He was a student activist, and on 6 October 1976 he and other leftist students gathered after an overnight protest at Thammasat [University], police commandos and right-wing militia members stormed the campus and butchered scores of students. ... [he] saw several of his friends gunned down in the massacre, decided armed uprising was the only solution. He fled to the southern jungle, joined the Communist rebels", and became a guerrilla fighter.