Gazelles and butterflies
The valedictory despatch of Sir Anthony Rumbold, after two years as British ambassador in Bangkok, that infuriated the Thais 42 years later
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“Ever since I was first posted to Thailand 30 years ago, I have been impressed by the richness of Thai culture, be it art, sculpture, dance, music or literature,” declared British ambassador Quinton Quayle in an unusual statement from the embassy in October 2009. “All this is embellished by the natural beauty of the landscape and the charm and warmth of the Thai people.”
The reason for this effusve praise of Thailand was that a despatch from 42 years before, in which a previous ambassador had been much less complimentary about the kingdom, had been rediscovered, causing a minor diplomatic incident.
The man who had caused the kerfuffle was aristocratic envoy Sir Anthony Rumbold.
In March 1965, The London Gazette published an announcement that Sir Horace Anthony Claude Rumbold, 10th baronet of the Rumbold dynasty — to give him his full name and title — had been appointed “Her Majesty’s Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary at Bangkok” with effect from December 21, 1964.
Rumbold was a career diplomat who first joined the foreign service in 1935. In 1937, he married his first wife Felicity. The best man at the wedding was his close friend Donald McLean, who was exposed as a Soviet spy in May 1951 when he fled to Moscow with fellow agent Guy Burgess. This led to suspicion that Rumbold was the so-called “fifth man” in the Soviet spy ring known as the Cambridge Five, who has never been conclusively identified. But no evidence was ever found to incriminate him.
Rumbold was principal private secretary to British foreign minister Anthony Eden in 1954 and 1955. He accompanied Eden and the prime minister, Winston Churchill, on a trip to Washington in June 1954 for talks with President Dwight D. Eisenhower. When Eden succeeded Churchill as prime minister in April 1955, Rumbold became principal private secretary to the new foreign minister, Harold McMillan.
In 1960 he became minister at the British embassy in Paris — second in command after the ambassador. After that came his posting to Thailand.
This was an era in which almost all senior members of the British foreign service were men who had been educated at Eton College and the University of Oxford. Rumbold was a typical example, schooled at Eton and then getting a degree from Magdalen College, Oxford. Britain remained a class-ridden society in which the elite had highly condescending attitudes towards foreigners.
Rumbold was born in 1911, an era when most British believed theirs was the most powerful nation on earth, and this conditioned the attitudes of his generation. Even in the 1960s when Britain’s global clout was in chronic decline, archaic attitudes still prevailed among the upper classes. All of which helps explain the highly prejudiced and chauvenistic diplomatic despatch Rumbold sent to foreign minister George Brown and the Foreign Office in London on July 13, 1967.
For centuries, until the practice was stopped on the orders of the government in 2006, there was a tradition in the British foreign service for ambassadors about to depart their posting in a country to write a so-called valedictory despatch, in which they threw all diplomatic niceties to the wind and gave their uncensored opinions on the nation they were leaving. Most ambassadors, many of whom liked to consider themselves superb prose stylists, devoted a great deal of time and thought to their valedictory despatches. The ability to write a compelling final despatch was a status symbol for senior diplomats.
As Christopher Meyer, who was ambassador to Berlin and then Washington, wrote in The Telegraph in 2015:
In the good old days of Her Majesty’s Diplomatic Service, it was the custom for ambassadors to write a valedictory despatch at the end of their posting. In contrast to the rather utilitarian style of daily diplomatic reporting, ambassadors were expected to spread their wings a little with candid comment on the country in which their service was coming to an end, larded, where the wit was willing, with humorously pungent observations on the character of the local population. Though always addressed to the foreign secretary personally, the best of the despatches were widely distributed throughout the diplomatic service for the enlightenment and amusement of its members.
A Valedictory Despatch gained an added dimension when an ambassador was not just leaving his or her post, but was retiring from the Diplomatic Service. This would give envoys the chance to comment on their entire careers, 30 years or more, with the same candour and wit.
As you may imagine, these were usually pretty sensitive. They were very definitely not intended for public consumption. They could give serious offence to any number of countries if their contents became known outside the portals of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
According to Chris Patton, the last British governor of Hong Kong until it returned to Chinese rule in 1997:
I thought it was a splendid tradition. It’s impotant to remeber that the final telegram from an ambassador at the end of his career represents the mountain top in this cultural exercise.
Often, however, valedictory despatches tended to be an excuse to unleash prejudiced stereotypes about a country and its people. They also tended to be rather grandiloquent and overwrought — Denis McShane, who was a Foreign Office minister between 2001 and 2005, likened ambassadorial despatches to the essays applicants have to write in the savagely competitive process to secure a fellowship at the fearsomely intellectual All Souls College in Oxford:
The days when, once a week, an ambassador would go into a darkened room and write an essay as if they were competing for a fellowship at All Souls are gone.
There are plenty of jaw-dropping comments in valedictory despatches. Robert Tesh, outgoing ambassador to Vietnam, wrote his final despatch in March 1978:
After four years in Hanoi I shall be overjoyed to leave. Of the six European Community missions here, four live, and three have their offices, in rat-infested hotels…
In the face of fact, few Vietnamese will lose face, admit they are wrong, or use common sense…
They leave everything to the last moment, then blandly rely on outsiders to extricate them from their own mess. They are infinitely charming and will give ten different reasons for not doing something which they have for months said they wanted to do and over which one has gone to endless trouble. After months of silence they will demand immediate and almost impossible action. Most things get done, somehow or other, at the expense of the nerves of others. That is why most foreigners in Vietnam, diplomats or not, are on the verge of insanity.
Malcolm Walker, ambassador to Liberia, June 1967
I have with regret to record that many of the people, particularly the women, are arrogant and ill-mannered… I think it would be difficult to fall in love with the country or its people
Roger Pinsent, ambassador to Nicaragua, June 1967:
There is, I fear, no question but that the average Nicaraguan is one of the most dishonest, unreliable, violent and alcoholic of the Latin Americans — and after nearly 21 years of Latin American experience I feel I can speak with some authority on this subject.
Sir David Hunt, high commissioner to Nigeria, May 1969:
The Nigerians certainly deserve a happy and united future after all they have gone through. I have a great affection for them because they are generally cheerful and friendly in spite of their maddening habit of always choosing the course of action which will do the maximum damage to their own interests. They are not singular in this: Africans as a whole are not only not averse to cutting off their nose to spite their face; they regard such an operation as a triumph of cosmetic surgery. But at least they usually make their blunders with an engaging air.
Reykjavik ambassador Aubrey Halford-McLeod on Icelanders in August 1970:
It is true that, alongside their many positive sterling virtues, [Icelanders] suffer from strong xenophobic tendencies, are grasping and opportunist, unjustifiably conceited and ashamedly suppliant in the same breath. They are not a comfortable people to handle and there is probably little we can do to change them.
Helsinki ambassador Sir Bernard Ledwidge in October 1972:
It could plausibly be argued that it is a misfortune for anybody but a Finn to spend three years in Finland, as I have just done. Even the Finns who can afford it are happy to make frequent escapes to sunnier climes. Finland is flat, freezing, and far from the pulsating centres of European life. Nature has done little for her and art not much more. Until yesterday the country was inhabited only by peasants, foresters, fishermen and a small class of alien rulers who spent most of their money elsewhere… Finnish cooking deserves a sentence to itself for its crude horror; only the mushrooms and the crayfish merit attention.
Jakarta ambassador Sir John Ford, February 1978:
Like the Balinese volcano Gunung Agung which bottles up its energy until the pent-up force within breaks out, so within the Javanese it seems as if a natural tendency towards violence is pent-up; cruelty is ever near the surface; and all hell breaks loose when restraints collapse. There is something particularly repulsive about the propensity to cold cruelty of the Indonesian.
But even by these standards, the valedictory despatch from Sir Anthony Rumbold on Thailand was particularly withering.
The summary at the start of the despatch already sets the tone:
The Thais are as difficult to understand as other orientals. (Paragraph 1.)
The domination of Bangkok. (Paragraph 2.)
General contentment and lethargy. (Paragraph 3.)
The rigid structure of society and the rules which govern it. Unwillingness to assume responsibility and endemic corruption. (Paragraphs 4-6.)
The country is governed by a benevolent dictatorship without a dictator. A description of some of the leading personalities. (Paragraphs 7-11.)
If there are constitutional developments it will be because the Thais like to be thought up to date. (Paragraph 12.)
Boom conditions and prospects of indefinite economic progress. (Paragraph 13.)
Importance of not over-estimating the terrorist movement in the north-east. (Paragraph 14.)
The Thais are afraid of China and although they do not like to be dependent on foreigners they will tolerate the American presence as long as they feel that it keeps danger at a distance. If the Americans let go in Viet-Nam the Thais might change course. There is not likely to be a sudden revulsion against the Americans. (Paragraphs 15-16.)
Our stake in Thailand is the same as that of other West European countries. Our membership of SEATO makes no difference. Our export performance could be better. (Paragraph 17.)
The Thai tradition of sending children to England to be educated gives us a certain advantage. The best way we can help the Thais is In the field of education. (Paragraph 18.)
The pleasures of living in Thailand, the virtues of the Thais and a tribute to the Embassy staff. (Paragraphs 19-20.)
Rumbold began his despatch by diving headfirst into the tired stereotype that Thais — and all Asians — are inscrutable, and rational Westerners will never be able to understand “oriental people”:
There is a theory that the Thais are rather easier for Europeans to understand than are other oriental people. I do not believe this theory. It seems to me that Sino/Indian/Malay/Thai ways of thought are so alien to ours that analogies between events in South-East Asia and events in Europe are nearly always misleading, that forecasts based on such analogies are bound to be wrong, that the motives of Asians are impossible for us to estimate with any exactness, and that Thailand and the Thais offer no exception. to these precepts.
He then pivoted to casually insulting the intelligence of the vast majority of the Thai population:
The general level of intelligence of the Thais is rather low, a good deal lower than ours and much lower than that of the Chinese. But there are a few very intelligent and articulate ones and I have often tried to get some of these with whom I believe myself to be on close terms to come clean with me and to describe their national characteristics as they see them themselves and to explain why they behave in this way rather than in that way. The result has never been satisfactory. Something alwavs seems to be held back.
Rumbold was, at least, fairly accurate about the dominant position of Bangkok in the kingdom:
There is one thing that nevertheless seems to me to be quite certain and that is that Bangkok dominates Thailand in the same way in which for centuries Paris dominated France. Events outside Thailand can obviously have an effect inside the capital and in some circumstances provincial developments might have a limited influence. But all political, economic and social changes of any importance in Thailand are the result of calculations and decisions taken by men in Bangkok and reflect the development of relationships between men or groups of men in Bangkok. There are historical reasons for this. Until recently it was the King who decided everything. It was only by being attached to the King's court that anyone could hope to acquire influence or money… Bangkok sucks everything to itself. It is moreover extraordinary how little the average citizen of Bangkok knows at first hand about the rest of his country. Those who can afford to travel for pleasure go to Europe and America. Apart from occasional visits to nearby seaside resorts or to Chiengmai which has a certain snob appeal they do not dream of travelling in any other part of the country. They are simply not interested.
Rumbold lamented the transformation of Bangkok over the previous decade:
The outward aspect of Bangkok has undergone some regrettable changes during the last few years. When I caught a glimpse of it in 1955 it was a pretty place of canals and trees and scarlet-and-gold temples. It is now fast becoming one of the ugliest towns in the world, indistinguishable from the meaner parts of Tokyo or Los Angeles.
He discussed the rigidly hierarchical nature of Thai society and the culture of prostration. Although he found the practice “irritating and even repulsive” he believed it helped maintain some degree of stability in the kingdom:
The traveller Henri Mouhot described the whole of Siamese society in the mid-19th century as being in a state of permanent prostration, every inferior receiving his orders from his superior with signs of abject submission and respect. This is metaphorically still true of Bangkok and in some detail still literally true. But I would go so far as to make the unfashionable assertion that the most steadying feature in the body politic of Thailand, irritating and even repulsive though it may be, is precisely this sense of his place in society possessed and accepted by each and every individual.
He derided the “unctuous servility” towards King Bhumibol in local media:
The god-like position of the King is questioned by nobody, not even by the handful of Thai exiles who compose seditious propaganda (at least not openly). Foreigners get sickened by the unctuous servility with which the local Press reports the daily doings of His Majesty; and conversely even Europeanised Thais are quick to resent any off-hand references to the King or the Queen in the foreign Press however well intentioned these may be. Below the King, very far below him, the individuals who control the nation are ranged in their respective places each one knowing exactly how he or she stands in relation to each other. These relationships are perfectly clear to the Thais themselves and are on the whole accepted as part of the natural order of things. The foreigner must not try to unravel and define them in all their complexity because the task is too difficult. The best he can do is to try to understand the general rules by which they seem to be established.
He noted that wealth, and proximity to military power, were important factors determining status and influence:
Since the revolution of 1932 which put an end to the absolute monarchy, though scarcely affecting the veneration owed to the monarch, proximity to the source of military power has been the most important factor in assuring influence and position. In that year there was a sort of cataclysm in the Siamese universe producing a new magnetic field and setting the stars on new courses. The shock-waves are still felt to-day although their force has diminished since the death of Field-Marshal Sarit in 1963. Money is another important factor. All Thais love money and the possession of it is regarded as a sign of virtue or merit. They call it vitamin M. The amount of it and the use made of it is of more significance in their eyes than the method by which it has been acquired. Family connections are very important. Even good birth is still a factor to be reckoned with, for weight is still given to titles and honorifics and the rules of social precedence continue to be strictly regarded. Nearly all those who have handles to their names are descended from one or other or both of the great 19th century Kings, Mongkut or his son Chulalongkorn, each of whom had about 100 children.
He argued that the burueaucracy was infused with the old traditions of the royal court, which meant obsequious grovelling and corruption were ubiquitous:
…the tradition of obsequiousness which might be proper or at least understandable in a royal court has been carried over into the Civil Service. Independence of mind is frowned upon and willingness to take responsibility is firmly discouraged. But the making of money by the exploitation of official position is accepted as normal provided certain understood limits are not exceeded. This has always been so and it is natural that it should continue to be so, so long as the public service confers more prestige than do other occupations and yet remains miserably paid.
Rumbold claimed that admirable qualities like intelligence and diligence were not particularly valued in Thailand:
At the end of the list of factors which determine the rules of relationship is that collection of human qualities or assets, intelligence, good education, hard work, single-mindedness and so forth which we overselves pretend to prize. In Thailand these qualities count for a certain amount but they count for very much less than they do in Europe or America.
He was scathing about Thanat Khoman, the foreign minister, his main interloctor in the Thai government:
He is quite comfortably off and has a rich wife. He retains his position principally through the protection of the King, who began to take an interest in him a year or two ago, as well as through his unquestioned abilities. He is also on good terms with the Prime Minister. But he is vain, touchy and disputatious. Most of his colleagues in the Government dislike him for his intellectualmarrogance and because he lets everybody including themselves know that he despises them. He keeps everything to himself and is beastly to his subordinates…
He is a strong adherent of the American alliance and supporter of American policies, though his attitude towards the United States is qualified by xenophobia and the Americans find him difficult to handle. He is a vigorous promoter of all forms of regional co-operation. I think he is ambitious and would like to be Prime Minister one day and I feel fairly confident that the King sees him in this light. But without the backing of the King, and for the time being at any rate of the Prime Minister, he would soon be cast aside. There are some who think that he has already steered his country too far away from the traditional Thai policy of non-involvement for his own future good and that retribution will one day overtake him. His obsessions about liberals", about the French and about Cambodia sometimes make one wonder whether he is altogether sane. But he is not entirely repulsive. He quite likes the British, indeed he worked with us in the war, but he regrets our present weakness and our tendency to appeasement as he sees it.
Rumbold was dismissive of Prince Dhani, the president of the privy council:
Brief mention must be made of Prince Dhani, President of the Privy Council and one of the only scholars in this lowbrow country. Over 80 and of an amiability bordering on feeble-mindedness he is worth considering for what he represents. He is the guardian of arcane court lore and the regulator of royal custom and procedure.
He pointed out the contradiction that Thais “mind a great deal about what foreigners think of them, though they resent any interference by foreigners” and noted that Thai aristocrats preferred to have their children educated in England:
One of our assets here is that a large proportion of the ruling class has been educated in England. The tradition of English education goes back a long way and shows few signs of declining. The King is having his only son educated in England because he believes strongly that all Thai youth is in need of the kind of discipline which only our schools can provide. In terms of actual numbers more Thais now go to the United States than to England mainly because there is more money available for scholarships. But most Thais would send their children to England for preference. Th ey still have a touching faith in the character-building qualifications of English schools. The whole top crust is strongly marked by the imprint of the English educational tradition. At the biggest "public school" in Bangkok the boys play fives and sing "forty years on" and at luncheon with the board of the Bank of Thailand the talk is about the county cricket championship. One must accept all this without scoffing because it all helps.
He ended his despatch with a barrage of insults about the culture and character of the Thais, with a couple of compliments thrown in. Because of their gracefulness and elegance, he said, “we are elephants and oxen they are gazelles and butterflies”:
I have very much enjoyed living for a while in Thailand. One would have to be very insensitive or puritanical to take the view that the Thais had nothing to offer. It is true that they have no literature, no painting and only a very odd kind of music, that their sculpture, their ceramics and their dancing are borrowed from others and that their architecture is monotonous and their interior decoration hideous. Nobody can deny that gambling and golf are the chief pleasures of the rich and that licentiousness is the main pleasure of them all. But it does a faded European good to spend some time among such a jolly, extrovert and anti- intellectual people. And if anybody wants to know what their culture consists of the answer is that it consists of themselves, their excellent manners, their fastidious habits, their graceful gestures and their elegant persons. If we are elephants and oxen they are gazelles and butterflies. On the other hand I am glad not to be staying here longer because I am certain that the deterioration in my mental processes is due not only to the onset of old age but more particularly to the enervating effects of the climate which no amount of exercise and airconditioning can nullify.
Valedictory despatches — especially those that were insulting about a country and its people — were usually restricted to relatively few recipients. Rumbold’s despatch was coded “Q” which designated a narrow distribution channel. But the clerk’s handwriting was indistinct and when it was printed, the despatch was mistakenly given a wide “A” distribution code.
This meant that it was sent to the foreign services of more than 50 countries in the Commonwealth, including Malaysia and Singapore. The despatch became notorious among diplomats, but the issue was soon forgotten. Rumbold’s letter was declassified 30 years after it was published, in 1997, in line with standard practice, and became available for reading at the British national archives at Kew on the outskirts of London, which is where I first encountered it.
You can download and read the full despatch here:
In 2009, it was featured in a BBC podcast by British writer, broadcaster and former politician Matthew Parris, who had begun researching valedictory despatches:
This was what put Quinton Quayle in an awkward position — the podcast had drawn attention to a despatch that would otherwise have remained rarely read in the national archives. The Thais were not amused.
“My own views differ from my predecessor of 42 years ago,” Quayle, a fluent Thai speaker who was on his second diplomatic posting to Bangkok, said in his statement.
Meanwhile, Thai foreign ministry spokesman Vimon Kidchob said the government considered the matter closed, and gave only a very brief comment on Rumbold:
This is only his personal opinion based on his own prejudices, not an official one.
Rumbold moved to a new post as British ambassador to Vienna. When he retired from the foreign service, his valedictory despatch in April 1970 was almost as rude about the Austrians as he had been about the Thais:
Austrians have become steadily and uninterruptedly better off… One would have expected their success to have strengthened their patriotism and their self-confidence. But it has hardly had any such effect. On the contrary, the Austrians still talk about their country in a deprecating way. The fact of being Austrian does not particularly stir them. It is only when ski-championships are involved that they show the slightest signs of chauvinism. They do not know the words of their national anthem. Their attachments have become more and more local and the interests increasingly private …
I am afraid that the average modern Austrian only thinks about his Schnitzel and his annual holiday…
Sir Horace Anthony Claude Rumbold, 10th Rumbold baronet, died on December 4, 1983. He was 72 years old.
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it is my experience that many foreigners residing in the Kingdom have similar prejudice against the Thais, this is especially applicable to those expats who don't speak any Thai and are well-off financially