Author Archives: Chuck Hill

New Chinese Cutters–How Many?–Sorry, I’ve Lost Count

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The China Defense Blog has three new posts with several photos of new Chinese Coast Guard Cutters.

The first is news of the award of a contract for four new 5,000 ton cutters. and while the text says they will be similar to an earlier 5,000 ton cutter (CMS01), the illustration that accompanies the story shows a very different ship, in many ways similar to the National Security Cutter. It appears there is a medium caliber gun on the bow. (This would be a significant but not unexpected change for the Chinese Coast Guard.) There is a frame over what appears to be a stern ramp not unlike that on the NSC. The hull shape also appears similar to the NSC.

The second post reports the commissioning of the second of two 4,000 cutters commissioned this month.

A third post asks, “What would a 12,000 ton Coast Guard Cutter Look Like?” reports as was reported here earlier, China’s intention to build the world’s largest Offshore Patrol Vessel. They don’t have any illustration of the new ship, but they do say it will have a 76mm gun, two 30mm, facilities to support two Z-8 helicopters, and a top speed of 25 knots.The size of the helicopters is notable. The Z-8 is a large, three engine, 13,000 kg helicopter based on the Aérospatiale SA 321 Super Frelon. The transport version of this helicopter can transport 38 equipped troops. The same airframe is also used for SAR, ASW, and vertical replenishment. The post also says it shows photos of new 3,000 ton cutters, but all the photos except those of hull number 3306 were referred to elsewhere as 4,000 ton cutters.

New hull numbers seen in this series of posts are 1401, 2401, 3401, 3306, and MSA-01). Unlike most earlier Chinese cutters, all of these ships have helicopter decks.

This is the fruition of their earlier stated ambition to build 36 cutters in three years for the Chinese Maritime Surveillance Agency (CMS, only one of four agencies that combined to form their Coast Guard).

Thanks for a successful 2013

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Before we get too far into the new year I would like to thank my readers, and particularly those who have contributed to the discussion, for what I consider a very successful 2013.

I would also like to thank other bloggers who have seen fit to reference our little corner of the internet, including:

  1. thinkdefence.co.uk
  2. coltoncompany.com
  3. timawa.net
  4. cimsec.org
  5. http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/
  6. http://forums.bharat-rakshak.com/

Daily readership is up approximately 50% from where we ended 2012. During the course of the year, the site got 155,432 views. New monthly records of successively higher use were set in January, May, June, October, and December, the last with 16,909 hits. On a typical day about 200 individuals visit the site. WordPress tells me we had visitors from 170 countries, but I suspect some of those were were spammers, still, in the last year, readers in 32 different countries have made 200 or more views. Aside from the US the most frequent visits were (in order) from the UK, Canada, Philippines, Netherlands, Australia, France, Germany, Chile, India, Italy, Greece, and Japan, all with over 500 views.

I’m happy to see many readers are using my list of recommended blogs. It is in fact the most viewed post.

The busiest day of the year was December 5th with 1,700 views. The most popular post that day was What is a Corvette? and What Next?.

There were 239 new posts in 2013, pushing the total to 960 posts.

The posts most frequently viewed in 2013 were:

The most commented on post in 2013 was “Reinvent the Fifth Armed Service, Quickly”-USNI

I look forward to 2014 and will continue to try to give you material that is worth your time without duplicating stories on the official sources.

If anyone has any suggestions, or would like to write a post for publication here, you can contact me at chuckhhill@aol.com

Chinese to Build World’s Largest Cutter

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File:JapanCoastGuard Shikishima.jpg
Japanese Coast Guard Cutter Shikishima, this class of two are currently the largest offshore patrol vessels in the world. Photo from Japanese Wikipedia; ja:ファイル:JapanCoastGuard Shikishima.jpg

German Navy blog “Marine Forum” reports (21 January) that the

China Ship-building Industry Corporation has been contracted with developing and building a 10,000-ton and another 4,000-ton surveillance ship.
(rmks: for paramilitary China Coast Guard or China Marine Surveillance)

Meanwhile, in a move designed to bolster their claims in the South China Sea, they also report,

With Vietnam: China will expand paramilitary infrastructure at Sansha City (Paracel Archipelago) in the South China Sea … permanently base a 5,000-ts patrol ship (rmks: prob. China Marine Surveillance – CMS) and begin regular patrols.

Don’t expect China’s new 10,000 ton cutter to look like a US Coast Guard Cutter. The Chinese seem to measure their Coast Guard primarily in comparison to the Japanese Coast Guard which has until now operated the largest cutters in the world, two 9,350 full load, Shikishima class high endurance helicopter carrying cutters. Like their Japanese counterparts, they are likely to be built to merchant standards, will be only lightly armed, but will have excellent aviation facilities. The additional tonnage is likely to give them an advantage if they get in a “shoving match” with opposing coast guards, and they are likely to have a secondary military transport role. With a relatively large number of boats, they could probably land a fair number of personnel in a relatively short time. By way of comparison the National Security Cutters are 4,500 tons full load.

Honoring More CG Heroes–Naming Ten More Cutters

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File:Proposed modification to the Damen Stan patrol vessel for the USCG.jpg

US Coast Guard Illustration

As names were announced for the first fourteen Webber class Fast Response Cutters, the official USCG blog, “Coast Guard Compass” gave a short description of the service of the enlisted heroes these ships were named for. (You can find links to these fourteen posts here.)

Now ten more names have been selected and Coast Guard Compass is again posting descriptions of their service. The first five are:

Migrant Interdiction, Australian Style

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File:RAN-IFR 2013 D2 116.JPGOne of the less glamorous and certainly less rewarding missions the Coast Guard does is alien migrant interdiction operations (AMIO). It seems to come in waves but it never goes away completely.

Other countries have similar operations. We’ve talked about the problems the Italians have been having.

The Australians are having similar problems but their geography works against them. Plus they are trying to address this problem with vessels that simply may not be up to the job, at least not they way they are doing it.

Their workhorse for this mission are ten Armidale Class patrol boats, based in Darwin. These vessels are longer than the Fast Response Cutters, but because of their aluminum hulls, they are actually much lighter displacement. Their range and crew size are similar. They are slightly slower at 25 knots.

The problem is that the emigrants are not trying to come directly to continental Australia, they are trying to get to Australian territory in the form of islands close to Indonesia but distant from mainland Australia, The Cocos Islands or Christmas Island.

The Cocos Islands are less than 600 miles from Indonesia but over 2,000 miles from the boats’ base in Darwin.

Christmas Island is less than 200 miles from Indonesia, but over 1500 miles from Darwin.

These relatively small patrol craft have to transit about 1,500 miles before they can even start to work. The Australian Navy has recently gotten into a bit of hot water over entering Indonesian waters as they try to enforce their immigration laws.

Interviewed regarding Corvettes and Offshore Patrol Vessels

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I was interviewed on a pod-cast for Center for International Maritime Security (CIMSEC) talking about Corvettes and Offshore Patrol Vessels, and the series of posts that I managed for them. You can hear the pod-cast here: Sea Control 18 – Naval Corvettes

You can find the original posts in the series here:

http://cimsec.org/corvette-next/

http://cimsec.org/corvettes-persian-gulf-strategic-survey-paul-pryce/

http://cimsec.org/corvette-exists-przemyslaw-krajewski/

http://cimsec.org/opv-missions-wartime/

http://cimsec.org/philippine-navy-frigate-program-opv-name/

http://cimsec.org/corvettes-support-global-seapower/

http://cimsec.org/cheaper-corvettes-coop-stuft-like/

http://cimsec.org/case-pickets/

http://cimsec.org/offshore-patrol-cutters-opc-lcs/

http://cimsec.org/look-corvettes-air-defense/

http://cimsec.org/seafighters-will-never-operate-logistics-free-world-2/

 

 

Coast Guard to help the Forrest Service–Fire Aviation

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Fire Aviation is reporting an interesting wrinkle in the story of the transfer of Coast Guard C-130s to the Forrest Service,

“We were surprised to hear from Mrs. Jones (a Public Affairs Specialist for the Forest Service at the National Interagency Fire Center-Chuck) …that a joint U.S. Coast Guard and U.S. Forest Service program office will provide logistics, operations, training, maintenance, and support for the C-130H aircraft. The Coast Guard has been managing a fleet of C-130s since 1959, using them for long range search and rescue, drug interdiction, illegal migrant patrols, homeland security, and logistics. They have 24 older C-130Hs which are being upgraded with new center wing boxes and cockpit equipment with new multi-function displays. In 2008 they began replacing some of the C-130Hs with new C-130Js; they have six now with three more on order. All these numbers were valid before the Coast Guard agreed to send seven C-130Hs to the USFS if the Coast Guard could get the 14 almost new C-27J aircraft from the military that had been earmarked for the Forest Service.”

Enhancing the Integration of USCG w/ USMC and USN–SLD

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Second Line of Defense has an editorial “Enhancing the Integration of the USCG with the USMC and the USN: Synergy and Mission Effectiveness as Key 21st Century Efforts,” advocating a more “naval” Coast Guard. In particular, it supports the building of more large ships that might be used as adjuncts to the Navy/Marine Corps Amphibious Ready Group/Marine Expiditionary Unit (ARG-MEU) teams.

It also raises the question, can the MV-22 Osprey land and take off from our ships so that they might act as “lily pads.”