We all know that Prime Minister Samak Sundarawej was lying to the CNN when he claimed that he was not involved in the 6^th October massacre and that only one person died. Before the event, he was closely associated with the Tank Corps Radio Station, which called for right-wing thugs to kill left-wing students. Samak was also very close to the Royally sponsored "Village Scouts". After the event, and the coup on the same day, he became Minister of the Interior and has lied about the massacre to this day. For those who are unaware of the details of the event, this is part of a chapter on the 6^th October.

From the city, via the jungle, to defeat:

the 6th Oct 1976 bloodbath and the C.P.T.

 Ji Giles Ungpakorn

First published in Radicalising Thailand: New Political Perspectives. (2003)  G.J. Ungpakorn -Contributing editor.  Institute of Asian Studies, Chulalongkorn University.

Abstract

The blood-stained shadow of the ruling class massacre of  students on the 6^th October 1976 and the subsequent collapse of the Communist Party still have important effects on modern Thai politics. This massacre marked the start of the eradication of the Thai Left from both official history and present day formal politics. The process was completed after the collapse of the Communist Party  in the mid 1980s. The manner in which ex-Left-wing activists have been rehabilitated back into society after the 6^th October, has paved the way for gradual democratic reforms, in a form which does not challenge the real power and privilege of the ruling elite. The result is a corrupt parliamentary system devoid of any socialist politics. This chapter presents details of the 6^th October massacre, provides a Marxist critique of the Communist Party and examines the present day implications and lessons from the collapse of the Left in that period.

In the early hours of 6th October 1976, Thai uniformed police, stationed in the grounds of the National Museum, next door to Thammasat University, destroyed a peaceful gathering of students and working people on the university campus under a hail of relentless automatic fire. At the same time a large gang of ultra-Right-wing "informal forces", known as the Village Scouts, Krating-Daeng (or "Red Gaurs") and Nawapon, indulged in an orgy of violence and brutality towards anyone near the front entrance of the university. Students and their supporters were dragged out of the university and hung from the trees around Sanam Luang; others were burnt alive in front of the Ministry of  "Justice" while the mob danced round the flames. Women and men, dead or alive, were subjected to the utmost degrading and violent behaviour. One woman had a piece of wood shoved up her vagina. Hopefully she was already dead. Village  Scouts dragged dead and dying students from the front of the campus and dumped them on the road, where they were finished-off. A young man plunged a sharp wooden spike into the corpses while a boy urinated over them. Not only did the state's "forces of law and order" do nothing to halt this violence, some uniformed members of the police force were filmed cheering-on the crowd [i].

From before dawn that morning, students had been prevented from leaving the campus by police who were stationed at each gate. The operation was what Thais call "slamming the door to beat the cat". Inside the sealed university campus violence was carried out by heavily armed police from the Crime Suppression Division, the Hua Hin airborne division of the Border Patrol Police and the Special Forces Unit of the Metropolitan Police. Un-armed women and men students who had fled initial rounds of heavy gunfire to take refuge in the Commerce Faculty building were chased out at gun point and made to lie face down on the grass of the football field, without shirts. Uniformed police fired heavy machine guns over their heads. The hot spent shells burnt the skin on their bare backs as they lay on the field. Other students who tried to escape from campus buildings via the rear entrance to the university, were hunted down and shot without mercy. Wimolwan, a Mahidol University nursing student and volunteer member of "Nurses for the Masses" was shot dead in the Chaopraya river, at the back of Thammasat, while she and her friends tried to swim to safety. At  least 5 medical and nursing students from Mahidol University who were volunteer members of Nurses for the Masses, were killed on that day (Friends of Mahidol 1997). The invading police showed no respect towards anyone found in the temporary field hospital in the basement of the Commerce Faculty. Some seriously wounded students who were lucky enough to make it to a single ambulance that had been called to the campus, had to wait for hours without proper medical help or even water, until the police allowed the ambulance to leave the campus. Volunteer student nurses tried to keep the wounded alive by feeding them their own saliva.

Examples of courage and the struggle for human dignity shone through the violence and brutality of that day. Auntie Mien, a middle-aged machine shop worker from Makasan Railway yard, was sheltering in the Commerce building along with many students. As a trade unionist she had opposed the military dictatorship of Tanom and Prapat since before it was overthrown during the 14th October 1973 uprising, 3 years previously. At that time she had encouraged her husband to also take an interest in politics. On the 14th October 1973 her husband was shot dead while protesting against the military dictatorship. Mien was in Thammasat on 6th October 1976 because she wanted to protest against the return of ex-dictator Field Marshal Tanom from exile in Singapore. It was Tanom whom she held responsible for her husband's death. In fact all those present on the university campus on the morning of 6th October were there as part of a protest against Tanom's return and the threat of a new dictatorship.

As Auntie Mien was rudely herded out of the Commerce building at gun-point, she refused to allow police to steal her hand bag and all its belongings. She had previously seen men in uniform systematically kick and rob the youngsters as they left the building. She also refused to bow her head down as ordered; she felt that she had done nothing wrong.

Pachern and his wife risked their lives to help wounded students. When the police finally found him they beat him with their guns and kicked and punched him. Sixteen years later Pachern's wife and fourteen year old son were killed by the military in the bloody May uprising of 1992. Such are the lengths to which the ruling class are prepared to go to cling on to power. Such are the lengths to which many brave Thais are prepared to go to fight for freedom and justice.

Many of those who died on that day gave up their lives to save others. The student security force, which was set up by necessity to protect peaceful student demonstrations from violent attacks, took heavy casualties. This force was necessarily armed because on previous occasions Right-wing goon squads had shot at, and thrown bombs into, unarmed student gatherings causing many deaths. For example, in March 1975, at Siam Square, four people died and 24 were injured after a bomb was thrown into a demonstration against U.S. military bases. Socialists, and prominent leaders of student, worker and farmer organisation were systematically murdered in that period. On each occasion, the police did nothing to stop such violence. In fact there is evidence that organisations linked to the security forces helped to organise such attacks [ii]. Only one minute after the Siam Square incident, the Tank Corps radio station announced news of the bomb attack, as though it had helped to plan it and Krating-Daeng thugs were seen using police radios (Morell & Samudavanija 1981:167).

On the morning of 6th October 1976 the brave members of the student guard fired their meagre collection of small hand guns in a last minute attempt to delay the invading hoards, while thousands of their friends escaped out through the back of the university towards the river. Their task had always been to fight off the Krating-Daeng and other groups of thugs, not take on the armed might of the state. They were heavily out gunned and most of them eventually died.

Apart from the student guard, student leaders like Thongchai Winichakul and Somsak Jeamteerasakul also risked their lives to save others. As the football field at the centre of the Thammasat campus came under sustained heavy fire from the police, they continued to give speeches from the makeshift open-air platform, erected at one end of the field. Since the police could not see all the football ground at this time, the aim was to draw police fire towards the open-air assembly area while people took refuge in the Commerce and Journalism buildings. Towards the end, Thongchai had to continue his speech while lying on the ground as the stage itself came under heavy fire. There, he repeatedly asked the police to stop shooting. He was ignored.

Shopkeepers and ordinary house-holders around the back entrance of Thammasat tried to hide students from the police as they escaped via the river. One Chinese shopkeeper, in his 60s, saved half a dozen students from arrest by pulling them off the streets to hide in his shop. On many occasions the police threatened to open fire on shops and houses which sheltered students. The students were not kicked-out by these good people; they left so as not to bring trouble to their hosts. Other examples of acts of courage included the volunteer medical students from Sirirat Hospital, who came across the river by boat to tend the wounded in Thammasat University under fire.

The director of Channel 9 state-owned TV station, Sampasiri Wirayasiri, observed what was happening at first hand that morning. "It  was our sons and daughters that were being murdered. How could they do such things? I didn't have a gun. My only way to fight this injustice was to film what was happening, so everyone could see the truth" (I.T.V. 1999a). Sampasiri was sacked from his job immediately afterwards.

That morning thousands of students were arrested in Thammasat while many more escaped. Their friends, relatives and supporters watched the scenes of brutality on Thai TV screens in horror before they were blanked-out by government censors. Even some low-ranking police officers, especially ones from the local Chanasongkram police station, were shocked. These officers initially tried to help the students escape from the campus before their units were replaced by hardened units of the Boarder Patrol Police.

[i] "6 October 1976" video compiled from live television footage at the time.

[ii] Witness No. 54, Songchit, at "The 6 October 1976 Fact-finding Committee" in September 2000, stated that while listening to police radio communications in March 1975, he heard police give direction to the bombers at Siam Square.

 The entire chapter can be read and down-loaded for free at    http://wdpress.blog.co.uk/