Posted on 10/08/2005 7:28:24 AM PDT by StoneGiant
By Grim
This AFP report (no link) has it:
The killers left a note near the bodies of Thanongsak Choomuang and his wife Supaporn, saying they had been killed in retaliation for recent arrests of suspects in the beating deaths of two marines last month, police said.
"The perpetrator left a note in Thai that (said) 'You have arrested innocent people in Tanyong Limo, so we will go on killing innocent people'," Colonel Chaiyant Supachaikit, superintendent Yarang police told AFP.
Two marines were held hostage in Tanyong Limo in neighboring Narathiwat province for 18 hours, as villagers stared down the military while the pair were beaten to death on September 21.
The killing of the Royal Thai Marines at the end of last month seems to have touched off something new in Southern Thailand.
These two Marines need a little explanation. They weren't line soldiers. They had been deployed in the South of Thailand for ten years. They spoke the language (Malay), they knew the customs, and they were undercover. Villagers believed they were part of a secret government death squad, which is why they were treated so roughly.
The Thai government denies the death squad rumors. They are widely believed, however. This may be why the insurgents seem to think that people will accept that "arresting innocent people" by the government justifies the insurgents in "killing innocent people" in reprisal. Perhaps the people have become convinced that the arrested won't reappear.
Still, it's obvious that the insurgency in Southern Thailand is both broad and deep in the population. That was not the case two years ago, when the insurgents began carrying out military-style attacks. It has become the case, in spite of the fact that Thailand has and deploys men like those two Marines -- men trained in and long accustomed to the local culture, with contacts and networks and local connections.
That's good counterinsurgency warfighting strategy, but it wasn't nearly enough to prevent a rapid and deep spread of support for the insurgents. The insurgents are beating the Thai government at propaganda, both at making it believed and making it spread. They've taken advantage of every mistake the government has made (Tak Bai first among them, a horrible mistake that has made it easy for the insurgents to spread 'death squad' rumors). They have capably played off both Muslim-fellow-feeling and Malay-ethnic separatism in the region.
Thailand's enemy is clever, devoted, and well-trained. Thailand's government has a lot of resources that aren't available in certain other counterinsurgency efforts -- political control of the region where the insurgents are active; well-established counterintelligence and counterinsurgency networks; trained and loyal men with a decade's experience in the region and with the culture.
Those tools, powerful as they may be, are not enough. It must be a lesson for counterinsurgency men everywhere: there is only so much that can be done to limit the spread. Sometimes an insurgency, like a virus, has to run its course. Once we have done what we can to limit its spread, we are still going to have to expect a long and grinding fight. That's the nature of the thing.
The 'insurgency' in Southern Thailand is not going to be stopped through the use of force only. It is going to be stopped the same way the communists in Thailand were stopped twenty years ago. This is a combined effort to reduce the desire to fight among the 'insurgents' and is going to take time. This is done through education and when needed, killing them.
I am curious where the author got the information that the two Marines were 'undercover'. Marines do not operate covertly. That is done by others.
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