Republic of Thailand

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The Republic of Thailand, formerly known as Siam, is a country at the center of the Southeast Asia's Indochinese peninsula. The nation was a member of the Axis during the Second World War and is now currently an independent member of the Co-Prosperity Sphere. The country is bordered to the north by Yunnan, to the south by the Military Governorate of Shonan-Marai, to the north-west by the Union of Burma; and the east by the Republic of Kampuchea and the Kingdom of Laos.

History

In the early hours of June 24th, 1932, the course of a small, rather insignificant Southeast Asian nation would change forever. Siam, once a feudal, absolutist relic of the past with an illusion of independence under the mercy of the British ever since the mid-1800s, had just overthrown its absolute monarchy. 30 Years later, that Kingdom is now a Republic, one moved beyond it’s past of Western domination under the guidance of Field Marshal President Plaek Phibunsongkhram with the help of his Japanese compatriots to create an Asia for Asians, and a Thai State for the Thais. Yet to just about everyone, this version of modern Thai history isn’t entirely true.

Acceding to power in 1938, Phibun’s “nation-building” program took a fascistic lines of Mussolini with massive modernization and westernization of Thai life as wide-ranging as clothes, film, and eating utensils; but the most effort was expended on creating a national state as respected and all-pervasive as Italy or Germany are. True to his title, Plaek took full advantage of the miraculous fascist victories in Europe by launching several campaigns into surrounding French and British territory, while the Japanese were still largely tied down on the Burmese and Chinese fronts.

However, Plaek's manic dreams of domination over the entire peninsula were quickly dashed when the Japanese quickly moved to occupy any remaining western colonial holdings following the end of the war. The war ended and despite managing to remove the Monarchy, his last obstacle to absolute authority, he ended up compromising with those who reluctantly helped him with Pridi Banomyong’s Clique in governmental affairs while the military began splitting into factions loyal to Kat Katsongkhram, Sarit Thanarat and Phin Choonhavan. Towards the end of the decade, matters grew worse when severe flooding of the Chao Phraya river left almost a million dead and the nations infrastructure in tatters and Phibun’s influence grew less as the Pridi-dominated cabinet began pushing towards parliamentarization and de-participation of the Khana Ratsadon. Phibun would later found his opening to regain control in 1949 with the beginning of Operation Issara, a major military invasion of Laos and Cambodia to “pacify the communist threat” and for Thailand to finally exert control of it’s lost land once more, yet this dream was also crushed after desperate negotiations, Japanese intervention, and public discontent, with the last nail in the coffin being Sarit Thanarat’s Coup of 1957, reducing Phibun into nothing but a mere figurehead. Sarit’s eccentric personality and his drunken rampage would, however, proved to save Phibun’s legacy as he and many within the state apparatus manages to remove Sarit and restore the status quo by 1960, restoring the previous balance of power, although the military now have a clear dominance over civilian institutions.

This left the real Republic of Thailand in 1962, not one of glorious liberation, but a nation ravaged by decades of war, natural disasters, political chaos and infighting. Phibun’s health also reflected the nations mood as well as his health began to falter and a successor needed to be find soon, a topic that not even Phibun seems to care about as he wished that he could escape the capital and spend the last of his days in peace, yet unfortunately for the Marshal, his creation wouldn’t be so kind to him…


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