This analysis first appeared on The Indo-Pacific Review and is reposted here with permission from the author. Zachary Abuza, PhD, is a professor and analyst of Southeast Asian politics and security.

 

With the the peace process between the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and the Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP) so far being successfully implemented, there has been a lot of interest in whether the experience in the southern Philippines has any applicability in southern Thailand.

 

Every insurgency is sui generis, and yet there are interesting parallels between southern Thailand and the southern Philippines. Both regions are comprised of majority Muslims, who have fought for many decades in order to protect against encroachments from Siamese Buddhist or Catholic Filipino encroachments and attempts at national assimilation. Both governments are overly centralized and have had neocolonial relationships with their provinces. Both Thai and Philippine security forces have been abusive and corrupt, creating a culture of impunity and resentment amongst the locals. In both countries, armed separatism emerged in the 1970s, though in both countries the movement was hampered by intra-Muslim infighting, factionalism and debates over ideology and tactics. The coverage of both conflicts by both national media tends to be very biased, often reinforcing negative stereotypes of the Muslim community. In short, despite all the differences, between the Moro and Pattani rebellions, there is enough similarity for this analysis.

 

But the real question is whether the Thai government could replicate the Philippine peace process? And the answer is, possibly, but not without a fundamental change in its thinking. Neither the Malay insurgents nor the Thai government have any incentive or will to negotiate right now. Certainly neither is willing to make the hard concessions that the Philippine government and the MILF have done. I will start with an analysis of the internal and external factors for both the MILF and the GRP that made the peace process possible, before looking at 10 key components of the peace process, without which the whole endeavor could have fallen apart. I will conclude with an analysis of why the conditions for a similar agreement are not ripe (maybe not even fruiting) in Thailand.

 

The MILF: Internal Factors

 

The MILF had been fighting for an independent homeland since it broke away from the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) in 1978 (formally established in 1984). With the MNLF’s conclusion of an autonomy agreement in 1996, the MILF doubled in size as many rank and file MNLF combatants outside of Sulu defected. The MILF controlled vast territories and established a de facto independent state. They had a small government, judiciary and limited social services in a region of the country that government forces had no access to. But the nascent “homeland” made for a target. Government forces captured Camp Abu Bakar, the MILF’s administrative center, in 2000 and the MILF lost its de facto capital, its showcase model, a viable alternative to the corrupt Philippine government. In 2003, government forces took another MILF base camp that straddled the one road linking Cotabato and Davao. Once that road was opened, commerce and people flowed across Mindanao, and importantly cell phone towers were erected. The net effect was that the MILF no longer controlled the population or their sources of information, they became integrated into Philippine society.

 

Following the loss of Camp Abu Bakar in 2000, the MILF never won another battle. Indeed, in every major encounter they lost territory and control. The MILF were pushed deeper into the mountains away from population centers.

 

In mid-2003, the MILF’s founder and ideologue, the al Azhar-trained cleric Salamat Hashim, died. He was succeeded by Ebrahim el-haj Murad, who came up through the ranks and understood that a military victory was an impossibility. Murad was pragmatic and began a peace dialogue with the government in 2003. Soon after, the MILF’s Central Committee decided to accept autonomy, rather than a bid for full independence. This was a hard pill to swallow. What was left to be negotiated were the details and size and scope of their “Ancestral Domain,” which referred to not just the increased numbers of Muslim majority villages that would be included in their autonomous government, but also villages where Muslims had become minorities due to Christian immigration. For example, the MILF argued that there should be 1,478 villages in addition to the ARMM included in their future autonomous government, while the government said that only 613 were currently Muslim majority. But there was at least legal recognition of lost lands.

 

Murad felt compelled to act. Not only was the MILF militarily weaker, it was becoming less centralized. The loss of camp Abu Bakar led to the establishment of nine separate base commands that varied in terms of their resources, capabilities, equipment and funding. Some remained disciplined and under central command and control while others quickly degenerated into armed gangs that engaged in extortion and kidnapping for ransom. Discipline in the ranks was ebbing quickly and Murad was cognizant that if he did not reach an agreement soon, he would not be able to enforce it.

 

The protracted peace process devastated the MILF’s military capabilities, which was reflected in negotiations: in each iteration of the talks the government offered less to the MILF. What was on the table in 2004 and 2005, an eventual referendum, was dropped while the size and scope of the MILF’s ancestral domain shrunk, between 2007 and 2014 from 750 barangays to an undetermined number. With a growing economy, and more resources, time was on the government’s side, not the MILF’s. When the Memorandum of Understanding on Ancestral Domain was rejected by President Arroyo’s cabinet in 2007 and the Supreme Court in 2008, the MILF had every reason to return to war; yet their capabilities were so limited that they barely sustained two months of low-level hostilities.

 

The MILF also had a financial incentive to reach an agreement. The MILF was desperate to get its hands on the mineral resources especially on several offshore service contracts in the Sulu Sea, near the Malaysian state of Sabah, which all have tested and proven reserves. Unlike the Catholic Church or communist New People’s Army, which have been vociferous in their criticism of mining, the MILF has always been eager as long as an equitable wealth sharing agreement is reached.

 

Finally, the MILF, like any rebel group sees itself as a vanguard movement. But it tended to over estimate their popular support. The Muslim community was war weary. Every ceasefire violation resulted in massive numbers of IDPs. Although there was no formal peace process, as long as the ceasefire held, there was a de facto peace dividend. The population would turn on the MILF if all out hostilities resumed.

 

The MILF: External Factors

 

There were a number of external factors that compelled the MILF to negotiate as well. First was the involvement of the Malaysians as the mediators. Clearly Kuala Lumpur has a vested interest in keeping a tab on events in Mindanao, and in particular has an interest in maintaining close ties with the MILF, as the MNLF and many other Filipinos still hold a claim to Sabah state in eastern Malaysia, and launched armed incursions there in 2013 that left 62 dead. But the Malaysians demonstrated inordinate patience year after year and were willing to put boots on the ground to build confidence during the drawn out peace process. Second, the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) was deeply involved, as were Libya, Brunei, and Indonesia; each offered diplomatic support or peace monitors.

 

Third, there was a lot of development assistance on the table should a peace agreement be implemented, both multi- and bi-lateral, but that too was waning. From 2004-2007, the United States, Japan, the European Union and a host of multilateral donors were actively engaged and ready to pour significant funds into the region. The protracted talks and pessimism following the failure of the draft agreement in 2007-08 led to donor fatigue. With the onset of the global economic slowdown in 2008, there was just less money on offer.

 

But the most important factor was the changed external environment after 9/11. This impacted the MILF in three key ways: First, the MILF had shortages of ammunition and arms. With U.S. military involvement in the Philippines after 9/11 and massive increases in assistance, came much more oversight over how that aid was being used. Black arms markets dried up, while the changed external security environment made arms smuggling far more difficult. Second, U.S. military assistance to the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) did improve their capabilities; not much, but enough against an adversary such as the MILF. More importantly, the U.S. presence had a significant impact on the AFP’s not committing egregious human rights abuses. Third, the MILF had a terrorism and PR problem. Beginning in the mid-1990s, the MILF opened up their camps to members of the Southeast Asian affiliate of al Qaeda, Jemaah Islamiyah (JI). Few cared at the time, but this became a huge headache for the MILF after the Bali bombing in October 2002 when the war on terror began in earnest in Southeast Asia. The U.S. deployed Special Forces in MILF claimed areas while the U.S. government threatened to have the MILF designated as a Foreign Terrorist Organization and proscribed by the U.N. Security Council due to their provision of sanctuary to JI terrorists including Dulmatin and Umar Patek.   The MILF had no choice but to distance itself from radical supporters across Southeast Asia, which in turn limited their ability to fundraise overseas. Funding was already under significant pressure due to U.S. and U.N. economic sanctions which targeted MILF supporters and front companies.   Yet, as the MILF lost on the battlefield, it increasingly had to rely on terrorist tactics. Though the MILF denied using terrorism, it always achieved its tactical goal in ending government offensives. It was, however, a strategic disaster. If the MILF wanted international backing for its peace process, it had to sever all ties to terrorism. In early-2003, Chairman Salamat Hashim wrote to President Bush renouncing terrorism.

 

The GRP: Internal Factors

 

The GRP, too, had every reason to cut a deal. For the first year-and-a-half of his term, President Benigno Aquino did little on the peace front. Though he held a publicized meeting with Murad in Tokyo, in August 2010, everything that did transpire was through back channel talks. He had to get the ball rolling before lame duck status set in and made a deal harder to reach. With his political adversary former President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo somewhat neutralized, and a stabilized and growing economy, the president felt that the time was finally right. He had political capital to spend. And the MILF made a major concession in agreeing that the peace talks would take place within the current constitutional framework.

 

Aquino, too, needed to secure his legacy. In part, that was done by at least appearing to take on the endemic corruption that plagues the Philippines and growing the economy. But a peace deal was also part of his sense of social justice that he inherited from his mother. In a sense, he felt the need to conclude the failed presidency of his mother, Corazon Aquino, that had so many dashed hopes.

 

Finally, the government was confronted with a double edged sword: a weaker MILF meant fewer concessions, but the flip side was that a weaker MILF might not be able to implement an agreement. Their command, control and discipline were ebbing quickly. The MILF is already confronted with intra-clan wars and rido conflicts over land amongst its members. And they still have little clout in the MNLF heartland of Sulu. Yet, for all its faults and weaknesses, the MILF was the best chance for sustained peace in Mindanao. The government recognized that the MILF leadership had as much legitimacy as anybody else in Mindanao, though it was ebbing.

 

The GRP: External Factors

 

Exogenous factors also played a role: The Philippine government did have pressure from ASEAN and the U.S. to resolve the conflict. More importantly was the country’s changing security landscape and the recognition that for the first time, the greater threat to the state emanated from external threats. With China’s increasingly aggressive behavior in the South China Sea, Aquino was compelled to negotiate an end to the insurgency so that he could dedicate the country’s limited defense resources on external threats. And he tried to deal with the moral hazard issue by offering the AFP the potential of more funding, not less, were the insurgency to be resolved.

 

President Aquino, in 2011, announced plans to allocate more resources to upgrading the military by establishing the AFP Modernization Act Trust Fund, and reaffirmed them in the 2012 Revised Modernization Program. In May 2013, President Aquino announced a $1.8-billion military modernization program; these funds were in addition to the normal defense budget, which largely goes to pay personnel costs. This money was earmarked for new equipment that would help protect the archipelagic country’s maritime domain. Philippine defense expenditures have risen marginally to $2.9 billion in 2012 from $2.3 billion in 2009, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. For the most part, the Philippines continues to rely on U.S. military assistance, subsidized sales, and hand-me-downs from Japan and Korea.

 

The Mindanao Peace Process

 

On 15 October the GRP and MILF signed the Framework Agreement, which created a roadmap and institutions, to lead to a final peace agreement. The Framework agreement established the Bangsamoro Transition Commission which negotiated four separate annexes and drafted the Bangsamoro Basic Law that the President submitted to congress in September 2014. The Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro was signed on 27 March 2014. The GRP-MILF peace process is far too complex to explain here. So I will focus on 10 key factors that have made the peace process in Mindanao successful.

 

1. Both sides reached the obvious conclusion: there was nothing more to be gained from fighting. Neither side could win militarily, and the battlefield stalemate was too costly and counterproductive. Indeed, on the MILF’s side there was a recognition that fighting had become counter-productive. 

 

2. Mechanisms to make the MILF feel like an equal partner were established. This included the Coordinating Committee for the Cessation of Hostilities (CCCH), which investigated almost every violation of the ceasefire, with equal representation from the two sides. Without it, there never would have been sufficient trust to keep the peace process moving forward. Later the Ad Hoc Joint Action Group (ADJAC) was established to investigate violence and criminality, including kidnapping. Since a lot of the lawlessness was being perpetrated by MILF combatants, this mechanism allowed the MILF to save face by quietly resolving the conflict internally, while developing their own capabilities at internal policing.

 

3. Third party involvement at every stage of the peace process was essential and welcome by both parties. Malaysia’s mediation was absolutely critical. Other countries, including Indonesia, Libya, and Brunei also played a role. The offer of multi- and bi-lateral assistance was also important, in everything from economic rehabilitation to human resource development to transitional justice. NGOs including Henri Dunant Center and the U.S. Institute of Peace also helped bridge some of the divide and provided frameworks and models for autonomy or details on technical provisions for a peace process. The Asia Foundation continues to play a paramount role during the entire peace process as an invited outside monitor, and is formally a member of the International Monitoring Team. The Konrad Adenauer Foundation has been active in developing the MILF’s political party. The Malaysian-led peace monitoring team (IMT) was really small (it should have been larger) but it played a role in building confidence as the costs of cease fire violations became much higher in the presence of outside monitors. The IMT also included members from Japan, Brunei, and Libya, further securing their commitment to the peace process. Finally, following the signing of the CAB, third party peace implementation agreement monitors, external members of the arms decommissioning team, and a transitional justice mechanism were established. Neither the Philippines nor the MILF saw the inclusion of third parties, including foreigners, as a violation of their sovereignty.

 

4. Although the MILF did not get their independent homeland, and indeed, their autonomous region was not as large as they had hoped, they received formal and legal recognition of their Bangsamoro “Ancestral Domain.” In effect, they got the moral satisfaction that they had rights to the land and were wronged. This was further codified with the transitional justice mechanism.

 

5. The Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro creates a true devolution of powers. The Annex on Power Sharing (8 December 2013), established an entirely new parliamentary system of government for the Bangsamoro, and outlined the power, functions, and responsibilities of the central government and the Bangsamoro, respectively. It gives the Bangsamoro legislative, legal, and fiscal autonomy. This required a lot of legal/bureaucratic negotiations in order to synch the two systems. This has not been easy, and there is still a long way to go, but it was a creative solution to a complex problem.

 

6. The MILF received significant control over its natural resources: 75 percent of subterranean mineral wealth. The two sides concluded an agreement on the “Addendum on Bangsamoro Waters” that demarcated the authority and wealth-sharing on the waters that surround the future Bangsamoro territories. The MILF will receive 100 percent of revenue from subterranean resources (sand, gravel, etc.). Although the MILF relinquishes some wealth to the central government, they get it back through block grants.

 

7. The Sharia: Much of the Moro struggle was about defending Moro culture and religion. So a key demand of theirs was the formal establishment of a parallel sharia court system to be applied to the Muslim community. There is still a lot of concern and details to work out about how the sharia courts will work with the national legal system (i.e. can the Supreme Court overturn a Sharia court decision? or what happens in a case involving a Muslim and a Christian?). This is not going to be easy to implement, but it was an essential concession for the government to make.

 

8. Disarmament, Demobilization & Rehabilitation (DDR). The MILF conceded that they will have to put their weaponry beyond use. The two sides have a road map to phase in decommissioning as certain benchmarks in the peace process’ implementation are met. There will be the ceremonial decommissioning of heavy weapons in December 2014 with other phased in as the Bangsamoro Basic Law is passed and the plebiscite conducted. Small arms will still be allowed, which has raised alarm amongst critics of the peace process. The DDR process will be monitored by the International Disarmament Board, comprised of members from both sides as well as a group of third country nationals.

 

9. There was broad public buy-in through the involvement of civil society. Especially after the CAB was signed, there was active engagement with the public, directly, through workshops, public forums, congressional hearings (often in Mindanao) and social media. The Institute for Autonomy and Governance and the Asia Foundation, along with the Office of the Presidential Advisor on the Peace Process held dozens of community meetings and workshops to answer questions and to stop the spread of disinformation. Journalists played a key role in furthering the peace process. Finally, inclusion into the Bangsamoro will be done through a plebiscite.

 

10. None of these would have been possible without the true statesmanship demonstrated by both President Aquino and Chairman Murad. Both men had to make enormous concessions, successfully sell them to their constituencies, neutralize spoilers, and spend all of their political capital to see through the peace process. Both men, put their careers and reputations on the line. They were willing to think outside the box and not be trapped by old paradigms and institutional dogma. This was more than political leadership, it was truly statesmanship.

 

There is still a lot that can go wrong. Congress may not pass the Bangsamoro Basic Law, or demand so many amendments that we are back to square one. The MNLF is not on board, and is likely to be a spoiler in the peace process despite recent OIC attempts to unify the two groups. The plebiscite could go very badly for the MILF. The MILF has only limited experience in governing and providing social services and it has a real shortage of human capital. There is not enough money set aside for DDR in a land of high levels of unemployment, lawlessness, clan wars, and a deeply embedded gun culture. There are hard-line spoilers on both sides who would love to thwart the peace process. And yet, the peace process is still likely to succeed, because the costs of failure are just too great.

 

Lessons for Thailand

 

When looking at what made the peace process in Mindanao successful, the reality is almost none of this is present in Thailand today. While there are some back channel talks on going, formal talks have been suspended since mid-2014. The resumption of talks seems more like a cynical ploy on the part of Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha and the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO) than a genuine desire to end the insurgency. It is part of an overarching narrative that the coup was mounted to move the country forward from a political stasis, yet everything must be resolved on the military’s terms. Very few of the internal and external factors that drove both the MILF and GRP to the table are currently present in Thailand. And it is really hard to see any of the key components that has made the Mindanao peace process successful being accepted in southern Thailand in the near future.

 

A) Internal Factors

 

Neither the Thai security forces nor the insurgents believe that the utility of force has been exhausted; indeed both sides seem to believe that there is more to be gained by fighting than talking and that they have not yet set the battlefield for negotiations. Both sides are achieving their short-term goals: insurgents have sown mistrust towards the Thai state, driven large number of Buddhists out of the region, hampered the provision of social services, and made large parts of the south ungoverned space. Perhaps this is changing, as violence in the past several months has fallen dramatically, though it is not clear if this is due to the insurgents’ degraded capabilities, or it is simply a tactical lull. Based on a number of interviews recently conducted in the south, I believe it is the latter. In recent interviews with people associated with the insurgency, all believed that violence has to go up for the government to come back to the table. The military still seems to believe that the insurgents can be effectively degraded and divided to the point that few concessions will be necessary. And there is a fear that in the post-coup environment, the security forces can operate even more aggressively and with total impunity. The military has consolidated power in the south, weakening civilian institutions such as SBPAC or running much of development assistance through ISOC, in the name of national security.

 

There is no financial pressure to settle the agreement. For the militants, the insurgency is as low cost as it gets: IEDs are largely made from stolen cooking gas cylinders or fire extinguishers and ammonium nitrate. Small arms and ammunition are stolen or taken from victims. On the Thai side, the military has dedicated only a small fraction of its budget to the insurgency. Between 2004 and 2013, the government claims to have spent Bt200 billion in the south. Moreover, the NCPO raised the 2015 defense budget to 193 billion baht ($6 billion), representing a five percent increase in spending during 2014. Combating the insurgency is small change for the government. While events such as the 25 July bombing in Betong, Yala did inordinate damage to local tourism and other services, the pain remains localized in a region the junta takes for granted due to their long history of support for the Democrat Party.

 

While there is a growing sense of war wariness in the deep south, it has not reached a critical mass that is compelling either side to negotiate. There is some pressure from the local community. The four rounds of talks held in 2013, though they did little to end the violence, were widely supported by the public. This was borne out in public opinion polling. An April 2013 poll found that 67 percent supported peace talks. Even as talks stalled in June 2013, 54 percent of the respondents wanted talks to continue. Moreover, while the talks were under way, insurgents actually reduced attacks on civilians, though they did continue to attack security forces.

 

Indeed, I am constantly struck by how the residents of the south have learned to live with the violence, what I term, the “new normal.” As long as the majority of violence is directed at security forces or against perceived legitimate targets such as informants and is largely away from urban population centers, there will not be a critical mass compel either side to negotiate.

 

In the Philippines, the military was largely hostile to the peace process, culminating in 2007 when they pulled their support for the draft peace agreement. They came around, in large part due to growing external threats. But Thailand faces no external threats. Malaysia, Laos, and Cambodia pose no threat to Thailand, while Myanmar is in the thralls of reform and can ill-afford any conflict. With no external threat, the RTA can continue to be preoccupied with internal threats and politics.

 

There is also no consensus about the peace process amongst the insurgents. This is not to say that the MILF was unified, it wasn’t. But Murad and the majority of the MILF leadership and field commanders were able to fend off challenges from hardliners who later broke off and founded the fringe Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Front.   But it is hard to see the insurgents in southern Thailand coming together: there are at least five different groups and factions thereof. While the MILF had some hierarchy, the Thai insurgent groups are very horizontal with far more autonomy than MILF units. There is intense rivalry amongst the insurgent groups over leadership of the movement, which could explain their disorganized negotiating stance, such as their five retroactive preconditions issued in April 2013. The BRN, BIPP, Pulo, New-Pulo and the GMIP all want to be seen as the vanguard for the Pattani Malay. Some groups might hope that attending talks confers a degree of international support and legitimacy, thereby neutralizing rival organizations.

 

B) External Factors

 

Malaysia has facilitated the peace process, though it has not been asked to mediate the peace process. It clearly does have an interest in what happens in the three Malay-dominated provinces of southern Thailand: IEDs are going off a mere 500 miles from Kuala Lumpur, and security officials have to be concerned about potential blow back. Malaysian authorities have arrested Thai insurgents on their soil. But they are clearly fearful of either pushing the insurgents too hard or cracking down on their operations. Malaysia’s role is fundamentally different than in Mindanao. In part this is because Kuala Lumpur’s leverage over Bangkok is much less than their leverage over Manila. Thailand was able to take advantage of their close ties with Kuala Lumpur during Malaysia’s presidency of the OIC and effectively neutralized the grouping from making a larger issue of the insurgency. Likewise, Jakarta has offered some assistance, but not pushed Bangkok hard on the issue. The west seems unconcerned. While the Philippines is still labeled as a terror hotspot with requisite travel warnings, Thailand barely registers. In part, it is because there has only been one westerner killed in the deep south since 2004, and the insurgency has stayed contained in the south. Although the insurgents planted a large bomb in Phuket in December 2013, it was meant as a message; it did not have to be detonated. The rare attacks in Hat Yai are enough to get Bangkok’s attention without garnering negative attention from the international community. That was not the case in Mindanao, where insurgents frequently engaged in terrorism in Davao or Manila. In the littany of grievances the international community might have against Thailand, today, the insurgency is a low priority. There is no significant bi- or multilateral funding on offer.

 

C) Concessions?

 

Beyond those internal and external factors, it is hard to see either the Thai or insurgent side making the hard concessions that would make a peace process successful and durable; certainly not in the near or medium term.

 

The military-controlled government will countenance no third party involvement. They cannot accept anything that infringes upon their sovereignty, though no peace process has been successful without some degree of external, third party peace monitoring. Malaysian involvement will be limited to setting up meetings. The Thai side does not believe the Malaysians are truly honest brokers. Foreign NGOs are largely mistrusted by the junta.

 

At a time when the military-backed government is consolidating power in Bangkok, any devolution of power seems far-fetched. The interim charter lays out nine principles that the permanent constitution must endorse, the first of which is that the Kingdom is one and indivisible. The Thai state will be unitary and inviolable which precludes any type of political autonomy or devolution of powers, however limited. The National Reconciliation Committee’s chief was clear: “The new charter must reflect traditional pillars of Thai society,” i.e., the monarchy, the military and Buddhism.

 

Beyond that, the junta’s track record since the 22 May coup has been completely uncompromising. Why should we expect the NCPO to make any concessions on an issue that the army has thwarted civilian leaders from making over the past 10 years? While many attribute the stalling of the peace process to the political gridlock in Bangkok last year, talks had largely come to a standstill because of the army’s opposition to the Barisan Revolusi Nasional’s five demands. The military has refused implementation of most concessions, such as the use of the Malay language as well as other modest reforms.

 

In Mindanao the peace process entailed a general amnesty. Though the government has arrested some MILF combatants, it’s done so largely in consultation with the MILF. In Thailand, the military has refused to implement a general amnesty. In 2007-10 there were proposed amnesties but they were so highly conditioned that few insurgents trusted them. The military rejected outright the BRN’s April 2013 demand for a release of everyone detained on security-related charges. Since the coup, the prospect of an amnesty seems even dimmer.

 

The appointment of Gen Akanit Muansawat to head the talks is another case in point. A long-time critic of the talks but an adviser to the NCPO, he is deemed completely unacceptable by the BRN, the largest of the insurgent groups, due to his condescending attitude and previous hostility to peace talks. And yet, Prime Minister Prayuth trusts him.

 

There is nothing the NCPO will negotiate or concede that will satisfy the insurgents. Autonomy is not on the table. The withdrawal of more security forces is unacceptable, increasing accountability and ending the security forces’ culture of impunity will not happen in the current political situation. If anything, the military really seems to be here for the long haul. There are more troops and rangers deployed cross the south and they are operating more aggressively and with fewer constraints.

 

Nor is there any political pressure on the junta to make concessions. With the National Legislative Assembly firmly in the military’s hands and one-third of the cabinet directly controlled by them (including all of the key ministries responsible for security), let alone a “super cabinet” of the expanded NCPO, they are under no political pressure to make concessions. Democracy is suspended, so even if there were popular pressure for a durable peace process, it cannot be manifested.

 

Thais remain largely prejudiced towards the Muslims of the south and still believe that the Muslims are the only minority group that has really failed to assimilate into Thai society. They will not accept any responsibility for what the Malay believe to be historical wrongs. They will never accept the concept of a Pattani “ancestral domain.” The BRN included the recognition of the “rights of the Malayu Pattani peoples to Pattani land” in their April 2013 demands; this was rejected outright by the RTA. The government is likewise unwilling to meet the BRN’s demand that it be deemed a “liberation movement” rather than a “secessionist group”, as the former suggests that they have legitimate grievances and that they are under occupation.

 

Likewise, it seems unreasonable to countenance the establishment of a transitional justice mechanism to investigate human rights abuses committed by the military which has operated under a culture of impunity since 2004. The government has rarely waived immunity for its troops except in the most egregious cases, and done little to investigate allegations of abuse, including the National Human Rights Commission’s findings that 75 percent of torture complaints were filed in the south between 2007-2013. The role of civil society and journalists has been hampered, especially since the 2014 coup, but even before with extra judicial killings (EJKs) and disappearances of activists. Malay Muslim civil society activists whom I have interviewed have all experienced routine harassment, threats, raids, and arrests.

 

Even smaller concessions seem unfathomable. The Thai government will never cede control over mineral wealth nor allow a formal and legal Sharia court system. The Thai government will barely allow Malayu to be used in schools or officialdom. Few government officials, almost all of whom are Thai, speak Malayu. To wit, recently a police station was singled out and lauded for having signs in Malayu. Why is this the exception and not the rule? While there are fewer soldiers in the south, they have been replaced with rangers, village defense volunteers and the police, all of whom have spotty human rights records. In all, there are some 150,000 security forces in the south, including 50,000 soldiers and police.

 

That is not to say that talks should not be held. They should. The two sides do need to exchange views and get their positions and parameters on the table. But they should begin with secret back channel talks out of the limelight. A peace process is a long term project and the two sides have to start somewhere. And there are still incentives for talking. The insurgents will show up because the Malaysians are making them, and for fear that they will be outmaneuvered by rivals.

 

So what can be gained from the talks from the government side? Again there is some public pressure. The NCPO can only claim that resolving the south is a priority without actually doing anything for so long. There is intelligence value in seeing who comes, who doesn’t attend, and what their positions are. More importantly, for the government, the costs of appearing to negotiate are low; they know they are not going to actually make any concessions or do something that hurts. It lets the NCPO demonstrate to the Pattani Malay they are sincere without making any hard concessions. The NCPO will then show that continued attacks against them demonstrate the insurgents’ lack of sincerity or inability to exercise any command and control to justify canceling or scaling back talks until it is politically convenient to restart them.

 

Moreover, after plateauing for several years, violence is starting to come down. And for that reason alone, the NCPO may be more confident in its unwillingness to make concessions. While the government takes credit for the decline in violence, it is hard to attribute it to any policy shift or specific actions by security forces. More likely, the downward shift reflects the tactical shifts, limited resources and operating environment faced by the insurgents. As such, it could spike again. And as long as insurgents aren’t losing, they’re winning. They have driven out large numbers of Buddhists, especially from the countryside, forced cutbacks in social services, and made large areas of the deep south ungoverned space. And with no political offer on the table, they will continue to do just that.

 

There is nothing harder than a peace process following a protracted conflict. It requires statesmanship, bold decisions, major concessions, a recognition that nothing more is to be gained from fighting, an acceptance of external actors, new ways of thinking about problems, and a lot of political capital. It took decades for these to come together in the Philippines. It is not to say that they can’t in Thailand, but a lot has to change beforehand.   More than anything, there has to be a change in the Thai government’s position that peace is simply the absence of violence. It is about a durable political solution, addressing historical grievances and social justice. The Philippines shows that it can be done, though it takes a lot of political courage and a willingness to adopt creative solutions.

 

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