In what appears to be an unexpected plot twist in Thailand’s political drama, a new face is emerging looking to bump Thaksin into distant memory status. If this scenario turns out to be true, look for a battle between Seh Daeng and Thaksin.
This has all the makings of a Hollywood movie where bad guy #2 looks to bump off bad guy #1. But before Connecting the Dots gets too deep into this, we want to offer a bit of a disclaimer. What we are seeing is a clash of egos and 2 Alpha males looking to take control of the Red Shirts for their own personal agenda. So it becomes a bit difficult at this stage to nail down any hard facts to connect the dots. So much of this post is speculation based on personality traits and probable reactions to situations.
From the go Seh Daeng seems the most likely suspect in the grenade attack on the army chief officer. Based on his displayed anger like a disgruntle employee who just got fired, his Alpha male side simply would not let him sit and do nothing as his territory was taken from him. So coining an American phrase ‘Going Postal’ it is likely Seh Daeng was behind the grenade attack to send a message he was not going to take this sitting down.
Based on Seh Daeng’s behavior that lead to him getting his plug pulled, it is clear his ego was overriding any sense of being less than #1 and he was doing what he wanted. Although his motivation was to support Thaksin, once he got his plug pulled it became personal.
So being an Alpha male he proclaimed himself leader of the Red Shirts and was declaring war on the Thai military. Based on that it simply says he was taking the Red Shirts from Thaksin so he could use them to deal with his own personal war with the military who pulled his plug. By doing that it is about as close to an admission of guilt as you can get on the grenade attack. The Red Shirts are to be his next weapons attacking the same target.
If this is all starting to sound like Thaksin and what he is doing you would be right. This also sets up a conflict as in both Seh Daeng’s and Thaksin’s minds they look to take the top seat. Needless to say this will not go down well with Thaksin. Thaksin needs the Red Shirts now to make trouble and divide the country further and attack the government. He can not afford to have them distracted to see to Seh Daeng’s personal agenda of attacking the military.
If there is a war between Seh Daeng and Thaksin, you can expect things to resemble a messy divorce with the only winners being the Abhisit government. Thaksin will not stand for anyone in the way of his personal agenda, but Seh Daeng has some leverage that Thaksin does not. Seh Daeng is in Thailand and Thaksin is on the run with questionable cash reserves. If Seh Daeng can rally the people that he is the next Thaksin, the popcorn should be double size with extra butter.
