Political Brinkmanship (by Theary C. Seng)

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Theary C. Seng (Photo: Roland Neveu, Dec. 2009)

Political Brinkmanship

Political brinkmanship...Within recent hours, Hun Sen has been emboldened by China's congratulations of his premature win and its fresh supply of arms, and there are talks that he is arming the CPP youth wing.

Hun Sen is playing a very dangerous game of chicken where he and the CPP have the most to lose.

For 2013 is not 1997.  Hun Sen and the CPP know this -- particularly Hun Manet and his generation who were only teenagers in the late 1990s and since have enjoyed the spoils of elite education in the States, travels around the world, particularly to the US, Canada, and Europe, and real estate amassed in Phnom Penh, the countryside, and overseas, including the US -- and they think no one else knows this?

They not only have these material plunders to lose, but also their ability to clean and clear their reputation from their bloody blood ties, the sins of their fathers (and mothers -- think acid attacks and Piseth Pilaka).

And they risk the International Criminal Court which could not retroactively try the crimes of 1997, but has the jurisdiction to try mass crimes after July 2002.  It can be argued that they can limit the violence so that it does not lead into ICC jurisdiction.  But, one, no one can contain or predict the boundary of mass protests.  And, two, international law is in flux and the crimes are not neatly defined with figures of limiting culpability.

Also, the CPP is not monolithic as it wants the public to believe.  Many times in recent years, we the public are given glimpses into the schism within the party, despite its effort at discipline through fear and patronage.  There are many CPP, both of the new and old generations, who are no longer of the falsetto communistic "everyone's equal, but some more than others" mentality.  These falsetto communists have become more capitalistic in their greed than the traditional ones -- unrestrained greed which have made them fabulously wealthy.

Their voracious appetite in 2013 is more risk-averse than in 1997; they will be extremely reluctant to risk this lifestyle which they have been accustomed to with violence that could come with a confrontation with the mass.  A mass that feels greatly aggrieved -- not only by the gross cheating and stunningly audacious fraud of the elections, but by the violations accumulated over the years.

It can be argued that they may risk the violence to losing the election which also poses great risks for them.

Yes, but the issue is balancing of risks.  The risk of violence which cannot be contained and predicted is more immediate and clear, whereas an election loss may ultimately be the way to salvage their spoils (see below my offer of an Exit Strategy to the CPP).

As I've stated even before election day, it will be suicide on all fronts for the CPP, especially the new generation, should they corner themselves into a political impasse forcing a mass demonstration.

The violence will be attributed to them, not the CNRP, as the CNRP has always been for peaceful resolution, does not possess weapons, does not employ fear.

- Theary C. Seng, 2 Aug. 2013 afternoon

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