Fingolfin_Noldor wrote:The story goes that in one of the coups in the 90s, when there was a mass protest and the military intervened, the two rivals who were posturing at each other. THey were summoned to the palace by the King. Later, when they emerged, one of the rivals, the Prime Minister, resigned.
No. What happened took place in May 1992, called Black May now. The existing government was a military junta run by General Suchinda. There had been some elections which had elected a civilian government and which the junta had disregarded and that caused mass demonstrations across Bangkok demanding a return to democracy, Suchinda responded by bringing in para-military troops from countryside areas to disperse said crowds. Those paramilitaries had no training in riot control an, in any case, had a deep dislike of Bangkokians. They more or less went berserk and started shooting into the crowds. The death toll went skywards and two things happened. One was that the regularA rmy started organizing an assault on Bangkok to clear the paramilitaries out and protect the demonstrators. The other was that the King saw the shooting on television. He immediately summoned General Suchinda and the leader of the pro-democracy demonstrators to "discuss" the situation on prime time television the next day. In the emantime, people were to go back to their homes and troops were to stay in their barracks. That's exactly what happened. Next day, on prime time television (at high noon actually which was more than symbolic), the King asked General Suchinda to explain himself. The General gave a long-winded speech to which the King listened politely, then he asked the leader of the demonstrators for his explanation. Another long-winded speech. Then the King pointed at the demonstrators leader and said "He is right." Then he pointed at General Suchinda. "You are wrong. Crawl across the floor and apologize."
General Suchinda, on prime time television remember with half the population watching, crawled on his hands and knees across the studio floor and apologized to the leader of the demonstrators and asked forgiveness for his actions and the conduct of his troops.
The King then appointed the leader of the demonstrators as the new prime minister with instructions to restore democracy.
Some more general comments
King Bhumibol is a genuinely good and honorable man. He has very little theoretical power but he has immense influence due to the fact that he is unconditionally loved and respected by the population. He got into that position by sheer hard work and constant attention to the needs of the people. He's spent a lot of his personal time and scads of personal cash on aid to farmers and the rural population. He's done things like making some villages "King's Villages" where new agricultural techniques and so on are tried out. They act as foci for improving the life of farmers in the area. There are King's Projects where he has used his own money to pay for development projects that have no hope of being funded normally due to their lack of obvious financial return but which were badly needed. Whenever there was a disaster, he and his family are there, not just looking around but actually doing things to get help in. There's one famous case during flooding quite a few years back when villagers were trying to repair a dyke that had burst. The villagers were digging away, trying to fill the breech when one of them looked at his neighbor. The King had quietly joined the work crew and was shovelling away with everybody else. No TV cameras, no photo-opportunities, just joining in the effort to do something.
Politically, the King has used that influence to try and keep things quietened down. He cannot, and does not, directly create legislation or rule but he does make his opinions known and, because he has forty years demonstrated history of trying to do the best thing possible for his country, when he does say something, people listen. Traditionally, his main contribution has been to tell people to "cool it". He's kept his own political positions very quiet, his constant refrain has been that violence and civil unrest solve nothing and only make the situation worse. People should cool down and compromise. He's spoken out against several different prime minsters and other rulers who have moved too far away from the center or have been unduly favoring one sector of the population against another. However, just to hammer the point home, he has no official power. He can't repeal or initiate legislation and he can't, on his own, tell a ruling figure to go pound sand. If a Prime Minister gets elected, the King can't change that. If there's a coup (another fun aspect of Thai politics that gets broadly misunderstood) he can't tell the Generals who have just taken power to go away. What he can do is to tell people that "this really isn't a good idea" or "Do you really think this is wise?" Because he has an established reputation (a well-deserved one) for justice and fairness, people listen and act on his advice. That's it.
Example, during the last part of Thaksin Shinawatra's time as Prime Minister, there were massive demonstrations against Thaksin and his TRT Party. The whys and wherefors of that situation aren't important here and they'd need a long essay to go into, but the critical point is that Thaksin was accused of electoral abuse and rigging the results plus a few other things. The King's advice was quite simple "this is an issue that the courts will address as soon as possible". In short, stop demonstrating and leave this issue to the courts. People did. Unfortunately, Thaksin also didn't take the hint and not only ignored teh courts but he tried to pack them with his political appointees. In the end he did the same with the Army promotion list and that cost him his job. Straight word on Thailand.
Don't mess with the Thai Army They're very good at what they do. The Army took Thaksin out because he was interfering on Army turf, not because of any back-room machinations.
King Bhumibol is unconditionally loved by the overwhelming majority of the population and publically insulting the Monarchy in Thailand is a good way of getting lynched. An example, I was in a cinema once with my then-girlfriend and there was a foreign tourist in the row in front accompanied by a lady of negotiable virtue. In Thai cinemas, they play the national anthem after each performance and put a picture of the King up on the screen. Everybody stands to attention and nobody tries to leave early. Except, the tourist in front of us was slouching around with his hands in his pocket. His partner looked at him out of the corner of her eyes, then slammed her stilleto heel down on his foot. As soon as the anthem was over, she turned and walked away leaving him flat (and she got polite applause for her action). Remember, in those days, tourists (Walking ATMs as the girls called them) were the Holy Grail for any Thai lady of negotiable virtue. That girl took a big hit financially by walking out on her client, money she probably needed quite badly. The Lese Majeste laws may be antiquated and passe but they reflect the overall attitude of the population. Politicians who have disrespected the King find their careers end rather abruptly.
On Lese Majeste laws. King Bhumibol has made known, very publically, that he does not approve of them and would like to see them repealed. In one of his Brithday speeches (I think the last one) he said (paraphrased). "Nobody in the Kingdom is above criticism, not even me. Criticism is very important and should be encouraged since, without criticism, how can we learn to do our jobs better?" That was a double-barrelled criticism, firstly of the Lese Majeste laws and secondly of the habit developed by some politicians (especially Thaksin Shinawatra) of suing anybody who criticised them for libel. The problem is that the overwhelming majority of people want those laws in place and any attempt to repeal them would be defeated. Also, they do serve a useful purpose. As I said, insulting the King is a good way of getting lynched; one product of the Lese Majeste laws is that it allows the Police to put the perp somewhere relatively safe until the temperature cools down. But, as I said, the King really doesn't like the Lese Majeste laws and invariably he pardons the offender as soon as public attention has moved away from the issue. The problem now is that the Lese Majeste laws are being abused by various political groups for their own ends. This is actually a response to Thaksin's use of libel laws to silence his opponents. This development may give the King the excuse he's been looking for to have the laws abolished.
As to "Australia not allowing" the perp in this case to be jailed, that's an absurd statement and, frankly, racist. Countries are sovereign entities, they have their own laws and legal systems. When somebody goes to a country, they implicitly agree to be bound by the laws of that country and if they break them, they bear the consequences. Usually, an Embassy will try to ensure that its citizen gets a fair trial but that's it. Trying to assert that a country should override the laws of a country in favor of its own is called extra-territoriality and is a much-hated and derided aspect of the racist and colonialist past. If you don't like the laws of a country, don't go there but don't ask your government to commit an act of war to get you out when you break those laws. In this case, the Australian Embassy is doing the best possible thing, keeping their mouths shut because they know the King will pardon the guy in a few days when public attention has shifted to something else. Kicking up a fuss will only prolong public interest and thus the time the guy spends inside. By the way, in this case, it smells to me like the perp offended somebody really important in the Police or government and this is pay-back.
