constitutional monarchy. However, the revolution did not originate from the m asses. It w as earned out by a small number o f civilian and military officials. Indeed, the initial public reaction to the coup was muted. M oreover, the way with w hich som e o f the Promoters subsequently exercised their power did not differ significantly from the practices o f the aristocrats in the absolutist period. These factors have led to som e historians, such as Wyatt to argue that the 1932 incident w as in fact a standard military coup and that it “can in no sense o f the word be accurately described as a revolution, save in its long-term im plications” - im plications w hich did not becom e apparent until much later on. See D.K, Wyatt, Thailand, p. 234.
Ultimately, it was the military that were in the ascendant and their zenith during this period was reached during the first government of Field Marshal Pibulsongkhram (1938-44).
The Pibul government emerged at a time of great international uncertainty. Germany was only a year away from starting the Second World War. Closer to home, Japan was resurgent and was seemingly unstoppable in its conquest of Chinese coastal cities. The seeming invincibility o f the Japanese war machine and its subsequent invasion o f Thailand in December 1941 pushed the Pibul government to closer co-operation with the Japanese, sealing a military alliance with Japan in 1941 and declaring war on Great Britain and the United States in January 1942.
The success o f the German war effort in Europe, in particular, the Fall of France in June 1940, also encouraged the regime to exploit the weakness o f the French Indochinese colonies in an effort to regain territories that had been lost during the absolutist era, culminating in the Thai-French War that started in November 1940. The conclusion of the war led to the return of territories that had been conceded to France following the 1893 Paknam incident. It was a triumph for the constitutional regime, and a personal one for Pibul.
Internally, the Pibul government also enacted significant measures, most significantly the Cultural Mandates which, among other things, changed the name of the country from Siam to Thailand in June 1939. The name change was a reflection o f the government's active policy to reclaim control o f the economy, long in the hand o f Chinese immigrants, for “Thais”. Thus discriminatory laws prohibiting Chinese from entering certain professions from lawyers to umbrella-making were passed, while measures such as the closure of the Chinese schools and the increased
promotion of the use o f the Siamese language in schools were designed to integrate ethnic minorities that had been bom in Thailand but had hitherto failed to integrate.
As the Second World War drew to a close, resistance to Pibul increased as his earlier association with the Japanese became a liability. Chief among the resistance was Pridi who, by 1944, had become the regent. Apart from organising parliamentary resistance to the Pibul regime, which eventually forced Pibul’s
resignation in July 1944, he was also the head o f the Seri Thai (Free Thai) movement in Thailand whose objective was the ending of the Japanese occupation. In the person of Pridi, the Allied command was confronted with the curious situation o f a nominal head o f state o f an enemy country, passing on valuable intelligence. Pridi was to become prime minister in 1946.
The period covered by the thesis thus ended like it began: with Siam (as it was renamed in 1945) trying to find its feet after a major conflict and a new role in the emerging international order. To that end, Siam made peace with the Allies, particularly the French who withdrew their veto o f Siam’s membership to the United Nations once the territories claimed during the course of the 1940-1 Thai-French War were returned. Siam eventually joined the United Nations as its 55th member in December 1946. Internally, there were also efforts to continue national development. A new constitution was drafted and came into force in 1946 - it was to be the second ‘permanent’ one and the first to introduce a bi-cameral legislature with a Hilly elected lower house that would, in turn, elect members o f the upper house.26
Yet the country remained unstable as indicated in the mysterious death of King Ananda Mahidol in June 1946, which threw the nation into another political upheaval as the people sought for someone to blame. The period ends with a
military coup against the Pridi-backed regime, with Pibul as the figurehead of the coup. At first, a civilian administration under Kliuang Aphaiwong (1947-8) was appointed. However, by April 1948, Pibul had returned to power as the leader of Siam and, in the following year, o f a re-named Thailand.
Thus, the period 1909-47, which coincided with the ministry o f Vicar- Apostolic Perros, was an important one in terms of the modern political history of Thailand. During this period, Thailand underwent major political changes: from being an absolute monarchy to a constitutional monarchy; from being the subject of unequal treaties, on the verge o f formal colonisation, to a nation o f equal status and o f such confidence that it would end up declaring war on Great Britain and the United States on the side o f a resurgent Japan in 1942.
It was in this turbulent environment that the Missions in Siam were tiying to operate. Yet, at the same time, it was also during this period that the ideas of Thai nationhood were being formed. What did it really mean to be “Thai”? Was Catholicism included in these ideas, and if so, did these roles change over time?