled figure with extremist views. Stevenson describes Sirikit in the 1990s as being lost and miserable, surrounded by scheming and sinister ladies-in-waiting described by one member of the king’s network as “barracuda ladies”:

The queen retreated into an informal court of her own. She was lonely and vulnerable…

Within his own royal court, Bhumibol had to deal with divisions… Silence about majesty had been cracked open by modern technology. Whispers in the darkness of cinemas were now shouted over the Internet which carried stories that Queen Sirikit, fighting age, had fallen under the influence of a ‘female Rasputin’ who prescribed medications that were hallucinatory in large doses. Sirikit had for so long been an astonishingly svelte and lovely woman, and courtiers either flattered her to get her help and favours, or told mischievous tales…

Queen Sirikit had difficulty coping with the rumours, the intrigues, the court chatter which cut her off from normal intercourse. “She feels she missed out on chances to educate herself,” her principal private secretary… Suprapada Kasemsant, had once told me. “She has more common sense in her little finger than anyone around here, but she suffers from this feeling of inadequacy.”

Suprapada was killed along with two of Sirikit’s ladies-in-waiting and 10 of the queen’s staff when their Super Puma transport helicopter crashed on the way to one of the royal projects in southern Thailand in 1994. Afterwards, Sirikit was even more vulnerable to the intrigues of the court. In one passage of The Revolutionary King, Stevenson describes Sirikit as being “on another planet”:

The queen said to me one day, “Thank you for helping my husband”. Members of the royal court were keeping their distance, forming a wide circle around her like benign captors who were also held captive by what she might do for them. Her words were softly spoken. Her eyes were moist and almost pleading. In her early sixties, she kept the style and grace of someone who had made it her life’s work to do what seemed right. Her hand trembled in mine. She wanted someone from the outside world to reinforce her husband. She was now marooned on another planet. She could watch distant events through images beamed through space from distant places on earth. Without interaction, these marvels only contributed to her sense of isolation. It was increasingly difficult for her to see things for herself.

Sirikit began holding infamous dinner parties for the generals and nobles in her circle: they would last all night and only end around dawn. The remarkable U.S. secret cable 09BANGKOK2967 describes Sirikit’s lifestyle and the toxic circle of ladies-in-waiting who came to surround her:

The Queen long maintained an active social life, with her tradition of twice weekly dinners that would start near midnight and last to dawn only ending with her move to Hua Hin. Based mainly out of Bangkok’s Chitralada Palace, she regularly spent extended stretches at palaces in the north (Chiang Mai), the deep south (Narathiwas) and the northeast (Sakon Nakhon) through 2004, years after the King stopped his provincial travels. A 1994 Puma helicopter crash tragically robbed Sirikit of her most valued and respected advisers who could steer her away from trouble.

The ladies-in-waiting who are left, the closest of which are Thanphuying Charungjit Teekara, head of the Queen’s Support Foundation, and Thanphuying Chatkaew Nandhabiwat, appear to reinforce the Queen’s tendency to be more nationalistic than the King. Those sentiments have led her astray in forays into political issues in recent years…

Besides Bhumibol’s “network monarchy”, Sirikit too had her network of supporters, usually extreme-right-wing nationalists who pandered to her fantasies of being a reborn warrior queen. The king and queen had minimal contact except at official events.

Bhumibol, meanwhile, increasingly querulous and hectoring, remained contemptuous of civilian politicians. During the 1990s he began taking a particular interest in Bangkok’s worsening traffic problems. Parts of the city were regularly paralyzed for hours by gridlock, and Bhumibol believed he knew how to fix the situation. Handley discusses his approach:

After the May troubles, Bhumibol began to be seen on television giving advice on traffic management to the city government and police, telling them to make a road one way or stop U-turns, for instance. The king had always had meetings with officials, but rarely were they televised, and then only with an overlaid summary. Now frequent broadcasts showed bureaucrats submissively nodding at the king’s remarks, which viewers could hear clearly and unedited. He would point at maps and talk about specific problems that the people themselves knew of, advising changes to the traffic configuration here and the traffic lights there.

The average TV viewer got no information on the utility of his ideas, and few even understood that there was already a whole bureaucracy working on traffic problems, backed by international expertise. It appeared like only the king was confronting the problem. This impression was amplified by news releases that portrayed the king in charge. One in October 1993 said the king gave the police chief a long list of things to do: build 23 traffic underpasses; increase shipping by river to reduce truck traffic in Bangkok; equip police with more motorcycles; upgrade police helicopters; and survey motorists, among others. Another had Bhumibol instructing the Bangkok government to implement a city master plan done by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The queen, meanwhile, made her own suggestions on her birthday in 1993: reduce cars, get rid of large cars, and put more buses on the roads…

He kept advising and criticizing through 1994, during which all the problems worsened. That December he warned that in five or six years the problems would overwhelm the country. “We must solve the problem by looking at the points of arrival and departure. We must shorten the distance between the two points so people will travel shorter distances and spend less time on the road,” he said.

It sounded good, but it didn’t mean much. Some of the king’s advice was useful, but mostly it echoed what was already being done. Some ideas were fundamentally wrong, like several underpasses and his opposition to higher vehicle taxes. He never addressed key problems like unregulated building, the need for mass transit, or the huge growth in new cars: at one point Bangkok-area roads were getting over 15,000 new cars a month. But by going public with his ideas, he ensured that no one else got credit.

Bhumibol was particularly appalled when Banharn Silpa-archa, a provincial godfather nicknamed “Mr ATM” for his skills at buying influence, became prime minister in 1995.  As McCargo says in Network monarchy and legitimacy crises in Thailand:

The King was visibly distraught at the new Banharn Silp-archa government, the creation of which coincided with the death of his mother. The Banharn government was a delayed political reality, the rise to the premiership of a low-class Chinese provincial businessman. As an elaborate royal funeral was planned, the King appeared almost nightly on television during August 1995, denouncing the country’s politicians for their venality and self-interest. Bangkok’s traffic woes and flooding were the two major themes of his criticism, but underlying them was a fear and loathing of ambitious corrupt politicians. The rise of Banharn demonstrated that the monarchy lacked the power to block such politicians from becoming prime minister. Nevertheless, the monarchy did not hesitate to undermine elected prime ministers of whom it disapproved, colluding in the ousting of perhaps three or four.

Addressing Thai diplomats at Chitralada Palace on August 17, 1995, Bhumibol savaged the government’s continued failure to fix the traffic mess. ”They only talk, talk, talk and argue, argue, argue,” he said, adding a defence of his right to raise such issues:

People may ask why the king is talking politics, but the fact is the king is a Thai citizen who has rights and freedoms under the constitution . . . Everyone has freedom under the constitution. I am using my freedom under the constitution to say what I have said. If anyone wants to sue me, they can try and come up with a charge. I will accept the charge.

Bhumibol’s very public interventions on traffic management followed the same strategy as his royal projects: a theatrical display of his great knowledge and his concern for the welfare of ordinary people, boosting his prestige and popularity at the expense of politicians and bureaucrats. And while well-meaning, his help was not worth much. He was no expert on the complex issues involved. He just believed, as usual, that he knew better. He relished the chance to look superior to elected prime ministers he despised.

Meanwhile, Anand Panyarachun and Prawase Wasi were working on the drafting of a more progressive constitution. They proposed a system that strengthened the powers of the elected government, to end the cycle of chronically weak revolving-door administrations. But greater executive power was to be offset by a set of institutional checks and balances, which were supposed to ensure that the prime minister and his cabinet ruled sensibly and honestly. The constitution was designed to institutionalize the system of network monarchy: governance by “good men”, acolytes of Bhumibol who believed they shared his moral virtue and selfless commitment to the common good. As McCargo wrote in another article, Thai Politics as Reality TV:

The unwritten principles of the new constitution were simple: Good people would be able to enter politics, these good politicians would follow agreed rules of the game, they would not challenge the power or prestige of the monarchy, and in return the monarchy would not interfere with their activities.

Any successful democracy requires a system of checks and balances on elected politicians. The drafters of the new constitution believed that King Bhumibol had, in effect, fulfilled this function during his reign, but this could not last forever. And so they designed a set of institutions to be staffed by ethically upstanding royalists who they hoped would keep politicians on the right track, mimicking Bhumibol’s role as the moral guardian of the nation. To quote McCargo again:

By creating new institutions — such as the Electoral Commission and National Human Rights Commission — the presence of these virtuous individuals could be secured within the political order. In other words, network monarchy could be reorganized on a firmer basis, transcending the informal subsystem that had existed until now.

Australian academic Michael K. Connors has described the ideology of Anand and Prawase as “royal liberalism”. Their philosophy is in many ways profoundly anti-democratic: they do not believe in popular sovereignty, and are convinced that Thailand instead needs to be ruled by selfless, educated and morally sound members of the elite. As he wrote in  Article of Faith: The Failure of Royal Liberalism in Thailand:

Over time, Thai liberal democracy has come to mean governments which rule by the consent of the people when they are able to make the right choices, where power is divided among the executive, legislature and judiciary, and the king plays a guardianship role, and holds ultimate sovereignty. Fundamentally, liberalism in Thailand has been a disciplinary ideology that promotes the production of a citizen-body committed to elite constructions of nation, king and religion.

But to many royalists, including Prem Tinsulanonda and members of Sirikit’s circle, and to the military, which has never tended to be genuinely royalist but which has exploited its symbolic position as defender of the monarchy to assert its right to meddle in politics, the proposals of Anand and Prawase were unacceptable. They would undermine the military’s political role, and strip power from the entrenched bureaucratic elites. The proposed constitution met with fierce resistance from Thailand’s old guard. And so, as McCargo says:

The political reform agenda reflected a struggle between liberals and conservatives for the soul of network monarchy.

During 1997, it appeared that the conservatives would prevail. The palace and the military, along with the vast majority of traditional royalists, were firmly opposed to the proposed changes. But then a sudden and savage economic shock changed everything.

The heady growth that had transformed Thailand since the mid-1980s had created a dangerous bubble mentality among many businessmen: they began to complacently believe that the boom would go on forever, and their investment decisions became more and more grandiose and irrational. This was compounded by the traditional corruption and cronyism of Thai business. The big firms that prospered in Thailand did not have to be the most efficient or the most productive; they just had to have the right connections. It was the same story when it came to getting credit: banks enthusiastically handed out loans with little or no oversight to well-connected Thais, and often the money was not invested for any productive purpose whatsoever, just frittered away in conspicuous consumption, sunk in unviable vanity projects, or used for speculation in property and the stock market. Golf courses, shopping malls and gaudy commercial office buildings began mushrooming all over Bangkok and in provincial towns too.

Much of the foreign cash that had flooded into Thailand was “hot money”, invested in speculative short-term assets rather than productive capital. And as Thailand’s underlying economic problems became more apparent, jittery foreigners began yanking their money back out of the country. Investors had moved funds into Thailand with little real understanding of the economic situation and the problems caused by corruption in the banking system, and now they responded with blind panic. They had been convinced Thailand was a miracle economy and a surefire route to riches; suddenly they decided that it was a financial disaster zone. Neither paradigm was particularly accurate, but the sudden switch from gung-ho bullishness to hysterical anxiety was catastrophic for Thailand. On May 14 and 15, 1997, the rush to the exit became a stampede. The Thai baht came under massive pressure, as hot money fled the country. Foreign exchange traders, scenting blood in the water and betting that the currency peg would not withstand the onslaught, launched an all-out speculative attack on the baht.

The government, under Prime Minister Chavalit Yongchaiyudh, dithered haplessly, eventually bowing to the inevitable and devaluing the baht on July 2. The consequences were far more traumatic than the Thai authorities had anticipated: Nobel laureate economist Paul Krugman described the debacle as “a meltdown”. Thailand’s economy went into freefall. On August 5, the government agreed to implement an IMF-monitored austerity and financial reform programme in return for a $17 billion loan to help prop up the baht. Most of the country’s biggest conglomerates were crippled by crushing foreign debts; the IMF prescribed shock therapy to fix the economy, with technically bankrupt businesses expected to sell off assets at fire-sale prices to foreign buyers. The Thai crisis in turn set off a regional contagion that sparked panicked outflows of hot money from economies across southeast Asia and in South Korea.

The contagion clearly demonstrated that perception and confidence played an absolutely central role in the Asian financial crisis. International investors had very suddenly lost faith in the stories they had been told about the miraculous economic prospects of the region, suddenly perceiving a much darker vision of massive corruption and toxic crony capitalism. The fairytale of Thailand’s economic miracle had been abruptly punctured.

Bhumibol saw the economic crisis as a vindication of everything he had been trying to tell Thailand’s people. From the 1970s, he had been developing a theory of agriculture and development that stressed self-reliance and self-sufficiency, and promoted modest and incremental improvements in income and living standards rather than maximizing consumption and economic growth. This became known as Bhumibol’s “sufficiency economy” theory. But the uncomfortable fact was that Bhumibol faced bankruptcy as a result of the 1997 meltdown. If he had foreseen the crash, as he claimed, he seems to have forgotten to warn the Crown Property Bureau, which managed royal finances. The CPB functioned much like other sprawling, overleveraged Asian conglomerates, and like them it was brought to the brink of ruin by the financial crisis. Respected financial technocrats were drafted in to help salvage the CPB, and the government provided assistance on extraordinarily favourable terms. Over the next few years, the royal finances were restored to remarkable health.

With politicians, tycoons and the palace all reeling from the financial crisis, the battle over political reform came to a climax. The conservatives initially saw a chance to once again impose traditional “Thai-style democracy”. In July 1997 conservatives began floating the possibility of a royal intervention with Prem reinstalled as prime minister. By August, Prem was declaring that he would accept such a role if he was asked. And in October he was still pressing the plan, as McCargo says:

Prem was deployed to shore up the legitimacy of the Chavalit government in the eyes of the IMF, on the basis that the survival of the country and the economy had to come first. For a time Prem was discussed openly as a possible interim prime minister. On 6 October 1997 Prem summoned newspaper editors to his house, to float the idea of forming a government of national unity. In effect, network monarchy would take over direct control of the country.

But instead, the economic crash strengthened the arguments of the liberal royalists who insisted that reform was essential if Thailand was to withstand the multiple challenges it was facing. Popular anger with the country’s politicians for getting Thailand into such a dire economic situation helped generate an unstoppable momentum for change. Despite the conservative backlash and efforts to install Prem as leader of a royally backed national salvation government, the so-called “People’s Constitution” was passed by parliament on September 27 and promulgated on November 11. Although far from progressive by international standards, it appeared to offer a set of rules that would allow Thailand to evolve as a democratic nation.

At the dawn of the 21st century, Thailand’s future seemed full of promise and potential. It was emerging from the pain of the economic crisis. The era of military dominance and frequent coups appeared to be at an end: humiliated by its behaviour in 1992, the chastened army had retreated from politics. The constitution passed in 1997 laid the foundations for democratic governance in which decisive leaders could emerge and corruption could be contained. Thailand was a beacon of hope and progress in the region, an example for other democratizing nations to follow.

Bhumibol’s reputation was at its zenith. As he celebrated his sixth-cycle 72nd birthday in 1999, he was beloved in Thailand and respected across the world as a wise and kindly monarch who had played a central role in steering his kingdom safely through stormy waters and turning it into a genuine democracy. Bhumibol had always said his goal was to help Thailand grow and prosper as a united, harmonious and fundamentally democratic kingdom. Most Thais fully believed that he had kept his promise.

The truth was much more complex and messy. Thailand’s faltering journey towards democracy had been hindered more than helped by Bhumibol Adulyadej. His accidental killing of his brother in 1946, failure to reveal the truth about what had happened, and acquiescence in the smearing of innocent men, strangled the development of democracy in the late 1940s. A generation later, as the country was once again taking tentative steps towards greater openness and freedom, the palace unleashed sinister forces that led to the horror at Thammasat University on October 6, 1976, and the toxic Thanin regime that followed. In 1992, Bhumibol again backed the wrong side, blinkered by his instinctive distaste for popular sovereignty and his preference for army rule. He deserved credit for acting as a curb on the excesses of military strongmen, and for ending the bloodshed in both 1973 and 1992: had he not intervened at these two critical junctures, Thailand could have slid far deeper into dictatorship. But he had also acted as a drag on democracy, retarding and undermining its growth.

Thanks to constant royalist propaganda, and the laziness of much foreign reporting of Thailand, a fairytale version of Bhumibol’s reign had become widely accepted as true. And the fact that Thailand appeared to have advanced to genuine stability and democracy gave retrospective credibility to the fairy tale. Most people in Thailand and beyond believed Bhumibol’s story was the incredible tale of a modest and unassuming monarch whose tireless efforts and moral leadership had brought democracy and development to his kingdom. Thailand could now face the new century with confidence and pride. An adulatory Time magazine story marking Bhumibol’s birthday in 1999 is typical of the praise showered on Rama IX:

The king is universally revered by the entire population of Thailand. The most common way of referring to the King in Thai is Prachao Yu Hua — “Lord above your head”. In the villages, many are still too overawed even to look at him. Instead they put out handkerchiefs for him to walk on and save the scraps of cloth with his footprint in shrines at home.

Thais have nothing but good things to say about their monarch… “Thailand wouldn’t be worth living in if we didn’t have him,” says Pim Sairattanee, also aged 72, a flower seller on Bangkok’s busy Sukhumvit Road. “He has a white heart, there is magic, goodness and power in his heart,” adds Prachob Virawong, 42, a street vendor from the poor northeast who sells fried grasshoppers in Bangkok. When boxer Somluck Khamsing won Thailand’s first ever Olympic gold metal in Atlanta in 1996, it was a portrait of the King that he raised over his head in celebration. Says Bangkok political scientist Chai-anan Samudavanija: “He is perhaps the only monarch who anywhere who has total love and no fear.”

Yet the King floats above this adulation, observing it as from outside his own body, gracious but distant, selfless in the Buddhist sense. In the age of celebrity, where the freeze-dried smile is required of all princelings of pop, King Rama IX is habitually shown with the demeanor of a religious ascetic…

Throughout his life, the King’s only real escape from Olympian melancholy has been his passion for jazz. Long before his health deteriorated, there were recorded sessions of the King’s band on weekends that went out over the radio. Any famous jazz musician visiting Thailand invariably received an invitation to play with the King. “Some say music is like medicine for him,” says Manrat Srikaranonda, a pianist who has played with the King since 1956. “He can play the saxophone very sweet… We used to play all night in Hua Hin until dawn came, and then walk out on the beach.”

But although Manrat still goes to the Palace on Friday nights, to play, the King has less stamina these days. Thais have not seen much of their King this year – his health is fragile. He has a heart condition that first required surgery in 1995, as well as chronic back pain that originated from a car accident 50 years ago. “Yes, he still plays, but not so long. And he must rest between sets.”

Many Thais are uneasy that they may be living in the twilight of Bhumibol’s reign. Even as the nation prepares to celebrate [his] 72nd birthday, thoughts of the future are tinged with foreboding. The 47-year-old Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn has yet to achieve the same level of devotion among Thais that his father enjoys, and some say the King has set an impossibly high standard to follow…

The King may take solace from the knowledge that he has outlived some of the forces of darkness that threatened Thailand during his reign: communism has disappeared, and along with it much of the vicious right-wing militarism that sprang up to oppose it. Coups seem barely conceivable in Thailand today. Thailand still has its problems, and the King has long agonized about how to make society fairer, even as the World Bank calculates that Thailand has the biggest gap between rich and poor in Asia. In recent years, the King has spoken out about the dangers of graft, environmental degradation, over-reliance on foreign investment and even the chronically gridlocked traffic in Bangkok – all issues affecting the everyday life of Thai citizens that heir governments have been slow to address. But after more than half a century of taxing rule, the King should be above such worries. In Buddhist terms, he has made more than enough merit. As he completes his sixth cycle of 12, nothing more stands between King Bhumibol Adulyadej, “Strength of the Land, Incomparable Power”, and the smile on the face of the Buddha.

Bhumibol believed his work was done. Following his sixth cycle birthday, he abandoned the smog and intrigue of Bangkok, going into seclusion in his seaside summer palace in Hua Hin, known as Klai Kangwon, or “Far from Worries”. Away from the company of constantly watchful courtiers and his estranged queen, his main companions were a brood of mongrel dogs: Tongdaeng and her nine offspring Tongchompunut, Tong-ek, Tongmuan, Tongtat, Tongplu, Tong-yip, Tong-yod, Tong-at and Tongnopkun, as well as Tongdaeng’s chubbier rival Tonglarng. He was visibly letting go, allowing himself to relax at last. As the U.S. embassy reported in 09BANGKOK2967:

The King’s decade-long sojourn in Hua Hin starting in 2000 significantly limited the amount of interaction he had not only with the Queen but also those whom many outsiders (incorrectly) presume spend significant amounts of time with him: Privy Councilors; as well as officials of the office of the Principal Private Secretary, all of whom are Bangkok-based and do not have regular access to the King… His most regular social interaction in recent years came in weekly late-Saturday night jam sessions with his pick-up jazz band, whose geriatric members have played with the King for decades.

Besides his beloved jazz, Bhumibol’s main project was writing The Story of Tongdaeng, his book about his favourite dog. Published in 2002, it shows a side of the king’s life that had rarely been glimpsed: in photographs throughout his book we see Bhumibol dressed in casual clothes, relaxing. He is explicitly depicted as an elderly man enjoying his semi-retirement. In one picture, Bhumibol — dressed in grey trousers, a pink shirt, a patterned garment that looks like a bathrobe, and slippers — is even shown on his knees sprinkling baby powder on Tongdaeng’s belly. In the background, a cushion shaped like a dog’s paw sits atop an upholstered chair. Several photographs show the interior of Klai Kangwon, and it is far from a vision of palatial luxury: instead, the pictures show a large drably furnished room cluttered with books and obsolete computer equipment. It is, unmistakably, an old man’s room, but also unmistakably an echo of the Lausanne study strewn with gadgets where Bhumibol spent so much time alone as a youth. On a sideboard behind Bhumibol’s disorganized desk, beside a roll of film and surrounded by at least three cheap computer printers, is a framed photograph of his mother Sangwan as an elderly woman, wearing pink.

In its gauche clumsiness, the book surpasses even The Story of Mahajanaka: the rather obvious moral of the story was that Thais should be as loyal, well-behaved and respectful to the king as his favourite mongrel:

Tongdaeng is a respectful dog with proper manners; she is humble and knows protocol. She would always sit lower than the King; even when he pulls her up to embrace her, Tongdaeng would lower herself down on the floor, her ears in a respectful drooping position, as if she would say, “I don’t dare.” …

One royal attendant mentioned that, if one wanted to know how to sit properly when one had an audience with the King, one should look at Tongdaeng.

Yet many Thais loved The Story of Tongdaeng. It became the biggest selling book in Thai history, a measure of how much Bhumibol was revered by many of his subjects. He seemed happy in Klai Kangwon: several photographs in the book show him smiling. Had he just stayed in seclusion until his death, watching the sun set on his reign from his seaside palace, Bhumibol would have been recorded in history as a unique and brilliant monarch.  His many mistakes would have been excused or forgotten, and his successes celebrated and magnified. He would be remembered not as an awkward, morally diminished man who lied about killing his own brother and who never wanted democracy, but as a compassionate king who shaped the destiny of modern Thailand and rescued the nation from the forces of darkness.

But that is not how the story ends. This is a tragedy, not a fairy tale. And tragedies don’t end happily ever after in a summer palace by the seaside.

CONTINUE TO PART V

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In April 2004, during the first U.S. military offensive in Falluja, an Iraqi friend who worked as a cameraman for Reuters in Baghdad called me on a satellite phone to tell me that Alaa Nouri, a Reuters driver, was dead. They had both been in a car on the outskirts of Falluja, and had suddenly come under fire from a U.S. Bradley fighting vehicle. Alaa had lost control of the car after it was hit by several 7.62 mm machinegun rounds; it veered off the road and crashed into the outer wall of a mosque. Alaa’s colleague told me Alaa had been shot in the head.

I was bureau chief for Reuters in Baghdad at that time. As they heard the news, others in the office started to weep. Some started to walk out of the room. I told them to get back to work. We would grieve for Alaa once we were sure he was dead. Until then, we would do everything to save his life.

I didn’t really believe it myself. It was just a way of stopping the bureau falling apart, and of postponing having to deal with the terrible fact that a friend and colleague had been killed.

There was another Reuters car outside Falluja. It had also been fired upon, and I had told the team in that car to come back to Baghdad immediately. I called them again and told them to try to find the mosque where the other Reuters vehicle had crashed. Showing amazing courage, they turned around back into the battle zone, and found their colleagues. Alaa was alive. He had smashed his head on the dashboard when his car hit the mosque wall; there was a lot of blood, but he had not been shot. Both teams got into the Reuters car that was still driveable, carrying Alaa who remained unconscious. They made it back to Baghdad. All are still alive today.

In September 2004, I got a similar phone call. My friend Seif al-Jubouri, a Reuters cameraman, had been filming a piece to camera by Mazen al-Tomeizi, a journalist from al Arabiya TV, in Haifa Street, one of the most dangerous roads in Baghdad, following an insurgent attack on a U.S. vehicle there. Without warning, a U.S. helicopter fired several missiles at the crowd around the burning vehicle. The source who phoned me – a fellow journalist from another organisation who was trapped in an apartment block nearby under heavy fire – told me that Seif and Mazen were dead.

Again, I took the decision to believe Seif was alive until I knew otherwise for certain. A team of Iraqi staff volunteered to drive into the ongoing battle in Haifa Sreet in a Reuters armoured car. They found Seif and Mazen. Mazen was dead; Seif was alive but grievously wounded and bleeding heavily from a huge gash in his thigh. The Reuters team managed to evacuate him and get him to hospital. He is still alive. (And on Facebook.) His photograph is at the top of this post.

An account of that incident is here.

Those of us who worked in Reuters in Baghdad were big fans of Pirates of the Caribbean. We agreed between us that there were some principles we would always try to live our lives by. We called it the Pirate Code. The first rule was that we would never, ever, give up on somebody unless we knew absolutely for certain that all hope was gone.

I still follow the Pirate Code today.

If anybody wonders why I fight for lost causes: now you know.

A letter from British ambassador Berkeley Gage in November 1954 records growing unease about the disastrous public relations performance of Thailand’s ruling junta when dealing with the foreign media and important visitors.

Gage said Field Marshal Marshal Phibun Songkram, the prime minister, was “thoroughly smug” during an audience with a visiting foreign banker.

Worse, when Doak Barnett, a Hong Kong-based U.S. correspondent for 50 syndicated American newspapers, asked to interview army commander-in-chief Sarit Thanarat, he was told by the director general of the Thai public relations department: “You cannot see Sarit because he is drunk”.

As Gage remarked, this was “no doubt a perfectly true statement but not one likely to give a United States correspondent confidence to encourage the readers of his newspaper in the belief that United States money was being well spent in Siam”.

I’ve written an article for the excellent Thai E-news website. It is available in both Thai and English. You can read it here.

A British Foreign Office report from August 1951 in the UK National Archives records a meeting with Suan Navarasth, the Thai ambassador in London whose honorific title was Phra Bahidda Nukara. The ambassador was not a happy man, and he wanted to complain about the British media.

On February 24, The New Statesman and Nation, a left-leaning British political news magazine, had printed a short item about the trial of three men for the murder of King Ananda Mahidol of Siam in June 1946. The brief article noted that the Thai regime that had seized power in a military coup in November 1947 was trying to falsely implicate former Senior Statesman Pridi Banomyong in the king’s death, and that no direct evidence had been presented to demonstrate the guilt of Pridi or of the three scapegoats standing trial. It added that the trial was being held “primarily for propaganda purposes”.

A copy of the article is below, annotated by ambassador Suan himself to highlight the passages he found most offensive:

The article had infuriated the Thai foreign ministry, which ordered the ambassador to speak to the magazine’s editor, Kingsley Martin.

Suan told Martin that the article was inaccurate and demanded a correction. Martin contested this and refused to issue a correction, but promised to publish a response from the ambassador if he wanted to provide one.

This response was duly printed in the June 23 edition of The New Statesman and Nation. Unfortunately for the Thai ambassador, his letter clumsily claimed that “investigation and evidence confirm the charges” against Pridi and the other accused, forgetting that a trial was currently under way that was supposed to determine whether or not the charges were true.

The magazine’s editor, Kingsley Martin, made this clear in his response to the ambassador’s letter, which was printed alongside it:

Never did a Government so completely give itself away. While the trial is still in progress the Thai ambassador states that “subsequent investigation and evidence confirm the charges” against the accused men and adds “there is no question of supposition”! In short, by his own admission, the accused have been selected as victims, the charges privately “confirmed”, and the trial is a farce which is to lead to their condemnation.

Martin also mentioned allegations of torture against the three accused who were on trial, and added that the claim that Pridi had anything to do with King Ananda’s death was “notoriously a piece of political warfare”:

This, of course, caused further outrage in Bangkok, and the hapless ambassador Suan was sent to the British Foreign Office to seek official help from the UK government to deal with the upstart editor who was refusing to buy the official claims about the death of King Ananda and the fairness of the trial.

British officials told the ambassador that there was nothing they could do: the United Kingdom allowed freedom of the press.

Rather pathetically, the Thai ambassador then requested an official letter from the British to say so, which he could show to his superiors in Bangkok as an excuse for his inability to resolve the matter:

Another article for those who follow sightings of Thai royals around the world with interest. In September 2009, Thai Crown Prince Maha Vajiralongkorn visited a fairground near Munich, where he lives for most of the time to get medical treatment for an unspecified medical condition. He was accompanied by a female companion as well as a few bodyguards.

Wochenblatt, a local newspaper, wrote about the visit:

An English translation follows:

Thailand’s crown prince at the fairground

The prince spends a few nice hours in Freising

Quite inconspicuously, the man strolled the Freising funfair on Saturday afternoon in jeans and a T-shirt. Surrounded by a few bodyguards, he walked around the fairground. What nobody guessed was that the man’s name is Maha Vajiralongkorn and that he is crown prince of Thailand. His royal title in Thailand is Phra Ratchaphithi Somphot Duan Lae Khuen Phra U [sic]. Crown Prince Maha Vajiralongkorn underwent military training and studies and holds currently the ranks of General of the Royal Thai Army, Admiral of the Royal Thai Navy and Air Chief Marshal of the Royal Thai Air Force.

Crown Prince Maha Vajiralongjorn was born in Dusit Palace, Bangkok on June 28, 1952  and is the second child of King Bhumibol and Queen Sirikit. In 1972 he was appointed crown prince and heir to the throne.

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