The Wild Tigers The Pageant of Wild Tiger Traditions was an elaborate anatr lasting for three days 3 and 5. The pageant was however, to the King in honor of his birthday fact of the King was the chief stager, organizer Master indeed, as he was formally designated of the Pageant." other top officers of government were called to lend their special talents: Prince Damron Min of the Interior, was historical assistant: Prince Paribatra. the Minister of Marine, was musical dir s: The pageant, held outdoors on the Wild Tiger drill field, lived up to its advance billing as "a magnificent spectacle." said a foreign observer of the players ith their excellent scenic arrangements t gave a good idea of the history of Siam from the earliest times to the present day. The costumes were historically correct, and no pains had been spared to make the ormances as realistic as possible. Nor were battle elephants wanting richly hung with costly trappings and jewelled ornaments.s3 The pageant announcement made it clear that the King's concept of Wild Tiger tradition was as broad as the country itself, "since the Wild Tigers of old were the makers of Siamese history. Altogether nine historic episodes were enacted, and the last episode on the last night was followed by the trooping of the colors and the singing of a patriotic song, "Love of our Race and our Fathers Land There were other not-so-formal social activities of corps members during the initial year. A cryptic newspaper item told of at least one His Majesty the King took part in two plays at Phrapatom last week, when a number of members of the Wild Tigers comprised the audience. In addition to discipline, drill, and social diversion, which were year-long corps activities, members were expected to make a con erted effort to attend and fully participate in annual military ma neuvers. In the first year of corps history, these maneuvers were hel in stages from January 20 to March 2, 1912. The center of the ma neuvers was Nakhon Pathom (about thirty-six miles west of Bangkok) winter palace theater, parade grounds, where the King had built and Wild Tiger clubhouse The purposes of these maneuvers, in addition to the obvious aim of preparing the Tigers to play their role of supporting the army in were succinctly spelled out by the King." First, par time of war ticipation in war games would heighten civilian appreciation of the The Wild Tigers Thai soldiery, would convince civi ans that soldiers' duties were onerous and required endurance. Such appreciation would lead to greater harmony between civilian Second, the and hardships experienced in the war would bring servants closer together. Instead of just meeting in their official es, in which true characters are masked, real bonds of sym pathy, understanding, and trust would emerge from the fellowship that field exercises would elicit. Third, war games would bring out the true man in each person, the man who had faced adversity and trial, who had endured them rather than be shamed before others and who in the end would take pride in his achievement and so become a better person and worker for it The essential format of the war games was simple. One contingent of Tigers was designated the defender: the other, the aggressor. A neutral party judged each action and issued a final report on who won and why. The first engagement took place on January 20 and at Nakhon Pathom between two of the Bangkok companies, one designated the red team and the other the green. The green team acting as aggressor. was defeated by the red, whose second-in command was the King A much larger exercise was conducted between February 2 and 6, when various provincial units were added to the Bangkok com panies. All in all, almost two thousand people were involved. The importance the King gave to these maneuvers can be judged from the fact that a special royal request was sent to every government ministry for the release of all men who could be spared." The response was good: for example, Prince Devawongse of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs released twenty-nine of his staff and kept only ten in Bang kok 60 In those maneuvers the yellow team, defending Nakhon Pathom, was headed by the Minister of Local Government, Chao- phraya Yommarat; the red team, attacking from Ban Pong, was headed by the King. After four days, the red team was declared the winner and the exercises came to an end.6 In subsequent weekends through February, maneuvers of smaller scale took place. On February 10 a unit of Royal Tigers led by the King attacked the bungalow of Prince Damrong, defended by the a local Tiger unit. A newspaper reported that the issue Prince a was somewhat indeterminate, but the Prince would have appeared to have escaped any serious injury since he was seen out motoring the following afternoon on subsequent weekends, maneuvers were held at Nakhon Pathom and at Hua Hin.63 The King appears to