Argentina, Chile step up plans to procure OPVs

Now that’s an interesting idea Wan, I know that Brazil and India are starting to move closer together pollitically, they are working of a few projects together

If both Brazil and Argentinia got in on India’s ADS project … bigger production run, lower unit cost.

Indeed KJ it is a wealth of info, thanks for shearing. Maybe you could shead some light on the current plans to build a new Carrier for the Amarda.

You are welcome. BTW, its not insider info, its just filtered info from spanish fora.

As for a new CV, well, err, hmmm, its simply out of the question, for many, many, many years to come. Lets take up this chat in 2020 again, shall we?.

There is no way we can afford a new ship (the BAZAN SAC 220 design will never we build, for the ARA that is), and there is no second hand ship around that even remotely suits ARA’s needs.

I can imagine a scenario where 25 de Mayo would have gotten LM-2500 gas turbines, new catapult and elevators, a DARDO firing system with Breda turrets, Aspides, and a full squadron of SUEs, Turbo Trackers and SH-3H’s operating on a low budget till 2010. We missed that chance in 1985. She rotted away for almost 15 years, and was not replaced.

We missed our second chance in 1998, when we should have opted for MN Clemenceau. With her scrapping the last situable* conventional CV for the ARA is gone.

Nothing of what the US Navy has already mothballed or will in the near future is situable. Those 60.000 tns + behemoths would drain the navy’s scarce yearly resources in a single month. And where should we get 60 + aircraft to operate on them, and 15 escorts and supply ships to form a carrier group. No way, its simply out of the question.

V/STOL carriers are out of the question due to political considerations as well. So are for the time being former soviet carriers and aircraft.

With a tiny fraction of the money, I would rather shop for some additional land based aircraft, such as P-3Cs, and a dozen former Bundesmarine Tornados in full gear **. 😎

King Jester

* suitable, hmm, you still have to put at least 25 aircraft aboard a Clemenceau, and assign her decent escorts. See the Marina de Brasil example.

** Tornados are prolly out of the question due to the same political considerations which leave out secondhand V/STOL aircraft 😉

Indeed KJ it is a wealth of info, thanks for shearing. Maybe you could shead some light on the current plans to build a new Carrier for the Amarda.

Thanks for clarifying, it’s nice to get some more detail from someone local.

Well, as I said, my take on the limits treaty is prolly skewed. You are welcome, anyway.

About the original topic, I checked again. The strongest offer seems to be IZAR’s BAM design. Mainly cause they would be halfways paid for with soft credits.

The NPO-2000 design is also a candidate, with more punch.

Altought, given the fact that our current MoD cannot distinguish a frigatte from a cruiser (in an interview he has been quoted as calling MEKO 360s “cruisers” and the M-113 a “tank” :rolleyes: ) there is a lot of confusion. The MoD has made several confusing anouncements that “new patrol corbettes” will soon be received. I suspect that in the end some stripped down ex-french A-69 Lorrient avisos will halfways replace the WWII era tugs, which do most of the patroling and outpost resuply nowadays, and no “new” OPV’s will be build at all.

I would propose a stripped down MEKO 140 design, a single 40mm on B-position, a fully enclosed hangar and extended landing deck for a medium SAR helo (say, an AB-212), cranes for hoisting two whaler boats, 40 men crew max (boarding team included), cargo space under the helo deck (eventually mines), finally provisions for chaff launchers, two rigs for heavy MGs, plus provision for one RAM.

King Jester

Thanks for clarifying, it’s nice to get some more detail from someone local.

Interesting stuff there mate, I had no idea about it. So I guess a co-operation deal would be right out then

Just to comment on both Wanshan an your own reply, co-operation is not that far out the question. It really has only become a matter of funds.

Argentina´s navy trusted ASMAR shipbuilders in 1998/2000 to reform ARA D-1 Hercules (former T-42 type) with a wider helo pad and huge hangar. Altought the resulting hybrid is not particularly pretty, the job was well done.

There was some talks about upgrading chilean subs (U-209s) at the MMDG shipyard in Buenos Aires. Finally the deal did not stick.

In the 2002/2003 timeframe there was a serious plan to build a total of 6 MEKO A-200 frigattes (four for Chile and two AAW´s for Argentina) on the Rio Santiago shipyard in Buenos Aires and ASMAR in Valparaiso. Lack of funds posponed the proyect, and Chile bought the secondhand M-class instead.

There was indeed some talks about building a large series of OPVs, for both navies, but then hesitation (lack of a clear idea of what the functions of an OPV are in the argie navy, really) on the argie side posponed the deal again.

Argentina is currently shuffling two or three offers, the strongest one from a spanish shipyard for a total of four OPVs (can´t remember the design name right now), but has in the past also looked closely at the MEKO 100 design, at a portuguise OPV and at a very simplyfied version of the locally build MEKO 140.
The spanish offer is the strongest, cause it includes spanish government soft credits for 200 million $. Spain is interested in keeping shipyards in Galicia alive, so they can afford to spend that kind of money. I personnally would prefer a local solution to the OPV question, a very simplyfied MEKO 140, or may be a carbon copy of the BAZAN Halcon design (which were build in Spain for the argie Coastguard in the 80´s), that way our own shipyard workers would stay in business.

As for the limits treaty, my view may of course be skewed (im argie!), both the ruling of 1977 and the Vatican solution of 1984 violate a basic principle outlined in the 1880 general limits agreement, which states clearly that Chile has souvereignty on the Pacific and Argentina on the Atlantic. By granting the islands to Chile, chilean souvereign waters and ZEE protrude clearly into the Atlantic. Just my two cents.

King Jester

Interesting stuff there mate, I had no idea about it. So I guess a co-operation deal would be right out then

The two countries may not be ready yet for such cooperation in the area of naval design and construction.

In 1978, during the dictatorships in Chile and Argentina (1976-1983), the two countries reached the brink of war over control of three Beagle Channel islands, Picton, Lennox and Nueva.

Chile and Argentina share a borderline stretching over 5,000 kilometres along the length of the Andes mountains, which was established through a July 1881 treaty that also granted Chile sovereignty over the Strait of Magellan, the western portion of Tierra del Fuego and the islands south of the Beagle Channel.

After numerous territorial disputes over the channel, an international arbitration panel declared in May 1977 that the islands of Picton, Lennox and Nueva definitely belonged to Chile. But Argentina refused to recognise the ruling.

Crisis soon broke out. On Dec. 21-22, 1978, the Chilean and Argentine fleets planned to face off in the disputed waters, but unfavourable weather conditions prevented the positioning of warships, the take-off of helicopters and the landing of troops.

On Dec. 22, Pope John Paul II intervened as a mediator and named Cardinal Antonio Samoré as his representative. The resulting negotiations finally reached a successful end on Nov. 29, 1984, with the signing of a Peace and Friendship Treaty between the countries in the Vatican.

Chile maintained control of the three islands, while Argentina was granted sovereignty over the waters in the eastern portion of the channel.

While the Beagle Channel islands dispute was resolved through Papal mediation in 1984, armed incidents persist since 1992 oil discovery; Chilean territorial claim in Antarctica (Chilean Antarctic Territory) partially overlaps Argentine and British claims.