Chavalit and the Salween saga

13 March 1998

The Salween logging affair is much more than just another chain-saw massacre. Its roots lie in Thai-Burmese relations and the rhythms of General Chavalit Yongchaiyudh’s political career.

On 1988 General Chavalit, army commander-in-chief, travelled to Rangoon at the head of a large, top-level military delegation. This visit resulted in a major change in Thai-Burmese relations. Thailand would quietly disassociate itself from the international antagonism to the Burmese military dictatorship, and stop supporting the rebel groups along the border. The price for this support was timber and fishing rights.

Why this change, and why was this part of foreign policy being handled by the army? On the Burmese side, the junta was gearing up to move against its opponents—the democracy movement and the rebel minorities—and it first needed support from Thailand and China. One the Thai side, the army was under intense pressure. Its bloated role in all aspects of government was being whittled back by increasingly confident elected politicians and pressure groups. The businesses (arms buying and construction), which had traditionally financed the generals’ taste for Mercedes and other trinkets, were being closed down by public exposure. Burma offered a new frontier—both for business opportunities and political assertion.

From the negotiations, 20 concessions were given to Thai companies for logging inside Burma. Virtually all the companies were owned by military officers and associates. Some of the executives figured among the supporters of the New Aspiration Party which General Chavalit founded a year later. Within months, the Thai government had banned all logging inside Thailand and these Burmese concessions had become hugely valuable.

The Thai Army began clearing up the border by shovelling some of the refugee students back into Burma. It stopped when the international press reported that many of these returnees had gone missing, presumably executed. A Burmese army unit was allowed to cross into Thailand and attack a Karen rebel refugee camp. A Thai border town was wasted in the attack. General Chavalit stamped his foot in outrage at this invasion and promised to extract reparations. But nothing happened.

Golden years. As recent reports attest, these were the golden years in Tak and Mae Hong Son. Fortunes were made fast and almost legally. The logging inside Burma faced almost no restriction, and the Thai companies chopped fast and furiously. Burma-watcher Martin Smith saw one forest reserve where 100,000 trees had been cut in one year. The border also bred other lucrative trades—bringing out girls and heroin, and trading in arms for the rebel groups.

But the diplomatic basis of this golden era was shaky. Between 1992 and 1994, it fell apart. International environmental groups and some Burmese voices protested against the scorched-earth clear-cutting by the Thai loggers. On the Thai side, the military’s prestige and political weight took another lurch downwards after the May 1992 incident. The Democrat-led government recaptured control over Thai-Burmese relations and took a slightly more conditional attitude towards support for the junta. The Burmese were no longer sure they had a deal.

In 1992-93, the Burmese government revoked the logging concessions and proposed to close the border posts. Although the army might be in retreat, General Chavalit was still in the frame as a minister in the Democrat-led coalition. In 1993, he managed to negotiate with Rangoon to keep the border posts open so timber could still flow out. But in December 1994 Chavalit quit the coalition. The golden age passed into history.

But the wheel of history spins round. In 1995, Chavalit returned as defence minister in Banharn’s coalition. Thai-Burmese relations again shot ahead. Construction began on the Yadana pipeline and a road link through Kanchanaburi. The army brokered deals for the Ital-Thai Development Co to enter Burma. A delegation of executives from major Thai companies visited Rangoon to prospect for business opportunities. Burma began to sidle up to Asean.

With the assurance of Thai support, the Burmese army upped the pressure on the rebel groups along the border with a mixture of armed attacks and conciliatory treaties. A year ago, in a repeat of 1989, the Thai Army stood aside while a Burmese unit attacked three rebel refugee camps inside Thailand. Again, the Thai Army began pushing people back across the border until human rights groups protested. And again, Banharn and Chavalit reopened the border passes for timber traffic.

New operators. But it seems the timber business developed very differently from expectations. The military-backed timber firms swung back into operation. But they were out-flanked by a group of people who had been mere bit-players in the earlier phase.

This new group changed the economics of border logging. Getting timber out of Burma had become more expensive. The remaining stands were deeper in, and the logistics more complex and risky. But trees have no passports, no nationality. Cutting down Thai trees and passing them off as Burmese promised much larger profits.

They also changed the economics by exploiting the human fall-out of border politics. They hired the rebel refugee Karen inside Thailand as cheap labour and devil-may-care gunmen to intimidate rivals. And they worked through pro-Rangoon Karen to launder Thai logs into Burmese.

Som Chankrajang’s career is typical of the jao phor (local godfathers) of this last generation. He started out with little education, no money, and a burning desire to be very rich. He worked in a gambling den where he learnt (as he endearingly told an interviewer last week) "the only way to win is to cheat". He made his first pile by hard graft in the trucking business. Then he made his fortune in the golden age by acting as agent for the logging concessionaires. He negotiated with the Karen rebel groups to get the timber out to the border.

His key contact was Bo Mya, the grand old man of the Karen resistance. For almost 40 years, Bo Mya had been one of the most commercially-minded rebel leaders. He had been dealing with Thai loggers and miners since the 1970s. By 1990, the profits had enabled him to create possibly the most settled and organised of the mini-states on the border. When Rangoon upped the pressure on the rebels in 1994, Some Karen groups chose conciliation. They made a pact with Slorc, and donated troops to help the Slorc mopping-up operations. Bo Mya held out, but became more isolated. To maintain his cashflow, he was ready to give Burmese nationality to Thai logs.

Final link. The final link in the chain was the sawmill, especially that of Vinai Panichyanuban. The logs arrived by several routes: routed through Burma to get Bo Mya’s chop; seized by the Forest Industry Organisation and then sold off; magicked through the checkpoints with no documentation; and possibly also chopped as Burmese without ever leaving Thai soil.

To disguise the operation, this group appears to have used a corruption strategy like carpet-bombing—dropping tons of cash over a wide area to flatten any potential source of opposition, and to leave no cover for anyone who wanted to risk a protest. If the list taken from Som’s relative is what it appears to be, the cash was paid in regular amounts to officials from police, army, local administration, customs, immigration, forestry and national parks—ranging from some very top men to the little people who hold open the gates.

But the monopoly attempted by Som, Mya and Vinai was bound to be vulnerable. The old logging companies were furious at being excluded and under-cut on price. Other rebel groups along the border hijacked logs in transit. After Chavalit fell from power, the business was quickly undermined. The Forestry Department obstructed the flow of logs through from forest to sawmill. Those managing the business believed they could use money to free up the resulting log jam. Somebody panicked.

Now the border business is like an ants’ nest that has been poked with a stick. The army tries to blame the Karen. Bo Mya’s men attack the rebel camps. Police, customs and local officials point fingers at one another. The Forestry Department, which must be used to such scandals by now, adopts the turtle defence strategy of withdrawing into its shell and playing dead.

But there are clearly two very different agendas at work. Some may want to clean up the whole business. But some may simply want to dislodge the Som-Bo-Vinai pirate monopoly, and allow more powerfully backed interests to take over again.

Most chilling of all has been General Chavalit. Last week he exploded with one of those impulsive, unguarded, revealing outbursts which have been the hallmark of his political career. Put up or shut up, he challenged; charge me or stop talking about it.

Charges may be difficult. But it seems clear that the appalling destruction of forests on both banks of the Salween is closely linked to the rhythms of General Chavalit’s political career.