Bangkok Post: 'Expensive submarines are just a toy for the military'
The navy receives a gift from the Thai government, submarines are purchased anyway. Permission has already been granted for the first and an agreement in principle has already been reached for the two. The submarines are built in China.
The newspaper Bangkok Post is harsh in its assessment of this waste of money. The navy in Thailand cites the sole reason that some neighboring countries also have submarines. According to the newspaper, an argument that does not make sense, you do not have to do the same thing that other countries in the region are doing, of course.
The newspaper points out that there is no arms race in the region, and there is no threat of war. An expenditure of 40 billion baht can therefore not be defended. The Gulf of Thailand is also too shallow to effectively deploy submarines.
It therefore seems that the junta mainly pushes its own way and takes little notice of the population.
The purchase of these expensive boats for the navy is seen by the public as just a plaything for the military, especially because there is no credible justification for the purchase.
Source: Bangkok Post
The fact that there is no threat of war is a silly argument. It takes years to design, build and train the crew to operate a submarine
If you only do all that when there is a threat of war, then you are too late. See the Dutch who were overrun by the Germans in the Second World War.
Where should the submarines have sailed if they were "overrun" on the Rhine, or even better the IJssel?
There are so many better things to do in Thailand with this in my opinion unnecessary spending money on submarines. Only the much-needed improvement of education, to name but a few, is actually much more important. Even with a real threat of war, which is not present at all at the moment, I cannot imagine that these submarines will be a determining factor for Thailand, because of a possible aggressor. With a real force majeure for Thailand, a few more weapons can at most mean that they can delay the enemy a little longer, to finally capitulate with even more deaths and destruction. Anyone who seriously thinks that the Netherlands in 1940 with more weapons would not have been overrun by the much greater German force majeure, is in my opinion a bit of a loss of reality.
Can only be used in 7 years. Would the current Junta still experience that? Is there an election coming up? Or ……….
I think in china they built within a few years.
Assume that the type is also used by the Chinese, so the design can be pulled straight out of the drawer.
I agree that it is wasted money, we also have an aircraft camp ship that is in sattahip most of the time. Occasionally used in disasters.
But yes, if one part gets something new, the others also want a new toy.
question is, what do you use it for? There's nothing they can do in the Gulf.
Then training and maintenance (certainly in maintenance the Thai is not that strong) were examples of this
The submarines to be ordered have already been designed (Chinese S26T diesel-electric submarine). Training personnel will be a problem as there is no experience in the Thai navy at all. The Dutch navy provides commander training for a number of nato countries and this is experienced as very difficult. So safe sailing with these boats could become a problem.
From a military strategic point of view, it is not entirely unusual to make an inventory of what the possible enemy has at his disposal and to base the wish list partly on that.
When they use the subs in shallow water, they last much longer, so that's only an advantage (the unexpected amount of use in the coastal waters just gave our Walrus-class subs an extra 10 years of service life).
For a country with such a long coastline, it is not surprising to have a few submarines.
Moreover, it indicates how good the relationship between China and Thailand is. That in itself is worth a lot and this deal will certainly not damage economic and political relations.
Finally, the defense budget in Thailand is about 1.5% of gross domestic product, which is not extreme, especially for a military junta.
The Bangkok Post has finished its story, of course, 'a toy for the military', is also put in the mouth of the population.
Well, it's not that much fun in a submarine, I've been told, and only a few people can get on board, so that's a bit short-sighted.
The Bangkok Post is increasingly becoming a newspaper where you can predict exactly how people will respond to certain matters without any knowledge of the facts.
Nobody benefits from that.
My experience is that only junk is made there in China.
Instead of training personnel to operate the submarine, they should first train technicians to keep them in service.
They will probably be watertight, but I suspect they will leak money…
They have a very special design in China, made especially for the Thai submarines. Really totally adapted to the very shallow Gulf of Thailand…. they are submersibles on caterpillar tracks, so they can drive over the seabed instead of sailing.
Expenditure item 40 billion, producer China. One + one = 2! Some people are filthy rich here
of becoming!!! Could this have played a role in the purchase decision?
A Ned. businessman also sold submarines to Thailand at the time, but these turned out to be unusable because it is too shallow here. And now again such a huge waste of money !!!