The Commander-in-Chief of the Royal Thai Navy Made Courtesy Call to the Kingdom of Spain as a Guest of the Spanish Navy

03 Juli 2025

Royal Thai Navy commander visited Spanish Navy HQ, Ferrol Naval Base, Navantia shipyard, and Escribano Mechanical and Engineering (EM&E) in Madrid (photo: Royal Thai Navy)

The official visit to Spain by Admiral Chirapol Wongwit, Commander-in-Chief of the Royal Thai Navy and his delegation from 17-24 June 2025 included a visit to the Spanish Navy (Armada), including the Spanish Navy Headquarters, Ferrol Naval Base, where they visited the Álvaro de Bazán (F100) class frigate - the F102 Almirante Juan de Borbón frigate.

The F102 Almirante Juan de Borbón F100 class frigate (photo: Warships)

Visit to the headquarters of Navantia Spain in Madrid and the company's shipyard in Ferrol, listening to a presentation on the Bonifaz (F110) class frigate project that is currently under construction, and visiting EM&E Group Spain, which has been contracted to supply the SENTINEL 30 machine gun mount for the two T.997-series close coastal patrol vessels, T.997 and T.998.

Visiting to the Navantia shipyard in Ferrol (photo: RTN)

This makes it possible to see that in addition to the project to increase the combat system capabilities for the floating landing craft, HTMS Chang (III), the Spanish company Navantia is also likely interested in joining the project to procure new high-performance frigates for the Royal Thai Navy.

Visiting to the EM&E Group (photo: RTN)

Companies that have already expressed interest include South Korea's Hanwha Ocean, which is proposing a modified Frigate 4000 variant of HTMS Bhumibol Adulyadej, Germany's TKMS, along with Thailand's Marsun, which is proposing the MEKO A-100 frigate. The UK's Babcock International, which offers the Arrowhead 140 frigate design, and the Netherlands' Damen, which offers the SIGMA frigate design, are both looking for partners in Thailand, Turkey's ASFAT, together with Thailand's United Defense Technology, which offers the Istanbul-class frigate and the ADA-class corvettes in the MILGEM project, and Singapore's ST Engineering, among others.

Visiting to the EM&E Group (photo: RTN)

The specification of the new frigate is expected to be finalized in July 2025, but according to the Budget Review Committee's 2026 budget statement, the navy's defense budget of approximately 43,491,000,000 baht ($1,337,094.69) has allocated approximately 1,750,000,000 baht ($53,796,496) for only one new frigate in Phase 1, while the Royal Thai Navy wants two to be built in Thailand.

(AAG)