The demonization of Thaksin Shinawatra as a uniquely dangerous supervillain — when in fact he was just an unusually effective and typically corrupt political godfather — channelled decades of fear and loathing for Vajiralongkorn. The elite recognized that an alliance of Thaksin and the crown prince posed an existential threat to their political dominance, and this was the reason for their bloodurdling millenarian rhetoric warning that the world was coming to an end.