The Internal Security Operations Command (ISOC), since the end of the Cold War, has been used mostly for political purposes, to protect and perpetuate the power of the Thai military and establishment elite rather than for internal security.
Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin recently rejected a proposal by the opposition Move Forward Party to scrap the ISOC. The PM argued that the ruling Pheu Thai Party had made no policy pledge to scrap the military-dominated agency.
“Dissolving the ISOC was never a part of the Pheu Thai Party’s policy, neither before, during, nor after the election. This fact is reinforced by the policy declaration I made to Parliament,” Srettha said on his social media platform X (formerly Twitter) on November 4. He was responding to an accusation by a Move Forward MP that his government was maintaining the agency to please the military.
Srettha said his…
