A close friend of the temporarily disempowered prime minister Phibunsongkhram (Phibun), Pote provided financial aid to the field marshal after his release from prison in 1946.

As foreign minister Pote was a wilful opponent of Phibun's attempts to recognise the French-backed Bảo Đại of Vietnam, a stance that had the full support of parliament, the press, and much of the government.

"[3] In the end Phibun discarded months of Foreign Ministry recommendations and on 28 February issued formal recognition of the royal governments of Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam.

The Sarasins had always cultivated good relations with the bureaucratic elite of the 19th century, and by the early 1950s held substantial interests in real estate and rice trading.

[8] His father, Wee Thian Hee, was the son of a traditional Chinese doctor and pharmacist who had immigrated from Hainan to Siam in the early 19th century.