Introduction
Prior to the 1960s, most ethnic Hmong people in Thailand had little contact with non-Hmong lowlanders. They spent most of their time in the mountains, where they conducted swidden agriculture, cultivated opium, hunted, fished and gathered forest products. The Hmong rarely travelled more than relatively short distances from their villages, as travel was only by foot or horse. Some had a limited amount of contact with lowlanders through paying taxes and engaging in trade, including selling opium to lowlanders and purchasing salt and other basic products. Furthermore, most only spoke the Hmong language. Life, however, changed dramatically during the 1960s and 1970s when many became affiliated with the Communist Party of Thailand (CPT), although some Hmong also chose to align with the anti-communist Thai government. This paper, however, is focused on those who sided with the CPT.
The CPT not only introduced many Hmong people living in Thai territory to communism but also afforded various opportunities for them to interact with a diversity of peoples, including Thai-Chinese from Bangkok, people from southern and northeastern Thailand and communists from other countries, including Laos (Hmong and non-Hmong), Vietnam, China and other countries in the region. The CPT also provided opportunities for Hmong people to travel to other countries for training, particularly Laos, China and Vietnam.
The main argument here is that Hmong involvement in the CPT generally constituted transnational, transcultural and gender-relations-transforming experiences—providing an important gateway for Hmong people to interact with other peoples, both Hmong and non-Hmong, from Thailand and other parts of Asia. Some might expect that going into “the forest” to join the CPT would have resulted in increased isolation, but the reality was generally the opposite. This period became truly transformative for the Hmong Thai, who became part of the CPT linguistically, culturally, socially and politically. This experience also interweaved transnational and transcultural aspects in particular ways while significantly impacting gender relations.
Political and Armed Movements and Identities
Political geographers have long known that political movements affect spaces, and the Hmong were greatly impacted by the relationships that they developed during the CPT period. A small number of Hmong even stayed with the remnants of the CPT beyond the early 1980s, when most of the CPT surrendered, until the armed struggle finally ended in 1994 (Interview with Thong Sae Xiong 2017). However, the Hmong were not the first group of Southeast Asian ethnic minorities to become deeply drawn into a transcultural experience due to involvement in a political and armed group. Indeed, there are various examples of this in the region. Gerard Hickey (Reference Hickey1982: 436–437), for example, noted that the increased inter-highlander contact that occurred in the Central Highlands of Vietnam after the 1954 Geneva Accords, due to the establishment of political armed groups, was important for increasing senses of “highlander ethnic identity”. In other words, people became well connected with people from other upland ethnic groups. This was true, for example, for those who joined the United Front for the Liberation of Oppressed Races (FULRO) in the 1950s and 1960s (see, also, Noseworthy Reference Noseworthy2013).
People from a variety of ethnic groups in northeastern Cambodia also became connected like never before as a result of their joint involvement in revolutionary activities under the Khmer Rouge (Baird Reference Baird2008, Reference Baird2020) and their later organization against the Khmer Rouge after 1975 (Baird Reference Baird2020).
Moreover, Vatthana Pholsena (Reference Pholsena2008, Reference Pholsena, Boute and Pholsena2017) has written about the experiences of ethnic minority girls and young women in rural and mountainous parts of eastern Laos’ Savannakhet and Sekong Provinces, in the Ho Chi Minh Trail area, and their recruitment by the communist Pathet Lao to study in Vietnam in the 1950s. Although otherwise officially proclaimed, Engelbert (Reference Engelbert, Engelbert and Kubitscheck2004: 230) reported that the strategy in southern Laos was to develop national unity “through rigid unification as well as ethnic and social homogenization”. This involved amalgamating youth from different ethnic groups for the national struggle.
In this paper, I expand upon this body of research by considering the involvement of the Hmong in the CPT and demonstrating how this involvement resulted in transnational, transcultural and gender-relations-transforming experiences.
Methods
There have been a number of articles and books written about the history of the CPT, both in Thai and English (see below). However, up until now none have specifically focused on Hmong experiences or other ethnic minorities’ involvement in the CPT. The main methods employed in this study were semi-structured and informal interviews. The first interviews were conducted in July 2012, but most were completed during the second half of 2016 and the first half of 2017, when the author was living in northern Thailand, as well as in June 2018. In total, this paper has benefited from more than 150 individual interviews, all done by the author in central Thai language, which was the main language used by the CPT. Most interviews were conducted in Hmong villages where Hmong people who are formerly affiliated with the CPT live. However, I also interviewed some Hmong who were opposed to communism and non-Hmong people who were both aligned with and against the CPT. Interviewees were mainly identified and contacted with the assistance of earlier interviewees, thus constituting a snowballing interview recruitment strategy. These interviews provided crucial, factual information and insights about how the Hmong experienced the CPT, but they also tell us a lot about how people remember and assess their time with the CPT (see Fentress and Wickham Reference Fentress and Wickham1992).
Although I initially expected at least some interviewees to be hesitant to talk, surprisingly, almost everyone that I approached was quite willing to speak fairly openly because the CPT is no longer illegal. Moreover, the vast majority are quite transparent about their involvement with the CPT. However, most live in relatively remote villages, so travelling to meet them was the biggest challenge associated with the research. Usually, I obtained their telephone numbers from other interviewees and then, phoned them to make appointments to meet—often after being introduced by those who put me in touch. Sometimes, once I reached the villages, I was personally introduced to other people in the village who were previously with the CPT. I did not ask the interviewees any particularly sensitive questions, although questions related to the monarchy were generally avoided. Most interviews were conducted at the houses of those being interviewed.
Background of the Hmong and the Communist Party of Thailand
The Hmong are an ethnic group who have lived in Thailand since the 1800s, most migrating there via China, where they originated as an ethnic group, and then Vietnam and Laos. As swidden cultivators and opium growers, the Hmong historically lived in upland areas, where they were organised based on shamanistic, highly patriarchal clans, sub-clans and lineages. Most only had limited contact with lowlanders, and few spoke lowland languages (Lee and Tapp Reference Lee and Tapp2010).
Prior to the 1960s, there is no indication that any Hmong in Thailand were involved with the CPT. Indeed, up until the early 1960s, the CPT mainly operated in urban parts of Thailand, particularly Bangkok, and most party members were Thais of Chinese heritage. However, in the early 1960s, the CPT shifted their strategy to focus on recruiting and strengthening support in rural areas (Tejapira Reference Tejapira2001). The first Hmong person recruited by the CPT was a man named Jong Teng Sae Vang (later known as Sahai or Comrade Kham). In 1960, he received basic political and military training from the CPT after walking to camp “A-30” in northern Laos, near the border with China (Interview with Wa Meng Sae Lee (Phu Kong Chot) 2017). Following three months of basic training, Jong Teng was asked to help translate for the second group of Hmong people from Thailand to receive training at A-30 because they, like him when he first started studying, could not speak Thai.
Later, he continued his studies in Yunnan Province, southern China. Although he was born in Thailand, Jong Teng was recruited when visiting Laos. Somewhat paradoxically, he initially went to Laos on the advice of his mother, after his father passed away when he was a child. She advised him to search for an important member of his clan, the top Hmong Royal Lao Army commander, Vang Pao, but he did not know how to find him and ended up in Hmong communist-aligned villages in Xayaboury Province, northern Laos, which borders northern Thailand.
Indeed, his mother had never met Vang Pao and did not know where he lived because his area of operation was not near the border with Thailand. She just recommended that Jong Teng find him because he was a famous, powerful person from the same clan as Jong Teng and thus would likely help a fellow clan member. Jong Teng was eventually contacted by Thais who had travelled to Laos from China to recruit for the CPT. They heard about Jong Teng from Hmong Lao,Footnote 1 who were affiliated with Pathet Lao communists aligned with Fay Dang Lor (see Lee Reference Lee2015). They also offered Jong Teng education, which he eagerly accepted because, at the time, there were few opportunities for Hmong. After studying in Laos and China, Jong Teng returned to Thailand in 1963 to recruit other Hmong to study as he had (Interview with Jong Teng Sae Vang 2014).
Although fighting between CPT operatives in northeastern Thailand and government authorities officially began on 7 August 1965—thus initiating the armed struggle of the CPT at the level of the nation-state (Marks Reference Marks1994)—it was not until 8 May 1967 that the first fighting between Hmong in the CPT and government forces ensued in northern Thailand. Huai Chomphu Village in Chiang Rai Province was the site of the start of the armed conflict (see Marks Reference Marks1973; Race Reference Race1974). Comrade Kham (Jong Teng Sae Vang) was providing basic political training to Hmong villagers at the time, but the CPT was still building its political base and had thus been avoiding direct confrontation with government forces (Interview with Jong Teng Sae Vang 2014).
However, conflict unexpectedly erupted between lowland Thai leaders and Hmong people at Huai Chomphu Village due to lowlander efforts to fine four Hmong families for conducting swidden cultivation in a watershed area above their village. Crucially, the Border Patrol Police (BPP) became involved in the dispute. On May 8, numerous BPP came to the village with lowland leaders, but the Hmong in the village hid in the forest when they heard that they were coming. The BPP started breaking into Hmong houses to look for things to take. A Hmong woman had forgotten a valuable silver necklace, and she went back to her house in the village to retrieve it. Some BPP saw her and followed her from the village to where the rest of the Hmong were hiding. When the BPP saw the group, they started shooting at them. The Hmong shot back with their flint rifles; during the ensuing firefight, one Hmong man was injured and one BPP officer was killed. The BPP retreated, leaving the lowland village headman and the sub-district chief as hostages. The Hmong stated that they would not release the “hostages” until their valuables were returned.
The next day, however, the BPP came back but this time with much more personnel and firepower. Just before the arrival of the BPP, the Hmong fled to the forest and abandoned the unharmed hostages. The BPP were angry and shot their guns randomly in the village, killing domestic animals roaming around. Then, they burned down all the houses, except for the one where the hostages had been held. These events forced the Hmong from Huai Chomphu to join the CPT in the forest (Interview with Kamnan Booncheut Wongnaphapaisan (Jouavue Sae Fa) 2014).
Following the outbreak of violence in Huai Chomphu, the Thai military started burning down other Hmong villages, such as nearby Pha Daeng, that they assumed to be under the influence of communist agents. At first, the BPP sent a helicopter into the village and whisked away the headman without explanation. Many Hmong assumed that he had been killed, although he was eventually released years later unharmed. Until then, most people in Pha Daeng had never heard of communism, let alone the CPT, because operatives had not yet arrived in the village. Once attacked, however, the people had nowhere to turn but the CPT, who encouraged them to fight (Interview with Lo Meng Fa 2016). Before long, most of the Hmong villages in that part of northern Thailand had been forced into the forest following pre-emptive attacks by the BPP and the Thai regular military (see, also, Marks Reference Marks1973; Race Reference Race1974).
In late 1967, the fighting spread further south to Nan Province (Peking NCNA International Service 1968). However, according to Hmong informants, one event in early 1968 was particularly important for escalating the conflict. Government soldiers in a military camp executed five Hmong men from Pang Kop Village, in Boklua District, Nan Province, along with one ethnic T'in or H'tin man from another nearby community. They were apparently killed because the soldiers suspected that they were supporting the CPT, even though they were not. They had only travelled to the military camp to seek assistance from the soldiers to find the lost daughter of the deputy headman of Pang Kop Village. Another T'in man who was initially arrested with the other T'in man, who was eventually executed, escaped from custody the night before the extrajudicial killings and informed people from a number of other Hmong and T'in villages in northeastern Nan Province that their compatriots were about to be executed. This caused considerable fear, leading many more Hmong and T'in people to flee into the forest (Interview with Thong Sae Xiong 2017).
In November 1967 in Tak Province, to the west and near the border with Burma, the Hmong people reportedly began fighting against the Thai government's security services, including attacking a police station. In the following month, they attacked a border patrol station, killing ten officers and capturing a quantity of rice that the Thai government had sent to Tak (Peking NCNA International Service 1968).
In November 1968, the fighting spread still further south to Nakorn Thai District, in Phitsanulok Province, where Hmong people with the CPT attacked village defence volunteers and other members of the government security services in the Huai Sai Neua village. Based on a number of interviews in the area, this eventually led to most of the Hmong population in the Phitsanulok, Phetchabun and Loei Province area (called the three provinces area, or Khet 3 Changwat) to flee to the forest and join the CPT.
Based on my many interviews, it is clear that, by early 1969, much of the Hmong population in northern Thailand, except for those living in Chiang Mai and Phrae Provinces, had fled their villages to join the CPT's armed struggle against the oppression that the government represented to them at the time (see Figure 1).
Figure 1. Hmong in CPT in the 3 Changwat area (compliments of Ka Toua Xiong, Khek Noi Sub-District, Khao Kho District, Phetchabun Province).
Although the grievances that made many Hmong particularly receptive to the CPT's recruitment efforts varied from community to community, many Hmong were generally disgruntled by the perceived prejudice and discrimination that they faced simply from being Hmong. The main specific concerns included the following: (1) the lowlanders’ predatory and unfair taxation, (2) the lowlanders’ racialisation of Hmong people, (3) unwanted sexual advances on Hmong women and sometimes the subsequent abuse of younger and married Hmong women, (4) the security forces’ killing of pigs and chickens for food without asking permission or providing compensation, (5) concerns about the lack of development and education services coming to their communities, (6) dissatisfaction that they were not eligible for citizenship in Thailand and were thus not welcome in the country, and (7) particularly in the Khet 3 Changwat area, extremely unpopular government plans to resettle Hmong villages from the Khao Kho/Khao Ya area.
There is not space to fully elaborate on all these grievances here, but it is worth providing some additional information about a few of them. In particular, the Thai racialisation of the Hmong included seeing them as primitive ‘hill tribes’ who were not real Thais (Vandergeest Reference Vandergeest2003; Forsyth and Walker Reference Forsyth and Walker2008). In some cases, lowland Thais even depicted the Hmong as being non-human (Interview with Jong Teng Sae Vang 2014). Racism was often quite explicit and nasty. Regarding the lack of development and education services, the main concern was government neglect, including a lack of schools, health services in Hmong villages, and other development services that were provided in lowland villages. Regarding citizenship, a small number of Hmong were granted Thai citizenship before the CPT period, but the vast majority were not officially Thais. Many Hmong and other ethnic minorities resented this exclusion (Keyes Reference Keyes2002; Laungaramsri Reference Laungaramsri and Marston2014; Sakboon Reference Sakboon and Barry2013).
Therefore, the Hmong generally appreciated the following policy of the CPT in relation to ethnic minorities, referred to as “nationalities”, following the Maoist Chinese terminology. The Communist Party of Thailand (n.d.) included the following as point number five of their “Ten Point Programme”:
The people of various nationalities in Thailand shall enjoy equal rights, should respect, support, and assist each other, shall be entitled to use their own languages and scripts and preserve their fine traditions, custom and culture, oppose any discrimination against and oppression of all nationalities. In nationality regions, autonomous administration will be accorded under the big family of Thailand. Economic, educational and public health development must be developed thoroughly and universally.
Once, however, when the Thai government became aware that communist activities were occurring in some villages, they sent the BPP into the communities to engage in “civic action” work designed to thwart the expansion of communism.Footnote 2 Army units also increasingly travelled to Hmong villages to supress the spread of communism in the uplands. Yet, ironically, according to the Hmong people living in various parts of northern Thailand, the BPP and other military units that were sent to the mountainous areas often behaved poorly, thus frequently contributing more to feelings of disenfranchisement and providing CPT recruiters, both Hmong and Thai, with more tangible examples of the types of class-based and ethnic-based oppression that the CPT wanted to abolish. Frequently, the presence of the BPP and other Thai military units in Hmong areas actually boosted the CPT's recruitment efforts.
The Thai government tried to appeal to the Hmong people to resist communism in mid-1969, asserting that the government cared for the living conditions and welfare of the Hmong people. However, the CPT's Voice of the People of Thailand Radio Station, which was operating in the White Hmong language—the main Hmong dialect used in the eastern part of northern Thailand, where most of the CPT strongholds were located—strongly responded through a broadcast on 30 August, stating that,
The clique [Thai government] has consistently looked down upon the Meo [Hmong] people, but the Meo [Hmong] people are aware that the above-mentioned calls of the clique are all deceitful schemes. The U.S.-Thanom clique is attempting to deceive the Meo [Hmong] people into becoming its stooges.
To make the point that the traitorous nature of the Thai government was not going to change, the Hmong language CPT radio broadcast mentioned two Hmong proverbs in particular. The first was, “No crow is white”, and the second was, “A man born to an intimidating race will never be merciful to anybody”. The first proverb made the point that the claims of the Thai government were unbelievable, due to the government's fundamental nature. The second conveyed the message that the dominating Thai people could not be trusted. The broadcast concluded by stating, “The Meo [Hmong] people of all nationalities have no alternative other than to rise up, take up arms, and fight against [the Thai government]” (Voice of the People of Thailand 1969).
By the early 1970s, most of the mountainous areas in northern Thailand where the Hmong people lived had become CPT “liberated areas” or “strongholds” (than thi man in Thai). Effectively, because the Hmong tended to live in the highest mountains and in the most remote parts of the borderlands with Laos, their areas were geographically easier to militarily defend, even with a small number of troops. These areas were also strategically located near the border with Laos, which allowed for supplies to be easily brought to them from China via Laos. These conditions allowed the CPT to establish state governance (Amnat Rat in Thai) in these areas, thus effectively establishing a state within the state of Thailand.
The strongholds or base areas were located in the following areas: the Doi Yao Pha Mon area in the mountains of Thoeng and Wiang Kaen Districts Chiang Rai Province (called Khet #8); the Phu Ji Phu Chang area in Pong District, Phayao Province (Khet #7); a liberated area in Chiang Kham District, Phayao Province (Khet #9); six strongholds in the mountains of eastern Nan Province (Khet #1–6); two “liberated areas” in northern and southern Tak Province, to the west near the border with Burma; and the Khet 3 Changwat area, which initially included two “liberated areas” (Khet #10 and #15) on the border between Phetchabun, Phitsanulok and Loei Provinces in the Khao Kho-Khao Ya and Phu Hin Rong Kla areas, and later the Phu Mieng and Phu Khat areas (see Figure 2). These areas remained exclusively under communist control between the late 1960s and the early 1980s.
Figure 2. Map showing the approximate locations of CPT strongholds or base areas in Thailand.
Furthermore, the CPT was able to test some of its governance plans with the local populations, which were mainly Hmong. Cooperatives were established, albeit unevenly and especially in the 3 Changwat area, and systems of taxation and agricultural products distribution were tested, although without pushing so far that such policies might alienate the local population. Schools for children (called rong rian anuchon daeng in Thai) and schools for new adult recruits were established, as were field hospitals. Local-level committees (khana tambon in Thai) were set up to govern villages in base areas. Similarly, military companies (kong loi in Thai) were put together for each base area, led by a Phu Kong or company leader (see, also, Fon Reference Fon2008; Fongthale Reference Fongthale2013; Khunphol Reference Khunphol2005, Reference Khunphol2009, Reference Khunphol2014; Lee Reference Lee2016; Looklanthai Reference Looklanthai2011).
The Hmong and the CPT: Transcultural, Transnational and Gender Liberating Experiences
Transnational Experiences
The Hmong experience with the CPT was fundamentally transnational. Although some might have expected that fleeing “into the forest” would have led to more isolation, this was generally not the case. Many Hmong were able to receive basic political and military training in northern Laos, and those who did well were given the chance to do middle-level training in Vietnam or China. These international education opportunities—albeit basic—were important for the Hmong. Indeed, the CPT's policy was that “[e]ducation and employment of youth will be ensured” (Communist Party of Thailand, n.d.).
One Hmong person who drew many Hmong people in Thailand to join the CPT was a communist Pathet Lao leader named Shoua Nou Xiong, who came from Laos and lived near the border with Thailand in Xieng Hone District of Xayaboury Province. He joined the Pathet Lao in the early 1950s in response to attacks on his and other Hmong villages by Chinese nationalist Kuomintang (KMT) soldiers who had crossed into Laos from Burma. Together with another Hmong man from the same area, named Va Koua Yang, Shoua Nou initially joined the Pathet Lao to gain support to fight against the raiding KMT (Interview with No Ki Yang 2018). Later, in the 1950s, the Pathet Lao radio broadcast various stories about Shoua Nou, initially in Lao language and later in Hmong. Hmong people in Thailand also learned about him via word-of-mouth from other Hmong. As a result, many Hmong from Thailand sought advice from the Shoua Nou at Phou Lan Village of Xieng Hone District, Xayaboury Province, where he was based.
When Hmong from Thailand came to visit Shoua Nou in Laos, he generally encouraged them to join the revolutionary communist movement in Thailand. On his advice, some Hmong from Thailand also ended up fighting for the revolutionary Pathet Lao army in Xieng Khouang Province in northeastern Laos, and a few even fought with the Viet Minh against the French at Dien Bien Phu in 1954 (Interview with Nhia Ja Sae Xiong (Phu Kong Su) 2017; Interview with Ja Fua Sae Xiong (Phu Kong Pheung) 2018). Furthermore, Hmong in Thailand often had clan connections and relatives in Laos, and they sometimes learned about the Pathet Lao from these people, either when they visited Laos or when people from Laos visited them.
Shoua Nou became even better known in the early 1960s. At one point, he worked with a Chinese Thai named Comrade Jan and encountered Hmong from northern Thailand. Two Hmong men from Tak Province, Lao Fong Sae Xiong and Lao Tua Sae Hang, were so inspired by the radio reports that they walked from Tak Province to Laos to find Shoua Nou and Comrade Jan. Even though they travelled separately, in or around 1962, they were both eventually able to meet Comrade Jan and Shoua Nou. Shoua Nou inspired the two Hmong from Tak to fight against oppression and join the communist struggle (Interview with Sa Chue Sae Vang (Comrade Tong Loo) 2017), along with many others.Footnote 3 Transnationalism was important for inspiring Hmong in Thailand to join the CPT.Footnote 4
By the mid-1960s, based on many interviews, the first two Hmong from Tak met Shoua Nou and then, returned to Tak to recruit other Hmong to go for training in Laos. More and more Hmong from different parts of northern Thailand were recruited to receive training from the CPT, with many teenagers travelling to faraway places and to different countries to be educated during the 1960s and 1970s. For example, many Hmong travelled to China for medical and political training or, sometimes, to Vietnam for middle- and upper-level military training. However, the interactions that these students had with non-Hmong people definitely had social and cultural implications because Hmong were introduced to new cultures, languages, ideas and practices.
Furthermore, about 250 soldiers from China came to work with the CPT units in strongholds in 1971—apparently in response to the Thai military hiring KMT that were based in Thailand to help them fight the Hmong CPT in the Doi Yao Pha Mon mountains of Chiang Rai Province (Interview with Daeng Noi Sae Lee 2018). Most of the Chinese communists who came to support the CPT were ethnic minorities, especially Hmong, Iu-Mien and Tai, and only stayed in Thailand for a few years before returning to China. Yet, a few married Hmong women in Thailand, became Thai citizens and never returned to China to live (Interview with former Hmong Chinese soldier 2017). Thus, these Chinese soldiers are another group of people who interacted significantly with the Hmong Thai during the CPT period.
Some Hmong with the CPT—especially those working near the CPT headquarters in eastern Nan Province, known as “708”—also interacted significantly with people from other similarly aligned communist movements, especially groups receiving support from China. For example, some of the leadership of the Malayan Communist Party, including Chin Peng, its leader, spent more than a year based in eastern Nan province in a CPT-liberated area with many of his followers (Interview with Thong Sae Xiong 2017). Members of the Revolutionary Front for an Independent East Timor, Frente Revolucionária de Timor-Leste Independente or FRETILIN, also spent some time there (Interview with Thong Sae Xiong 2017). Apart from taking refuge in the CPT areas, they also sometimes needed to pass Nan Province when travelling overland to and from China.
Moreover, the CPT was in close contact with the Communist Party of Burma (CPB), which was also aligned closely with China (Interview with Daeng Noi Sae Lee 2018). For example, the CPB helped transport supplies from China to Burma after Laos shut down the border with Laos because the conflict between China and Vietnam had intensified; Laos sided with Vietnam, and the CPT vocally supported China (Rousset Reference Rousset2009). They also supported the last CPT base located on the Thailand-Burma border, which was adjacent to Phetburi and Phrachuap Khirikhan Provinces, in the 1980s and early 1990s (Interview with Thong Sae Xiong 2017; Interview with Daeng Noi Sae Lee 2018), at a time when the CPB was expanding its influence in southern Burma (The Nation Review 1983). When the CPT finally disintegrated in northern Thailand in 1982, Lo Meng Fa, a People's Liberation Army of Thailand (PLAT) leader in Khet 8 in Chiang Rai Province, was afraid of vengeance and fled to stay with the CPB in northern Burma for a year. Eventually, however, his brother came and convinced him that he could return to Thailand without any risk of danger (Interview with Lo Meng Fa 2016). One Hmong telegraph operator in Tak Province stated that he sometimes sent and received messages for the CPT leadership in Tak from the CPB (Interview with Cha Lee Sae Vang (Comrade Charoen) 2017). Crucially, all these contacts facilitated important exchanges of ideas between the CPT and other aligned groups in the region.
Transcultural Experiences
“A society without class or class oppression and exploitation, one in which each and every person leads a happy and equitable life, this has been the aspiration of the toiling masses from time immemorial.” (The Communist Party of Thailand, n.d.)
“I never would have learned to have spoken Thai as well as I did if I had not joined the CPT.” (Interview with Lia Sae Her (Comrade Dao), a Hmong woman who studied to be a doctor with the CPT in China, 2017)
Janthana Fongthale (Reference Fongthale2013) and others have written about the journey that many young Thai people took to the forests to join the CPT after the 6 October 1976 massacre at Thammasat University in Bangkok. Thongchai Winichakul (Reference Winichakul2020) has also urged us not to forget the tragedy of 6 October 1976. Nothing, however, substantive has so far been written about the journeys that many young Hmong people, both men and women, took to faraway places when they decided to study with the CPT.
The A-30 training centre—despite consisting of just some temporary bamboo buildings with grass roofs—was a key contact zone for Hmong interactions with other people from Thailand (Siam Nakon 1980). Most of the Hmong who went to A-30 initially spoke very little or no Thai, but because all the training was in Central Thai language, albeit with Hmong translation provided for the Hmong students (at least initially), many Hmong rapidly learned Thai. Even though A-30 was located in Laos, by the end of three months of basic language training, many could communicate on a basic level in Thai. It was also the first place where most learned about national Thai politics, following the CPT's Maoist interpretations. Finally, it was the first place where many Hmong people had the chance to have meaningful contact with people from other parts of Thailand. That is, they studied at A-30 with other young men and women from southern Thailand and northeastern Thailand and with ethnic Chinese Thais from Bangkok, other places in central Thailand and all over the country. Moreover, the teachers at A-30 were from various parts of Thailand.
Thus, these CPT trainings created a crucial link between rural Hmong people and peoples from other parts of Thailand, including connections with the Thai language and nation. For the first time, Hmong people from Thailand were told that they were Thais, just like everyone else, and that they deserved to have the same educational, developmental, cultural and political rights as everyone else who was born on Thai soil. For many Hmong, they only really began to think of themselves as Thai once they received the CPT training in Laos. As Nhia Ja Sae Xiong explained, “When I was at A-30, I still didn't think I was Thai, but later, when I learned theory, I realised that I was Thai. Others also thought I was Thai, but I was still a minority” (Interview with Nhia Ja Xiong (Phu Kong Su) 2018). Thus, their education in Laos was transnational but also transcultural in relation to other people from Thailand and the Central Thai language and knowledge communicated there.
Friendships were made among people from different backgrounds, regions, ethnic groups, classes and countries, which were otherwise improbable but for the CPT training. For example, Song Xiong, known as Comrade Supha when with the CPT, reported that when she went to study to be a doctor outside of Kunming in 1969, she was one of 13 women who travelled together. Eight were Hmong, three were Thai and two were ethnic T'in. All were unmarried, and they lived together in accommodations provided by the military hospital where they studied. The co-habitation of these women in a faraway place helped create an important transcultural environment—unlike anything they had experienced before. All 13 graduated and then, returned to the places where they came from in Thailand to provide medical support (Interview with Song Xiong 2017).
In another case, Lia Sae Her, known as Comrade Dao, a Hmong woman from Phetchabun Province, reported that, when she went to study to be a doctor in China at a military college, there were 43 students from Thailand in her group. Three were Hmong women, four were women from northeastern Thailand, four were women from central Thailand and the remaining 32 were men from various parts of Thailand. These students lived and worked where they studied near Dali, in Yunnan Province. They generated close relationships, ones that were highly transcultural. Comrade Dao remembers receiving support in the evenings from Thai women studying with her. When she did not understand all the Thai language vocabulary presented during lessons, in the evening she would ask for help from the other women. She remains in contact with some of the Hmong and northeastern Thai women who studied with her (Interview with Lia Sae Her (Comrade Dao) 2017).
A Hmong man from Phayao Province, Ja Fua Sae Xiong, who was known as Comrade Pheung, reported that, when he first went for training at A-30 in Laos, he travelled together with 29 other people. Half were female, and people from various ethnic groups and parts of Thailand were in the group. He knew little of the Thai language when he started the trip, but he was young and learned quickly. By the time the training was completed, he could communicate in Thai. He also created friendships with people from other parts of Thailand that he had never interacted with before (Interview with Ja Fua Sae Xiong (Phu Kong Pheung) 2016). Indeed, various Hmong developed lifelong friendships with peoples from other ethnic groups and parts of Thailand through their educational experiences with the CPT.
When the Voice of the People of Thailand CPT radio started broadcasting from Kunming in the late 1960s, the programming was in three languages: Thai, Isan (Lao dialect in Thailand) and White Hmong (Hmong Daw). According to an ethnic Thai woman who worked at the radio station from January 1978 until it was shut down by the Chinese government in July 1979, each language had its own room, so the three groups did not always interact because the language and thus ethnicity was closely linked to the CPT radio programming. However, because the three offices were adjacent to each other, the different groups regularly met each other. Moreover, all the groups shared the same or similar news, and they all shared an increasing sense of being Thai (Interview with former northern Thai female student 2017). Indeed, the CPT was engaging in its own nation-building activities by promoting speaking, reading and writing in Central Thai, which was similar to the Thai government's actions.
A large proportion of the Hmong living near the Lao border in northern Thailand became part of the CPT's “liberated” areas in northern Thailand,Footnote 5 and thus, these largely stable areas governed by the CPT became relatively important places for Hmong experiences with other peoples. For example, the Hmong interacted with people from other regions in the country, especially southern, northeastern and central Thailand but also with other minorities such as the Iu-Mien (Yao). Moreover, the T'in and upland Yuan (Muang) people dominated some stronghold areas in Nan Province, where some Hmong people worked (Interview with Thong Sae Xiong 2017).
Interactions were especially common when many students fled to the forest after the October 6 massacre at Thammasat University in Bangkok (Fon Reference Fon2008; Fongthale Reference Fongthale2013; Khunphol Reference Khunphol2005, Reference Khunphol2009, Reference Khunphol2014; Lee Reference Lee2016; Looklanthai Reference Looklanthai2011). For example, Chaturon Chaiseng, the leader of the Student's Association at Chiang Mai University, reported that when he first went to the Pha Ji Mountain area in Khet #7 in Pong District, Phayao Province, he spent the first few months waiting for a political school to be established there. During that time, he regularly worked with local Hmong villagers. He helped them harvest their rice, and over a few months, he learned 50 or so basic Hmong words, which generally helped him to improve his relationship with the Hmong (Interview with Lo Meng Fa 2016). Some former Thai students also studied with Hmong teachers, such as Lo Meng Fa, who provided military training at the “October 6th Political and Military School”, which was established in late 1976 inside Laos but directly adjacent to the border with Thailand and the CPT's Khet #8 liberated area (Interview with Lo Meng Fa 2016). Close interactions between Hmong and Thai from the cities were virtually unheard of before the creation of the CPT strongholds in northern Thailand, which eventually led to friendships and even some marriages between the Hmong and lowland Thais.
The Hmong children also frequently came into contact with ethnic Thai teachers working in the stronghold areas. Mai Lee (Reference Lee2016) describes, from a Thai perspective, the experiences of one teacher who taught Hmong children in the Pha Ji area of Khet #7. Both Hmong and Thais generally view these interactions favourably. It is noteworthy, however, that Thai teachers sometimes encouraged their Hmong students to adopt Thai names when at school—apparently, so that the teachers could more easily remember them. Consequently, Hmong students were gradually pulled into Thai society, albeit Thai society in the CPT-liberated areas.
The CPT promoted a vision of Thai national identity, that included the Hmong—something the Hmong had not experienced before and which inspired many. Identities can certainly take on many different forms. However, the CPT's idea of national identity differed from that of the regular Thai society. For example, although the CPT did not denounce the monarchy, they also did not promote it, as is typical in Thai society. Similar to the regular Thai society, however, the Central Thai language was strongly promoted in the CPT areas. The CPT promoted Thai nationalism, albeit with an emphasis on socialism and equality between all groups of people. The idea that Hmong people should have equal rights to those from other ethnic groups was attractive to many Hmong. This was important, especially considering how poorly the Hmong had been treated before allying themselves with the CPT. After the end of the CPT period, however, many former CPT Hmong were at least somewhat disappointed that there was less equality in Thai society than what the CPT promoted. However, they now feel that they are treated with more respect.
Hmong Gender Liberation
One group of Hmong people who appear to have been especially inspired by the CPT and its policies were young Hmong women. Like men, many were interested in opportunities for education. However, promises of gender equality were generally even more important for Hmong women, due to the numerous cultural constraints related to the patriarchy in Hmong society (Vang et al. Reference Vang, Nibbs and Vang2016; Moua Reference Moua2017). Indicative of the CPT's commitment to gender equality, at least in theory, the CPT included the following clause related to women in 1969 in their list of policies:
Women shall enjoy equal rights to men in the political, economic, cultural, educational and vocational fields; bring the role of women into full play in the revolutionary movement and production; promote fully welfare work among women and children, ensure education and work to the youth. (Peking NCNA International News 1969)
The Communist Party of Thailand (n.d.) also made their policy about women clear within its “Ten Point Plan”, stating that, “Women and men are entitled to enjoy equal rights in political, economic, cultural, educational and working opportunities. Enhance the role of women in carrying out the revolution and production; guarantee the welfare of women and children.”
The CPT was certainly committed to gender equality in theory, and indicative of this, in 1974, the Voice of the People of Thailand radio broadcasts made a telling announcement regarding the CPT's policy in relation to gender in “liberated areas”. The statement might seem exaggerated, but it actually felt true to many Hmong women in particular: “[In] base areas, the people are enjoying a new life which has never before existed in history; all men and women have equal rights in the political and other fields” (Voice of the People of Thailand 1974). Indeed, social memory is crucial when considering oral histories because sometimes oral history is more important for understanding how people remember history than for understanding what actually happened (Fentress and Wickham Reference Fentress and Wickham1992), although there is no reason to believe that the information provided by these former CPT informants is not largely accurate.
For instance, one Hmong woman, named Song Xiong, explained that what initially caught her attention when the CPT started recruiting in Mae Jarim District, Nan Province—where she came from—was that women had the right to an education, something that the Thai government was not providing in her area at the time. She mentioned, however, that she was later particularly enthusiastic about the CPT's commitment to banning the traditional Hmong practice of “bride capture”, or zij poj niam (grabbing or pulling). This is when Hmong men, if they wanted to marry a woman or obtain a second wife but were unable to gain any traction with the woman, would abduct them and force them into marriage, even if the woman disagreed. Once she was in the house of the groom and the lwm qaib or bride purification ceremony had been done to accept the bride into the spiritual domain of the family, it would not be possible for her family to accept her back. Accordingly, she would be forced to accept the marriage.
Although sometimes bride capture was just an act to allow couples to marry when someone in either the bride's or groom's family was expected to object to the marriage, when it happened for real it was traumatising (Lee and Tapp Reference Lee and Tapp2010: 167–168). As Song Xiong expressed, “Women's rights are important. Before [Hmong women] could not refuse marriage. It was scary. Young unmarried women dared not leave their houses, for fear of being abducted. The CPT, however, banned this practice and the women were glad.” She was first sent to A-30 in Phongsaly Province in northern Laos to receive basic training.Footnote 6 In 1969, she returned to Thailand to educate “the masses” (muan chon in Thai) in Hmong villages, before being sent back to China for over a year to study to become a doctor (Interview with Song Xiong 2017). This was the type of educational opportunity that a Hmong woman could have never imagined being possible, but it was under the CPT.
Another Hmong woman from Phitsanulok Province, Lia Sae Her, was allowed to become a female CPT soldier in 1969. Later, she received more than 10 days of basic training to become a field nurse for the company to which she was attached. She also studied basic literacy when she was a soldier, something that was not an option for most Hmong women before aligning with the CPT. Furthermore, she mentioned that, prior to joining the CPT, “bride capture” had been a scary thing for young Hmong women. Like others, she was glad that the CPT banned it. She said that she stopped being afraid when she joined the CPT. She also had the chance to study, even though she initially did not know any Thai (Interview with Lia Sae Her (Comrade Dao) 2017). As with other women, it was a liberating time for her.
Another Hmong woman from Tak Province, named Jia Lo Sae Vang, is an excellent example of how young Hmong women were inspired by the CPT. Her brother was one of the early Hmong to travel to study in China. When he returned, he told her that girls had the right to study just like men, something that impressed her and made her hopeful. As she put it, “I learned that the CPT supported women to do the same things as men”. Indeed, Hmong is a heavily male-dominated society, so in the early 1960s, when news of gender equality for those in the CPT started to spread, it could not be assumed that girls could go to school like boys. At first, she studied in the village at night using a kerosene lamp. She completed the first basic elementary reader in Thai with the help of two other Hmong girls, who themselves had learned some Thai from a private Thai teacher who had previously hired out his services in her village. However, once her brother was back, she was able to study more. Once the CPT “liberated” the area, she was allowed to study nursing at the CPT's hospital, along with six other young Hmong women (see Figure 3). She also received some political and military training, although she never actually participated in any direct fighting. Her teachers were Chinese Thais, and one doctor came from China to specifically provide medical training. She communicated with them in Central Thai, and she soon became fluent. She later studied to be a surgeon while working at the hospital where she was based for over a decade. Unlike others, she was not able to study in Laos or China, as Tak was farther from the Lao border than the provinces to the east, from where more people travelled. She stated that all the Hmong women of her era were particularly impressed by the CPT due to its policy on gender equality (Interview with Jia Lo Sae Vang (Comrade Suvan) 2017).
Figure 3. Hmong nurses studying with the CPT at Thong Chai Village, Khet Neua, Tak Province (compliments of Jia Lo Sae Vang).
The CPT also instituted reform of the Hmong bride price tradition in liberated areas. Previously, bride prices varied by family or according to class. The CPT decided that the bride price should be both reduced and standardised. Therefore, it went from eight to ten bars of silver (theng in Thai), to either four bars in many areas or even no bride price at all in the 3 Changwat area. In Tak, where Jia Lo resided, the bride price was four bars, but she asked her parents not to accept any bride price when she married in 1981. She stated, “I told my parents not to accept a bride price because I did not want that being held over me. Some husbands used a dowry as an excuse to work their wives like cows and buffaloes” (Interview with Jia Lo Sae Vang (Comrade Suvan) 2017). Interestingly, this decline in the amount of brideswealth (or bride price) required for Hmong to marry fits with the fact that bride price for Hmong (Miao) in China is reportedly very low compared to neighbouring countries (Lee and Tapp Reference Lee and Tapp2010: 169), and many of the CPT policies were taken directly from China. Women were also generally happy that the CPT banned the Hmong practice of polygamy, something that the Hmong society historically accepted, at least from richer men (Lee and Tapp Reference Lee and Tapp2010: 165). Although the CPT did not force older polygamists to separate, they prohibited new polygamous relationships from developing (Interview with Jia Lo Sae Vang (Comrade Suvan) 2017; Interview with Nou Shoua Sae Xiong (Comrade Xiong Sang) 2018). Overall, Hmong women viewed the CPT positively because they felt that the CPT provided women with more rights, including the right to education and the right to choose one's own husband. They were also generally happy with reforms related to bride capture, bride prices and the prohibition of new polygamist relationships.
Although Hmong young women certainly viewed the CPT period as transformative from a gender perspective, not all the changes introduced during the CPT period continued to be practised after its end, a topic that is dealt with in more detail in a separate paper (Baird and Yangcheepsutjarit Reference Baird and Yangcheepsutjaritunder review). For example, polygamy has increased in the Hmong society since the end of the CPT period.
CPT Child Education in Northern Laos and China
Probably the most linguistically, culturally and socially transformative experience for some Hmong people from Thailand during the CPT period involved them being sent to northern Laos and later southern China. Similarly, the Pathet Lao Communists also sent teenagers to Vietnam to study, with somewhat similar transformational results (Pholsena Reference Pholsena, Boute and Pholsena2017). Moreover, a relatively small number of the children living in the CPT-liberated areas were sent to study. One Hmong leader from Mae Jarim District, Nan Province, reported that his eight-year-old daughter was sent to study in a boarding school run by the wife of one of the CPT Central Committee leaders near A-30 in 1977, along with 30 other children, boys and girls, including many Hmong from northern Thailand. He was told that it was not safe for his daughter to stay in a liberated area, due to potential aerial bombing or ground attacks. However, in 1979, when the CPT sided with China during its dispute with Vietnam and Laos (Chanda Reference Chanda1986; Chang Reference Chang1983; Siam Nakon 1980), the school was abruptly shut down and all the teachers and students had to be relocated across the border into China. Finally, the school was relocated a second time to Kunming, the capital of Yunnan Province (Interview with Nhia Ja Sae Xiong (Phu Kong Su) 2017).
After the Lao border was closed to the CPT, communications between the children studying in China and their families in Thailand became infrequent or non-existent. In the 1980s, the Thai government allowed those taking refuge in China to return to Thailand, by which time China was claiming that it was maintaining “only spiritual ties” with the CPT (Bangkok Domestic Service 1982b). Finally, most of the children were sent back to Thailand after many took advantage of the amnesties (66/23 and 66/25) offered by the Thai government in 1980 and 1982 (see Wedel Reference Wedel1982; Baker Reference Baker2003) and following the subsequent disintegration of the CPT strongholds by the end of 1982 (Bangkok Domestic Service 1982a; Bangkok Post 1982; Kerdphol Reference Kerdphol1986; Marks Reference Marks1994).
In one case, a Hmong child who had studied in China had to stay with a Thai family in Bangkok until her parents finally came out of the forest in or around 1994. By that time, she could only speak Chinese and Central Thai, not Hmong. This cemented her Thai identity. Indeed, she eventually ended up marrying a non-Hmong man and moving to a non-Hmong area in northeastern Thailand (Interview with Nhia Ja Sae Xiong (Phu Kong Su) 2017). Clearly, these educational experiences were not only educationally transformative but socially, culturally and linguistically as well.
An Uncompleted Revolution
So what would have happened if the CPT had gained control of the state in Thailand? One could compare the establishment of the CPT's “liberated areas” in northern Thailand to the government structures and systems that were established in northeastern Cambodia during the early years of the Democratic Kampuchea (commonly known as the Khmer Rouge), in the late 1960s and very early 1970s, because both movements were Maoist and closely aligned with China. At that time, the policies of the Khmer Rouge remained relatively moderate and thus generally more popular in the northeast. This can also be compared to the much more draconian measures that were introduced and enforced in the country beginning in or around 1973 and especially after Phnom Penh and the rest of Cambodia fell to the Khmer Rouge in April 1975 (Colm Reference Colm1996; Baird Reference Baird2020). If the CPT had been able to truly govern Thailand as the Khmer Rouge had governed Cambodia, the outcome is unclear. The CPT may have committed some of the same types of human rights abuses and killing that the Khmer Rouge had committed in Cambodia. Moreover, it may be more appropriate to consider how the Hmong who aligned themselves with the communist Pathet Lao in the 1960s and early 1970s fared after the Pathet Lao gained control of the government in the country in 1975. The Pathet Lao was certainly not as guilty of excesses as the Khmer Rouge, but they too organised hard labour camps, known as “seminar” camps, for imprisoning their enemies, where many wallowed under very difficult conditions for well over a decade (Kremmer Reference Kremmer2003; Na Champassak Reference Na Champassak2010; Thammakhanty Reference Thammakhanty2004).
We will never know what would have happened if the CPT had successfully gained control of the country, but some former student leaders (Interview with Chaturon Chaiseng 2017) (see, also, Chutima Reference Chutima1990; Matuphum Newspaper 1981) and some Hmong Thais believe that the CPT was too ideologically linked to China. They consider that this was one of the CPT's weaknesses and that it affected the way Thai society was analysed. Yet, in contrast, one Hmong man who previously lived in a liberated area in Phitsanulok Province told me, in 2014, that he would not have surrendered if the CPT had not run out of bullets. Indeed, most of the Hmong who were previously with the CPT and who I have interviewed in recent years nostalgically view their time with the CPT as positive and transformative.
Conclusion
Hmong involvement in the CPT represented truly transnational, transcultural, and gender-relations transforming experiences. The Hmong did not simply go into isolation “in the forest” when they joined the CPT. Instead, many things changed between the 1960s and early 1980s, when most Hmong surrendered. However, as the leader of one large group of defectors stated in Tak Province in late 1982, it was not that they were surrendering because they had been defeated but, rather, because they had decided that it did not make sense for Thais to continue killing Thais (Bangkok Post 1982). Indeed, the CPT was rarely defeated militarily, especially in Hmong areas in northern Thailand.
My interviews with many Hmong people who were previously with the CPT in northern Thailand indicate that most still hold a relatively positive opinion of the time they spent living in strongholds between the late 1960s and the early 1980s. Although life was certainly not easy, it is clear that many Hmong found the time with the CPT variously transformative. For Hmong men, the racialised relations and discrimination against Hmong by other Thais was probably the main obstacle that people wanted to correct. For Hmong women, CPT rules related to gender relations were especially inspiring. In all cases, the identities of Hmong people were greatly affected by the interactions they had with other people from Thailand and those from foreign countries. This occurred through the Thai language, the politics that they studied and the new gender relations mandated by the CPT, which were especially important for Hmong women and continue to impact Hmong social relations in Thailand.
The purpose of this paper is not to consider how to evaluate the Hmong experience but, rather, to argue that the Hmong experience of going “to the forest” with the CPT actually represented an important period for Hmong Thai language learning, education and cultural and gender relation changes, both potentially for better or worse. Interviews with various Hmong men and women suggest, however, that, even now, most believe that the struggle was necessary for gaining the improved rights and living conditions that they face today, even if all of them think that ethnic boundaries and prejudices still exist today. The Hmong people generally believe that their sacrifices have helped make a better Thailand for their children and grandchildren. This tells us as much about the experiences of the Hmong with the CPT as it does about social memory. Learning about the experiences of the Hmong people during the CPT is important, not just to understand what happened but maybe, more importantly, to assess how the Hmong people evaluate their experiences decades later.
Furthermore, it is important to recognise what has happened to the former CPT Hmong since the end of the CPT period. Crucially, the Thai government has granted almost all former CPT Hmong Thai citizenship, and the Hmong in Thailand are now the recipients of government services that are similar to other Thai citizens. For example, there are schools in the villages, and most villages are accessible by paved roads. Discrimination against Hmong people in Thailand has not ended—far from it—but the situation, in their view, is certainly significantly better than what it was prior to the CPT period.
Acknowledgements
Thanks to all the Hmong people who helped explain their ideas and circumstances, before, during and after the CPT period. Thanks also for the very useful comments provided by two anonymous reviewers. The map was prepared with the assistance of Austin Novak from the Cartography Lab at the Department of Geography, University of Wisconsin-Madison.
