SternAAlbifrons wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2019 6:55 pm

Clemen wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2019 6:14 pm Sorry, I should have posted the sat photo with a comment. The sat photo is of Kaoh Sdach, the story this thread started with was about this airport.

That's cool clement, we did divert the conversation for a bit, with talk about Koh Kong's FIRST airport at Koh Kong city.
That is probably why Phnom poon got his geography a bit mixed up - understandable.

1/ We have Koh Kong city airport
also known as Khemarak Phoumin City airport (officially)
currently decommissioned, choppers only, now talk of resurrecting.

2/ We have big new airport in Botum Sakor district,
100k's away as the crows fly, 200 k by road.
near Kaoh Sdach
to service Kiri Sakor resort
also known as Dara Sakor resort

Expect Sihanoukville meets Gold Coast, springing up along 70k's of coastline almost overnight.

China owns most of the coast for about 70km north os sdach and have done for years. i think the only visible bit was a four star hotel and golf course. HWen i wen tthere you could not get in, security everywhere but maybe you can now. I think it was just a scam to get access to all the prisitne jungle with valuable wood. Roads been finished for years. Today Samdech Hun Senh is quoted in the newspaper as saying he wants the prisin coast line preserved. Bit late, its all been sold to the locusts

China's Plan to Win Over Cambodia
By Phillip OrchardAugust 01, 2019

Speculation has swirled for more than a year that Beijing plans to militarize a number of Chinese-funded port and airport projects in Cambodia...

Why China Wants Cambodia

Cambodia is often overlooked in the mounting competition for Southeast Asian loyalties. It’s not party to the disputes over the South China Sea, and it wouldn’t be much use to an outside power trying to blockade Chinese maritime trade. It’s unimportant to the BRI transportation projects meant to expand Chinese trade access to the Indian Ocean and ease China’s dependence on the Malacca Strait and other regional chokepoints.

Still, its location does have some strategic value. It would substantially extend the reach of Chinese warplanes, anti-ship missiles, and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance assets in Southeast Asia, potentially giving Beijing ample coverage over the critical Strait of Malacca. It could allow Chinese maritime forces – the navy but also paramilitaries like the Chinese Coast Guard and the Maritime Militia – to sustain a much heavier presence around the southern fringes of China’s nine-dash line claims. It would also enable China to increase pressure on Thailand, an increasingly ambivalent U.S. treaty ally, and an increasingly belligerent Vietnam. The oil-rich waters off southeastern Vietnam are among the country’s most lucrative – and where Vietnam has defied Chinese pressure by moving forward with exploration projects with foreign firms. As demonstrated in the past two months’ standoffs around rigs in Vietnamese and Malaysian waters, China often tries to assert control over its territorial claims by harassing commercial operations with non-naval vessels. Whether or not Chinese warships ever call Cambodia home, opening its ports to Chinese paramilitaries and commercial and fishing fleets could prove valuable in this regard...
https://www.realclearworld.com/articles ... 13068.html

The full article is a very interesting read

We went through all this about six months ago when the cia/nsa, NYT, Wahington post, Bloomburg, Times, Pense, AAP, AFP, everybody, were spouting this fiction as fact.
Some of our conversation is back on this thread. Some of it was sent to the dark web because people were spouting this baseless crap at the same time the PM was denying it.
All around the world the leading establishment press was spouting exactly the same wild imaginings. Two weeks later it all went dead.

just quickly. Airfield
Dara Sakor/Kiri Sakor runway is 3400 m
eg, Phuket is 3000 and everybody is screaming for 4000
S'ville new extension is 3300
New Siam Reap is planned 3600
Cairns (small tourist airport) 3200, want to extend. too short.
Dara Sakor design is no different to other civilian airports
There are no signs of extensive heavy duty facilities and defences that a military fairield requires.
There is big move everywhere to seperate civilian from military airfields - not surprisingly the are not compatible.
- it is there to service a slow starting but huge planned replica of the Gold Coast/Sth Florida.
They have 70k of pristine coastline on 99yr lease.
The "satellite analysts" (US intel) who were feeding these stories stated there were no tourist facilities anywhere near.(!!!)

Naval base
No port facilitates are in evidence, nor construction for any.
Except a tourist Jetty the cia said was a naval base.
The water is not deep here. Big dredging or long piers would be needed for big ships.
No visible 1000 hctrs of heavy duty infrastructure that a military port needs.
Nor the space for it smack in the middle of a large integrated tourist facility
.
The kind of strategic forward base that has always been envisioned/postulated for here requires a heavy rail link from China - the are no plans and it would take a very long long time.
Light rail or high speed is useless militarily.
Then, five days later the naval base was suddenly going to happen at Ream, not at the tourist pier at Botum Sakor after all.
No evidence for Ream either. Just fear and speculation.

Strategic value
Strategically it makes much less sense than it did 20 years ago. for a chinese air and naval base on this coastline.
China now has access, and its own ports and military airfields, all over the Indian Ocean.
The China -Pakistan heavy rail link and mega port on the Indian Ocean eg, would be far more suitable.
For a naval facility and ships particularly, the Gulf is not ideal - trapped in a closed waterway surrounded by "the enemy".

NB - i am not saying this will not eventuate - or that the chins do not have these plans
only that the reports are very obviously US military/political/intell fear mongering or mischief making.
Suspicion, fear and wild speculation. The evidence on the ground is simply not there, and some stated facts are demonstrable bullshit.
NB also, this not an anti US speech - I really really want the US to muscle up in this region, like i have never wanted it before.
I just fear that their intel and interp will be as bad as it was last time around - and if this little drama is any indication that is exactly the way it looks to me right now.
(imo only !!)

Anthony's Weiner wrote: ↑Mon Dec 23, 2019 2:55 pm China's Plan to Win Over Cambodia
By Phillip OrchardAugust 01, 2019
Speculation has swirled for more than a year that Beijing plans to militarize a number of Chinese-funded port and airport projects in Cambodia...
Why China Wants Cambodia
https://www.realclearworld.com/articles ... 13068.html
The full article is a very interesting read

This is a very good piece. ^^ I don't disagree with a word of it.
Unlike the previous bout of stories about "definite evidence" of military bases in Botum Sakor - stated as fact, when so much of it was factually wrong.
This P. Orchard opinion-piece/risk analysis is just that - theories, fears, analysis, suppositions - but they are necessary too, and this is a good one.
A pretty realistic picture of some very real worries,

- although maybe a bit traditional/outdated in it's view of the value of cambodia's strategic location? I think that is a bit superseded by better options now.
Not long ago Cambodia was the only option for China to have close access to the Indian Ocean and the Malacca straits - that thinking is very obvious in a lot of strategic thinking still. but outdated.

SternAAlbifrons wrote: ↑Mon Dec 23, 2019 7:47 pm We went through all this about six months ago when the cia/nsa, NYT, Wahington post, Bloomburg, Times, Pense, AAP, AFP, everybody, were spouting this fiction as fact.
Some of our conversation is back on this thread. Some of it was sent to the dark web because people were spouting this baseless crap at the same time the PM was denying it.
All around the world the leading establishment press was spouting exactly the same wild imaginings. Two weeks later it all went dead.



NB - i am not saying this will not eventuate - or that the chins do not have these plans
only that the reports are very obviously US military/political/intell fear mongering or mischief making.
Suspicion, fear and wild speculation. The evidence on the ground is simply not there, and some stated facts are demonstrable bullshit.
NB also, this not an anti US speech - I really really want the US to muscle up in this region, like i have never wanted it before.
I just fear that their intel and interp will be as bad as it was last time around - and if this little drama is any indication that is exactly the way it looks to me right now.
(imo only !!)

Yep - they'll be converting that golf course into underground bunkers soon.

Here is the real truth about that development.

Well worth a read - good concept drawings and infographics. Designed for 1,300,000 residents...

http://www.mcc.sg/Dara-Sakor/index-eng.html

EX ACT LY. thanks Mish, great doc ^^

Everybody wants to get their knickers in a knot about secret chinese military bases.
Screaming for blood, falling over themselves with the thrill of all those smartly pressed uniforms.

I was accused of being some kind of a head-in-the-sand China apologist for calling out the "military purpose runway length", the "no tourists for 100 k's", the rickety naval pier etc, the total lack of military infrastructure or defences.

I could not raise a fleas piss of concern by all the howling brave vigilant "secret base" warriors - about a massive Chinese integrated coastal resort taking the best 20% of Cambodia coastline. 1.2 mill residents, 10 mill tourists/yr.
Not a peep.

China, my friends, is taking over the world without 1 shot needed to be fired in anger.
The dead-headed West is chasing ghosts while creeping financial, population and political muscle swallows everything without a whisper being raised.
Wake up Rambo fans.

PS Mish - thanks for this doc ^^ excellent find, says heaps (Heaps!!).
I do have reservations about the heavy commercial infrastructure bit - i think that is probably classic "development dreamsville".
Such grandiosity is not uncommon when trying to attract investors. Personally i reckon this location does not have many of the "economic geography' features and advantages to make good sense. 'Totally believe the tourist bit tho'. MASSive.

Anybody poo pooing chinese tourist floods because of current China slowdown and "Trumps successful trade war" is thinking very wishfully and very short term.

NB - all imo stuff ^^^ I am screaming out to be persuaded that this really is a secret military installation bothering nobody, instead of a huge flocking enviro/social/national-sovereignty catastrophe.

Where are you now Rambo's? - tourists and economics not exciting enough for you hero's?
(dead silent still...)

The USA has bombers that leave Missouri and hit anywhere in the world...Stealth.
Stealth fighters that are all refueled in the air.
Who needs runways in Cambodia?
The most dangerous are the subs that travel across the largest area of Earth...the oceans.
The chinese are just raping the coast and the forests and taking over as they are in african't and anywhere else who gives them a toe hold.
The chinese are trying to steal weapon systems capable of knocking out air craft carriers.
The long runways are for commercial planes bringing in shit tons of tourists once they transform the coast into a chinese wonderland.
They have a long lease and will turn it into a chinese resort. I dont blame them..They can do as they wish without Thai interference or Vietnamese hassle.
Its military value is minimal.
People want to underestimate President Trump.
While they are focusing on runway lengths and depths of ports; He is creating a Space Force with new advanced weaponry. He is getting europe to finally pay their promised share in NATO as are the Koreans and Japanese.
He attended a huge rally for the President of India in Houston solidifying their friendship.
The USA doesn't need china.
The USA is exporting energy.
Leading the world in energy production.
I have been very impressed with mainland china airports this year. One of my oldest friends..like a brother is from Hong Kong.
Taking over the world without firing 1 shot?
How many shots have they fired in Hong Kong in the past few months?
Out of pure fear this freedom fever will spread to the mainland.

I agree with that Bro5,^^
- the little bit of it directly related to the Koh Kong coast development.

(but most of the rest is irrelevant here, maybe start a new topic line? )
Thanks too Rich, i will try and look at this book - but can we keep this discussion on topic? (please)
What actually is occurring on the coast here is important to cambodia and to many of us. We have already seen that focus "hijacked" by global geo-political warfare. We can fight the nuclear/trump/commie wars elsewhere?
Grand strategy is important when talking about claims of military bases being built- but only to a degree, and where directly relevant.
my view only...