OPINION

Spending plans?

Re: "Prawit declares B87m in assets", (BP, April 25).

I was delighted to read of Mr Prawit's healthy bank balance at such an advanced age. One question springs to mind: What does he intend to do with it all?

Reforms are amiss

Re: "Generals fear looser grip on reshuffles", (BP, April 22).

Ace military reporter Wassana Nanuam's opening paragraph so perfectly captures Thailand's national dilemma of these past 92 years as we wend our way along a most circuitous path toward a truly democratic constitutional monarchy: "Top military commanders are concerned that a proposed rejig of the laws could invite undue political interference in armed forces' affairs, according to a military source."

Yes, you read that correctly: "... undue political interference in armed forces' affairs...". In 2024, 92 years after the 1932 Revolution!

No wonder Defence Minister Sutin Klungsang is on his way out. Apparently, he didn't get the message about the deal the owner of Pheu Thai worked out with the ruling elites for his jail-free return home. Among the many "secret" shackles willingly accepted by Mr Thaksin, all designed to bolster the defence of the ruling elites, "no reform of the military" was one of several inviolables.

Although Mr Sutin was obliged to abandon Pheu Thai's major election promises relating to reform of the military, including ending conscription, goaded on by the Move Forward Party, and possibly his own conscience, Mr Sutin has proved to be a sufficient irritant to the military's leaders, that he has to go. With his refusal to greenlight the submarine deal and talk of very light constraints on the military's much-cherished independence from political oversight, let alone control, Thailand's first civilian minister of defence, not concurrently serving as prime minister, bites the dust.

It will prove a pyrrhic victory for the defence establishment and its masters. The longer they delay reforms, the deeper the reforms will eventually cut.

And it's the same with those other "secret" shackles Mr Thaksin submitted to in return for his frictionless reentry. There will be a big price to pay for blocking any coalition with the Move Forward Party, for ensuring any constitutional reforms exclude chapters one and two and be implemented very slowly, for demanding that any political amnesty bill must exclude Section 112, and for limiting Pheu Thai's control to ministries selected by the ruling elite.

It's a lemon

Re: "Study on Land Bridge estate expected soon", (Business, April 26).

It is hard to imagine a more impractical, money-swallowing project than the government's scheme for a Land Bridge across the Isthmus of Kra. The previously long-touted idea of a canal was doomed because of the eye-watering cost and logistical challenges of constructing a sea-level canal through the partly mountainous route.

However, just when we thought the project was dead and buried, the idea was resurrected as a Land Bridge by a government desperate to attract foreign investment.

Sorry, PM Srettha, but this new idea does not compute, either.

First, let's examine its utility. Compare it to the world's two other major navigational "shortcuts" -- the Panama and Suez canals. They are successful because they save about 10-12 days of sailing time, avoid a challenging Cape and save 12-15,000km of fuel consumption.

By contrast, the Chumphon to Ranong Land Bridge would save just 30 hours of sailing and no more than 1,200km of fuel consumption. This is a mere 10% of the savings made by using those financially viable canals.

To make the Kra transit fees economical for shipping companies, the math indicates it would only make sense for them to pay a toll of no more than 10% of the amount paid to use either of the other two canals. How can such low revenue ever begin to cover the interest on the more than trillion baht PM Srettha says he is budgeting to build the double-track rail line and totally new container ports at Ranong and Chumpon?

Further, when you consider the fact that full unloading of a 12,000-unit container vessel would take about 2-3 days and a similar amount of time on the other side for reloading, this would cost shippers a total of 4-6 days of vessel delay. This fact alone should be enough to show that the idea of using the Land Bridge will be an impossible "sell" to shipping companies. The only way out of that dilemma would be for Thailand to provide them with huge compensation for the time their vessels lose from Land Bridge usage.

Although this is already evidence enough to shelve the Land Bridge idea, consider also the logistics involved in transporting the 12,000 40-foot containers carried on an average-sized container vessel. Those containers would stretch 480,000ft or 146km, and once loaded onto rail bogies, this expands to about 164km. Note that the rail line would be 130km in length. Double stacking could reduce the train lengths to about 80km. However, that would require extra investment, which would be needed to reinforce the railway track, dig deeper road underpasses, and install huge port cranes. As a side note, the world record length for a container train is 7.2km pulled by the Goliath locomotive in the USA in 2021. The Land Bridge project would need at least 11 of these monsters to haul the cargo of just one container vessel in one direction.

But one vessel paying 10% of what those other "shortcuts" collect won't pay the bills.

Consider that the Suez and Panama Canals transit about 30 and 15 large container vessels, respectively, each day. Chaos would result if Land Bridge train operators are set a target of hauling several hundred thousand containers by rail each way daily.

So, in summary, the days wasted in port time overwhelm the 30 hours saved in sailing time, and the logistical challenges of moving so many containers back and forth across the country are harrowing to contemplate.

So why take on so much headache just to make huge losses?

Finally, Thailand beware. The idea of Chinese support to include the Land Bridge into their Belt and Road scheme has been floated. That is an alarm bell warning that the Land Bridge will become another huge white elephant. One that will cause massive losses to the Thai economy and place sovereignty under threat when the Chinese (who may have angled to get another rail contract) and any other foreign creditors finally come calling for Thailand's transfer of ownership of the ports and rail lines to compensate them for their losses.

Truth to power

Re: "Good and bad", (PostBag, April 22).

The evidence is solidly against Songdej Praditsmanont's pious dream that "to prevent a coup, the only way is for parliament, government and judiciary not to give excuses for the military to come out to keep the peace, prevent corruption or other foul deeds by those in power which challenge human decency."

No coup has been committed this century, at least for which its architects had any justification based on corrupt politicians or any other such deceitful excuse. Those who commit coups, for example that of 2014, lie when they falsely claim they act to prevent corruption or the like.

Irrespective of what politicians, parliament, or the judiciary do, those whose morals are so low, so corrupt, as to actually plot and commit a coup against the Thai people and their nation will happily make up any fanciful falsehood about what motivated them, whilst suppressing the peaceful, free speech that would reveal the ugly truths behind why any coup was committed.

It is coups that are affronts to human decency, leaving any act by any politician, parliament, or court in the dust. Coups are unjust. They are committed by the morally corrupt, seeking to further their own selfish interests whilst pretending to have noble motives; hence, coup-makers feel the need to criminalise open dialogue on a range of "sensitive" topics. Those who oppose corruption naturally support free speech, nor do they cite bad laws to unjustly suppress peaceful expressions of opinion that are essential to a healthy democracy.

Reality check

Re: "Weather wars", (PostBag, April 23) and "Dubai floods expose weaknesses to a rapidly changing climate", (BP, April 20).

It's almost a shame Michael Setter didn't have his head stuck in the sand in the Dubai area this past week. We would have been spared his latest nonsensical bit of climate-change denial. It takes a particularly stubborn determination to prove one is right, contrary to all the evidence, to fabricate a whole new system of warfare from a single thunderstorm. It's called weather, Mr Setter, and it happens everywhere without the help of bad actors.

With his usual Luddite-like zeal to fend off any scientific experimentation and innovation, Mr Setter has found a new target for his cynicism in geo-engineers. Not only are these bad guys messing with stuff like cloud seeding, but they're almost certainly also working on ways to reduce levels of his beloved CO2, not to mention a device to create earthquakes, apparently.

Whichever 50s comic book Khun Michael found that one in, he should put it up for sale. It could be worth a lot of money these days.

Leading by example

While we were on holiday in Samui, every afternoon, my family and our eight-year-old grandson were on the beach ... collecting trash!

We took a trash bag walking along the beach for an hour. Most of it is plastic bags, plastic containers, and plastic bottles. But mostly broken glass!

Someday, we can't even carry the bag. We have to drag them!

When will people stop throwing trash into the sea? When are we going to see clean beaches? Maybe not in our generation!

But if we do nothing now, how will our children learn when their parents don't show them the way?