Cambodia to launch multiple missile test

All Photos: DAP-news

March 4, 2010
ABC Radio Australia

Cambodia will today conduct a multiple missile test but the move has raised a number of eyebrows. It comes as tensions with neighbouring Thailand continue and in the wake of Prime Minister Hun Sen's recent tour of military units on the shared border. But Hun Sen, his defence spokesman and analysts have played down the rocket launch, saying it's not intended as a show of force.

Presenter: Bo Hill
Speakers: Chhum Socheath, Cambodia's defence spokesman; Hun Sen, Cambodia's Prime Minister; Dr Christopher Roberts, Asian studies and international relations specialist from the University of Canberra

Click here to listen to the audio program (Windows Media)

(SFX) HILL: 200 rounds of Russian-made BM21 rockets to test Cambodia's launch capabilities. Cambodia's defence spokesman, Chhum Socheath has told Radio Australia's Khmer service it's the first live munitions test in a long time for Cambodia.

CHHUM SOCHEATH: (Khmer) This will be the first time we're testing live BM21 munition since the time of military integration after the end of the civil war in 1998.

HILL: The first live munitions testing in more than 20 years... and all at a time when tensions with neighbour Thailand are at boiling point. Cambodia's Prime Minister Hun Sen says it's a routine military drill.

HUN SEN: (Khmer) Soon we will use 10 BM21 in an exercise. But can I assure the Cambodian people this is not intended to show off Cambodia's military muscle.

HILL: Dr Christopher Roberts, an Asian studies and international relations expert from the University of Canberra, says it's important not to read too much into the military test.

ROBERTS: I tend to think that Hun Sen, if anything else, is primarily going about with daily business, and the way it was announced, just at the military academy, it may have been in the back of his mind how Thailand might react etc, but certainly the location is not provocative.

HILL: The rockets will be fired in Kompong Chhnang Province - very close to the capital Phnom Penh - nowhere near the Thai border, or the disputed Preah Vihear temple.

ROBERTS: At most there might be some deterrent value. For example, around the Preah Vihear temple they have purchased, or there's been reports of purchasing other land-to-air missile systems and laying landmines as well around the temple. In the worst case scenario, Hun Sen may be sitting there saying, you know, we are building up a deterrent factor, but at the end of the day, the two militaries are incomparable.

HILL: Southeast Asia specialist Dr Christopher Roberts says it's yet another case of Cambodia, like Thailand, using the political tensions to boost support amongst voters at home. For many Cambodians, however, the military test may not spur nationalistic fervour - but, instead, prompt the question, where did the estimated quarter of a million dollars needed for these rockets come from?

ROBERTS: That's a very good question. It doesn't have a lot of wealth, it shouldn't be in a position to be spending this sort of money on this type of weapons system, but unfortunately the military are often what brings legitimacy to the leaders in power, and so they get prioritised.