Book Reviews
A Siamese for All Seasons Zia Collinsfree
Collected articles by and about Puey Ungphakorn 6th edition, Komol Keemthong Foundation Press Since this year is the 100th anniversary of Puey’s birth and also the year that UNESCO is celebrating him as a globally-significant person, there has already been a lot of Thai-language promotion of him in some Thailanguage media, books and seminars. As for Englishlanguage recognition, there has been Puey Ungpakorn: An Honest Siamese in A Class of His Own, a translation of Sulak Sivaraksa’s book from the original Thai. That publication has received a few reviews in Seeds of Peace. To add to this, A Siamese for All Seasons has also been published as a sixth edition. It contains Puey’s economics papers, transcripts of seminars on democracy and the student movement, anecdotes and a translation of Puey’s war stories of his time in the Free Thai movement, published in Thai as Taharn Chuakrao (The Temporary Soldier). An exceptionally bright member of the first generation of Thammasat University students, Puey was awarded a government scholarship to study Economics at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE). When World War II broke out in Asia and the Siamese allied itself with the Japanese occupiers against the Allied Forces, groups of Siamese students in Britain and America defied orders to return home, instead organizing themselves as the Free Thai (Seri Thai) movement coordinating with Pridi Panomyong’s Siam-based resistance movement to liberate the country. While in the USA, the Free Thai movement was allowed to form its own independent corps, the UK-based movement, while recognized by the British government, was only permitted to operate under British military command and was heavily restricted due to Siam’s status as an enemy nation. As a result, members of Free Thai’s military wing, many of whom were royals or high-ranking diplomats, served in the lowly Pioneer Corps (motto: Labor Omnia Vincit; the same as that of Puey’s old school, Assumption College), doing menial tasks such as
cleaning toilets. They did this without any fuss, while also training in communications and undercover operations. Puey recalls his pledge not to kill any Siamese even though he was harmed and his dilemma, in case of capture, of whether to swallow his cyanide tablet (and fail to protect a vital written communication to Pridi carried on his person) or be taken alive and possibly tortured. While neither was particularly desirable, he decided to risk doing the latter. When he was mistakenly parachuted along with his comrades far from their intended location, he was captured by local villagers and detained. Due to their discovery of his mission and the novelty of his being a parachutist, he became something of a local celebrity. Despite a pro-Japanese government, the people were delighted with the news that Japan was losing the war. After completing his studies, Puey returned to Siam to work off his scholarship despite exemption due to his Free Thai service. In his career, his solid courageous integrity shone through. Several examples are given of events occurring under the successive postwar military dictatorships. The future Field Marshal Sarit Tanarat, then a general in Field Marshal Pibulsongkram’s government, tried to buy up a commercial bank guilty of illegal transactions. He asked Puey, as then-Deputy Governor of the Bank of Thailand, to persuade the Cabinet to reprimand the bank rather than fining it as was usual practice. Puey disregarded Sarit’s request and followed the correct procedure, only to be sacked by the Cabinet. He also crossed the godfather-like police chief, Pao Siyanon, who had arranged with the OSS (later CIA) to appoint a mediocre American firm to replace the betterquality British Thomas de la Rue in printing Thai banknotes. Puey, charged with assessment of the case, concluded that the American company’s product was inferior and the manager was of bad repute. Both of these instances angered Pibul, Pao and Sarit, but they needed his expertise. 58