Qualla: Ream Naval Base

Ream Naval Base: Introduction

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Dmitry Makeev, CC BY-SA 4.0. In September 2020 a building came down at Ream that the United States had paid for. It was not much of a structure, one of two American-funded facilities on the base, but its removal was noticed in Washington and has been quoted in nearly every account of the place since. Ream Naval Base occupies roughly 190 acres on a peninsula southeast of Sihanoukville, hemmed between the Gulf of Thailand and a national park full of mangrove channels and dugongs. For a facility that modest, it has generated an extraordinary volume of satellite imagery, official denial and diplomatic unease. The New York Times eventually reached for the only headline that fit the situation: 'The Chinese Base That Isn't There.'

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Image: Dmitry Makeev | CC BY-SA 4.0

Ream Naval Base: A Navy Nobody Had Time For

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit U.S. Department of Defense Current Photos, Public domain. Cambodia's civil war was fought on land, and the navy paid for that. When the 1970 coup installed Lon Nol, Ream amounted to a single pier in appalling condition, no working logistics system and almost no capacity to repair anything. What happened over the next four years is one o...

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Image: U.S. Department of Defense Current Photos | Public domain

Ream Naval Base: Dredgers in the Channel

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit U.S. Department of Defense Current Photos, Public domain. The base came back slowly after the Khmer Rouge were driven out in 1979, modernised again under the restored monarchy and commanded in recent years by Rear Admiral Ouk Seyha, deputy commander of the Royal Cambodian Navy. Then, in July 2019, American officials said they had seen a...

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Image: U.S. Department of Defense Current Photos | Public domain

Ream Naval Base: Two Reams

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Dmitry Makeev, CC BY-SA 4.0. The expansion finished in April 2025, and the ceremony said as much as the concrete did. A new joint training centre opened on 5 April with Prime Minister Hun Manet, Chinese ambassador Wang Wenbin and Cao Qingfeng, a deputy chief of staff from China's Central Military Commission,...

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Image: Dmitry Makeev | CC BY-SA 4.0

Ream Naval Base: The Guest List

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Dmitry Makeev, CC BY-SA 4.0. Cambodia's answer to all of this has been to invite people. Ream hosted joint exercises with the United States under the CARAT programme in 2010 and 2012, back when the argument had not yet started. Since the renovation, the visits have resumed and been publicised carefully: the ...

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Image: Dmitry Makeev | CC BY-SA 4.0

Ream Naval Base: Dugongs and Dredge Spoil

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Dmitry Makeev, CC BY-SA 4.0. It is easy to forget, in all this, what Ream is surrounded by. Ream National Park was established in 1993 and covers 210 square kilometres - 150 on land, 60 at sea - only about 18 kilometres from Sihanoukville. Mangrove forest, freshwater wetland, seagrass beds, evergreen forest ...

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Image: Dmitry Makeev | CC BY-SA 4.0