Guest wrote:
> How did the ethnic groups of Thailand line up in the Communist
> rebellion of the 60's and 70's? I would have thought that the
> "yellow shirt" Chinese Thais would favoured the communists,
> communism being the ideology of China. But the royalists certainly
> opposed the communists, whereas the royalists favour the "yellow
> shirts" today?
> So how was the ethnic divide then? Is this really the same fault
> line or have things been scrambled a bit?
Here's an article on Thailand's history from the point of view of the
Communist Party of Thailand (CPT):
http://links.org.au/node/1247
According to this article, the CPT remained unpopular because the
government was interested in having a good relationship with the
United States.
While that's a convenient excuse, I doubt that it tells what really
happened. A government relationship with the US would only energize
the Communists, not make them unpopular.
In the United States, second and third generation Mexican immigrants
often tend to favor strong immigration controls because they don't
want their lives upset by a new generation of young Mexicans coming in
and taking jobs away from the older Mexicans.
I would guess that the same thing is true in Thailand. The Chinese
that poured in during the 1930s are now in positions of power, and
don't want young Chinese workers to take their jobs, nor do they want
China's government to interfere with their lives. They may even fear
a Chinese invasion.
I've been trying for years to figure Thailand out. Today's article
was a big step forward, but it still leaves questions unanswered, like
the role of the new Chinese immigrants in the Thai-Thai vs
Thai-Chinese fault line, now, ten years ago, and in the 1970s.