| This study examines the modernization of military education in Thailand from 1887 to 1948 with an emphasis on the development of Chulachomklao Royal Military Academy, the first and the most significant military school in Thai history.;Military expansion had been a chief concern of both the absolute and constitutional regimes. Concerned about the threat of Western imperialism, King Chulalongkorn sought to organize the army and military education in European fashion. The modernized army was designed to be a deterrence against external aggression and a device to keep the order and integrity of the country. Afraid of possible European military intervention, the Thai government avoided the employment of Western military men. The advance of military education largely depended on the ability of the Thai military educators themselves, a matter of national pride.;Since the reform in the 1880s, military education, which was traditionally Indianized and varied in the hands of private instructors, had been one authorized system under the government control. Before the adoption of the West Point model in 1948, the military academy did not copy any particular European cadet school. In the 1920s, the German influence was dominant in the military school, but it declined in the early 1930s. After the 1932 Revolution, the French system of military technical schooling was introduced into the academy.;Prior to the expansion of the army in the 1900s, the school relied on the nobility as its sole recruitment base. But the increasing demand for officers forced the school to open also to commoners. Still, minority groups such as the Chinese were not allowed to attend the military school.;In the first part of the twentieth century, graduates of Chulachomklao Royal Military Academy were not only the professional army officers but also the elites of the society. The curriculum and the instruction of the military academy during that time stirred up the political consciousness of the cadets and prepared them to be supporters of progressive changes in the 1930s. |
