SCENESETTER FOR PACAF COMMANDER GEN HESTER'S VISIT

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 BANGKOK 007272

SIPDIS

PACAF FOR GENERAL HESTER
PACOM FOR FPA HUSO

E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/20/2015
TAGS: OVIP PGOV PREL MARR MASS TH
SUBJECT: SCENESETTER FOR PACAF COMMANDER GEN HESTER'S VISIT
TO THAILAND

Classified By: Ambassador Ralph L. Boyce. Reason 1.4 (a and d)


1. (C) General Hester, all of us in Bangkok look forward
to your visit as an opportunity to advance a number of key
U.S. foreign policy objectives. The Thai will likely ask you
for your latest thinking on the future of our annual Cope
Tiger Exercise. In addition to promoting issues directly
affecting the Royal Thai Air Force such as their pending
decision to replace aging F-5's, you can urge the Thai to
work with us to enhance our ability to monitor ship traffic
in the Andaman Sea and the Gulf of Thailand and to share
views on China and India's growing influence in the region.
You may wish to express appreciation for Thailand continuing
to let us use the air field and support facilities at the
Utapao Royal Thai Navy Air Base and should be prepared to
field questions about our willingness to provide safety
upgrades there. Thailand is a key ally in the Global War on
Terror and senior officials will welcome your views on this
subject as well as developments in Iraq and Afghanistan.
They will likely share opinions on Thailand's largest
domestic challenge -- unrest in the predominantly Muslim
provinces of southernmost Thailand. End Summary

THE BILATERAL RELATIONSHIP


2. (C) Bilateral relations with Thailand are very good. The
goodwill generated by America's quick and massive response to
the December 26, 2004 tsunami is palpable. American
businesses have over $20 billion in direct investment in
Thailand. The United States is Thailand's largest export
market and its second-largest foreign investor.


3. (C) Nonetheless, there are several points of friction.
Human rights remain a key concern. The State Department's
annual Human Rights Report cited the October 25, 2004 Tak Bai
incident, during which poorly trained Thai military and
civilian security forces forced nearly 1,300 Thai Muslim
protesters into trucks to be transported to a military base
nearly three hours away. 78 protesters died en route. In
response, JUSMAGTHAI has offered a comprehensive series of
human rights courses administered by the Defense Institute of
International Legal Studies (DIILS) for Thai officers and
soldiers rotating to southern Thailand. In early 2006, the
USMC will administer a series of non-lethal weapons training
courses for Thai soldiers as well.


4. (C) Thailand's policy of "constructive engagement" with
the military junta in Burma and provision of economic
assistance to Rangoon is a source of continuing frustration
for us. The Thai government supports democracy in Burma but
maintains, not altogether convincingly, that engagement with
the SPDC is the only realistic approach it has to make
progress on the major cross-border flows of refugees, illegal
economic migrants, and methamphetamines it faces from Burma.
Recently PM Thaksin has voiced growing frustration with
Rangoon and his Ministers tell us that the Thai may be
willing to be more critical, publicly, of the junta.

PM THAKSIN


5. (SBU) In 2001, Thaksin became the first democratically
elected civilian Prime Minister to win an outright majority
in the Thai Parliament. Thaksin won reelection in a
landslide victory on February 6. His Thai Rak Thai (Thais
Love Thais) political party dominates domestic politics and
controls 375 of the 500 seats in Parliament. Thaksin comes
from a prosperous Sino-Thai family in Thailand's second
largest city, Chiang Mai, and placed first in his class at
the National Police Academy. He spent several years studying
in the United States, earning a master's degree in Criminal
Justice from Eastern Kentucky University and a Doctorate in
Criminology from Sam Houston State University. After a few
years with the police, he left government service to run the
family business (Shinawatra Corporation, or Shin Corp),which
he turned into Thailand's largest telecom company, making
himself a multi-billionaire.


6. (C) Thaksin considers himself a personal friend of the
President, drawing on their common Texas connections, and had
a very successful meeting with President Bush on September 19
in Washington. They also met at the recently concluded APEC
Leaders Meetig in Busan, South Korea. The PM characterizes
himself as a "CEO Prime Minister" and likes to be known for
being decisive. He is also impulsive. His critics accuse
him of authoritarian tendencies, of staffing the major
institutions of the country with his family members or
classmates, and of reinforcing the business interests of
family and political allies through government policies.

MILITARY COOPERATION


7. (C) Perhaps because of its lack of a colonial heritage
the Thai are more open to cooperation with other countries
than many of their neighbors. The Thai give us greater
latitude in conducting military exercises than most other
countries in the region. We conduct a wide range of major
exercises and training programs with Thailand each year,
including Cobra Gold, our only joint/combined/multilateral
exercise in the Asia Pacific Region. Cobra Gold 2006 will be
the 25th year we have held the exercise. Over the past 25
years, the exercise has transformed from a bilateral effort
aimed at training to deter a conventional attack from
Vietnam, to a multilateral exercise aimed at enhancing
peacekeeping and other skills. Cobra Gold 2006 will include
participation by Japan, Singapore, and Indonesia and will
have a special focus on Peace Keeping and Peace Enforcement
operations. Thailand has been selected to be a key partner
nation in the Global Peace Operations Initiative (GPOI) -- a
G-8 program aimed to train 15,000 peacekeepers in the
Asia-Pacific region by 2010. Cobra Gold in 2007 will be a
GPOI capstone event.

COPE TIGER


8. (C) Our premier air force exercise with Thailand is Cope
Tiger. RTAF officials disagree with our suggestion to
combine Cope Tiger with Cobra Gold. During the November 7-8
U.S.-Thailand Strategic Dialogue, Air Vice Marshal Ittahaporn
Subhawong, Director of Operations for the RTAF, said that the
RTAF views Cope Tiger as instrumental in improving Thai air
capabilities and that it was important to maintain Cope Tiger
as a separate entity not focused on PKO like Cobra Gold. At
that time, BrigGen John Allen from OSD/ISA cautioned no final
decision about consolidating the two exercises had been made
and promised to relay the RTAF concerns to the appropriate
authorities. In asides, RTAF officials have told us that
they will not agree to move Cope Tiger and will plan to hold
the exercise bilaterally with Singapore, or even invite a
third country, if we insist on moving it. RTAF officials
will be very interested in hearing any update about our
plans.

UTAPAO UPGRADES


9. (C) PACOM experts recently characterized the Thai Naval
Air Base at Utapao as our most important Cooperative Security
Location (CSL) in the theater. Due to Thai concerns about
the term "CSL" we suggest you not use it when discussing
Utapao. Nonetheless, it would be entirely proper for you to
thank the Thai for allowing us to use Utapao as the hub for
military assistance during Operation Unified Assistance and
for their continued willingness to permit us to use it for
U.S. aircraft transiting the region. Thai officers and U.S.
officials in country agree that Utapao needs some safety
upgrades in order to continue to be of use to us. In
September, a PACAF assessment team visited Utapao to
determine what systems need enhancement or upgrading. During
the Strategic Dialogue, Rear Admiral Narongpol Na Bangchang
of the Royal Thai Navy asked about the Utapao survey led by
PACAF and the likelihood of Thailand receiving U.S. funded
upgrades. He was told at that time that the report was still
being compiled and that it would be released shortly.

F-16 SALE


10. (C) Thailand recently announced its plans to replace
aging F-5s in the RTAF fleet. Although the RTAF presently
has 59 F-16s in its inventory, reports six months ago
indicated that the RTG was leaning towards purchasing Saab
Gripens or SU-30s because of a belief (which we have worked
to overcome) that Saab or Sukhoi could offer a better
business deal to Thailand. We have worked hard with
Washington to ensure that Secretary Rumsfeld, Secretary Rice
and the President all urged Thailand to either use its
defense budget to upgrade its existing F-16s or to buy F-16
Block 52s. Most reports we have received lately indicate the
Thai will now perform about 400 million USD worth of Mid-Life
Upgrades (MLUs) on it F-16s. However, we still hear
persistent rumors that Thailand may make a token purchase of
either SU-30's or Saabs to curry political favor with Russia
or Sweden. It would be entirely appropriate for you to ask
your interlocutors for the latest information on the sale and
to repeat the President's strongly expressed desire to PM
Thaksin that Thailand purchase either MLUs or Block 52s.

THE ROLE OF CHINA AND INDIA IN THE REGION


11. (C) Southeast Asia is experiencing a period of dynamic
change in part due to the rising influence of China and India
in the region. While emphasizing the vital role of the U.S.
in the region -- and Thailand's desire to intensify U.S.
engagement -- Thai leaders also focus on developing stronger
relations with the two regional powers. Bangkok views both
countries as sources of unlimited consumer demand and hope to
conclude Free Trade Agreements with both nations. Some see
Thailand playing a bridging role between the U.S. and China
and India. Given PACAF's recent participation in Cope India
and your knowledge of the capabilities of the People's
Liberation Air Force, it would be worthwhile for you to share
views on the future roles of India and China.

MARITIME SECURITY


12. (C) Thailand is now cooperating with many countries in
the region to monitor maritime traffic in the Andaman Sea and
the South China Sea, including joint maritime patrols with
Vietnam and Malaysia. The Thai are also observers in the
"Eyes in the Sky" (EITS) program. Implemented in September,
EITS seeks to mobilize the combined resources of Indonesia,
Malaysia and Singapore to maintain maritime security in the
Strait of Malacca. In practice, EITS is of limited utility
because it only involves token patrol flights by one plane
each from Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia. The Thai
briefed us recently on an Indonesian proposal to set up ship
patrols coupled with reporting stations in the region to be
part of a "Combined Maritime Patrol" architecture. This
architecture would be multi-national and interagency --
running in parallel with EITS -- and would divide the Strait
into five reporting zones, with reporting stations in Phuket
(Thailand),Lumut and Sabang (Indonesia),Dumai (Malaysia)
and Changi (Singapore). Although there would be no single
command and control center, each country would receive a full
activity report from all sectors. The Thai have explained
that this project is currently in the "working-group" stage
and the Thai side did not know when it would be implemented.
Nonetheless, our experts believe that such an architecture
could provide tactical feed from all of the stations into a
Thai-U.S Maritime Operations Intelligence Fusion capability,
now in the planning stages. Time permitting, it would be
useful to hear Thai views on both EITS and maritime security
generally to determine whether we have opportunities to work
together in this area.

COUNTERTERRORISM AND SOUTHERN THAILAND


13. (C) Prime Minister Thaksin's biggest domestic challenge
is the unsettled security situation in the far southern part
of the country. Southern Thailand, in particular the
southernmost Muslim majority provinces of Pattani, Yala, and
Narathiwat, has experienced episodic violence since it was
incorporated into the Siamese Kingdom in 1902. However,
since January 2004, we have witnessed a dramatic increase in
the level of violence. Press reports indicate that over
1,000 persons have been killed either by militants or by
security forces during this period. Local Muslim separatist
militants have attacked symbols of Thai and Buddhist
authority, Buddhist civilians, and Muslims suspected of
collaborating with the Government. There continue to be
daily incidents of violence. In March 2005, Thaksin
appointed a National Reconciliation Commission (NRC) headed
by highly respected former Prime Minister Anand Panyarachun
to look for alternative solutions to the long-running
insurgency. The NRC is expected to present its findings in
early 2006.


14. (C) Thai officials may ask you for U.S. equipment and
technology such as UAVs to support efforts to monitor
militant movements in the South. We recommend you be
receptive but noncommittal, and suggest that technical
experts follow up. You may also wish to point to our current
efforts to improve human rights training for Thai soldiers
and officers who will rotate to the South. There are widely
circulated rumors among the ethnic Malay Muslims that the
U.S. has fomented the violence in the South in order to
justify a U.S. security presence there. This has made the
RTG very sensitive about any visible U.S. assistance aimed at
the South. You should be aware of these concerns when
discussing offers of possible U.S. assistance.

PROLIFERATION SECURITY INITIATIVE (PSI)


15. (C) After a year and a half of lobbying from the U.S.
and others, Thailand has still not endorsed the Proliferation
Security Initiative (PSI) Statement of Interdiction
Principles (SOP). PM Thaksin has told us that he is
reluctant to endorse PSI until another Muslim ASEAN state
does so. This key U.S. objective has been raised with senior
Thai officials by the President, Secretary Rice and Secretary
Rumsfeld. It would be helpful for you to underscore the
importance of PSI with your interlocutors perhaps by advising
them that endorsement will allow us jointly to conduct a
number of exercises and seminars to stop proliferation.

WE LOOK FORWARD TO YOUR VISIT


16. (U) I look forward to your visit and to discussing the
broad range of our mutual interests.



BOYCE