11-10-2020: If we were to believe much of the Western press, during September a mass movement for democracy swept through Thailand, shaking the rule of Prayuth Chan-o-Cha and the Palang Pracharath Party. Yet even the most cursory investigation into the background and the motives of the Thai “student” movement reveals yet another US government backed attempt at regime change, under the entirely false guise of “human rights”. Like many imperialist orchestrated colour revolutions, the current fake Thai “democracy” movement has negligible support from Thailand’s 69 million odd citizens. As with other US government organised and funded “oppositions” in South East Asian countries – this Thai “opposition” is aimed squarely at the People’s Republic of China (PRC), and efforts to prevent trade, investment and security ties with the world’s largest deformed workers’ state.

NED funded “opposition”

It is not a cliché to say that the Thai “democracy” movement is US backed. It is not as if it is hidden. One needs only to visit the website of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) – the public relations arm of the notorious CIA. There you will find almost all the organisations in Thailand leading the “democracy” protests listed[1], and an amount of money – or the amount that is admitted to. Front organisations such as the Internet Law Reform Dialogue, Human Rights Lawyers Association,  and the Isaan Record are openly paraded as being funded by the NED – which is funded in turn through the US Congress. The Thai “democracy” movement is in fact a handful of pro-US and US funded charlatans with ultra-reactionary politics.

How reactionary? How about publicly backing the NATO backed colour-revolution in Belarus[2], complete with protestors waving the flag of those who collaborated with the Nazis in World War II? Thai student protest leader Netiwit Chotiphatphaisal proudly posted on a picture of himself on social media with a sign saying “Thai people stand with Belarus”, displaying the Thai national flag and the white-red-white of the Byelorussian Central Council.[3] The Byelorussian Central Council flag represented those Belarusians who worked with the Nazis during 1943-44, before they were forced from any levers of power. This was at the time when the Soviet Union waged a war which essentially saved the world from fascism, despite suffering staggering losses.

In August, “student” protest leader Anon Nampa was arrested by the Thai government to face charges of sedition. Much of the Western corporate media decried this on the grounds of the alleged abuse of “human rights”. Yet they did not mention that the 34 year old Anon Nampa is not a student, and works for Thai Lawyers for Human Rights – which is wholly funded by the NED.[4] To put it another way, the alleged “student” and “democracy” protests in Thailand are in fact organised and funded by the US deep state, in a blatant and hypocritical violation of even the first elements of respect for national borders. This is open “meddling”, of which the US government constantly accuses other nations.

Targeting Red China

Transparently, one of the real aims of the so-called democracy movement in Thailand is to disrupt and discontinue the increasing mutually beneficial ties with the PRC, Thailand’s direct neighbour. Another is to use whatever means possible to derail the PRC’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI or New Silk Road), a massive trade, investment and infrastructure super-highway linking Asia, Africa and Europe. For fifty years, Japan was the largest foreign investor in Thailand, but this year the PRC surpassed them, thanks to a 224 billion baht (Thai currency) project to link three Thai airports with high-speed rail. A prominent member of the consortium which signed the contract with the Thai government is the PRC state-owned China Railway Construction Corporation.[5] This project will obviously spur more economic development throughout Thailand, and not just in tourism. Only the PRC, with its still expanding socialist economy, is in a position to offer assistance with economic development. The US and Europe, with their flailing for-profit economies, are not even in the ball game.

In addition, the Thai government recently approved nearly 400 million $US for a high-speed rail project linking the northeastern Nakhon Ratchasima province with the capital Bangkok, to be built largely by Chinese state-owned firms. The Thai government is also polling its residents on the proposal to extend this high-speed rail line to Nong-Khai on the Thai-Laos border.[6] There is also the option to link this line with the BRI project linking Kunming in South-Western China, Laos, Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore. If constructed, the PRC and its neighbours will be permanently connected, which will promote economic, developmental, trade and even cultural ties. One can see that for every minute such a project is under construction or in operation, it becomes more and more difficult for the US Empire to run its anti-China political subversion amongst the PRC’s South East Asian neighbours.

Working people need to defend Thailand and even its government and monarchy from US government funded fake “democracy” movements, which is little more than a translucent attempt at regime change. The US Empire aims to encircle Red China with pro-US satellite states, in a similar way in which it is encircling Russia with pro-NATO states. Workers internationally cannot allow this to occur, not least due to the fact that the PRC’s gargantuan and largely collectively owned economy to some extent props up the stumbling economies of the West, particularly that of Australia. The PRC has the right to develop trade, investment and even cultural and sporting ties with all nations, especially its neighbours – without interference from the imperialist powers ultimately under the sway of Washington. At the same time, the political leadership of the PRC should be trying to reach the workers of Thailand and neighbouring states, imploring them to join a regional and international struggle for socialism. This would require the junking of “national socialism” and a resurgence of genuine Marxism. The defence of Thailand against imperialist backed “democracy” subversion is but the first task.

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WORKERS  LEAGUE

www.redfireonline.com

E: workersleague@redfireonline.com

[1] https://www.ned.org/region/asia/thailand-2019/ (11-10-2019)

[2] https://redfireonline.com/2020/08/20/belarus-covid-19-colour-revolution/ (11-10-2019)

[3] https://altthainews.blogspot.com/2020/09/thai-opposition-figure-supports-us.html (11-10-2019)

[4] https://www.globalresearch.ca/exposing-us-color-revolution-thailand-aimed-china/5720574 (11-10-2019)

[5] https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/economics/article/3047489/china-becomes-thailands-top-source-foreign-investment-first (11-10-2019)

[6] https://www.rfa.org/english/news/china/thailand-railway-09292020200617.html (11-10-2019)