growing class polarization. This is a new phenomenon for Thailand, and it confirms the character of the period opened by the "revolution" of October 1973 as one of the awakening of class struggle. The agrarian crisis This ongoing polarization has taken an especially acute form in the countryside in the North, where the large landed proprietors have arranged the systematic murder of the cadres of the Farmers Federation of Thailand (FFT). This organization was officially founded only on November 27, 1974, but it nevertheless has roots in peasant mobilizations that took place before the fall of the military dictatorship. At one time, in fact, many formers From various provinces came together in Bangkok in response to a demagogic invitation issued by Colonel Narong Kittikachom, one of the strong men of the military triumverate then ruling the country. The first chief of government named at the end of 1973 - Sanya Dharmasakti - was conscious of the explosive potential of the countryside. In fact, the agrarian crisis is a structural one, as is the crisis of the entire economy. Thai agriculture is largely extensive. According to Brian Phelan, 90 percent of the country's growth in agricul24 tural production since the second world war has been due to the extension of the amount of land under cultivation, through the clearing of new land and the planting of new crops, However, "Today the land frontier has been reached in many parts of the country, with growing landlessness, tenancy, and attendant agrarian unrest. (Broadly speaking, landlessness is more acute in the northern valleys, tenancy in the central plain, and indebtedness in the arid northeast, while in the South there are extensive illegal settlements that have produced land uses termed 'ecologically catastrophic.) "(1) A "green revolution" in Thailand would have meant transition to an intensive agriculture, which implies a complete restructuring of the rural economy, which is characterized by a class of landed proprietors organically tied to the state apparatus and jealous of its privileges and a mass of landless peasants, who now constitute 6065 percent of the rural population. During 1974, Sanya had three laws adopted: the Land Reform Act, the Farm Rent Bill, and the Farmer's Aid Fund Bill. Officially, the point was to assure a significant distribution of land to the needy, to drive down the rate of farm rent, to assure a minimum price for grain, and to furnish financial aid for modernization and for the purchase of fertilizer. After calling for the adoption of an agrarian legislation (and in spite of the moderation of the one that had been adopted), the peasant movement sought to put pressure on the government to force the application of the law. Apart from a few grandstand gestures (the king donated some of his personal land holdings and some of the crown lands to the reform fund), the agrarian laws turned into dead letters in the provinces. Successive delegations of peasants went to Bangkok, a process that culminated on May 1, 1975. More than 20,000 peasants assembled on that day, linking up with the workers and students movements. There were six simultaneous demonstrations in the cities of Chieng Mai, Lampang, and Pittsanulok (in the North), Udorn and Surin (in the Northeast), and Bangkok. The FFT laid siege to the ministries for a week. But in vain. Kukrit Pramoj slammed the door and broke off discussions. The farmers were supposed to continue to give 50 percent and more of their harvests to the landed proprietors. This breakoff of negotiations marked an important turn in the history of the peasant struggles. At the time of its foundation, the FFT had proclaimed its apolitical character. But after the breakoff of the negotiations, is members went back to their villages to turn the FFT into a militant movement of mass struggle. Since then, the FFT has supported left parties, like the Socialist party of Thailand during the by-elections in Chieng Mai. An initial test of strength occurred immediately after the rupture of discussions in Bangkok. During a period of four months, twenty-one leaders of the FFT were murdered one after another by professional killers.
Growing Class
Polarization by PAUL PETITJEAN Half of these murders took place in the North, where Intha Sriboonruang, regional president of the FFT, was murdered on July 30. The agrarian crisis is especially acute in the North. Fragmenfation of land occurs quickly for the smallholding peasants. In 1961 average holdings were 16.1 rai (with a national average of 21,7 rai). In 1972-73 the figure in the North had fallen to 8.8 rai.(2) In an interview granted shortly before his death, Intha gave a good illustration of the process of radicalization going on in the peasant movement. He said, on July 15: "If we are united and if we have a large number of farmers participating in fighting the cause, we will be able to get somewhere. From now on, we will only fight for land reform so that the farmers can have their own land to till. The present system of land reform cannot work, because those supervising the scheme are all rich people chosen by the officials themselves. Believe me, as long as the capitalist goverment is in power, we will never see improvements in our living conditions. As long as the state power is not in our hands, we will continue to live this way. . . . I'II have to fight. 1 am not scared about death. If we didn't fight we would be dead anyway. "(3) This test of strength between the landed interests and the farmers movement required a national response unifying the struggles of the peasants, workers, and students. This national resporse, however, was limited by the internal weaknesses of the mass movement and the Thai revolutionary formations. Division in the workers movement The Thai "October" of 1973, initiated by the student movement, had been prepared by the development of an initial series of workers struggles, But it was above all after the overthrow of the dictatorship that the real wave of spontaneous strikes broke out. (See INPRECOR No.21, March 13, 1975.) Success was often won rapidly. But that was not to last long. The social weight of the working class is still small. The active population numbers only 18 million out of a total population of 41 million, and 14 million of this 18 million are rural workers. Of the remaining 4 million, only half work in industrial enterprises, "the mafor portion of which are widely dispersed rice mills. "(4) The Thai proletariat could have compensated for this relative social weakness only by a capacity for independent political intervention. But this proletariat is only gradually breaking out of the traditions of precapitalist social and cultural relations and is only gradually casting off the weight of the organizational atomization it suffered under the dictatorship. Moreover, the Thai working class is largely made up of immigrant Chinese workers who suffer political oppression and have a separate status, foreign to the Thai peasantry. Under these conditions, the post-October 1973 workers movement, while it experienced an important spontaneous growth, divided into three big currents. The first group essentially includes the unions of the state sector, in which a practice of collaboration with the government labor department predominates. While its militant rank and file is weak, it receives significant financial aid. The second current comes from the formation of workers groups in 1968 and from the establishment of workers educational courses at the University of Chulalongkorn in 1972, Its members, such as Sanan Wongsuthee, have very often become "professional negotiators" appointed by the official bodies for labor relations, internationally linked to the American trade-union movement and to Catholic associations. This group particularly includes unions based in the foreign companies, especially in the textile industry. The third group, the Labor Coordinating Center, may be defined as a class struggle current. If is the product of the linkup of the militant workers radicalization and the politicization of the student vanguard. As of July, the Labor Coordination Center (LCC) included seventeen unions, while the three groups taken together included about sixty-five. The LCC is contesting the second group for influence in the textile industry. While the current represented by Sanan Wongsuthee is predominant in the important industrial zone of Samut Prakarn (Saman Pimpas is the director of the Samut Prakarn Textile Workers Union), the same is not true in the industrial zones of Korat, Nakon Pattorn, and Samut Sakorn (Prasit Chaiyo is the leader of the Samut Sakorn Textile Workers Union). The junction of this class-struggle workers current with the radical wing of the student movement cannot be considered simply unity in action and a de facto collaboration. While members of the young generation of workers leaders are effectively directing the Labor Coordination Center - leaders like Terdpoom Jaidee (hotel sector) and Prasit Chaiyo (texfiles) - another member of the secretariat of the LCC is Seksan Praesertkul, former leoder of the FIST. (5) This division of the workers movement, long latent, was clearly manifested during the demonstrations on May 1, 1975. The two first currents, the class-collaboration currents, refused to call for the traditional as -sembly point in front of Thammassat University of Thai-
25
THAILAND land, which is known for its radicalism. Nevertheless, Sanam Luang Square (near the university) had generally been the site of the major social demonstrations. Thus, two popular demonstrations were organized on May 1, One, held in Lumpini Park called by the sixty-five unions (that is, all the unions, since the class-struggle current did not want to break off unity), lasted all day. It drew 200,000 participants. The second demonstration, called by the Workers Coordination Center of Thailand, was held in front of Thammassat University. Although smaller (20,000 demonstrators), this assembly was more militant, even though the official slogans of the two demonstrations were actually very close, sometimes having been worked out by the same leaders. Two strikes broke ouf during the May Day demonstrations, one of Dusit Thani Hotel, the other at the Standard Garment Textile Company (which is Taiwanese owned). The employers, who had long since established an employers organization, decided to turn these strikes into tests of strength. Negotiations were blocked. The police attacked the striking workers of the Standard Garment Company in order to bring in scabs. One of the workers was seriously wounded. Commandos of the "Red Gaurs" (Red Buffaloes) harassed the employees at the Dusit Thani Hotel night after night with plastic bombs, while the police remained passive. Divided, the workers movement of Bangkok and the surrounding region was unable to respond with sufficiently active solidarity. The Dusit Thani Hotel strike in particular ended in a stinging defeat for the workers. This crisis of the workers movement - which nonetheless does not prevent the continual outbreak of many strikes - is serious. Between May and August a real offensive of the far right developed. The far-right offensive During the third and fourth quarters of 1975 the offensive of the far right, sometimes disorganized by the eruption of the mass movement, was not limited to the murder of a number of leaders of the FFT, to the organization of the division of the workers movement, and to the breaking of advanced strikes. The military far-right also tried to take the political initiative again. This far right still holds the key posts in the state apparatus and does not hesitate to attack the Kukrit government, from within and from without. Obviously, there is a bit of the con game in the different policies of Kukrit and some of his military ministers. The prime minister is not visibly opposed to the formation of a parallel repressive force for whose actions the government does not have to take official responsibility. And the "liberal" pretensions of Kukrit should deceive no one. In this sense, he follows a policy analogous to that of Tun Abdel Razak in Malaysia (see INPREC OR, No.37, November 6). He asked for the lifting of the anticommunist law, only to replace it with an even more rigorous antisubversion law. (6) But there does seem to be some division within the ruling class. The 26
Investor published a series of articles in its August issue dealing with workers and peasant struggles, the aim of which was to warn the employers and the people bankrolling the killers against the possible consequences of their actions: To murder peasant leaders is to contribute to radicalizing the FFT; to reject the workers movement as a whole, not to support its moderate wing, is to renounce isolating the "class-struggle wing, " "the extremists" of the Labor Coordination Center. "The Labour movement in Thailand at the moment, "concluded the Investor, "is not by any standard alarming. . . . If is useless for management to pray for a military coup to put an end to the Thai labour movement, because the consequences would be much worse. * Kukrit and General Kris Sirara — who has just withdrawn as commander in chief of the army and is probably getting ready to enter political life - seem to share this view. Nevertheless, at least a part of the military hierarchy has opted for a "policy of tension," The tension has been regularly stepped up on the Thai-Lao border ever since the month of May. A protracted strike and violent demonstrations by the Thai guards at U.S. bases, who were threatened with layoffs, took a decidedly antigovemment tone. The policy of the individual murder of mass leaders has made its appearance in Bangkok, although it is much more limited in scope than in the countryside. Two student cadres were killed in this manner, and on June 3, 1975, Terdpoom Jaidee (leader of the Hotel and Hostel Workers Union) was shot in the hand. Perhaps even more serious, the organizations of the far right (if not outright fascist organizations) are seeking to win a mass base among the vocational school students and among the petty bourgeoisie. There are many such organizations, but the two best known ones are the Navapol and the Red Gaurs (Red Buffaloes). The development of the Red Gaurs is perhaps the most significant success of the military. The students of the vocational schools had fully taken part in the demonstrations of October 1973. Nevertheless, the police and army have cleverly played on the antagonisms between the university students and the vocational school students. They have thus gained a mass base for many operations against urban struggles, such as systematic attacks on student demonstrations with plastic bombs, antistrike actions, various sorts of threats, and so on. These right-wing organizations are openly led by military officers. It was General Wallop who founded the Navapol organization in October 1974. He had "studied" in the training schools for "psychological warfare" in the United States. And it was an officer of the Internal Security Operations Command (ISOC), Colonel Sudsai Hasdin - leader of the "Montagnard tribes" division of the ISOC - who gave an interview to Norman Peagam in the name of the Red Gaurs, He explained the group's objectives foursquarely: "We had to cut off the head from the arms. The Red Gaurs first plan was to cut off, to separate the vocational student from the university student..... We try
to back the police. The goverment and the police are afraid to take action because of the newspapers. That is the next important thing. We plan to warn the newspapers to report correctly or we will take some action against them. The bad newspapermen must be washed out. We are not afraid of the newspapers. "(7) The string of generals participating in this policy of tension are not small fry. They include Generals Wallop Rajanawisut and Chamnian Phongpairod (respectively former and present chief of Thai Military Intelligence), Saiyud Kerdphol (chief of ISOC), Vitoon Yasawat (Former chief of Thai mercenaries in Laos and a member of the general staff), Prachvab Sundarangkul (general staff, former head of the police department), Sant Chitpatima (commander of the Thai Fourth Army), Suraphol Chulapram (chief of the Border Patrol Police). They are said to be linked to the clandestine anticommunist command - known as Command 333 - which is based at Udorn along with General Paitoon Inkaranuwat and the CIA. These far-right elements have their counterparts within the Kukrit government, notably in the person of General Pramarn Adireksarn, the minister of defense. (8) According to Norman Peogam, this minister of defense in the Kukrit government could well have been behind the sacking of the house of the prime minister during an organized antigovernment demonstration of between 1,000 and 2,000 policemen of the city of Bangkok, That happened on August 19. Kukrit had just ordered the release of eight peasants and a student who had been arrested. The police demanded a harder policy against the social movements - and behind them a section of the military hierarchy and the government apparatus did the same. The next day, the Red Gaurs attacked the campus of Thammassat University with firearms and home-made bombs, briefly occupying some of the offices of the university. At the time, Thailand seemed to be on the brink of a military coup. An incomplete recomposition Nevertheless, it does not seem likely that a coup had actually been planned. That would not correspond to the interests of American imperialism in the region. The mass movement and revolutionary formations on the one hand and military and paramilitary forces on the other remain too weak and divided to impose any sharp change in the current equilibrium. The Thai Communist party increased its activity after the overthrow of the military regime. The victory of the Indochinese revolution strengthened the position of the CP's guerrilla bases in the North and the Northeast. The level of military operations was very high during 1974: officially, the government admits 526 soldiers killed in the fighting. And the number of clashes increased rather than decreased during the rainy season of 1975. More important, the influence of the Thai CP seems to be continuing to grow, beyond the areas in-
Kukrit habited by ethnic minorities (the zones of the CP's greatest implantation) among the Thai peasantry and in urban radical milieus. But the CP is not in position organizafionally or politically to offer centralized leadership to the various ongoing movements of struggle. Is direct role in the mobilizations in the capital during recent months was probably rather small. And it appears that the Thai CP is now going through a strategic debate about what orientation to adopt, a debate similar to the one that divided the Malayan CP. It is concentrating its propaganda efforts against the Kukrit government -which "is pursuing the same policy line as previous traitor governments. It is selling out our national independence and sovereignty in exchange for weapons to suppress the people and protect the throne"(9) - and against the presence of U.S. imperialism. But it also denounces the action of "Soviet social imperialism" in Thailand, (10) which makes for divisions, at least in the urban areas, where some elements of the CP favor an orientation closer to that of the Vietnamese CP, with a more prudent balance between the USSR and China. In the absence of a nationally implanted Communist party it is the student movement - and above all the radical student groups that developed after October 1973 - that are once again taking up objective responsibility for centralizing the struggles. Nevertheless, this movement is now reaching the limits of its capacities. The student movement registered some successes at the beginning of this year in its denunciation of the illegal concessions the military had made to Temco in the southern part of the country and in exposing the provocations of the far right. But the division introduced by the military and the police betweeh the student movement and the vocational school students and the constant confrontations that have followed from that division have little by little shifted public opinion and par-
27
THAILAND tially isolated the movement. The mobilization against the murders of the peasant leaders highlighted this weakThe Kukrit government had begun with a complete rejection of the demands of the Farmers Federation of Thailand. None of the killers were arrested. What's more, on August 4 the prime minister permitted the imprisonment of eight peasants and one student for acts allegedly committed three months earlier (the burning of a tree farm, site of a conflict between the government and the peasants, and the occupation of a mine near a village). The Antidictatorship Front, the National Student Center of Thailand (NSCT), the FFT, and the Workers Coordination Center of Thailand tried to respond to this provocation with a massive mobilization. The campus of Thammassat University was occupied for a week. But although there were about 20,000 demonstrators at first, their number decreased rapidly. And Kukrit's eventual decision to release the nine militants was due more to his desire to lessen the pressure being exerted by the mass movement on his left at a time when he had to deal with a large movement on his right than to a direct victory of the mobilization against the government. In fact, the movement turned most of its attacks against military reaction, but without massively demonstrating ofter the sacking of the prime minister's house and the affack on Thammassat University. The student movement remains divided among many organizations and individual leaders, permeated by liberal reformist currents and revolufionary currents and dominated by a strong populist tradition. More serious, its capacity for action is partially paralyzed by the constant attacks of the far right. It cannot arm itself openly without risking political isolafion and police repression. Under these conditions, the Kukrit government, although it is incapable of solving the problems it is facing, remains in control of the situation, on the whole at least. The prospect of a military coup may find some response among the urban petty bourgeoisie, which is fed up with "disorder. " But the army is still divided into various factions, and the two major government parties -the Social Justice party and Chat Thai party - seem to be essentially concerned with squabbling over posts in the state apparatus. Further, American imperialism, which is still strong in the country, is probably not prepared to unify the military right behind the perspective of a coup. The state-military cliques still lack an overall project. The "American choices" appear decisive for the future of the policy of the ruling class in Thailand. The withdrawal of U.S. forces affects only combat troops. The regional electronic spy network remains in place, as do the tens of thousands of "advisers" of the JUSMAG and MAGTHAI. Washington remains the eminence grise of organizations like the Border Patrol Police and the ISOC.(11) The strategic Importance of Thailand rules out any real voluntary disengagement of U.S. imperiBut while the Kukrit government maintains general control of the situation, and while the mass movement and 28 the forces of the far left are still incapable of offering a national response to the crisis of the regime, it is nonetheless true that the ruling class has little chance of being able to stabilize the situation. Even when the economic situation was favorable - and before the Indochinese revolutionary front won the final victory over U.S. imperialism - the social crisis continued to deepen. (See INPRECOR, No.21, March 13, 1975.) Today, the favorable economic situation seems finished: "While high commodity prices for Thai exports tended to offset oil price increoses for a time, the prolonged strain of recession has now begun to affect Thailand's export performance, " wrote the Far Eastern Economic Review. (12) While the growth of the gross domestic product in constant terms was 8.7% in 1973, it fell to 3.8% in 1974 and will not exceed 3% in 1975. A comparison of export values for the first six months of 1975 with the first six months of 1974 shows a general decline for the major products, apart from tapioca, sugar, and clothing. A crisis of confidence among investors has appeared following the victory of the Indochinese revolution. Industrial production grew by only 4.3% in 1974(9.4% in 1973), the lowest figure in twelve years. Thailand's currency reserves, however, remain large.(13) Under these conditions, the objective social crisis will inevitably intensify, and this at a time when a rise of the regional class struggle is taking place, What is now shaping up in Thailand is a new accentuation of the ongoing class polarization. FOOTNOTES: 1. Brian Phelan, Far Eastern Economic Review, October 12, 1975. 2. Figure given by The Investor (a Thai monthly) in August 1975. A rai is slightly more than 21/2 acres. 3. Interview published in The Voice of the Nation, Thai daily, August 13, 1975. 4. Figures cited in The Investor, August 1975, P.24. 5. Federation of Independent Students of Thailand, probably the most radical student organization, along with the People for Democracy Group. 6. The major part of this law (the National Security Bill) was published in the September 6 Bangkok Post. 7. Far Eastern Economic Review, July 25. 8. See the articles by Norman Peagam in the Far Eastern Economic Review. 9. Far Eastern Economic Review, May 9, 1975. 10. Radio broadcast of Voice of the Thai People, Pekin Information, No.31, August 4, 1975. 11. See the article by Marcel Barang in Le Monde Diplomatique, November 1975. 12. August 17 issue, p. 9. 13. Figures cited in the Far Eastern Economic Review, October 17, 1975.
The Conference of Communist Parties of Latin America and the Caribbean took place in Havana, Cuba, June 9-13 this year. Of the various meetings that have taken place on the continent since the OLAS conference of 1967, this one was probably of the greatest political significance. Not only because it was the first fime that a sort of continental congress took place uniting all the old pro-Soviet CPs with the Cuban Communist party, but also and more fundamentally because of the resolutions it passed and their meaning for the struggle in Latin America in the immediate and near future. Every one of the old CPs of the continent showed up for the meeting. This time nobody was missing. There were no expulsions and no notes of discord. The agreements reached were sealed with unfailing and complete unanimity. The common declaration issued by the conference committed all these parties to the same line and to similar tasks. This time, the Cuban Communist party, leadership and government of the first workers state of Latin America, sat side by side with Communist parties like the CPs of Bolivia, Venezuela, Argentina, Brazil, and Chile, and worked out common objectives. This time the Venezuelan CP did not suffer attacks of the sort that had been directed against it by Fidel Castro himself at the OLAS conference. And the Uruguayan CP did not have to defy the Cuban leadership in the name of all the "fraternal parties" of the continent. It was the most important such event since OLAS because of the "lineup" if engendered (or rather confirmed) in the ranks of the workers and revolutionary movement of the continent; and also because of the devastating effects this will have on the centrist Latin American organizations in the immediate future, the abandonment it will mean for the Castroist and neo-Castroist movement, the confusion if will create among the "new vanguard" that arose in Latin America out of the triumph of the Cuban revolution and developed within the wave of struggle that swept the continent during the ensuing years. Finally, there will be future implications for the development of the struggle, starting with the necessary recomposition through which the workers and revolutionary movement will have to pass in many countries after the deep