Thai military seeks US$8.8b for weapons: army
Posted: 26 November 2007 1657 hrs

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BANGKOK: Thailand's defence ministry said Monday it will seek 300 billion baht (8.8 billion US dollars) from the next government to buy 10 more fighter jets, a submarine and other weaponry.

The military has already ordered 12 Swedish-made JAS-39 Gripen fighters at a cost of 34.4 billion baht (one billion US dollars).

Some of the spending on those jets would be folded into the new budget, which would cover a ten-year period from 2009, the ministry's spokesman Lieutenant General Pichasanu Puutchakarn said.

He said the new weaponry was needed to bring Thailand on a level with neighbouring countries and to help fight a separatist insurgency that has claimed 2,700 lives over four years in Muslim-majority southern provinces.

"In response to changing circumstances we are facing, including the southern insurgency and the rising threat of terrorism in the world, Thailand needs greater capabilities to defend our country," Pichasanu said.

"For example, some of our neighbours already have a submarine. We need to make a decision now so that one will be available to us in the next five to 10 years," he told AFP.

In addition to a submarine, the plan also calls for 10 more fighter jets over a decade starting from 2009, he added.

The military has been on a shopping spree since seizing power in a bloodless coup last year.

Since the takeover, military spending has skyrocketed to 140 billion baht for 2008, up from 29 billion baht the year before the coup.

Last month Thailand announced it would buy 12 Gripen fighters, made by Sweden's Saab, by 2017. The military also ordered 96 Ukrainian armoured vehicles for 133 million US dollars in August, and is looking at other weapons from Israel.

The military says the spending is needed to modernise Thai forces, which have been using equipment that dates back to the Vietnam War, noting that defence spending had been on hold since the 1997 Asian financial crisis.

Pichasanu said the government aimed to boost the ratio of defence spending from the current 1.5 per cent of GDP to 2.0 per cent over the next decade.

The planned budget would have to be submitted to the government that will be installed after elections on December 23, the first polls since the putsch that overthrew twice elected premier Thaksin Shinawatra. - AFP/ac