Thai PM defends submarine purchase and explains causes of huge public debt

[grego49]

On 2/17/2021 at 9:53 PM, foreverlomsak said:

nah, there for the mekong river to stop the illegal migrant workers crossing into Thailand

 

[Rob Cook]

Maybe submarine rides will be TAT's next tourist scheme?  

[Morch]

3 hours ago, Rob Cook said:

Maybe submarine rides will be TAT's next tourist scheme?  

 

I'll believe that when they let me set foot on  their defunct aircraft carrier.

[billd766]

On 2/19/2021 at 12:34 PM, Patong2021 said:

How many times do I need to write that;

1. Thailand does not have a naval vessel inventory that will allow for the type of operations needed to surveil its fishing fleet or to protect its cargo  shipping that comes through the high piracy prone routes?

2. I have already explained 2X that Thailand's fishing fleet has been implicated in illegal fishing, particularly in the Indian Ocean. Thousands of Thai vessels work in foreign waters sometimes legally and sometimes illegally. The EU has already sanctioned Thailand for this. The agreement for lifting of sanctions was for Thailand to  police its foreign fishing.

3. Do you know what is in the the Thai naval fleet inventory? Aside from its frigates Thailand does not have any vessels that can easily or cost effectively deployed for offshore foreign water activity. The submarines are far more cost efficient to use for foreign activity than the frigates.  Look at Thailand's patrol vessels. They are intended for close offshore work. They are mostly older 30+years. They are not appropriate for the tasks described.The submarines are cost effective.

4. Do you know how reliant Thailand is on on the  Indian ocean for shipping? Are you not aware that  3 of the worst regions for ocean piracy are South China Sea, Malacca Straits Indian ocean with critical area the region around Somalia? Thailand uses these shipping lanes for its regional sea trade.

 

So easy to criticize Thailand having some small submarine capability. Australia has 6 submarines and has a smaller fishing fleet and ocean cargo exposure than Thailand.  Australia submarine mission sets several priorities, but the lead 5  are;

1. Intelligence collection and surveillance;

2. Maritime strike and interdiction;

3. Forward intervention activity.

4. Interdiction interdiction of shipping;

5. Support of land operations

 

How areThailand needs  so much more different than this? You  don't believe Thailand has these requirements?  You think Australia  submarines operate exclusively within 100 km of Australia?

Canada has a few submarines. What do you think they are used for? Israel has submarines. The sea off of Israel is not particularly deep. Your logic would have Israel  a country with a much much smaller coastline and no offshore  island spread like Thailand shut down its submarine fleet.

 

How many support vessels has Thailand ordered to support those 3 submarines and is a fully equipped, well trained submarine rescue ship on order?

 

To send a single submarine on a patrol in fairly shallow waters without any support ship would be foolish in the extreme.

 

As for keeping the navy happy, they have an aircraft carrier with no aircraft that goes nowhere and does nothing.

 

Thailand would have been far better off buying a fleet of anti submarine ships which would of far more use in shallow water than any submarine.

[Stygge]

Even though Pengo2001 sounds very factual and convincing there is still hard to understand that submarines are the answer to Thailands surveilance problem.
It has been pointed out that the Siamese sea is only 50 meters deep in average and that is very shallow for a sub. The Baltic sea is not much deeper but it consists of tens of thousands of small islands and numerous rocks and cracks for at skilled uboat to hide and cause serious damage to an enemy fleet. The Siam sea is, as I understand it, mainly flat and sandy with very few places for a uboat to hide. It make them very vulnerable to forces with antiuboat capabilities.
As for surveilance submarines just don´t make sense. As pointed out here before one of the main crime surpressing factors is to be clearly seen to make a preventive statement. Also entering a suspect vessel is vary hard from a uboat. If not a nuclear submarine a surfaces vessel has normally a longer preserverence for extended assignments at sea. In the end I can´t find any compelling reason for Thailand to choose a submarine solution to mentioned problems. I don´t understand the argument that the subs would be more cost efficient than other more task efficient solutions. Subs are shown to be pretty expensive.

[PatOngo]

8 hours ago, billd766 said:

Thailand would have been far better off buying a fleet of anti submarine ships which would of far more use in shallow water than any submarine.

Thailand would have been better off giving the money to the people that need it most, but hey, it just does'nt work that way, does it?

[PatOngo]

55 minutes ago, Stygge said:

Subs are shown to be pretty expensive.

Expensive subs.........large commissions!  

[ivor bigun]

They need them in case the Chinese invade Thailand ,oh i forgot ,they have already and taken over????

[Morch]

On 2/21/2021 at 6:45 AM, PatOngo said:

Expensive subs.........large commissions!  

 

If they'd use the same budget, but purchase surface vessels and aircraft etc. the commissions would have been the same, but maybe spread out among more people.

[PatOngo]

1 hour ago, Morch said:

 

If they'd use the same budget, but purchase surface vessels and aircraft etc. the commissions would have been the same, but maybe spread out among more people.

Greed is a bit more complicated than that!