Thread: Citizenship Granted to Thailand's Colonial Diaspora

PRACHUAP KIRI KHAN — Following decades of bureaucratic delays, Thai authorities have finally granted citizenship to descendants of Thais who found themselves without a formal nationality after the British Empire declared their homes to be in Burmese territory nearly 150 years ago.

Pongpan Wichiansamut, permanent secretary to governor of Prachuap Kiri Khan province, presided over the ceremony granting Thai citizenship to 24 representatives of those descendants today.

The new citizens’ ancestors lived west of Prachuap Kiri Khan and lost their official nationality when the British Empire declared the area part of colonial Burma in July 1868. The region, called Tenasserim, had previously been considered part Thailand, then known as Siam.

Although the descendants of the group later migrated to Thailand, they were never formally recognized as Thais by authorities. The group first filed a request for citizenship in 1976, but their application was only accepted by the Cabinet in 2006, Pongpan said.

In total, 167 people have been granted the citizenship, including the 24 representatives who attended the ceremony today. Another 169 people are still waiting for their applications to be finalized by the Ministry of Interior Affairs.

Pongpan and other officials handed out Thai ID cards, residential registration booklets, and portraits of His Majesty the King to the new citizens. The group then sang the Thai national anthem together.

In the 19th century the Siamese government claimed parts of modern-day Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, and Malaysia as its dominions. The Siamese claims were later contested by British and French colonialists in Southeast Asia in the middle of the century. By the early 20th century, the Siamese government's territories in Malaysia and Burma were annexed by the British Empire, while Cambodia and Laos fell under French control.

Known as "The Losses of Territory," the incidents are now routinely portrayed in public school textbooks as acts of Western aggression on Thai sovereignty.

Citizenship Granted to Thailand's Colonial Diaspora

The tragedy is, the British failed to annex Pattani at the conclusion of the Second World War in reparation for the Thai collaboration with the Japanese. Mountbatten was dissuaded from pursuing this intention by the Americans who wanted to use a United Thailand as a puppet state " investment chip " of their own.
What a pity, eh?

Originally Posted by Seekingasylum

The tragedy is, the British failed to annex Pattani at the conclusion of the Second World War in reparation for the Thai collaboration with the Japanese. Mountbatten was dissuaded from pursuing this intention by the Americans who wanted to use a United Thailand as a puppet state " investment chip " of their own.
What a pity, eh?

You'll recall the post-war political theatre, the Brits had truly no say so to much of anything - the Americans were running the show and had charge of most everything. The empire baton had been passed....

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It has been brought to our attention that there are certain forces working within the halls of this fine forum, the TeakDoor, who are of the disposition to state political and other views in a manner that might be offensive to other forum members. As such, we'd like to take this opportunity to provide examples of responses that illustrate a politically 'correct' approach and those that don't quite exemplify the finer qualities of our members:


Example of a politically 'correct' response:

Gentlemen, for those that take this opportunity to malign the United States of America, I suggest that you look inwardly to consider your own people's contributions to this problem that has languished in the Thai halls of 'justice' for decades. While many country's policies and actions have contributed to this predicament, singling one out in particular may not be looking at the complete picture.



Example of a not so politically 'correct' response:

Certainly a major factor in this is that poms are cowards who basically gave up without a fight in Singapore. Their legacy is to hopelessly and endlessly try to pass the buck to make it look like it's anyone else's fault but their own. Then there's the chickenheads, whose lack of any sign of intelligence and usefulness for anything other than prostitution and ripping others off might just be the real cause for their own ridiculous predicament. Duh.



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Disclaimer (aka the fine print): the views expressed in this post are not necessarily those of the poster.

Originally Posted by Seekingasylum

The tragedy is, the British failed to annex Pattani at the conclusion of the Second World War in reparation for the Thai collaboration with the Japanese. Mountbatten was dissuaded from pursuing this intention by the Americans who wanted to use a United Thailand as a puppet state " investment chip " of their own.

I wasn't aware of that . . . yes, a shame

Originally Posted by The Ghost Of The Moog

Originally Posted by OckerRocker

Originally Posted by Seekingasylum

The tragedy is, the British failed to annex Pattani at the conclusion of the Second World War in reparation for the Thai collaboration with the Japanese. Mountbatten was dissuaded from pursuing this intention by the Americans who wanted to use a United Thailand as a puppet state " investment chip " of their own.

I wasn't aware of that . . . yes, a shame

Indeed. Shame on you, Henry.

Churchill proposed taking the entire Kra Isthmus. The Foreign Office wanted to annex Pattani, pointing out that culturally it made more since for it to be part of a future Malay organization. The Brits did want to punish Thailand but even they were split on how severe that should be.

They settled of return of the Malay states annexed during the war (along with the Shan states in Burma) and an insistence on a free delivery of up to 1.5 million tons rice (which I don't think was ever delivered).

Some would say the reason for the disagreement on how to deal with Thailand at the end of the war was the US never considered itself at war with Thailand (Siam), but the [some] British and Australians certainly did.

Some interesting reading on the subject. http://www.siamese-heritage.org/jssp...ations1945.pdf
TH

Originally Posted by Sumocakewalk

Example of a not so politically 'correct' response:

Certainly a major factor in this is that poms are cowards who basically gave up without a fight in Singapore. Their legacy is to hopelessly and endlessly try to pass the buck to make it look like it's anyone else's fault but their own. Then there's the chickenheads, whose lack of any sign of intelligence and usefulness for anything other than prostitution and ripping others off might just be the real cause for their own ridiculous predicament. Duh.

That's a fine example of British defeat. and a bad one it was too. Besides Spion Kop in resounding defeats. But there weren't many besides

Stupid analysis.

The fall of Singapore at that time was attributable to the failure of one man, General Percival, whose tactical blunders and poor leadership ensured the facile Japanese victory. Cowardice was not a factor.

Although, in the longer term, had he held out and stymied the Nip advance it would have been futile and only a matter of weeks before Armageddon would have arrived - the allies had no carriers to spare in the region and with overwhelming airpower the Nips would have taken the island easily in the course of which the civilian casualties would have been in the tens of thousands.

Singapore was always dead in the water, an ironic conclusion since the island was dependent upon the peninsular for its supply and in the hands of the Nips this would have been cut off immediately prior to any siege. Even the thickest cretin can work out the consequences of denying a million people water in a tropical climate where the ambient daily temperature is 32c.

thegent, you do seem quite knowledgeable on the topic, and for the most part your posts in this thread have focused on what appears to be historical fact, with the occasional barb directed at the septics amongst the members here.

I find it difficult to accept that the loss was the sole responsibility of General Percival, as he had to be appointed and follow orders from above. Therefore I feel the blame has to be looked upon as an overall failure of the British chain of command.

Yes, my post was an oversimplification of the situation and did not take into account those who may have wished to stand their ground and fight, but instead followed orders coming from questionable leadership.

That said, the casualties that followed the surrender were in no way light. The victims of the Sook Ching massacre are estimated to be as high as 100,000 Chinese. Then there was the plight of the POWs, who perished in the thousands in circumstances such as the building of the Death Railway.

My question then is, would it possibly have been better to offer more resistance, even in the face of overwhelming odds, and go down fighting?

No, it would not have achieved anything except possibly Churchill's anachronistic view of saving the Empire's face.

The slaughter would have been enormous and, as I have said previously, ultimately futile since the siege could not have been repulsed for more than a few weeks and certainly no more than two months.

The massacre of Chinese civilians by the Nips covers a wide estimate of between 5,000 and 50,000. Figures are still inconclusive but lack of bodies etc suggests no more than in the low teens, Approximately 7000 commonwealth troops died in captivity arising from the surrender.
General Wavell was Percival's commander and he passed on Churchill's orders to fight to the last man which of course Percival rightly refused to carry out.

If Percival had marshalled his troops better at the outset he could have resisted the advance which would have stymied the Nips quite quickly. However, it would have only postponed the inevitable surrender which was guaranteed - Percival knew this and I suspect once the attacks came from Johore and not from the sea he knew the game was up.

When Churchill sent the Repulse and Prince of Wales capital ships without the support of an aircraft carrier taskforce it signalled a desperate throw of the dice and was effectively the end of the campaign when they were sunk ignominiously. Leaving the island without adequate air cover was another disastrous lapse and ensured the Nips had air supremacy.

Militarily, in 1942 Singapore was nothing more than a totem for the British Empire and could not be defended against a determined attack from the land.