In a paper released last year studying the prime minister’s control over RCAF, academic Paul Chambers quoted 2014 statistics estimating its size – without including the premier’s personal Bodyguard Unit – at about 191,000.
“Tightly connected to both the Prime Minister and the CPP, Cambodia’s security apparatus is opaque, accountable only to the ruling party, and engages in repression with legal impunity,” wrote Chambers, a professor of international relations at Thailand’s Chiang Mai University.