Things were quiet and the people of Thailand welcomed the September 2006 Coup with open arms. That quiet lasted about 90 days and then bombs started going off in and around Bangkok. It first was implied to be terrorist related, but after careful examination it was established the bombings were political.
Once again Thaksin denied any involvement and was out of the country. But the fact that the bombings were political, the list was very short who was behind it. All that was lacking was a solid link back to Thaksin, but that was typical as Thaksin was very good at hiding his involvement when less than straightforward transactions of any kind took place. There were layers upon layers of false leads between what was seen on the surface and Thaksin, and it could take months to spot all the connections. It was even rumored that the investigators wanted to use US software that is designed to find links between people and transactions. However that never happened as Thailand was paper intensive and not computer intensive when it came to official documents, thus making it easier for corruption to prosper.
Seeing that the bombs were more about anger and not about Sondhi Limthongkul, we can start to eliminate reasons and add new reasons. At the time of the bombings there was a temporary military appointed bridging Government in place, and the bombs were meant to destabilize that government. This then provides the second dot in that anything that looks to eliminate Thaksin is attacked with violence.
Things eventually progressed along, Thaksin’s Thai Rak Thai (TRT) Party got dissolved in May 2007, and the TRT politicians banned from politics for 5 years for the corruption in the elections Thaksin had called at the start of 2006. A new Constitution was ratified about 2 months later with roughly 63% approval, and new elections were put in place for late 2007.
As it would be another Pro-Thaksin Government was elected named the People Power Party (PPP), but it did not take long before much of the same corruption was seen again and a new round of Anti-Thaksin protests started around mid 2008 with the Yellow Shirts this time. Needless to say attacks started again and the use of military weapons was starting to be used on the peaceful protesters.
This provides another clue and dot in that it is a new Government being the PPP so therefore new players. Sondhi Limthongkul was leading the Yellow Shirt Anti-Thaksin protests, and The military was no longer involved. So that left Thaksin himself as the only common element thus far.
Next up on deck was the Red Shirts who were very clearly Thaksin’s replacement for the Forestry Service. The Red Shirts were not shy about being violent and were very happy to attack anyone that was Anti-Thaksin, and their main target was the Anti-Thaksin protesters. This also is another dot in that the Anti-Thaksin protesters were still the target of attacks and Anti-Thaksin protester deaths started to occur as a direct result of those attacks.
This series of protests and attacks continued until the courts once again dissolved Thaksin’s party the PPP and banned those politicians for 5 years and the Democrats took over as the next biggest party in Parliament. Parliament elected Abhisit Vejjajiva as Prime Minister and there was no doubt Thaksin did not like that and attacks on Abhisit and his Government started almost immediately after.
About 4 months after the Democrats took over, Thaksin tried to launch his own personal Coup to remove the Democrats. So once again there were attacks on anything or anyone not seen as being Pro-Thaksin. There is plenty of evidence of Thaksin’s involvement as there are several YouTube clips showing Thaksin wearing a Red shirt rallying the Red Shirts to take violent actions to regain power. Sondhi Limthongkul was not involved in this so he can clearly be eliminated as can both the TRT and PPP as both met their fate in the court. The only common element still remains Thaksin in all the attacks.
Next Part 3 of 4
