And a few meters (it is an European boat) of good hemp line ...
The HDMS Absalon — the Danish flagship of the three-vessel NATO flotilla in the region — disrupted a pirate operation by "scuttling" one of the large boats used by Somali gangs to transport attack teams to piracy hunting areas far off the coast.Not yet.
The mothership was fired on and sunk after its crew members were transferred to a smaller boat in tow, which was allowed to return to the mainland, she said.
"NATO is not in the business of firing at skiffs with pirates in them," Lowe said in an interview from NATO's naval headquarters in Northwood, near London.
Ok, no dead pirates, but one thing at a time. A small "Decision Point" on PLAN SALAMANDER; I'll take it.
One note here: we are talking about the Danes. They don't have horns on their bridge wings, but as they prove every day in AFG and other areas in the war on terror, for a nation of a bit more than 5 million souls - Denmark pound for pound is one of our best allies. Few caveats - little problem going "kinetic."
They play varsity football in this war, and deserve praise at every turn.
....and yes - I would be remiss if I didn't remind you that they are using one of my dreamboats: HDMS ABSALON. We've talked about her many times here. Once again - I would trade 15 LCS for 10 ABSALONs any day. You talk about a ship perfect for "soft-power," "presence," and so on .... she is it - and she is a true multi-mission ship on top of it all.
40 Absalons for 55 LCS? I think it would be good deal... and of course anything that disrupts pirates is good.
ReplyDeleteThat Ship and her crew have been kicking A's out there since they got on station. Man, I wish I was on deployment with her.
ReplyDelete1 Absalom could make reefs out of all 50 LCS's. Plus, it's a mini-amphib!!!
ReplyDeleteOK, Let's build 50 Absalom frigates in the USA.
ReplyDelete25 up here in Maine, and 25 down in Pascagoula. Sounds fair. Of course BOTH shipyards would have to keep their designers equally busy. Therefore, the Navy would end up just like the BURKE class destroyers: the DDG-51 drawings up here in Maine, are all different from those same drawings down in Mississippi. So, after launching almost all 62 Burke Class DDG's, we still pay each yard to maintain their separate drawings on supposedly "identical" warships. When DDG-103 had her entire deskhouse burned while under construction in Pascagoula in 2005, the Navy paid Bath Maine to build an entirely new replacement deckhouse and ship it down to Mississippi. Turns out it ended up going onboard DDG-105, since NG simply paid overtime to have their version of the deckhouse for DDG-105 completed in time to go onboard DDG-103 at Ingalls. However, the active duty Navy crews reporting onboard each of these two new construction warships, which were tied up next to each other for many months in Pascagoula, were able to notice many, many differences between the interior arrangements of the BATH built deckhouse vs. the INGALLS built deckhouse. Numerous changes, Hard to say which design was better, but the point is the Navy is paying 2 separate shipyards to maintain their own drawings for the same ship class.
And we could do the same procedure if we built 50 Absaloms, too. Politics and jobs vs efficiency.
So much for the past 25 years of "acquisition reform" !
USS MOOSBRUGGER had horns, albiet on her bridge face, not her wings. Why can't we hang them? The pirates are latruncuni, enemies of all mankind.
ReplyDeleteActually, BIW is the planning yard for the Burkes. All drawings and engineering support come from BIW.
ReplyDeleteTo refine the point: Since Ingals is a building yard, they will re-draw all the BIW drawings into their own system since that all has to translate to their in-house CAD system and associated cutting and machining systems. That is probably the difference.
ReplyDeleteWe've always noticed over the years that you could tell a BIW FFG from one built by Todd...
Looking at the pics & the specs, the Absalons make even this old Zoomie salivate.
ReplyDeleteLooking at the pics & the specs, the Absalons make even this old Zoomie salivate.
ReplyDeleteIt also carries the sacred 5" gun! Let's build some! We'll call them the Salamander class:
ReplyDeleteFF-1 USS SALAMANDER
FF-2 USS HELLBENDER
FF-3 USS NEWT
This would emphasise the littoral and amphibious nature of thier mission, and allow us to build 500 of them before we ran out of names.
Great idea!!!!
ReplyDeleteI can already see a mascot for USS Newt:
http://www.alicia-logic.com/capsimages/a_097CarrieHenn.jpg