Thanks for the info, it will be an interesting evolution if that does come to fruition. I am surprised they haven't followed the same formula they did for Success. Cheers.
Royal Australian Navy Discussions and Updates 2.0
- Thread starter OPSSG
- Start date
Sorry, I've written it in a way that implies its a simple rotation.
Your a 24 yo submariner, now, Collins goes into LOTE, at any stage one or two subs are on hard stands, things like promotion and sea time are severely cut for the next 8-10 years with the remaining pool, so much so you are thinking about leaving the service, as there is effectively no submarine service as you know it during this period. However, RAN comes at you with a promotion position on surface ship, same submariner pay while at sea, and a retention bonus, and then a option to return back to subs (with sub time at sea) after if you wish 24 months. 24 yo WO with an engineering degree, I assume the RAN would want to keep someone like that. There are UAV/ASW and other activities that are relevant to those who work as submariners. Its about managing change.
The Change is going to happen if we get additional Hobart's or not. Have we already forgotten
Or you and your friends just pack your things up and leave the ADF.
Converting FFH to DDG is also not a simple rotation. But at least with Hobarts, there are 3 ships currently in service to build from, there are training and experienced people who have already moved on from their time in the Hobarts and can train others.. The Hunters won't have 3 ships until 2035? Our training pipeline for the Hunters won't fatten out until 2040.
Even if we can accelerate the hunter build, we probably can't accelerate the Hunter crewing pipeline.
Particularly if we pull our existing Aegis ships from the water 2024-2030's
Or...at 24yo you get posted to a submarine on hardstand for 2 yrs. Get 2 years of Submariner seagoing while effectively being ashore, do few courses here or there but making good coin for not much duties. When time comes to actually go to sea, you look outside ADF and move on...
Also agree with the clarification point. Submariners dont start on surface ships, they go from Cerberus to WA and commence submariner training when qualified in their field.
They do offer transfers into Subs from the fleet but alot of their crews come "direct entry" and apply for that role from beginning.
Some officers do their early phase work on surface ships and transfer in, some ME/WE go straight to Subs.
Dolphins dont like being a target on surface so dont sail above
Which will happen en masse when platforms go back to sea, we have seen this before. Solving the "crewing problems" while ships are undeployable doesn't solve the core problem. Ship or boat is ready, and there are no sailors for them.
Not sure how we are meant to increase grow the submarine force by ~30-40 sailors per year, annually every year for the next 8-10 years with Collins undergoing LOTE at this time. And move them to the east coast. And onto a new more complicated and advanced platform. With entirely new and unique positions, with skills not available in Australia.
The more specialized the role more that makes sense. But going forward how sustainable is that?
With less subs available going to be hard to grow the sub force and grow the RAN in general.
Having a bunch of surface sailors and offering them mega bucks to move to subs has occurred before. We did it with Oberon and we did it with collins. Not everyone, but its a pipeline. More surface sailors more pipeline. More proven sailors, better retention. Surface platforms and churn more with bigger crews, easier to crew platforms, more career opportunities.
Going to be very hard if Hobart's, Collins, Anzacs are all on hard stands. undergoing LOTE/upgrades, all at the same time (2024-2030)..
It will be a challenge to turn submariners back into surface targets crews. But it is another pipeline that currently just generally points out to leaving the ADF. Doesn't have to be. It doesn't have to be appealing to everyone. Just needs to be more attractive than just posting to a boat on hardstands.
We currently don't have a plan to crew the SSNs
We currently don't have a plan to build SSN
We currently don't have a plan to cover the Hobart capability gap
We currently don't have a plan to LOTE the Anzacs.
We currently don't have a sustainable ship building plan
Quite a few challenges ahead. IMO RAN will have difficultly just filling its current numbers. Unemployment rate is lowest its been in 50 years. RAN and the ADF will have to be a first choice employer if it wants to compete in this market.
In 1990 we had more surface combatants than we have today, with almost 1,000 less personnel, each requiring a significantly higher crew complement, and a population nearing ten million less than today.
The argument that we can’t crew a larger fleet just doesn’t make any sense at all.
It’s abundantly clear that long-rusted on attitudes, utilisation of personnel, and the high crewing requirements of legacy platforms like Anzac, is as much an issue as anything else and can’t be ignored as the key factor it is.
I do somewhat get the feeling that some ‘bright’ desk jockey decided let’s crew up our platforms to the brim to solve retention issues - ignoring all other factors that play a part.
The RAN has almost four times the personnel of the RSN and over five times the population, yet operates 11 major combatants vs 6? It doesn’t add up.
The argument that we can’t crew a larger fleet just doesn’t make any sense at all.
It’s abundantly clear that long-rusted on attitudes, utilisation of personnel, and the high crewing requirements of legacy platforms like Anzac, is as much an issue as anything else and can’t be ignored as the key factor it is.
I do somewhat get the feeling that some ‘bright’ desk jockey decided let’s crew up our platforms to the brim to solve retention issues - ignoring all other factors that play a part.
The RAN has almost four times the personnel of the RSN and over five times the population, yet operates 11 major combatants vs 6? It doesn’t add up.
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Sadly I have to say this is a better outcome than some options. Certainly better than trying to sell it back into commercial service...... which was never really a goer from a financial and/or practical perspective.
Just wondering if the RAS gear and associated equipment off Hmas Sirius could be repurposed onto Hmas Choules.
Would give the fleet a third ship to provide some limited refueling utilising Hmas Choules existing large fuel bunkerage.
I recall reading about a deep southern ocean patrol some decades ago when an Anzac frigate was accompanied by a replenishment ship.
Maquarrie Island if I recall.
Highlights the need for flexibility from our limited assets.
A large supply ship for a solitary frigate looked a bit overkill
Just a thought
Cheers S
Yes, there were a number of deployments by RAN frigates accompanied by a replenishment vessels into the Southern Ocean. The attached article from the Sea Power Centre’s Semaphore provides some details. “The Great Patagonian Toothfish Campaign”. We watched for 14 days as ACV Southern Supporter conducted a hot pursuit of the Togo reg’d FV South Tomi toward South Africa, eventually boarded by a SASR detachment in a Joint Operation with the South African Defence Force.
Another one that didn’t get away!
www.antarctica.gov.au
Customs pursuit enters 10th day
Lots of news on accelerating Hunter.. One story claims its 12 months a head of schedule.
APDR claims it can be accelerated much faster. But the evil Hobart class is a threat to the Hunter class.
asiapacificdefencereporter.com
Again missing the point..
Hobarts and Hunters are separate ship classes. One is a Frigate and one is a destroyer. One has flex space, a heavy ASW focus, minimal crewing, some air defence capability, CEAFAR radar. It is likely slower and quieter. There are no type 26 ships commissioned. Australia won't get its first ship until late 2020, possibly FOC in 2030's. They are to replace the anzacs.
Hobarts have larger VLS magazine, SPy 1DV or likely Spy6 radar, has no flex space, is designed to tighter integrate with other aegis ships and fleets like the US. We already have 3 Hobart's in the water. Its of a older limited design, but already in service. They may even have different baselines of aegis and may still yet have different consoles. While it has moderate ASW capability, its smaller and less focused on that. They replaced the 4 FFG's with 3 AWD's. The 4th AWD was never built, purely to curtail the program because governments didn't like it (Labor because under Gillard they gutted Rudds defence, under liberals, it was a labor project). The original program was 3 + 1 if the project met targets, which a labor government deliberately slowed the project down, which deliberately costed more, and blew past any chance of a 4th. There should be at least a 4th AWD, Spain has 5 ships of this class what is arguably a smaller navy with lesser needs in a more benign environment.
We had 6 FFG's and 7 Anzacs in 2005, heavens how 20 years later we have fallen!. Now we have 3 AWD and 8 anzacs in 2022. We have less missiles at sea than we had in 1990. In 2024 we will have 2 AWD and 7 Anzacs. Then each year going forward we will have less ships and submarines than what we have today. Until ~2030, the old chariots keep on slogging on with their antiquated systems and concepts and designs. Ships older than those who serve on them. Ships their Grandfather could have served on. In 2030, off against the most modern navy on the planet.
The Hobart's need to be upgraded because currently they have a combat system that can't fire SM-6 do BMD and AD at the same time and is ~20 years old (think Pentium III with MMX and Windows Millennium). It also needs to be able to fire tlam (new capability) NSM(new capability), SPY6 should also be installed (most likely needed if we ever want to fire SM-3 or be part of a taskforce that has SM-3 capability), currently it will cost about the same to build 3 new destroyers as it will to cut the 3 existing destroyers in half and upgrade them. But if we do that, cut them in half, we will have no aegis ships for the rest of the 2020-2030 period.
Building faster hunters does not solve Australia's destroyer problems. Australia should had 5-6 destroyers (like it had oh, for the last 100 years), and sizeable (9) frigates.
So it begins.. Aus tearing the ADF in on itself due to people not seeing the bigger picture. This is dumb. Cancelling or cutting IFV is dumb. Cancelling tanks is dumb. Destroyers and frigates are different ships, we need both capabilities. You might as well cancel the Hobart and the hunter and replace them with OPV if we want to continue being dumb. Replace the F-35 with training aircraft like Hawks. Replace artillery with mortars. Replace submarines with seamines. Different branches and politicians will go out to assassinate each others non-overlapping programs, while the media hatchets anything and everything if it drives clicks.
APDR claims it can be accelerated much faster. But the evil Hobart class is a threat to the Hunter class.
Hunter class frigate program could be accelerated - APDR
On August 26 there was good news during a media briefing in Adelaide by BAE Systems Australia - Maritime CEO Craig Lockhart.
asiapacificdefencereporter.com
Again missing the point..
Hobarts and Hunters are separate ship classes. One is a Frigate and one is a destroyer. One has flex space, a heavy ASW focus, minimal crewing, some air defence capability, CEAFAR radar. It is likely slower and quieter. There are no type 26 ships commissioned. Australia won't get its first ship until late 2020, possibly FOC in 2030's. They are to replace the anzacs.
Hobarts have larger VLS magazine, SPy 1DV or likely Spy6 radar, has no flex space, is designed to tighter integrate with other aegis ships and fleets like the US. We already have 3 Hobart's in the water. Its of a older limited design, but already in service. They may even have different baselines of aegis and may still yet have different consoles. While it has moderate ASW capability, its smaller and less focused on that. They replaced the 4 FFG's with 3 AWD's. The 4th AWD was never built, purely to curtail the program because governments didn't like it (Labor because under Gillard they gutted Rudds defence, under liberals, it was a labor project). The original program was 3 + 1 if the project met targets, which a labor government deliberately slowed the project down, which deliberately costed more, and blew past any chance of a 4th. There should be at least a 4th AWD, Spain has 5 ships of this class what is arguably a smaller navy with lesser needs in a more benign environment.
We had 6 FFG's and 7 Anzacs in 2005, heavens how 20 years later we have fallen!. Now we have 3 AWD and 8 anzacs in 2022. We have less missiles at sea than we had in 1990. In 2024 we will have 2 AWD and 7 Anzacs. Then each year going forward we will have less ships and submarines than what we have today. Until ~2030, the old chariots keep on slogging on with their antiquated systems and concepts and designs. Ships older than those who serve on them. Ships their Grandfather could have served on. In 2030, off against the most modern navy on the planet.
The Hobart's need to be upgraded because currently they have a combat system that can't fire SM-6 do BMD and AD at the same time and is ~20 years old (think Pentium III with MMX and Windows Millennium). It also needs to be able to fire tlam (new capability) NSM(new capability), SPY6 should also be installed (most likely needed if we ever want to fire SM-3 or be part of a taskforce that has SM-3 capability), currently it will cost about the same to build 3 new destroyers as it will to cut the 3 existing destroyers in half and upgrade them. But if we do that, cut them in half, we will have no aegis ships for the rest of the 2020-2030 period.
Building faster hunters does not solve Australia's destroyer problems. Australia should had 5-6 destroyers (like it had oh, for the last 100 years), and sizeable (9) frigates.
So it begins.. Aus tearing the ADF in on itself due to people not seeing the bigger picture. This is dumb. Cancelling or cutting IFV is dumb. Cancelling tanks is dumb. Destroyers and frigates are different ships, we need both capabilities. You might as well cancel the Hobart and the hunter and replace them with OPV if we want to continue being dumb. Replace the F-35 with training aircraft like Hawks. Replace artillery with mortars. Replace submarines with seamines. Different branches and politicians will go out to assassinate each others non-overlapping programs, while the media hatchets anything and everything if it drives clicks.
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Two seperate production lines might also be necessary if we are going to have a viable surface fleet by the end of this decade even if one of those production lines is based in Spain.
Even if construction for the Hunters were to start next year you would maybe claw back one year which would still not see the Hunters in service before the 2030s.
Even if construction for the Hunters were to start next year you would maybe claw back one year which would still not see the Hunters in service before the 2030s.
I dont disagree with most of your post but .... To be fair ..... some air defence capability, CEAFAR radar is monumentally playing down the AAW capability of the Hunters. Except for the number of VLS this will be as good (and better in some circumstances) as the current fit on the DDG (noting the DDG is to be upgraded as well as you note). The vessel will have combined engagement capability and a Multi Static Sonar arrangements (and lets face it both are a serious capability) and will be capable of some BMD.Lots of news on accelerating Hunter.. One story claims its 12 months a head of schedule.
APDR claims it can be accelerated much faster. But the evil Hobart class is a threat to the Hunter class.
Hunter class frigate program could be accelerated - APDR
On August 26 there was good news during a media briefing in Adelaide by BAE Systems Australia - Maritime CEO Craig Lockhart.
Again missing the point..
Hobarts and Hunters are separate ship classes. One is a Frigate and one is a destroyer. One has flex space, a heavy ASW focus, minimal crewing, some air defence capability, CEAFAR radar. It is likely slower and quieter. There are no type 26 ships commissioned. Australia won't get its first ship until late 2020, possibly FOC in 2030's. They are to replace the anzacs.
Hobarts have larger VLS magazine, SPy 1DV or likely Spy6 radar, has no flex space, is designed to tighter integrate with other aegis ships and fleets like the US. We already have 3 Hobart's in the water. Its of a older limited design, but already in service. They may even have different baselines of aegis and may still yet have different consoles. While it has moderate ASW capability, its smaller and less focused on that. They replaced the 4 FFG's with 3 AWD's. The 4th AWD was never built, purely to curtail the program because governments didn't like it (Labor because under Gillard they gutted Rudds defence, under liberals, it was a labor project). The original program was 3 + 1 if the project met targets, which a labor government deliberately slowed the project down, which deliberately costed more, and blew past any chance of a 4th. There should be at least a 4th AWD, Spain has 5 ships of this class what is arguably a smaller navy with lesser needs in a more benign environment.
We had 6 FFG's and 7 Anzacs in 2005, heavens how 20 years later we have fallen!. Now we have 3 AWD and 8 anzacs in 2022. We have less missiles at sea than we had in 1990. In 2024 we will have 2 AWD and 7 Anzacs. Then each year going forward we will have less ships and submarines than what we have today. Until ~2030, the old chariots keep on slogging on with their antiquated systems and concepts and designs. Ships older than those who serve on them. Ships their Grandfather could have served on. In 2030, off against the most modern navy on the planet.
The Hobart's need to be upgraded because currently they have a combat system that can't fire SM-6 do BMD and AD at the same time and is ~20 years old (think Pentium III with MMX and Windows Millennium). It also needs to be able to fire tlam (new capability) NSM(new capability), SPY6 should also be installed (most likely needed if we ever want to fire SM-3 or be part of a taskforce that has SM-3 capability), currently it will cost about the same to build 3 new destroyers as it will to cut the 3 existing destroyers in half and upgrade them. But if we do that, cut them in half, we will have no aegis ships for the rest of the 2020-2030 period.
Building faster hunters does not solve Australia's destroyer problems. Australia should had 5-6 destroyers (like it had oh, for the last 100 years), and sizeable (9) frigates.
So it begins.. Aus tearing the ADF in on itself due to people not seeing the bigger picture. This is dumb. Cancelling or cutting IFV is dumb. Cancelling tanks is dumb. Destroyers and frigates are different ships, we need both capabilities. You might as well cancel the Hobart and the hunter and replace them with OPV if we want to continue being dumb. Replace the F-35 with training aircraft like Hawks. Replace artillery with mortars. Replace submarines with seamines. Different branches and politicians will go out to assassinate each others non-overlapping programs, while the media hatchets anything and everything if it drives clicks.
I should also defend the DDG as a moderate ASW capability really does not reflect the fact the vessel has a Bistatic ASW system. This is a good ASW capability.
Agree both are required.
PS - I still dont think anybody relying on information in the public domain about the number of cells to be fitted to the Hunter.
John Newman
The Bunker Group
Those figures you have quoted above are inaccurate.
Back in 2005, for most of the year the RAN has 12 MFUs, 6 x FFG and 6 x FFH.
The 7th FFH commissioned in October 2005, one month later the 1st FFG decommissioned, eg, back to 12 again.
Yes today it’s 3 x DDG and 8 x FFH, and it will stay that way until approx 2030 when the 1st FFG commissions and the 1st FFH retires (in subsequent years it will be 1 FFG replacing 1 FFH, until eventually it will be 3 x DDG and 9 x FFG, back to 12.
Going back to 2005 to today, the ‘commissioned’ MFUs have averaged 12, now its 11, briefly (very very briefly it was 13).
But that doesn’t tell the full story, over time all 8 FFH commissioned, the FFG fleet reduced to 4, and over that time the 4 x FFG went through the very slow FFG-UP, operational hulls dropped lower.
Since then the 8 x FFH have gone through ASMD upgrade and are now going through AMCAP, shortly the 3 x DDG will go through their update too.
A distinction needs to be made between ‘commissioned’ and ‘operational’ MFUs, the operational MFUs fluctuate all the time, always has, always will.
As for ‘we have less missiles at sea than we had in 1990’, let’s examine that too.
Back then we had 3 x DDG armed with SM-1, 4 (not 6) x FFG, armed with SM-1 and Harpoon, and 5 x River DE with 4 x SeaCat (SeaCat was very obsolete to say the least).
If memory serves me correct the DDG and FFGs had a missile magazine of approx 40 SM-1(?).
Today we have 8 x FFH with 8 cell VLS with quad pack ESSM (32 missiles per ship), plus 8 x Harpoon.
The 3 x DDG have 48 x VLS, a nominal load out is 40 x SM-2 and 8 x quad pack ESSM (32 missiles per ship) and 8 x Harpoon,
I’d argue we have more missiles at sea today, and more capable too.
Anyway, do we need more MFUs? Without doubt, but I don’t think things were a lot better back then compared to today.
Just my opinion of course too.
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Redlands18
Well-Known Member
I think an Anzac circa 2030 will be a far more capable ship then the River class DEs were by 1990 too, fair idea which one I would rather go to war in.
I think it was, it just wasn’t something we concerned ourselves with.
A situation that has lasted up until around 2020 or so, which is why we are currently scrambling around like a chook with it’s head cut off trying to find solutions.
The solutions are straight-forward. Go out and buy what we bloody well need TODAY, instead of continuing to blather and dither. Most of what we need is already IN the IIP.
Instead we get another 9-12 month delay where basically all acquisition is put on hold while reviewing “what” we need.
Back then the U.S navy was considerably larger than the P.L.A.N this article suggests that the P.L.A.N was only copying Russia and just had raw numbers
The Rise of the People's Liberation Army Navy: Chinese Naval Modernization from 1990 to 2018 - WhiteFleet.net
The Rise of the People's Liberation Army Navy: Chinese Naval Modernization from 1990 to 2018 - WhiteFleet.net
John Newman
The Bunker Group
Yes the Review, hmmm....
And of course they put Smith in charge, arguably one of the worst Def Mins in living memory.
Smith who was also part of the Rudd/Gillard/Rudd Governments that didn’t order the 4th DDG.
Now we are hearing reports they are dithering over the order for 40 UH-60M to replace the MRH90 fleet, hmm.....
One bit of bright news:
Lockheed Martin contracted for additional MH-60Rs for Australia | ADBR
The US Navy has awarded Lockheed Martin a contract for US$503.7m (A$730m) for the production of 12 Sikorsky MH-60R Romeo Seahawk helicopters for the Royal Australian Navy. The new aircraft…
adbr.com.au
It does appear an order for the 12 additional MH-60R is proceeding, maybe the order by the Morrison Government was too far along the track to stop? Hmmmm..
But, no news on the ‘13th’, the replacement for the one lost at sea by the RAN.
Again, hmmmm....
Wouldn't there have to be another DSCA announcement to cover that one, similar to the one for the growler replacement?
This contract for 12 would only cover the 12 approved in the DSCA Approval and it would probably slow down the process to wait for the approval for the 13th.
It's arguable that Seacat was obsolete when it was commissioned & remained so until withdrawn despite upgrades.
The Hobarts were a Liberal government project, the contract was signed under Howard.
The option for a 4th AWD in the original program lapsed in 2008 under Rudd and could not later be revived whatever subsequent governments may have wanted.
SPY-1 ships can, and on a number of occasions have been, involved in ABM shoots as detecting, controlling and firing unit. It just requires an updated Aegis baseline to the one fitted in the Hobarts; but one which can use effectively the same hardware generation.
The option for a 4th AWD in the original program lapsed in 2008 under Rudd and could not later be revived whatever subsequent governments may have wanted.
SPY-1 ships can, and on a number of occasions have been, involved in ABM shoots as detecting, controlling and firing unit. It just requires an updated Aegis baseline to the one fitted in the Hobarts; but one which can use effectively the same hardware generation.