The bypassing of Thailand by US vice president Kamala Harris during her recent visit to Southeast Asia prompted some critics to wonder aloud whether Thailand has lost some of its international clout.
Ms Harris limited her visits last week to just two Asean members, namely Singapore and Vietnam. These are understandable choices. Singapore's profile has risen sharply under the strong leadership of Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. Meanwhile, Vietnam, a former arch-enemy of the US back in the 1960s and 70s (North Vietnam at the time), has maintained a strong economy and has been supportive of Washington policy regarding the South China Sea disputes.
Thai diplomats, however, may choose to dismiss such concerns as an overreaction and being overlooked for a high-level visit this time is no disaster. After all, Indonesia, the largest Asean member and another long-standing ally, was not on the US radar either.
Disaster or not, the fact is that the snub by Ms Harris has shed the light on the state of Thai diplomacy under Don Pramudwinai.
Some political scientists believe the nation is still paying the price in international circles for the last coup staged by the then army chief Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha, who led the putsch by the now-defunct National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO). Like it or not, there have been no top-level visits by US leaders ever since. When Thailand hosted the Asean summit in 2019, the Donald Trump administration sent a non-cabinet member to attend. Such low level representation, unprecedented in US-Asean ties, was seen by many as an insult.
Panitan Wattanayagorn, a lecturer in political science at Chulalongkorn University, believes the Democrat Party in the US does not consider Thailand to be a true democracy and that is why the present administration has so far kept its distance. The 2014 coup sent ties with the US, and the West in general, into the doldrums for many years.
More importantly, it must be admitted that Thailand's diplomacy lacks dynamism as those at the top of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs seem happy to maintain the status quo, in what is termed as a "balanced approach", rather than adopting pro-active policies, or taking the lead. That is unfortunate given the country's strategic location, potential, and historical role as one of the key Asean founders.
Unlike some of its neighbours, such as Indonesia, for example, which formulated the Asean Outlook on the Indo-Pacific (AOIP), Thailand has shied away from proposing initiatives of its own, either regionally or internationally. At times, the country seems to have missed the boat on key global issues such as human rights, given its poor record on rights abuses, and also collaborative efforts to mitigate the impact of climate change.
During the Myanmar crisis, following the Feb 1 coup, Thailand notoriously opted for silent diplomacy, taking a "behind-the-scenes" role despite other Asean neighbours' vocal stance against dictatorship and the killings of several hundred pro-democracy citizens. The general impression that Thailand's military leaders are on good terms with Myanmar's Tatmadaw cast the country in a bad light.
It seems apparent that dwelling too much on the status quo should no longer be acceptable in what we hope will be a vibrant post-pandemic landscape. What is needed now is for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to reinvigorate its approach to diplomacy as there is no room for complacency during such a critical period.
A time of reckoning has come.