A Vietnamese navy vessel yesterday completed a port call at Cambodia’s newly-expanded Ream Naval Base, the second foreign navy to weigh anchor at the base since the inauguration of new China-funded facilities in early April.
According to a report in Cambodianess, Vietnamese People’s Navy (VPN) Ship 261, commanded by Mai Dang Danh, deputy commander and chief of staff of the VPN’s 5th Regional Command, docked at the base on Monday before departing yesterday.
The Cambodian state news agency AKP reported that the patrol vessel is on a three-day visit “aimed at strengthening the ties of solidarity, friendship, and cooperation between the two countries’ navies.”
Since 2022, the Ream Naval Base, which lies around 30 kilometers from the port city of Sihanoukville on the Gulf of Thailand, has seen an extensive – and controversial –expansion and refurbishment funded by the Chinese government, Cambodia’s closest partner and ally. The upgrades, which Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet officially inaugurated on April 5, include a 300-meter-long deep-water pier, a 5,000-ton dry dock, a 1,000-ton slipway, office buildings, and a Cambodia-China Joint Logistics and Training Center.
The Vietnamese port call comes after two Japanese naval vessels – the Uraga-class mine-countermeasures vessel JS Bungo and the Awaji-class minesweeper JS Etajima — paid a four-day visit to the base on April 19. In a statement, the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Forces said that the port call “contributes to a free and open Indo-Pacific region, and is also an opportunity to strengthen the defence ties between Japan and Cambodia.”
The Japanese and Vietnamese port calls are an attempt by Cambodia’s government to assuage Western (and particularly American) concerns that Ream Naval Base will evolve into a de facto Chinese military outpost, if it isn’t one already. These concerns have swirled since 2019, when the Wall Street Journal, citing unnamed U.S. and allied officials, reported that then-Prime Minister Hun Sen had signed a secret agreement granting China’s military the right to use the base for a period of 30 years.
The base has been viewed with a similar consternation by the security establishment in Vietnam, which, despite its longstanding friendship with the Cambodian government, fears that the growing Chinese security presence in Cambodia could result in its encirclement.
For its own part, Cambodia has denied that it has any intention of permitting a permanent military presence on its territory. In a speech at the inauguration of the base on April 5, Prime Minister Hun Manet stated that his government “has no intention – whether in the past, present, or future – of violating its own constitution by allowing any country or military to establish an exclusive base on Cambodian soil.” He also said that Cambodia “welcomes all friendly parties” to visit the base.
In a speech in Kampot province on April 21, Hun Manet said Cambodia “is expected to welcome naval vessels from Russia, India, and possibly the U.S. at the Ream Naval Base in the near future,” according to the AKP report. The possibility of an invitation to the U.S. Navy was also raised by Lt. Gen. Phat Vibolsopheak, director of the international relations department at Cambodia’s Ministry of National Defense, who was interviewed by the Washington Post in March. “We are aware of the anxiety from Washington regarding Ream,” he told the newspaper, “After the Japanese, we welcome offers from other ships to dock, including the U.S.”
Whether this does much to assuage American concerns about the future of Ream Naval Base remains to be seen. While it is clear that China enjoys some privileges at the base – the establishment of a Cambodia-China Joint Logistics and Training Center suggests as much – this will likely remain below the threshold of a permanent military presence. The challenge is that U.S. concerns at least partly revolve around the role that Ream might play in the event of a regional conflict involving China. It is unlikely that Cambodia will succeed in assuaging these fears without being much more transparent about the nature of the Chinese role at the base – something that could well risk damaging its relationship with Beijing.
As Japan’s ambassador to Cambodia said of the Japanese port call earlier this month, “We are not in a position to prove to the world that the Ream base is not allowing a Chinese presence here.”