Arya News - It is not clear whether it was Thailand or Cambodia that had broken their fragile ceasefire on Monday.
It is not clear whether it was Thailand or Cambodia that had broken their fragile ceasefire on Monday.
But as tensions flared, Cambodia’s decision to move a Chinese PHL-03 MLRS (multiple launch rocket system) closer to the contested border had Thailand scrambling .
With a range of 81 miles, a provincial airport and district hospital could be within reach of the mobile rocket launcher – so Bangkok moved to pre-emptively hit military depots with air strikes.
Rear-Adml Surasant Kongsiri, a spokesman for Thailand’s defence ministry, told Reuters: “Based on our intelligence as well, there have been attempts to lock on the co-ordinates of these facilities.” He also claimed the strikes had been successful.
The strikes emphasise the role Chinese-made weapons have played in escalating tensions, even as Beijing calls for peace between Bangkok and Phnom Penh.
Tita Sanglee, a Bangkok-based associate fellow at the Iseas-Yusof Ishak Institute think tank, said: “China is walking a tightrope between the two, despite being a great power.”
She added: “It has no reason to antagonise Thailand but at the same time, Cambodia is its ‘client state’... While China probably does not want Cambodia to use its weapons against Thailand, it also needs to preserve Cambodia’s goodwill .”
This dynamic was seen at play during the last clash between the neighbouring countries in late July, when 48 people were killed and some 300,000 were displaced during a five-day stand-off, ostensibly caused by differing interpretations of a colonial-era map .
In June, weeks before the violence broke out, Chinese Y-20 aircraft had made six flights to Cambodia, delivering a shipment of rockets, artillery shells and mortars, according to Thai intelligence documents seen by The New York Times.
These weapons – which were packed into 42 containers – were then transported to the contested border. Much later, human rights groups would conclude that most of the rockets Cambodia used to strike four Thai provinces came from China.
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1012 PHL-03 Rocket launch system
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Beijing has become Cambodia’s biggest military supplier, especially since the US paused arms sales to Phnom Penh in 2010 over human rights concerns. This commitment goes beyond hardware – China has heavily invested in modernising Cambodia’s infrastructure, most controversially in the Ream Naval Base on the Gulf of Thailand.
Cambodia’s neighbours, Thailand and Vietnam, fear the upgrades at Ream could give China exclusive military access to the strategically vital port and encircle the long Vietnamese coast.
But analysts said this did not mean Beijing categorically supported Cambodia’s position in this conflict.
Thai soldiers on patrol near the border with Cambodia after a fragile ceasefire negotiated by Trump was broken - RUNGROJ YONGRIT/EPA/Shutterstock
Dr Rahman Yaacob, an advisor to the ASEAN-Australia defence scholarship programme at the Australian National University, told The Telegraph: “The Cambodians actually were planning to deploy the PHL-03 against the Thais [in July], but I was informed that the Chinese actually requested the Cambodians not to use the system.
“I think from the Chinese perspective, they were concerned that if the Cambodians used the rocket system, it would escalate the military conflict further.”
According to the International Institute for Strategic Studies think tank, Cambodia’s military has six PHL-03 MLRS. These weapons can fire guided and unguided rockets significantly further than the Soviet-designed BM-21 rockets that Cambodia has repeatedly used in the past.
Anthony Davis, a Bangkok-based security analyst, said: “The PHL-03 is basically the heaviest artillery system the Cambodian armed forces have.
“What makes it particularly significant is obviously its range – you’re talking large-calibre, 300mm munitions, that can be delivered up to a range of 81 miles … so able to reach targets deep inside Thai territory.”
He added: “If things escalate – and there is now significant potential for escalation – the Thais would need to worry that this particular system might be deployed,” he said.
But at the same time as selling decisive rockets to Phnom Penh, Beijing has also supplied Thailand with arms. Between 2019 and 2023, Bangkok spent almost £375m on Chinese weapons, compared to just over £75m from the United States, according to data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.
Thailand appears in no mood to take any risks as the new wave of fighting unfolds.
Credit: X
So far, at least 10 people have died since Monday, while nearly two dozen have been wounded and hundreds of thousands evacuated. The escalation is being driven in part by domestic politics and rising nationalistic sentiment.
Bangkok’s rhetoric has hardened.
On Monday, Gen Chaiyapruek Duangprapat, the Thai army’s chief of staff, said the country intends to crush its neighbour’s military capability. Among the examples officials have shared so far is the attack on Cambodia’s PHL-03 rockets.
Dr Yaacob said: “I think the Thais are trying to signal to the Cambodians that they are able to take out their most advanced rocket or artillery system if need be … to show them, ‘we can hit you where we want to.’”
“The Thai military may feel it makes sense now to essentially teach the Cambodian military a lesson it will not forget for at least the coming five years,” Mr Davis added.
“My sense is not that the Thais are losing patience, but rather that they’ve already lost patience .”
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