Thailand (catch all)

[Dayuhan]

This is true, but both China and U.S. will respond to the challenges and opportunities presented by this event to pursue their own interests.

They will, but I don't see either gaining or losing much. The Thais will do business with both but will keep policy independent of both. I wouldn't expect them to be taking sides in any disputes, or to allow themselves to be pulled into anyone's camp, no matter how the current situation shakes out.

I never said or came to close to implying that we could or should, that isn't the point of this discourse. The principle point is China will be more flexible in their response, while our options will be severely restricted by our laws, which could give China the ability to gain more influence with Thailand, while U.S. influence is reduced.

Maybe I misinterpreted this comment:

China's approach could create an opportunity for us to leverage our soft power

As above, I don't think either the US or China really has much influence on Thailand, if we define influence as the ability to shape policy decisions to one's own advantage. I don't think the current situation will change that.

I think the Thai military would agree with you, their leaders have on more than one occasion called the Thai government a false democracy. I suspect they're more than a little frustrated with us blindly embracing the concept of democracy while ignoring the realities of how it is playing out.

Certainly they are frustrated, but I don't think they are really all that frustrated with "us"... in fact I don't think "we" are much of a factor at all. The frustration largely stems from the reality that while a long-term military government is not something they want or feel capable of managing, every time they send power back to civilians the same thing happens. US influence has not been a major factor in the timing of returns to civilian rule. In past coups the monarchy has played a greater role than the US in assuring a rapid return to civilian rule. That may be changing, if this article has it right:

http://www.theguardian.com/world/201...j-junta-senate

There's going to be a lot of watch and see going on, because many parties have interests and very few have meaningful influence. From the US I'd expect to see the usual boilerplate statements urging a rapid return to civilian rule, backed up by very little action, if any.