Lee are in receipt of money from the Thai Oovernment' and there are CIA "advisers" fighting with the KMT because I have heard them complaining of the coordination difficulties when requests for artillery support fire have to go on their wireless net to the Royal Thai Army. However, it does seem that the KMT are now doing less in the counter insurgency field than they were. Last year when they were given the promise of an arca to live in if they could clear the terrorists out, they did so most efficiently. Having cleared the terrorists out they are not indulging in much aggressive patrollin; although they are giving anybody who enters their area short shrift indeed.
5.
It seems to be the feeling in Thai Government circles now that the correct policy is to assimilate the KMT. Hai Amphoe in Fang district which contains General Lee's camp told me that he thought assimilation was the only possibility. The big difficulty is that the KMT remain Chinese. They have Chinese schools and many if not all of the signs in their support villages are Chinese. It is said that the school in General Tuan's camp is the finest Chinese school in Thailand and that pupils come from as far away as Songkhla to learn landarin there because no Thai is spoken at all. For this reason it may be that the recent move to allow some Chinese teaching in schools in Thailand is not only motivated by considerations of foreign policy. It would after all bring the legal fiction and the reality closer together in North Thailand.
6. The recent increased contact between the RT and the Thai Government has not been always harmonious. The KIT have bocn charging taxes on a couple of roads which they have built which has annoyed some people and there is also a Teeling that they are getting a bit out of control in the use of the money which they got for the oplum burnt last year, but there is no doubt that General Krien;sak now has much more control over the WT than he had 15 months ago. A measure of their new respectability may be that it is now fashionable to talk not of the KKT but of the CIF (Chinese Irregular Forces).
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7. Against this rather lengthy background it should now be possible to examine the current "campaign" against the KMT by the Bangkok Post. There are several possibilities. It may be that the Bangkok Post is
just badly informed, eg you may recall a recent article which stated that an agreement had been reached between the KIT Generals and the Governors of Chiang Mai, Chiang Rai and representatives of Supreme Command at a meeting in ae Sot, Tak Province. This is just false. I spoke to the Governor of Chiang Mai two weeks ago and he said that no such meeting had ever taken place. The details given in the newspaper referred to the deal made with Kriengsak over a year ago. The only recent event had been the visit to Chiang Mai by Dawee before Ne Win's visit to brief the governors on lines of thinking on policy towards the . Alternatively, the Bangkok Post which is really the only paper consistently printing news about the KIT may be swayed by individuals in the worth who are providing them with this "news" because they are badly disposed towards the KUT. These people would be supporters of the Shan State Army which is engaged in what amounts
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