Thai Agression On Cambodia

Thailand’s domestic politics drives Cambodian border clash

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By Sebastian Strangio
Published in World Politics Review, April 28, 2011
PHNOM PENH, Cambodia–Since the morning of April 22, Thai and Cambodian troops have waged a series of heated firefights along sections of their shared border. The two sides have now traded artillery and small-arms fire for a week, leaving at least 13 soldiers dead on both sides and forcing the evacuation of tens of thousands of people from border areas. The initial skirmishes were confined to areas close to Ta Krabey and Ta Moan, two Angkorian temple ruins lying close to the border, but the fighting quickly spread to Preah Vihear, a cliff-top temple some 93 miles to the east.
Military commanders from the two sides met early this morning, and the Cambodian government subsequently announced that a cease-fire had been reached. But Thai military commander suggested that questions remained over how to enforce the deal, which, like others before it, remains fragile.
As on past occasions, both governments have accused each other of starting the skirmishes. In a letter to the Thai Embassy in Phnom Penh on Tuesday, Cambodia decried the “repeated violations of Cambodian sovereignty and territorial integrity by Thailand,” adding that the country “reserves its legitimate rights to self-defense.” The same day, the Thai cabinet passed a three-point resolution authorizing “retaliatory military action” to push Cambodian troops out of disputed areas.
Today’s tentative cease-fire follows calls over the past week by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, Association of Southeast Asian Nations Secretary-General Surin Pitsuwan and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for the two sides to return to the negotiating table. However, a plan to send Indonesian observers into disputed border areas, floated after similar clashes in February but steadfastly opposed by the Thais, has apparently been entirely abandoned after the shattering of the previous two-month-long cease-fire.
The clashes are just the latest in a series of skirmishes that have occurred since July 2008, when UNESCO designated Preah Vihear as a World Heritage Site. Phnom Penh claims ownership of the temple based on a 1962 ruling of the World Court in the Hague; Thai nationalists, spearheaded by the yellow-shirted People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD), argue that the court failed to rule on the status of a roughly 3-square-mile area adjacent to the temple, the site of February’s skirmish.
On first glance, the clashes appear to be yet another manifestation of a deeply rooted disagreement between two traditional rivals. But some analysts say the border conflict reflects — and continues to be fueled by — Thailand’s domestic political turmoil. Since the 2006 coup that ousted Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, the country has been rent by a widening political divide. Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, who rode to power on a wave of Yellow Shirt street protests in 2008, now finds himself beholden to the demands of the PAD and the military, both of which maintain hawkish designs on Preah Vihear and other parcels of “disputed” land along the Thai-Cambodian border.
On the other side of the divide stands the anti-government Red Shirt movement, aligned with Thaksin, which faced down Thai troops in the center of Bangkok during street protests last year. Many analysts believe a Thaksin-aligned government would quickly work to heal rifts with Phnom Penh, a hope symbolized by the Cambodian government’s brief appointment of Thaksin as an economic adviser in late-2009.
But the stakes for both countries have only risen as Thailand inches closer toward landmark elections, due to be held by July. Abhisit has hailed the elections as a means of finally bridging the country’s gaping political divide, but with his Democrat Party and the Thaksin-aligned “red” opposition running neck-in-neck at the polls, there is every chance the elections will unleash another round of civil unrest.
Enter the Royal Thai Army. The military, which sees itself as the guardian of both Thai national interests and the country’s revered monarchy, fears that elections could see their Democrat Party allies dumped from power and replaced by pro-Thaksin forces. Some analysts say the recent outbreak of fighting with Cambodia is an attempt by the Thai military to set the foreign policy agenda.
“The current Thai-Cambodian border conflict is primarily an internal Thai conflict in which the army is seeking to demonstrate its continuing ability to pursue its own independent foreign policy goals,” said Duncan McCargo, a Southeast Asia expert based at the University of Leeds. “The Thai military is deeply conflicted about the election, fearing a return to power of pro-Thaksin forces that it will struggle to work with and has difficulty in managing.”
After fighting broke out last week, Bangkok was swept by coup rumors, a fear that came to a head when nationwide television transmissions blacked out briefly on April 21. In an article this week in Asia Sentinel, Pavin Chachavalpongpun, of Singapore’s Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, said the military presence in Thai politics was “at an all-time high.”
The army’s close involvement in Thai politics is nothing new — the country has experienced 18 coup attempts, 11 of them successful, since 1932 — but it does not bode well for solving the country’s political crisis and reaching a negotiated settlement with Cambodia. Michael Montesano, also an analyst at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, said the clashes showed “the recklessness of the military and its backers, to get involved in an international conflict where lives are being lost” out of sheer insecurity about the outcome of upcoming elections. “At the same time,” he added, “it is not clear that the military and its backers have a well-planned way out for Thailand.” Until Bangkok gets its own house in order, there is little hope for lasting peace in the crags and jungle redoubts on the Cambodian border.