
A few ideas? General Prayuth talks to Thai journalists. Photo by Reuters/ Athit Perawongmetha.
In the aftermath of the Bangkok bombing, all we’ve seen is an investigation characterised by inconsistency and incompetency.
As sympathetic as everyone must be towards the Thai and other victims of this week’s bombing at Bangkok’s Erawan shrine, we must also recognise that the Thai authorities’ response is turning a tragedy into a farce.
The host of contradictory statements emanating from police and, especially, from the erratic and incompetent dictator, General Prayuth Chan-ocha, suggest severe internal disarray, making it unclear whether the perpetrators will ever be caught.
There have been at least three major sources of confusion. The first is the nature of perpetrator. Initially, they were supposedly Thai: Prayuth instantly linked the bombing to an ‘opposition’ (ie Red Shirt) group based in Thailand’s northeast. The regime’s spokesman quickly rowed back from this, saying they could be foreigners.
Following the release of extremely grainy CCTV footage showing a yellow-shirted figure leaving a backpack at the shrine, police quickly declared – on no apparent basis – they were seeking a ‘“Caucasian” or “Arab-looking” man’ (sic).
However, the advisor to the deputy prime minister for security later stated it was unclear whether the figure was even a man or a woman. The release of an identikit apparently confirms his sex, but certainly not his ethnicity. Police still admit he could have been a Thai in disguise.
Secondly, how many culprits were they? Police initially declared that yellow-t-shirt man was ‘not just the suspect: he is the bomber’. Now they say they are only ‘more than 50 per cent sure’.
They subsequently identified two others in the CCTV footage as his accomplices. They then backtracked, saying that subsequent footage proved their innocence since they reacted ‘girlishly’ to the blast – truly a deduction worthy of Sherlock Holmes. (The two terrified men later handed themselves into police and were swiftly cleared of involvement.)
Even before that, though, other police spokesmen were saying that at least 10 people were involved in a ‘network’ – apparently pure guess work.
Third, were there any international linkages and motives? Initially it was implied that the supposed ‘network’ of 10 involved foreigners – though it took three days for Thai police to file the case with Interpol. However, international terrorists were then ruled out – apparently solely on the basis of discussions with allies’ intelligence agencies.
Prayuth again boldly declared this, while also dismissing any link to the recent deportation of 109 Uighurs to China (which might explain why Chinese tourists were apparently targeted). Yet, it was simultaneously reported that the police had been pursuing this as their main lead, with Special Branch having specific forewarning of a possible attack on Chinese tourists after 11 August.
Nonetheless, this was apparently scotched by Prayuth and his allies, who are still trying to refocus attention on internal oppositionists. Others in the police are suggesting an organised crime link – though why the Thai mafia should want to bomb the Erawan shrine is anyone’s guess.
Obviously, any attack of this sort, which catches security forces entirely unaware, creates confusion and panic, and a wide range of hypotheses must be investigated to narrow down an investigation. But the Thai response is particularly chaotic.
Yesterday, BBC reporter Jonathan Head found fragments of the bomb near the shrine and was unable even to hand them in to police – who instead subsequently criticised Head’s own knowledge of explosives.
Indeed, the haste with which the shrine has been swept and repaired may have seriously compromised the investigation. Prayuth and his allies have obviously prioritised the restoration of superficial calm and ‘happiness’ over apprehending the culprits.
This is all redolent of the 2006/7 New Year bombings in Bangkok.
Then, as now, the military ruler, Surayud Chulanont, instantly (and baselessly) blamed the Red Shirts. Then, as now, the sites were rapidly swept and repaired, undermining the investigation.
Then, as now, the regime seemed to be caught in complete internal disarray, with suspects ranging from Thaksin’s friends, to Thaksin’s enemies, to the police, to factions within the military regime itself.
Then, as now, Thailand’s Muslim separatists were instantly discounted as suspects – yet the best guess of Thai intelligence today is that the Pattani United Liberation Organisation was responsible (possibly with external assistance from Jemaah Islamiyah). This is consistent with the fact that no one ever claimed responsibility – a hallmark of separatist bombings in the South.
It also refutes the suggestion, repeated today, that the separatists have never struck outside the South and have never harmed tourists (10 foreigners were among the 38 injured).
Ultimately, no one was ever caught for the 2006 attacks. This could well be the outcome this time around.
The Thai police’s professionalism, competence, expertise, political independence and moral rectitude have not noticeably improved in the intervening nine years; they appear well out of their depth. Prayuth is even worse than Surayud: paranoid, bombastic, loose-mouthed, erratic, idiosyncratic and ignorant.
Having presided over a security disaster, he now has every incentive to direct investigators away from anything for which the military could also be blamed – notably the escalating Southern insurgency and the Uighur deportations.
Unsurprisingly, Prayuth immediately refused offers of external assistance – including help from the British government – as attempts to ‘intervene’ in Thailand. His brilliant solution was instead to urge Thai police to watch the US crime drama Blue Bloods to get ‘tips, ideas and insights’.
Many Thais see all this as a national disgrace. They are right.
Lee Jones (@DrLeeJones) is Senior Lecturer in International Politics at Queen Mary, University of London. He is author, most recently, of Governing Borderless Threats: Non-Traditional Security and the Politics of State Transformation (CUP, 2015).
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Great analysis. Thailand is being run by complete incompetents……This government was always one step away from disaster…now its on its doorstep.
One only has to look at the sham masquerading as a trial in Koh Samui to understand the depth of the incompetence and moral turpitude of the Thai police.
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[…] On 21 August I was asked to write a piece for New Mandala on the Thai regime’s incompetent handling of the investigation. […]
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[…] Thai junta turning tragedy to farce Sums up my thoughts on announcements without facts.. Also the BBC finding evidence which the police then refused to accept it when they tried to hand it in.. Then human remains falling out of a nearby tree.. Kinda expected I guess.. Still a shame tho. […]
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Prayuth should have instructed the police force to stop watching and acting like the “Keystone cops”.
A total farce and once again an international disgrace on Thailand’s illegal military rulers.
In time this episode will not appear in the history books as it demonstrates the stupidity of the nation. Red Drum, Tak Bai and the slaughter of the innocent in Bankkok 2010 immediately come to mind.
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The problem with the farcical nature of the Thai official response is that, in the words of Neil Kinnock, they are “playing politics with peoples’ lives”.
The latest bizarre twist saw the Thai police swooping on Palestinian refugee families who have fled here from Syria and are desperately waiting for resettlement to a third country.
Whole families were taken away until negotiations reduced the detainees to seven Palestinian men. The women and children, although released, now face pressure from their landlords who would rather they moved elsewhere. The Thai Muslim community is rallying round them as best they can.
Palestine Solidarity Campaign Thailand has stated “We condemn these arrests of some of the last people who would have any reason to carry out or be connected with such an atrocity. But because they look and sound different – and possibly because of their religion – not to mention the fact that the desperate Thai police act desperately in an attempt to show some kind of results, we see innocent refugees being made scapegoats.”
For those of you living in Bangkok, the FCCT is organising a meeting on Monday evening, “The Bangkok Bombing: What Do We Really Know?”
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A further element that could be added to confirm the general thrust of this nuanced analysis is the poor relations that exist between the police and the army. This goes beyond the kind of turf wars that occur between state and federal authorities in countries with federal systems, or that between semi-military police forces, like the Gendarmerie in France or the Carabinieri in Italy, and national police forces. In Thailand these tensions have a distinct political dimension.
Thaksin Shinawatre, it should be remembered, rose up in the ranks of the police not the Thai Army. During his period in office he favored the police over the Army in dealing (poorly) with the insurgency in the Deep South. In late 2013 the police hierarchy seemed to have sided with the government against a resurgent yellow shirt movement opposed to Yingluck Shinawatra.
Lingering tensions and distrust between the military (now fully in power) and the police could be an exacerbating factor in somewhat farcical situation Lee Jones describes.
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Congratulations Lee Jones – the best, most comprehensively internally consistent analysis so far. Though it should be noted that any military blaming of police “incompetence” reflects not merely Thaksin [police) v. old Establishment (military) antagonism, but also police-military hostility dating way back into the last century, at least.
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My immediate reaction to the bombing was not horror for the victims, but mourning for how it would be mishandled and politicized. I posted this prayer of protest to place Christianity in Thailand clearly against that statists and power-hungry capitalists when someone said “pray for Thailand”:
Pray for change. God of justice and peace, who sent Jesus to us, remove our blindness that we might not crucify you again tonight. Remove our silence as people with no authority nail you again to a cross. Change our attitudes of submission to evil into obedience to you in all things. May your kingdom come to replace what we’ve got . Help us to build our villages into places that worship and live in freedom and in truth, as we await your return. For thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory forever.
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What the heck has this to do with Christianity fairy tales???
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Directly, nothing. if you have experience with Thailand, you know the only way change happens over time is when religions move their previous thinking and positions. Rama IV proactively reformed Buddhism to reject a mystical understanding of humanity and to oppose degrading commoners.
If Christians or Buddhists looking at this coup government sit idly by and never actively oppose the state, they are just another group of conservative contributors to the status quo. It has to do with rejecting nations — entirely — in good anarchist tradition. As for secularists who try to trick the people to believe that the authoritarian state can be an agent for good, they might as well be fundamentalists.
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Was the 1932 revolution the result of religion changing tack? I think not.
Throughout Thailand’s history (1932) when the people rise up to question their masters they are brutally murdered.
The Buddhist religion is split just as other religions are.
The hirachy is firmly in the grip of the state and not the other way round.
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Pridi was inspired by a left wing authoritarian position and b.pibilsongkram by a fascist one. Combined they dared reduce the monarchy. They thought the people were ready to follow that. Such sense of readiness has its roots in a positive assessment of how far the political culture had evolved since 1782 and the Rattanakosin coup. B. Seems to have shifted back to a domesticated and glorified monarchy position after global fascism went underground in 1945. He saved Thai fascism through a compromise with public sentiment. Conservative Buddhist monks were elevated to spread the message and noone again spoke of the Thummayud Party.
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‘you know the only way change happens over time is when religions move their previous thinking and positions’ We know nothing of the kind. Change may occur for a great many reasons. To cite a Thai example, Thaksin’s election brought about political change because he implemented populist policies and in doing so changed the political landscape. I’m not a supporter of Thaksin, simply making a point.
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As I have understood that the NM formula/praxis would appear to be, quite rightly, that the later one comments on a posting, the less likely it will be read, agreed to or damned, may I abuse my reproducing line a fifth comment that came in 23rd in comments on a previous posting.
Without going into speculation on the culprits – and I for once agree with Peter Cohen (and Lee Jones) in this case, that Malay Muslim militants from the Deep South should not be excluded – I think ‘Dr Watson’ has a point here.
Having just been in Bangkok and Pattani I was struck by the advertising blitz for the ‘Bike for Mum’ event which in the end attracted nearly 300,000 enrolled participants. It has entered the Guinness Book of Records.
‘Bike for Mom’ can be seen as having a twofold objective. On the one hand, part of the civilianized military’s junta’s campaign to prepare the succession to the present king by enhancing the image of the Crown Prince (quite a challenge). He not only led the event, but his daughter also participated. Moreover, now given the theatrical nature of Thai politics, with a new ‘socially acceptable’ wife (his fourth) about to enter ‘centre stage’ and two new legitimate potential princes to boot in the ‘wings’, he can at last aspire to imitating his father’s image of paternal benevolence.
On the other hand, ‘Bike for Mom’ in Bangkok (the antithesis of Copenhagen in terms of bike friendliness), seems designed as part of the ‘thainess’ and ‘happiness’ trope of the present civilianized government, legitimizing its holding onto power as long as possible till a semi-democratic regime is, once again, embedded.
It is pure conjecture, but the tight security put in place for “Bike for Mom” event in Bangkok perhaps inhibited the perpetrators of the bombing who waited till the day after. The site of the bombing – Ratchaprasong Junction – has much symbolic importance for many Thais that goes beyond the Erawan Shrine as such. However the idea that the bombing was an anti-royalist statement (sic) is too hard to contemplate.
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“Then [2006-7] as now, the military ruler, Surayud Chulanont, instantly (and baselessly) blamed the Red Shirts.”
Technical point: there were no “Red Shirts” in 2006-7.
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Fair enough, but as I suspect you know, I was merely using “red shirts” to denote the faction around Thaksin, which certainly was blamed.
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I would have thought that a schism in the junta (or military) would be a fairly prominent theory as to who perpetrated this bombing, and would subsequently explain the misdirection, lies and incompetence of the investigation with the ruling clique caught between a rock and a hard place. I’m not hanging my hat on this theory, but surely it makes as much sense as southern insurgents et al.
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Best article yet in the sudden outpouring from NM.
It isn’t just the junta that is turning this tragic reality into a farce.
Websites like this one rushing to get as much verbal gush online as quickly as possible with articles like the ones from Blaxland and Vatikiotis are doing their part as well.
When Blaxland essentially denies any possibility of RTA responsibility and Vatikiotis points to the “seedy underbelly” of Bangkok with its Arab, African and South Asian denizens in his “analysis”, we are seeing nothing more or less than another version of the BS pouring out of the various Thai officials.
Shame on NM for giving them a platform.
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Any readers track Patani terrorism? Can you tell me if any of their militant groups have a record of co-ordinating attacks with important dates in their calendar? Noted that the Erawan attack coincides with the 61st anniversary week of the disappearance of Patani leader H.Sulong. tnx
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[…] Great shit on the Junta's epic fail in regards to the bombing: Thai junta turning tragedy to farce […]
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ISN’T EVERYONE OVERTHINKING THIS UTTER TRAGEDY QUITE A BIT? IS IT REALY THAT COMPLICATED? Look, you take a bunch of popularly, duly elected governments and then proceed to kick them out by stripping them of their mandates — first on ‘cooking show’ rules and then cooked up technicalities –, then take out the NEXT elected government at the point of a gun. Meantime, sure, rechristen all voters as ‘peasants’ and ‘buffalos — BUT — allow them to occupy the Golden Mile for a few months so they see, feel, TOUCH their ‘democratic power’. Then — surprise! –take their power back! Ratatatat Tattat tat tat! Kick them back to their miserable FARMS! Now you chuck in mostly ‘nominated’ MP’s, judges, appoint your own Electoral ‘Fairness’ overseers, and then dilute the so called ‘constitutions’ to successive serial soap operettas. Next? Throw up into the darkening skies the control of $40 bil on a ‘first come first served’ basis, and postpone ANOTHER promised election yet again — you BELIEVING THIS?!! — to be launched ‘After The UNNAMED IMMINENT Event’. Now, promise to launch yet another ‘constitution’ with no input for, by or of the people who have to live by it. If folks want to know WHEN it will be introduced? Tell them it will be AFTER that next, postponed, election. — Ready now? Not yet, my friends! — Now juice up this ‘smokin’ hot’ cocktail by opening up Pandora’s farken SUITCASE, releasing its instant internet connections to the rest of the world — where the stories that the populace has LIVED BY for decades are suddenly shown up to be pathetic MYTHS. Okaaaaaaay! NOW you are ready! —– and NOW something happens? Yes. So, here’s what will happen: SOMEONE’S GONNA GET MIGHTY FARKEN PI**ED OFF !!!!!!! …………. And now, evidently, SOMEbody is …… And I bet they live right around YOUR hood. (‘Southern insurgents’? My A*&$SE!)
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[…] Fonte: New Mandala, August 21, 2015 […]
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This is being performed exactly like police investigations in Thailand have always been performed, under military governments as well as democratically elected governments. Would you expect a democratically elected prime minister in a real democracy to interfere or be responsible for a police investigation? Of course not. That’s not how parliamentarism works. There are three estates, remember?
This is one of the things that have always been lacking in Thai “democracy”. Prime ministers and other politicians have interfered in police work and other areas that are none of their business, undermining democracy as well as the investigation. A competent, uncorrupt police force would have helped of course, but alas…
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Jorgen: anyone who still believes there are ‘three distinct estates’ in Thailand, or indeed have ever been for any length of time, is actually living in a FOURTH called CUCKOOLAND.
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That is one of the main problems that this country is struggling with. One thing is that the distinction is lacking, but even worse is the fact that the concept seems to be alien to most of the population. Add to that the fact that a large part of the population, those who live and work in agricultural communities (around 40%), has hardly been represented in the parliament at all. If my memory serves me right, it actually went down from around 2 to around 1% when Thaksin won his first election in 2001.
The fourth estate? Isn’t that the press? I guess some representatives of that profession give the impression of coming from Cuckooland, but don’t you think it’s a bit of a generalisation to claim that all of them are 😉
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Pinpoint article.I may well be out of the loop on the very latest springbok rumours, and if I’ve got this right at all, what I have a always found curious and puzzling – and yet barely mentioned – was the Thai guy, who was briefly arrested and had ‘apparently’ said on FB that there was a warning – a sit up and wake up possibility of a bombing of real note. After a few hours they let him go….nothing to see her folks, move along.
Ok, fine. Perfectly innocent. A nobody. Just an attention seeking time waster. But among this sigh inducing confusion and bloated rumour – and assuming that guy wasn’t talking bullshit – I reckon he’s best lead they have.
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I am assuming you don’t live in Thailand . If you did You might have been wArned about inauspicious days or why You shouldnt travel to such and such due to some broad pronouncement by a famous or even unknown fortune teller
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I guess you’d be referring to Phongphob Butsari / Pongpob Boonsaree and his multiple Facebook aliases referred to in this article?
http://www.thephuketnews.com/2-more-bomb-suspects-sought-53716.php
The fact that he was so quickly released by the police, does to me from a distance smell rather fishy, but not too surprising in the context of colour-coded military and police factional politics, perhaps? No wonder Australian and UK govt. offers of assistance were politely refused. No knowing what political intrigue may be uncovered.
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It is grimly looking like terror is winning in Thsiland. Ghost of Samai must be grinning from hell.
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A good sensible article. It’s all speculation at the moment but I’d like to point out that the possible involvement of Southern separatists has been ruled out by some because ‘they don’t operate outside the South’ Ever heard of a change of tactics? The same applies to an international islamic terrorist link. Just because it hasn’t been seen before (apparently) doesn’t mean it can’t be happening now.
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