Royal Australian Navy Discussions and Updates 2.0

[Morgo]

Not so sure about that now. It’s been said here in the past..just after comments we would never get nuclear and the americans would not share their technology. One of the previous posts …putting all politics aside ….. makes the most sense. Have all 3 countries produce the same subs gives an increase in production capability..assuming an Australian yard gets added to the mix, commonality of parts, systems and support across the continents. How different is the operational requirement between US and British subs…I don’t know… it has to be more efficient for one yard to be producing 20-30-40 of the same section …1-2-3-4 a year rather than a batch of 6 over 15 years or more.

It’s definitely more efficient. It’s also completely unpalatable politically in the US.

It’s currently illegal for this to happen (see here), specifically:

“no vessel to be constructed for any of the armed forces, and no major component of the hull or superstructure of any such vessel, may be constructed in a foreign shipyard.”

The only exception is if the President deems it to be in the US national interest, which then triggers a 30 day review period by Congress. This would be political suicide, especially when the White House and Congress are held by different parties.

It ain’t gonna happen.

 

[StingrayOZ]

But would they accept them being maintained in another country? It would give South and West Australia some work and help drive down the US maintenance backlog. And next time I will read the rest of the posts before commenting. My bad but believe this should be on the AUKUS table

That would be fine. As long as there isn't a huge corruption scandal for services offered to the USN. Wink wink.

Fat Leonard scandal - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Building is in a different category. US is very paranoid about build capability. Like how they stopped the F-35 production because of Chinese magnets in a pump. Military equipment must be made in America. You buy harriers, you start a factory in the us to build them. You want Austal ferries, you build a factory in the US to make them.

Chinese Parts in the F-35 Highlight Concerning Trend in the US Defense Sector

The contraction of U.S. defense and civilian industries since the end of the Cold War has made foreign inputs into key weapons programs indispensable.

thediplomat.com

US repairs ships in shipyards all over the world. McCain was towed to Japan to be fixed after the collision.

USS John S. McCain Leaves Singapore for Repairs in Japan - USNI News

After more than a month pier side in Singapore, the guided-missile destroyer USS John S. McCain (DDG-56) has left to be transported to Yokosuka, Japan for repairs, the Navy announced on Thursday. McCain will be transported by the heavy-lift transport M/V Treasure from the Changi Naval Base to...

news.usni.org

Even non treaty allies are used.

A first, US naval ship Charles Drew arrives in Indian shipyard for repair

According to senior Ministry of Defence (MoD) officials, New Delhi had proposed during the 2 + 2 dialoge in April that the US Navy could avail of the services and expertise of Indian shipyards

www.business-standard.com

The US operates globally, it acknowledges to keep its navy working efficiently, ships and vessels need to be repaired, all over the world, it makes no sense to slog it back to the USA at 3 knots being towed, when there is a perfectly good ship yard that can do the work nearby. If they did that there would be no USAF planes flying and no USN ships sailing.

USN subs being able to have work done in South Australia would be a big plus, would help the US with their backlog, is a logical and trusted place for repairs, and would help upskill and familiarize the workforce with that design and platform particularly given they might need to build them. Hence why basing out of Perth is fairly plausible. UK would see similar value, because you can't just get a Nuclear boat repaired in any dockyard.

Having people maintain subs is part of the way to building them. We maintain Oberon submarines and after 20 years we could basically do anything with that platform including upgrading, chopping them in half, mid life refits, and we could sell that experience to other operating nations.. Maintaining subs is more than just a grease and oil change and new tyres. It can get quite involved. But just pulling them out scraping barnacles off them, and giving them the basics (which is more like refurbishing a space shuttle for its next launch, not like scraping a oyster farming boat), hogs ship yard time. So if simple stuff can start to occur in Osborne, which needs facilities to do that kind of stuff anyway, then more can happen on big stuff in US yards, including construction.

 

[ngatimozart]

There is no way in this world that the US would accept any part of their subs being built in a foreign country.

One line posts aren't acceptable from newbies. Please ensure that you have at least two lines of text.

 

[seaspear]

The defence minister Richard Marles has provided a strong hint that the submarines will be built onshore and is expected to make a statement in march 2023 if an interim conventional submarine is needed. Will wait for more tea leaves to read.
Defence Minister Richard Marles hints AUKUS submarines will be manufactured onshore | news.com.au — Australia’s leading news site

 

[Depot Dog]

It’s definitely more efficient. It’s also completely unpalatable politically in the US.

It’s currently illegal for this to happen (see here), specifically:

“no vessel to be constructed for any of the armed forces, and no major component of the hull or superstructure of any such vessel, may be constructed in a foreign shipyard.”

The only exception is if the President deems it to be in the US national interest, which then triggers a 30 day review period by Congress. This would be political suicide, especially when the White House and Congress are held by different parties.

It ain’t gonna happen.

I agree that currently illegal to construct US ships by a foreign shipyard. Two years ago it was illegal for the USA to share their nuclear submarine secrets with Australia.

Memorandum on the Presidential Determination on the Proposed Agreement between the Government of the United States of America, the Government of Australia, and the Government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland for the Exchange of Naval Nuclear Propulsion Information | The White House

Presidential Determination No. 2022-05 MEMORANDUM FOR THE SECRETARY OF ENERGY SUBJECT: Presidential Determination on the Proposed Agreement between the Government of the United States of America, the Government of Australia, and the Government of the United Kingdom of Great...

www.whitehouse.gov

September 2021 we sign Aukus. November 2021 we sign agreements with the UK and USA to exchange nuclear propulsion information. Recently UK and USA agreed to start training our naval personal. These are examples of the political will. In this time period Australia has a change of government and the UK has had a revolving door of prime ministers. Political change isn't a factor for now. Regarding USA ban on foreign shipyards. Maybe if it suits all partners that can be changed in the future. We just have to wait and see

Regards
DD

 

[Redlands18]

The defence minister Richard Marles has provided a strong hint that the submarines will be built onshore and is expected to make a statement in march 2023 if an interim conventional submarine is needed. Will wait for more tea leaves to read.
Defence Minister Richard Marles hints AUKUS submarines will be manufactured onshore | news.com.au — Australia’s leading news site

Seriously, how fast does anyone think we could get a conventional sub of any type and size, let alone one that is of any real use to the RAN

 

[hauritz]

Actually I am more intrigued with the idea of a common design. I am not sure how this would work. You just have to compare the Block V Virginia to the Astute class. US boats tend to be larger and more expensive while I expect the UK and Australians don't have the same deep pockets.

Also if Australia is to get an all new design than you can forget Australia getting its hands on new subs until the 2040s.

 

[Morgo]

I agree that currently illegal to construct US ships by a foreign shipyard. Two years ago it was illegal for the USA to share their nuclear submarine secrets with Australia.

Memorandum on the Presidential Determination on the Proposed Agreement between the Government of the United States of America, the Government of Australia, and the Government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland for the Exchange of Naval Nuclear Propulsion Information | The White House

Presidential Determination No. 2022-05 MEMORANDUM FOR THE SECRETARY OF ENERGY SUBJECT: Presidential Determination on the Proposed Agreement between the Government of the United States of America, the Government of Australia, and the Government of the United Kingdom of Great...

www.whitehouse.gov

September 2021 we sign Aukus. November 2021 we sign agreements with the UK and USA to exchange nuclear propulsion information. Recently UK and USA agreed to start training our naval personal. These are examples of the political will. In this time period Australia has a change of government and the UK has had a revolving door of prime ministers. Political change isn't a factor for now. Regarding USA ban on foreign shipyards. Maybe if it suits all partners that can be changed in the future. We just have to wait and see

Regards
DD

Fair point. I think the key difference here is that there will be US constituents who lose out, whereas AUKUS was at worst neutral and likely a net positive for the US economically.

I think the maintenance (and maybe even deep maintenance / FCD) at an Australian baseis a much more likely idea as others have suggested. Although I can’t see this making sense being done anywhere except Adelaide.

 

[Morgo]

US boats tend to be larger and more expensive while I expect the UK and Australians don't have the same deep pockets.

One quibble - the unit cost of an Astute appears in broadly the same ballpark as a Virginia from what I’ve seen GBP1.65bn vs USD2.8bn. There’s a difference but not an order of magnitude, and seemingly both much cheaper than what was planned for the Attack. I haven’t considered inflation, discount rate and exchange rate movements but directionally I think the Virginias don’t look all that more expensive.

The issue seems more to be the lack of scale. The UK has built 6 exquisite hand made Aston Martins while the US is cranking out 66 mass produced Chevy Corvettes. If Australia and the UK can get the benefit of that scale (and to a lesser extent the US as well) then all the better.

 

[seaspear]

With regards to the Hunter class frigate I have attached an article on the "Kingfisher shells" they indicate an ability to be used from the main gun to counter uuv,s, depth charge submarines to provide masking of their ability to track ships ,and even sonar bouy applications .
Does this provide better options for the Hunter class if there are no plans to include Asroc or multiple launch torpedo systems

 

[Mark_Evans]

With regards to the Hunter class frigate I have attached an article on the "Kingfisher shells" they indicate an ability to be used from the main gun to counter uuv,s, depth charge submarines to provide masking of their ability to track ships ,and even sonar bouy applications .
Does this provide better options for the Hunter class if there are no plans to include Asroc or multiple launch torpedo systems

Could you attach the article please

 

[Morgo]

Seriously, how fast does anyone think we could get a conventional sub of any type and size, let alone one that is of any real use to the RAN

To quote the AFR article yesterday:

Sources said the possibility of acquiriing another conventional submarines to avoid a capability gap between the ageing Collins class fleet of six boats and the delivery of nuclear submarines has all but been ruled out, with the navy not keen.

 

[seaspear]

Could you attach the article please

The Kingfisher gun-launched anti-submarine munition | Navy Lookout

 

[seaspear]

This article from Crikey states some that the Auditor-General found that the defence department was unable to explain why there was under reporting to the public and industry of the real costs to the then submarine and future frigate programs to a total of 36 billion dollars,
Incompetent, deceptive or both: why did defence hide the real cost of its submarines and ships? (msn.com)

 

[Morgo]

This article from Crikey states some that the Auditor-General found that the defence department was unable to explain why there was under reporting to the public and industry of the real costs to the then submarine and future frigate programs to a total of 36 billion dollars,
Incompetent, deceptive or both: why did defence hide the real cost of its submarines and ships? (msn.com)

Isn’t the simple answer that they didn’t want to tip their hand on the size of the envelope they were willing to spend before the bids were received / contracts were signed?

Thats procurement 101 isn’t it?

 

[hauritz]

When you think about how can anyone accurately predict the cost of a massive, complex, long term project such as the submarine procurement program?

The building phase of this program will run into 2050s. Then there is the ongoing cost of operating these things. We are already laying out money for all the preliminary work and will continue to do so until the last of these subs decommissions sometime in the 2070s or even 2080s.

By that time I expect Australia's population will have doubled, and the economy should grow even faster than that so I don't expect that it will be as big an imposition to the average taxpayer as current commentators believe.

Also, to be honest, I expect I would have decommissioned a long time before then so really, it's not my problem.

 

[spoz]

The ANAO report was in 2016, before either contract was signed. As indicated above, not revealing in detail how much budget available is procurement 101. An incompetent “filler” piece by an outlet known not to have a good record for reporting on Defence.

 

[Todjaeger]

Responding here as the content is really much more RAN-centric vs. overall ADF kit and structure.

If this was the way it was going to go then I think it would look something like:

8 Hunter ASW first
8 Hunter AWD second

8 GP frigates approximating the Mogami frigate (concurrent) - ~5000t so not a corvette

12 Mine warfare with full kit - operate 4 as fitted mine warfare and 8 as patrol with kit in storage.
6 OPV (or however many are currently under construction).

It's a lot of extra funds so would definitely require GoD commitment.

Regards,

Massive

Rather than getting hung up on what one things should be ordered (kit-focused approach) how about approaching the potential issue from the perspective of what capabilities the RAN would need to have available, and then determine what types of kit are needed and in what quantities?

Also consideration should be given to how RAN vessels are to be home ported. Should there be a East fleet and a West fleet? If so, what should the responsibilities of the two (or more, depends on how things are to be organized) fleets?

I ask these questions because in order to reliably create and deploy vessels, there needs to be certain minimum numbers of hulls. The Hobart-class DDG's are an unfortunately good example of what I mean. With only three DDG's, and going off the cycles for training and pre/post-deployment, maintenance repair & upgrades, as well as deployment or available for deployment, with only three such vessels in the fleet, there would only reliably be a single DDG either on a deployment or available for deployment if/when needed. If all three DDG's are based in different locations, that could making forming a proper TF escort for high value assets difficult and/or time consuming as vessels would need to transit to different locations to be where needed.

Now IMO, having the RAN get short/small class sizes of vessel for anything other than high value vessels is at best short-sighted, and goes down hill from there rather swiftly. To that end, I would be opposed to the RAN even attempting to get another three of the so-called "Hobart II" DDG's and that would be just another short class with little commonality across the RAN. To my thinking, it would likely make more sense to bring the Hobart-class DDG replacement programme forward and build a half-dozen or more of these, to provide extra area air defence capabilities beyond what is possible with only having three such vessels.

Given the increasing tensions which do not really seem to show signs of abating, I think it is necessary for the RAN to expand, the question becomes where, how, and by how much.

 

[Volkodav]

Responding here as the content is really much more RAN-centric vs. overall ADF kit and structure.



Rather than getting hung up on what one things should be ordered (kit-focused approach) how about approaching the potential issue from the perspective of what capabilities the RAN would need to have available, and then determine what types of kit are needed and in what quantities?

Also consideration should be given to how RAN vessels are to be home ported. Should there be a East fleet and a West fleet? If so, what should the responsibilities of the two (or more, depends on how things are to be organized) fleets?

I ask these questions because in order to reliably create and deploy vessels, there needs to be certain minimum numbers of hulls. The Hobart-class DDG's are an unfortunately good example of what I mean. With only three DDG's, and going off the cycles for training and pre/post-deployment, maintenance repair & upgrades, as well as deployment or available for deployment, with only three such vessels in the fleet, there would only reliably be a single DDG either on a deployment or available for deployment if/when needed. If all three DDG's are based in different locations, that could making forming a proper TF escort for high value assets difficult and/or time consuming as vessels would need to transit to different locations to be where needed.

Now IMO, having the RAN get short/small class sizes of vessel for anything other than high value vessels is at best short-sighted, and goes down hill from there rather swiftly. To that end, I would be opposed to the RAN even attempting to get another three of the so-called "Hobart II" DDG's and that would be just another short class with little commonality across the RAN. To my thinking, it would likely make more sense to bring the Hobart-class DDG replacement programme forward and build a half-dozen or more of these, to provide extra area air defence capabilities beyond what is possible with only having three such vessels.

Given the increasing tensions which do not really seem to show signs of abating, I think it is necessary for the RAN to expand, the question becomes where, how, and by how much.

As a rule of thumb three hulls gives you one all the time, five give you two, eight gives three, and ten gives four. The minimum class size to give one ship on each coast is five, and for two you need ten.

Ships operating in task forces of two or three are exponentially more capable than those operating alone.

Looking at it this way, a class of three doesn't provide the minimum require availability, meaning anything less than five is pointless. If you need to deploy and not just train, you need a class of ten or two of five, i.e. one on each coast training and one from each coast to deploy together.

 

[Stampede]

Responding here as the content is really much more RAN-centric vs. overall ADF kit and structure.



Rather than getting hung up on what one things should be ordered (kit-focused approach) how about approaching the potential issue from the perspective of what capabilities the RAN would need to have available, and then determine what types of kit are needed and in what quantities?

Also consideration should be given to how RAN vessels are to be home ported. Should there be a East fleet and a West fleet? If so, what should the responsibilities of the two (or more, depends on how things are to be organized) fleets?

I ask these questions because in order to reliably create and deploy vessels, there needs to be certain minimum numbers of hulls. The Hobart-class DDG's are an unfortunately good example of what I mean. With only three DDG's, and going off the cycles for training and pre/post-deployment, maintenance repair & upgrades, as well as deployment or available for deployment, with only three such vessels in the fleet, there would only reliably be a single DDG either on a deployment or available for deployment if/when needed. If all three DDG's are based in different locations, that could making forming a proper TF escort for high value assets difficult and/or time consuming as vessels would need to transit to different locations to be where needed.

Now IMO, having the RAN get short/small class sizes of vessel for anything other than high value vessels is at best short-sighted, and goes down hill from there rather swiftly. To that end, I would be opposed to the RAN even attempting to get another three of the so-called "Hobart II" DDG's and that would be just another short class with little commonality across the RAN. To my thinking, it would likely make more sense to bring the Hobart-class DDG replacement programme forward and build a half-dozen or more of these, to provide extra area air defence capabilities beyond what is possible with only having three such vessels.

Given the increasing tensions which do not really seem to show signs of abating, I think it is necessary for the RAN to expand, the question becomes where, how, and by how much.

Suggest need

One - 24 / 7 / 365 constabulary tasking around our coast with particular emphasis to our north. As to distance from coast I'd appreciate
some advice

Two - The ability to have a sovereign capability to put together a small task force that can conduct offensive operations within our region against a near peer. This would be able to dominate the ASW realm and be able to dominate with protective land based air support.

Three - The ability to work with and integrate with our allies.

Four - the ability to carry and land an amphibious battalion sized battle group ( Non contested ) within our region.

Five - The ability to have a regional superior submarine capability 24 / 7 /365 of at least two boats.

The above are very broad suggestions without much detail within each group ,but it is an overview only.


Some of the above would reflect current capabilities with vessels on hand.
Some would need additions to current inventory.


Thanks S