firstly its only worth $200,000 and secondly it was mostly stripped of parts prior to crushing. don't believe the hype. the same shit happens in Australia when customs catches illegally imported cars. I know of one compliancer under the old CPA scheme who had roughly $150,000 worth of Rav4's crushed for illegally importing them without approvals.
Also keep in mind that the money to buy these cars don't come from hard earned wages. they come from drugs, prostitution and other illegal sources. f**k em, if you don't set a precedent the cockjockeys will never get the message.
Pulling a stunt like that requires big balls, especially in a place like Thailand, the people involved took a huge punt and got caught out. This is the same government that censors/blocks google and youtube... they're not afraid to enforce the law to the letter of the word.
this has no relation to the GDP of the country, the people involved in this are richer than a lot of people in australia... there's a very big economic imbalance in these regions. Even if that car was auctioned not a cent of it would have gone back to the people. It'd merely have channeled itself back into a politician/official's pocket or the perps themselves.