Thailand has been spared its Tiananmen moment, says Eric Ellis in Bangkok, but Thais now know what civil war looks like
Murderous though May and the months before it were in Bangkok, this was not 1989 as it spontaneously rose in Beijing. Casualties were measured in Thai tens not Chinese thousands. Unlike the People’s Liberation Army, the Royal Thai Army was quick, professional and exercised considerable restraint in its purge, just as it did when seizing power (again) in 2006, the most recent major milestone precipitating this drama.