120-billion baht defence budget sails through the House after 3-hour debate

[bwpage3]

Generals are all millionaires and this is how it happens.

 

Their kids are all attending school in UK, USA, AUS

 

Need homes in those countries

 

Air pollution a concern? Nope!

 

Education a concern? Nope

 

Lack of water a concern? Nope!

 

This should tell you something.

 

Military purchases is the one area that is hard to get any evidence to prove corruption and these politicians know that.

 

When was the last time the country was under any kind of foreign military threat.

 

The politicians are eating steak, lobster, and champagne celebrating this latest vote.

 

 

 

 

[bwpage3]

5 hours ago, DLock said:

As a % of GDP and per capita, it seems pretty much line.

 

So ignoring all the Cha Cha hype, I don't really see anything wrong with it.

You must have forget when the military spent 700 million on 2 airship blimps that never flew a mission and rotted away in a hanger. Or the hundreds of millions spent on the fake bomb scanners.

Edited January 9, 2020 by bwpage3

[UbonEagle]

6 hours ago, saengd said:

1.5% of GDP, lowest in the region and well below the global standard for these things.

Spot on, it's all relative...let's not let the facts get in the way of a good story...

Also worth bearing in mind the public service here (army, police etc) while far from perfect are a very large employment source for young Thais and this ultimately contributes to the economy.

[mickey rat]

Thailand has many external threats and desperately needs more subs and black hawk helicopters to detour evil dictators like Putin from taking over the world. 

[PatOngo]

10 hours ago, Titan1962 said:

Maybe they should be thinking ahead

They do.........…..how big a trough will we need and what's my share!

[PatOngo]

4 hours ago, bwpage3 said:

You must have forget when the military spent 700 million on 2 airship blimps that never flew a mission and rotted away in a hanger. Or the hundreds of millions spent on the fake bomb scanners.

….and fake politicians!

[Chazar]

13 hours ago, saengd said:

Sure it is! It's only not OK for those people who like to rail every time the words military spending and military budget are spoken.

Or health and education........why waste  anything on those

[Chazar]

8 hours ago, UbonEagle said:

Also worth bearing in mind the public service here (army, police etc) while far from perfect are a very large employment source for young Thais and this ultimately contributes to the economy.

nothing  worth  noting at  all,  inefficient and largely useless police could  be halved easily and  salary  doubled for  actually  doing a  job properly

[ubon farang]

14 hours ago, saengd said:

1.5% of GDP, lowest in the region and well below the global standard for these things.

Well done. Having such a strong military makes everyone feel safe and good. Especially the government in power

[JRG23]

This story is wrong on so many levels. The actual defence budget is THB233 billion. This 'story' is about a proposed reduction. Thai journalists!!!

[ExpatOilWorker]

15 hours ago, saengd said:

1.5% of GDP, lowest in the region and well below the global standard for these things.

It is about 6% of government expenditure (tax revenue), which is in line with the global average.

This defense budget is also not the entire military budget. Last year they spend 220 billion baht on the military.

[saengd]

50 minutes ago, Chazar said:

Or health and education........why waste  anything on those

In this fiscal year 2019, the Education Ministry received a budget of 489.7 billion baht, followed by the Interior Ministry (373.5 billion baht), Finance Ministry (242.8 billion baht) and Defence Ministry (227.6 billion baht), public health-care budget of 193 billion baht,

[saengd]

2 minutes ago, ExpatOilWorker said:

It is about 6% of government expenditure (tax revenue), which is in line with the global average.

This defense budget is also not the entire military budget. Last year they spend 220 billion baht on the military.

Yes agreed, but it's still under the global guideline of 2%  of GDP and substantially less than that of neighbouring countries, Singapore 3.1%, Vietnam 2.3%, Myanmar 3%, Cambodia 2.2%

 

https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/MS.MIL.XPND.GD.ZS

[Assurancetourix]

Now that they have provisioned their military expenses, all of this may lead us to a substantial drop in the baht compared to other currencies once these materials have been paid to their suppliers.
I would like to know which are the countries who sell military materials to Thailand.
I imagine USA, France, Great Britain, China certainly ..

I am not an economist but it would be smart for these supplier countries to require Thailand to significantly decrease its currency before the sale.

[saengd]

1 hour ago, Assurancetourix said:

Now that they have provisioned their military expenses, all of this may lead us to a substantial drop in the baht compared to other currencies once these materials have been paid to their suppliers.
I would like to know which are the countries who sell military materials to Thailand.
I imagine USA, France, Great Britain, China certainly ..

I am not an economist but it would be smart for these supplier countries to require Thailand to significantly decrease its currency before the sale.

The baht would lose value only if Thailand sells THB in exchange for USD, any other currencies wouldn't have an impact.

[Scott]

A post with a link to the BKK Post has been removed.   We are not permitted to link to the Post.