普密蓬·阿杜德国王10月13日去世后，泰国进入了一个相当关键、如履薄冰的过渡期，王位将从世界上在位时间最长的国王传给王储玛哈·哇集拉隆功。王储预定于12月1日继位，但加冕典礼要等到一年之后。他父亲在过去70年统治期间获得泰国人民高度爱戴，新国王在这方面很难比肩其父，这增加了发生内部动乱的可能。因此，无论是皇位继承还是日常政务，目前都由军政府总理巴育·占奥差将军掌控，他在2014年军事政变中夺取了政权。

根据军政府颁布的新宪法，泰国很可能在2018年举行大选，选出新一届政府。不过，在大选后军方很可能继续通过某种方式控制政权。新宪法规定，议会上院的议员均由军方指定，并保留指定而非选举产生总理的可能性。圈内人预计，2018年之后巴育将作为符合宪法程序的总理继续控制泰国政治。

2014年军事政变以来，泰国变得日趋关注国内事务，外交政策有所收缩。美泰关系在此期间有所恶化。美国法律规定，民选政府被军事政变推翻之后，所有援助必须暂停发放。因此，逾400万美元本该拨付给泰国的安全援助款被推迟，每年一度的美泰“金色眼镜蛇”军事演习规模也被缩小，但所幸并未完全暂停。作为美国的长期安全盟友，这些限制令泰国军政府和巴育非常恼火。曼谷还对华盛顿批评军政府限制政治和公民自由感到不满。

两大盟友关系陷入僵局给了中国改善与泰国关系的机会，事实上两国关系在过去20年里持续发展。在北京的“一带一路”倡议中，泰国的位置非常重要：规划中旨在促进中国和东南亚贸易的南北向铁路将穿过老挝、泰国、马来西亚，最终抵达新加坡（虽然由于泰国政府认为北京目前的金融条款不太具有吸引力，因此尚未成为这一铁路的正式合作伙伴）。由于泰国和中国在南海没有领土争议，因此泰国通常不愿在中国和东南亚国家的领土纠纷中选边，这也令北京感到满意。得益于中泰2003年达成的双边自由贸易协定，中国已成为泰国最大贸易伙伴，虽然日本和美国是更重要的投资来源国。

由于军事政变后美泰关系出现裂隙，泰国和中国的安全关系大幅增进，两军如今联合展开海陆空军事演习，虽然这些演习的规模还不能和美泰军事合作相比（即便考虑到目前的种种限制）。泰国已签署协议将向中国购买三艘潜艇。在政治领域，巴育政府更倾向于不向中国异见分子提供庇护，遣返那些被联合国视为难民的中国维吾尔族人。而北京也尽量避免批评巴育政府对政治异见分子的镇压。

不过，虽然泰国、中国、美国存在复杂三角关系，但这种关系并不是零和游戏。曼谷的地区力量平衡术颇为老道——泰国人将这种颇具弹性的政策称为“竹子外交”，这令泰国在19世纪成功避免了被西方殖民的命运。泰国领导人认为，同时与北京和华盛顿维持良好关系不存在冲突，虽然他们也偶尔利用一方对付另一方。当与一方关系出现问题时，曼谷就会适度倒向另一方。此外，泰国的权力平衡术也并不总盯着中美两国。在巴育政府治下，泰国和俄罗斯的关系回暖，在英国公投“脱欧”之后，曼谷还从同时与英国和欧洲大陆增进关系中看到机遇。

在唐纳德·特朗普意外当选美国总统之后，曼谷可能开始改善与华盛顿的关系：

首先，泰国并不是跨太平洋伙伴关系协定（TPP）成员，尽管巴育曾表达过加入这一协定的意愿。如果特朗普兑现竞选承诺退出TPP，并着手新的双边贸易协议，华盛顿和曼谷或可重启两国自由贸易协议谈判。之前的谈判于2006年搁浅，部分是因为当时的总理他信·西那瓦遭遇政治危机，如今更为稳固的政权有助于达成自由贸易协议。

其次，美泰安全同盟和美国在亚洲的其他盟友关系（例如与日本、韩国和菲律宾）显著不同，因此特朗普对盟友极具争议的态度反而可能有利于美泰同盟发展。这是因为，对美泰安全同盟来说，分摊安保成本并不是个问题，并且美国目前似乎从这种同盟关系中获益更多。泰国并没有特别重大的外部安全威胁需要美国保护，而美国则依赖这个弱小盟友提供基地来补给、维修舰船和飞机，并允许美军飞越领空。如果泰国新政府能协助扩大美国海军在太平洋的存在，正如特朗普所希望的那样，在越南战争期间美泰联合建设的海军基地乌塔保或将成为这一计划中的咽喉要地。

再次，特朗普对气候问题缺乏兴趣对泰国来说既是利好也是利空。总体来看，东南亚将直接受气候变化影响，并且近年泰国遭遇了越来越多的季风雨和洪水。不过，泰国也面临要求放弃参与湄公河大坝修建的压力，因为这可能给下游国家带来严重生态影响。虽然这些大坝目前正在老挝境内建设，但泰国将是水电站所发电力的主要消费者。

最后，特朗普在选战期间没有打人权牌，不管对错，这让曼谷认为美国新政府不会高调关注这一问题。这可能使因为军政府限制政治自由导致的两国紧张关系有所缓和。军政府预计，如果希拉里当选，两国紧张关系可能持续下去。

如果特朗普政府提供改善美泰关系的机会，曼谷很可能将充分利用。不过，华盛顿能收获些什么，只有等到特朗普外交政策方针明确成型后才能评估。

When King Bhumipol Adulyadej died on October 13, Thailand entered a profound and long-feared transition, from the world's longest-serving monarch to his heir, Crown Prince Maha Vajiralongkorn. The Crown Prince is scheduled to be proclaimed king on December 1, but will not be crowned for at least a year. He is not expected to enjoy the high regard - indeed the reverence - of the Thai people that his father had accrued over a seventy-year reign, which raises fears of internal instability. As a result, both the royal transition and daily governmental affairs are managed by the military government of Prime Minister General Prayuth Chan-ocha, who seized power in the 2014 coup.

Under the new constitution midwifed by the junta, elections will take place to select a new government, most likely in 2018. However, the possibilities of prolonged military rule in some form after that are considerable. The constitution mandates an appointed upper house in parliament, whose members will be chosen by the military, and allows for the possibility that the prime minister can be appointed rather than elected. The smart money is on Prayuth's continued domination of politics as a constitutionally-approved prime minister after 2018.

Since the 2014 coup, Thailand has been inward-looking, with a scaled-down foreign policy. In this interval, U.S.-Thailand relations have deteriorated. U.S. law requires that assistance be withheld when a government is overthrown by a military coup. Over $4 million in U.S. security assistance to Thailand was therefore suspended, and the annual Cobra Gold exercises were downsized, although they were not halted altogether. As a longstanding security ally of the United States, these restrictions rankled the Thai military and Prayuth in particular. Bangkok also objected to Washington's criticism of the junta's suppression of political and civic liberties.

This state of affairs between the two allies has provided opportunities for China to advance relations with Thailand, which had been expanding gradually for two decades. Thailand is critical to Beijing's One Belt, One Road regional framework: the planned north-south railway that will facilitate Chinese trade with Southeast Asia will run through Laos, Thailand and Malaysia to Singapore (although the Thai government is not yet a formal partner, since it finds Beijing's current financial terms to be unfavorable.) Thailand is not a claimant to the contested islands in the South China Sea and for the most part declines to take a position on China's sovereignty disputes with the Southeast Asian claimants, which often works in Beijing's favor. China is Thailand's largest trading partner (although Japan and the United States are more significant investors), aided by the 2003 China-Thailand Free Trade Agreement.

With U.S.-Thailand disaffection over the coup, Thai security relations with China have expanded to the point that the two militaries now conduct joint land, naval and air exercises, although these are still modest in comparison to cooperation between the Thai and U.S. militaries, even with the present restrictions. Thailand has contracted to purchase three submarines from China. On the political side, the Prayuth government has shown greater willingness to deny sanctuary to Chinese dissidents; over the past year, Bangkok has willingly returned to China Uighurs that the United Nations had classified as refugees. For its part, Beijing has assiduously refrained from criticizing the Prayuth government's crackdown on political dissent.

But although there is a triangular nature to Thailand's relations with China and the United States, it would be a mistake to view that dynamic as zero-sum. Bangkok is a supreme balancer of regional powers - a flexible practice the Thais describe as “bamboo diplomacy” - which enabled Thailand to avoid Western colonization in the 19th century. Thai leaders see no conflict in forging equally strong relations with Beijing and Washington, although they are not above playing one against the other on occasion. If relations with one power suffer a downturn, Bangkok will lean toward the other, but to a limited degree. Moreover, Thailand looks beyond the China-U.S. nexus in its balancing act. Under Prayuth, Thai relations with Russia have warmed, and Bangkok sees opportunities to strengthen relations with both Britain and the Continent in the aftermath of Brexit.

With the surprise election of Donald Trump, Bangkok may find openings to improve relations with Washington:

1. The U.S.-Thailand security alliance is significantly different from other U.S. alliances in Asia (with Japan, South Korea and the Philippines) and may therefore fare better under Trump's critical approach to alliances. Burden-sharing is less of an issue; indeed, the United States arguably benefits from the alliance more than Thailand does at present. Thailand has no major external security threat from which it needs protection, while the U.S. depends upon its smaller ally for access to bases for refueling and repair of ships and planes, as well as flyover rights. If the new administration moves to expand the U.S. naval presence in the Pacific, as Trump has indicated it will, Utapao, the Thai naval base jointly developed with the United States during the Vietnam War, could become a critical chokepoint in that plan.

2. Thailand is not a member of the TransPacific Trade Partnership (TPP), although Prayuth has expressed interest in joining at some point. If, as he promised in the campaign, Trump eschews the TPP in favor of bilateral trade agreements, Washington and Bangkok may revive talks on a U.S.-Thailand Free Trade Agreement. Those foundered in 2006, in part because then-Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra was failing politically, but the FTA may succeed under a more stable regime.

3. Trump's expressed lack of interest in the environment could be both an advantage and a detriment to Thailand. Overall, Southeast Asia will be acutely affected by climate change and in recent years Thailand has experienced more severe monsoon rains and resulting floods. However, Bangkok would also be under less pressure to abandon its participation in the construction of dams on the Mekong, which will have a severe ecological impact on the downriver countries. Although these dams are being built on the Laotian side of the river, Thailand will be the major consumer of the electricity they will produce.

4. Trump did not raise human rights during the campaign which, rightly or wrongly, has led Bangkok to assume they will not have a high profile in the new administration. This could reduce bilateral tensions over the military's restrictions on political freedoms, which the junta had anticipated would continue if Clinton had won the election.

If the Trump administration offers opportunities to improve U.S.-Thai relations, Bangkok will likely move to maximize them. What gains Washington may reap, however, can only be calculated when the shape and direction of a Trump foreign policy are more clearly defined.