JonesyI don’t mean to be rude, but only one of them seemed to be even half decent. You’ve also got to wonder how many from countries like Saudi just get through based on diplomatic relations. Hopefully those UK guys will have to go through a LOT more training and exercise before they are allowed to command for real. There is limited availability for exercise, and the submarine fleet is ever shrinking, so it’s understandable that it is hard to keep the standards and skills up.
I went through HMS Raleigh with a lad from the Saudi Navy in division with us. He’d got PO rank in his service – by passing a written test. Our divisional PO had to do 20yrs plus active duty in the Falklands to get his rank. The Saudi lad got no favours whatsoever and, quite memorably, our dear PO went to some lengths to find the worst English speakers in the division to help translate for him – finally selecting a pair of Glaswegians who managed to talk at about 492 words per minute with relatively little of it actually English!. Diplomatic relations were left at the gate trust me on that!
Elements of that show, shall we say, seem ‘edited for television’ and dont quite ring true.
JonesyBillions spent for a part time carrier capability?. A capability that drew funds from SSN and escort fleets. Smart? Not sure bout that.
JonesyIndeed. I wonder who has built his career on this procurement? Whoever it is, he’s done a remarkably good job so far.
Absolutely….its either a world class sales job by someone associated with the Texan production line or there is another motive here.
This whole concept was gnawing away at a memory of something I read from a USN pilot in Vietnam. The same idea of arming a lo-end prop trainer was kicking about then and they landed on the idea of bombing up T-28’s into AT-28D’s as the net result. Many of these, simple, types ended up on the strength of the young, and somewhat ill-fated, South Vietnamese AF.
Perhaps history is going to completely repeat itself and the US is setting up a small fleet of simple combat types to pass on to the ‘new’ Afghani AF when they pack the wagons and leave theatre?
JonesyProbably quite an interesting assignment. Not good for reaching a high rank probably.
Not after Afghanistan gets wound up. They’ll then be abslutely worthless and pointless and the question will be asked why manned light strike was pursued when unmanned light strike was so readily available.
JonesyIsnt this a case of horses for courses?.
If you look at sensors like the EL2022 or Thales Searchwater you have a set that is offering what is, by any definition, long-range radar coverage i.e a large air target at 300km+. Yet you have an array that tips in around the 100kg mark requiring ‘just’ 2.5kw of power to drive. The 2022 is already an array fitted to MALE UAV’s and Searchwater lives happily scabbed onto the side of a Sea King….a platform not exactly blessed with huge amounts of installed power.
Searchwater or the Israeli set are not of the same calibre as MESA or APS-145, but, attached to an economical, high endurance, platform they do represent another approach to the problem of persistent surveillance. Do you need one big radar when two, or perhaps, three distributed smaller sets could be lofted in theatre.
JonesyPhillippine navy has already received 1 ex-USCG Hamilton class cutter, which ihas Phalanx and 76mm (and used to have Harpoon, ASW torpedoes, sonar etc). Another country to receive one has been Nigeria. You might see some more of these 3000+ ton vessel going to the Pacific. Supported by US FMF, some refitting of the equipment mentioned might well occur.
Noted Wan. I know the hints are that up to 8 WHECs will make their way to the Philipines eventually. Seems a big jump to go from ‘coastal pottering’ in 100ton PG’s to extended patrol deployments round the SCS.
For my money the Po Hangs offer the interim step and a natural lead in to a more developed naval capability, a decade or more down the track, based on a modern multirole platform like the FFX.
JonesyNow what kind fo Hardware. The US needs a new Perry style class it can sell to these countries to help protect them. I actually think that AEGIS equiped ships would be good but worry about the 1st the cost and 2nd who’s getting it and could it fall in the wrong hands?
Korea looks like it could have a big regional surrogate role to play here if the other states would tolerate that. For the very near term 6 ROKN Po Hang class corvettes are due to decomm between now and 2016 last I read anyway. Would seem like a perfect fit for Phillipino requirements and would provide a baseline, sustainable, capability.
The Korean FFX Incheon Class boats would, ultimately, seem to offer a suitable platform for standardisation across several fleets in the immediate region and shared costs, plus regionally-based based manufacturer support, would seem the ideal solution. US overview and financial support would be about the only requirement and could even be shared with the Koreans.
JonesySaw it at the show. The video is confusing. The point would certainly be to release the warheads outside the reach of the BMD and CIW systems. Awww. Don’t like it. Single big boooom Russian style 200/400kg is still better than dropping some tiny SDB look-a-likes.
I like the idea of bussing out submunitions to overload defensive hardkill fire-channels. The combination of high ingress speed at wavetop plus submunitions is a bizarre one though. The use of submunitions is an acceptance that you are going to be tracked…..why bother going low?. If you are relying on saturation of defensive fires to get your hit in anyway why not send the bus vehicle aeroballistic…and faster. The high altitude gives a missile seeker head a proper field of view for target detection/assessment/discrimination and the bus-out phase enables target engagement almost regardless of the opposing area defence envelope. You going to ripple off half a dozen expensive Aster30’s at BAT-style smart submunitions?.
Perseus looks a bit of a halfway formed thought to me I’m afraid!.
JonesyBit of a risk using builders sea trials as a show of anything!.
If even a slightly unbalanced shaft knocks out a reduction gearbox (or any one of about a hundred other potential show-stopping faults not uncommon on first-of-class hulls) and the ship has to be assisted home its not really a good demonstration of the awesome might of the Chinese state is it really?. Rather its likely to make the PLAN needlessly appear a bit Keystone Cops?.
Any of the Chinese contributors here have local language confirmation of this ‘not-quite-finished-sabre-rattling’ as it sounds patently absurd to me!.
JonesyWell my guess Jonesy is that the internal fit out is pretty much done and sea trials can be started with her looking a bit rough around the edges on the outside. Then bring her back for a good paint in time for her official launch.
Pity we can’t see her deck edge lifts, I wonder what state they are in now?
Possibly Fed but thats not really the way things are usually done. Usually the internal fit is the last thing you do because the lads running around with the HVAC conduits and cable runs etc will have finished and wont need to knock unexpected big holes in the nice new internal fittings that you have just put in. It was only a couple of weeks ago they were still sticking radars, weapons mounts and deck fixtures on!.
Also, ideally, for your sea trials you want the ship as representative of the finished article as possible so that you can properly evaluate its performance and, most importantly, properly catalogue the defects. The paint scheme and surface protection is a serious part of that.
JonesyWell Tango’s most recent news thread makes me a liar. Not normal to do the internal fitout while the external crews are still running round cutting holes in things, but, each to their own I guess.
Unless these ‘sea trials’ are more akin to the kind of basin trials I mentioned and the proper trials will start after the October launch.
I’d expect them to take longer than a week (mentioned in the news article) just learning how to properly store the ship for sea the first few times!.
JonesyStill a wee while yet i’d imagine. Few months fitting out internally, safe bet would be some limited basin trials with a quick go over any snag list that arises out of that.
I’m not current on this programme but i’d guess at Nov/Dec this year as the about the earliest you’d look at for sea trials. If memory serves thats not a bad time for the weather down there either?
Jonesywhats that line about dying young and leaving a pretty corpse?!
JonesySounds great, but just wondering why everyone doesn’t have them already, seeing as the technology is well-established by now, and why there are still so many manned aircraft – fixed wing and rotary – doing CAS in Afghanistan?
Big difference between a technology/platform being well established and a capability to deploy those being established. You could say that the one nation that has really worked towards establishing the capability IS using them extensively.
The RAF are great illustration of this as they are still developing their capability in this regard out there. The problem is that they the RAF, likely, dont want it to be too successful that it draws attention and funding from their core manned platforms. You will see an intent to keep a manned presence in theatre for that reason if no other.
JonesyAffordability for one thing….. 🙂
How many OV-10/AT-6 airframes, with how much ground support/logistics, and how many trained pilots will you need to replicate the coverage for 1 UAV on station for 24hrs?.
The only serious cost element to the UAV will be satellite bandwidth and even that could be mitigated if pre-existing high endurance aerial platforms such as AWACS are in theatre….or with the simple expedient of tasking a second UAV as a commo relay platform.
Sign In
