And that's where the gold diggers show up again!

I have previously written on Thailandblog about the Thai version of the Loch Ness Monster; a persistent myth that pops up with the regularity of a clock. Although in this specific case it is not about a prehistoric aquatic creature, but about an even more imaginative enormous treasure that the retreating Japanese troops are said to have buried near the infamous Burma-Thai Railway at the end of the Second World War.

Historically, it cannot be denied that during the war the Japanese army stole large reserves of gold and silver, as well as money and valuable artifacts from the occupied territories in Southeast Asia, among other things to finance the Japanese war effort. A complex and large-scale operation that was co-led by Prince Yasuhito Chichibu, a brother of Emperor Hirohito. Legend has it that the Japanese Imperial Army would have used the know-how Yakuza, the well-organized Japanese mafia to rob as much as possible. The stories of hidden treasures inspired numerous adventurers and prospectors to explore those areas occupied by the Japanese forces between 1942 and 1945.

Some of the Japanese spoils of war are also said to have been hidden in Thailand. According to some rumors, it would be as much as 5000 tons of gold. An incredibly high and therefore implausible figure, but that does not prevent people from looking for it with the regularity of a clock. Since the XNUMXs, at least eight expeditions are officially known to have been organized in the inhospitable jungle in the border region between Burma and Thailand, but according to some Thai police sources there have been more than XNUMX attempts in the last half century. recover treasures.

Are the stories about Japanese gold all bullshit? Maybe, maybe not. One of the most persistent legends is about railway carriages hidden in the limestone caves along the River Kwai. A story with a historical basis of truth. After all, it is an established and undeniable fact that, according to the Thai National Railways, nine of the forty locomotives requisitioned by the Japanese army that were still running in 1945 disappeared without a trace in the summer of that year. And the Thai National Railways should know this because they collaborated unconditionally with the Japanese military administration. One locomotive was recovered in 1978 when Australian adventurers tracked down a secret siding using a Japanese military map and found the locomotive in a bricked-up cave.

Finds like this fed the rumor mills. On February 21, several Thai newspapers including the Bangkok Post that there are hidden treasures left behind by the Japanese army in the hills around Sukhothai. A certain Kliang led a select group of journalists to a cave where, according to his grandfather, the Japanese engineers had excavated rooms where gold and other valuables were said to be hidden. The entrances to this system of corridors and chambers were dynamited when they retreated. Kliang reportedly showed them some places where those entrances had been blown up and the remains of what, with a little imagination, could pass for ventilation shafts. Somchai Duenpen who was described as the deputy municipal mayor van Tambon Nai Muang was quick to rule out any possible track.

Again according to Kliang, after the war, several dozen Japanese former soldiers searched in vain for the underground treasure room(s) in the area. In any case, a respected local historian confirmed that Sukhothai was regularly visited by the Japanese forces. And that part of the story is absolutely correct. In 1942, a railway line ran from Bangkok to Sawankalok. Japanese troops on their way to the front in Burma were brought there by train and then marched in several stages at night via Sukhothai to Mae Sot to cross the border there. If you, dear reader, feel compelled to go to Sukhothai driven by the gold rush, I must warn you, because anyone who starts digging in the Thai caves without a permit and is caught red-handed will face a hefty fine with imprisonment .

Whether the story of the Japanese gold in Sukhothai is based on more than just Khun Kliang's imagination remains to be seen…