Davie/Helsinki Arctic Security Cutter ASC. Click on the photo to enlarge. 

Sixty Degrees North provides an excellent review of the Davie/Helsinki Shipyard version of the Arctic Security Cutter design, including a history of the previous ships that provided the basis of the design.

The post includes some details I had not previously seen.

The ships will be provided with a SCIF, “Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility.”

It also appears, from the graphic, they will have a multi-mode radar.

Armament will reportedly include a 25mm Mk38 (upgradable to 57mm) and 4 x M2 .50cal mounts/remote weapons stations. The mention of remote weapon stations (RWS) is encouraging. Requiring a crew to stand out in the open in the Arctic for long periods of time is probably not conducive to readiness. Plus the electro-optics on the RWS can be very useful for various missions. Still I would hope the main gun would have been a 30 X 173mm Bushmaster II Mk38 Mod 4 currently planned for the Polar Security Cutter. The Secondary armament for all large cutters should include something like the RWS used for the Army’s M-SHORAD that includes a 30 X 113mm M230 chain gun and short range missiles like Stinger, APKWS, Hellfire, or JAGM. Both versions of the 30mm offer air burst munitions while the 25mm does not. This would give the ships at least some protection against surface craft, drones, low flying aircraft, glide bombs, and cruise missiles. Replacing the Mk38 with a third such RWS in addition to two near the rear corners of the superstructure would provide good all round protection while simplifying training and logistics.

There was a suggestion that the Moon Pool might be used for ASW even in the ice.

“The design’s ‘standard’ moon pool intrigues me, as one criticism of armed icebreakers is that they cannot conduct Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) because icebreaking is so loud as to make SONAR systems useless. Absent the capability to detect and counter submarines, icebreakers will not survive long in combat. Deploying ASW UUVs (or even ROVs) via a moon pool may challenge that criticism in the future.”

The most surprising thing was the suggestion that these ships could host Mk70 containerized missile launch systems, providing the equivalent 16 Mk41 Vertical Launch Systems. (See the rendering below.) This seems like an answer to the similar sized Russian Project 23550 icebreaker which when first revealed the model of the ship had two containerized CLUB-K missile systems on the stern, but in fact we have not yet seen any icebreaker equipped this way. Basically any ship that has room for containers in an open area can do this, including putting them on the flight deck.

Rendering of the MPPS ASC version showing four MK70 launchers (16 VLS cells) and a cargo handling crane. (Image: Davie Defense)