Prawit denies ordering Navy to buy Chinese submarines
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Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Gen Prawit Wongsuwan said on Monday that neither he nor Prime Minister Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha had told the Royal Thai Navy to buy three submarines from China.
.Who would listen to us even if we gave an order?” he said.
Prawit was responding to media speculation that leaders of the government and National Council for Peace and Order had ordered the Navy to buy the submarines in return for Beijing siding with the junta after its 2014 coup upset Thai-US relations.
The speculation arose after Navy admirals acknowledged that the Chinese subs are inferior to vessels available from other countries.
Prawit insisted that a committee comprised of 40 to 50 members decided on its own to purchase the Chinese subs after comparing prices among vendor nations. The Navy had been mulling the deal for more than 10 years, he said.
