In the uncovering of mass graves and 21st-century death camps — essentially forced labour camps where the twist is that the victim's relatives must work and sell their possessions in the hope their relatives will be freed — as well as in the detection of hundreds of unregistered fishing trawlers, Thailand has a choice.
The first is to deny everything and avoid injuring vested interests and thereby potentially causing disharmony along social cleavage lines such as the military versus the police.
The second option is an onslaught on the evil that Prime Minister Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha has acknowledged lies within the system — an evil perpetuated by xenophobia.
The Thai military seems to have chosen this alternative and has initiated command and control centres to eliminate human trafficking and revolutionise the Thai fishing industry.
Thailand does not have much time. The next US Trafficking in Persons Report comes out in June.
While it may not bring immediate sanctions, the international fallout of being termed a slavery-tolerating nation necessarily has repercussions on core commercial sectors such as tourism.