Thailand

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Surprisingly, the Assembly was not totally tame. A number of MPs (mostly professionals such as doctors, lawyers, and journalists) began to openly challenge some of the government's policies, producing evidence of widespread government corruption on a number of large projects. As a new budget was being debated in 1971, it actually appeared that the military's demand for more funds might be voted down. Rather than suffer such a loss of face, Thanom carried out a putsch against his own government, suspended the constitution and dissolved the Parliament. Once again Thailand had been returned to absolute military rule.

By 1944 it was evident that the Japanese were going to lose the war, and their behaviour in Thailand had become increasingly arrogant. This, plus the economic hardship caused by the loss of Thailand's rice export markets, made both the war and Phibun's regime very unpopular, and in July Phibun was forced to resign as Prime Minister.

Chakri ruled under the name Ramathibodi (he was posthumously given the name Phutthayotfa Chulalok), but is now generally known as King Rama I, first king of the Chakri dynasty. One of his first decisions was to move the capital across the river to the village of Bang Makok (meaning "place of olive plums"), which soon became the city of Bangkok.

Indeed one of Siam's problems was the widening gap between the westernised royal family and upper aristocracy and the rest of the country. It took another 20 years for western education to extend to the rest of the bureaucracy and the army: a potential source of conflict.

The king had to be vigilant to prevent royal princes from combining against him or allying with Ayutthaya's enemies. Whenever the succession was in dispute, princely governors gathered their forces and moved on the capital to press their claims.

Seni Pramoj became Prime Minister in 1945, and promptly restored the name Siam as a symbol of the end of Phibun's nationalist regime. Pridi as regent was the real power in the new government, which held democratic elections in January 1946. These were the first elections in which political parties were legal, and Pridi's People's Party and its allies won a majority.

During the early 20th Century, Thailand, after learning lessons from Burma - a militarily stronger neighbor failed to protect itself from western powerhouse Britain in 1885, mostly used flexible and significantly compromising approach towards its counterparts including numerous western nations and Japan.

At first Rama V's reign was dominated by the conservative regent, Chaophraya Suriyawong, but when the king came of age in 1873 he soon took control. He created a Privy Council and a Council of State, a formal court system and budget office. He announced that slavery would be gradually abolished and debt-bondage restricted.

The decline of the kingdom started in the early 16th century, and became worse after the death of King Phraya Kaeo in 1526. There was fighting over who should succeed him. Some of the kings were assassinated; others had to abdicate. This political instability invited an invasion from the neighboring Burmese kingdom, and in 1558 Lanna had to surrender and became a vassal of Burma. When the dynasty of Mengrai became extinct in 1578, the Burmese sent their own princes to serve as rulers of Lanna.

Lanna was not to be an indepedent kingdom again. In 1877 a Viceroy from Bangkok ruled together with the king. In 1892 Lanna was formally annexed by Siam, and administrated as the Monthon Phayap. The last of the Lannathai kings, Chao Keo Naovarat, never held any true administrative power.

During much of the fifteenth century Ayutthaya's energies were directed toward the Malay Peninsula, where the great trading port of Malacca contested its claims to sovereignty. Malacca and other Malay states south of Tambralinga had become Muslim early in the century, and thereafter Islam served as a symbol of Malay solidarity against the Thais. Although it failed to make a vassal state of Malacca, Ayutthaya continued to control the lucrative trade on the isthmus, which attracted Chinese traders of specialty goods for the luxury markets of China.

This was the last major Burmese invasion of Siam, although as late as 1802 Burmese forces had to be driven out of Lanna. In 1792 the Siamese occupied Luang Prabang and brought most of Laos under indirect Siamese rule. Cambodia was also effectively ruled by Siam. By the time of his death in 1809 Rama I had created a Siamese Empire dominating an area considerably larger than modern Thailand.

The Siamese coup d'état of 1932 transformed the Government of Thailand from an absolute to a constitutional monarchy. King Prajadhipok (Rama VII) initially accepted this change but later surrendered the throne to his ten-year old nephew, Ananda Mahidol. Upon his abdication, King Prajadhipok said that the duty of a ruler was to reign for the good of the whole people, not for a select few. King Ananda Mahidol (Rama VIII) died in 1946 under somewhat mysterious circumstances, the official version being that he shot himself by accident while cleaning his gun.

As a reward, Japan allowed Thailand to annex the Shan States in northern Burma, and to resume sovereignty over the sultanates of northern Malaya. In January 1942 Thailand actually declared war on Britain and the U.S., but the Thai Ambassador in Washington, Seni Pramoj tactfully decided not to inform the State Department of this fact.

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