The June 2021 edition of the U. S. Naval Institute Proceedings has a short article by Captain Michael Cilenti, USCG, currently CO of USCGC Tampa, in the “Professional Notes” section, pp 78-79, about the service life extension program (SLEP) planned for six of the 270 foot WMECs. It is available on line if you are a USNI member.

Captain Cilenti, confirms what we have suspected, that the 76mm Mk75 gun and Mk92 firecontrol will be replaced by a 25mm Mk38, the same gun currently used on the Webber class WPCs.

The Captain is concerned primarily because the loss of the Mk92 means the loss of the ships’ most capable radar. The Mk92 is a multi-function radar. In addition to providing firecontrol, it is the ships’ only air search, and its most sensitive surface search. It is more effective in detecting the targets such as low profile semi-submersibles.

Capt Cilenti suggests that there is are alternatives already in or planned for Coast Guard use that could be installed to provide these capabilities. He suggest the AN/SPS-75 (TRS-3D), currently installed on the Bertholf class National Security Cutters and the Freedom class LCS, or the AN/SPS-77, planned for the Offshore Patrol Cutters and currently used on the Independence class LCS.

He notes that the addition of a multi-mode radar would allow the 270s to control emergency helicopter low visibility approaches by the embarked helicopter and facilitate UAS operations.

I hope someone is paying attention to the Captain’s plea. Adding a modern multi-mode radar and a UAS system such as V-BAT, could give us WMECs that are more capable than ever, of performing their law enforcement and SAR missions, while requiring few crew members and less extensive training. Deleting the Mk92 firecontrol system without replacement will leave these ships little more capable than the 210s and probably preclude installation of more capable Unmanned Air Systems.

The 270 SLEPs will begin in the near term. A decision to retain and enhance these ships sensor capability is urgent.

Late Addition:

I would suggest that the 25mm Mk38 be mounted up a deck, like the gun of the very similar Irish Naval Service Offshore Patrol Vessel LÉ Eithne pictured below. This would provide a greater degree of protection from green water coming over the bow. (Incidentally that gun is an earlier version of the 57mm being used on the National Security Cutters.)

Dmitry Shulgin reports the successful test of a new rocket assisted, laser homing round, the “Guided Multipurpose Munition” (GMM), for the Carl Gustaf Recoilless Rifle (M3E1 in US service) and the AT4 single shot, recoilless, smooth bore, disposable, anti-tank weapon (designated M136 in US service).

We talked about the possibility of Coast Guard use of the Carl Gustaf before. The M3E1 is now a common weapon that will arm every US Marine infantry squad. In the US Army there will be one for every platoon.

It may be that the laser guided round is only a Special Forces requirement, but after development it is almost certain to become more generally available.

This would not be a comprehensive answer to the Coast Guard need to be able to counter a terrorist attack by surface vessel, regardless of size. Even with the new round, it does not have the 4,000 yard range I believe desirable to minimize the probability of effective counter fire from improvised armament. It is unlikely to be effective against larger vessels, but, particularly with the new guided round, it could certainly be effective against small, fast, highly maneuverable threats.

There is always a concern for providing security for a highly portable weapon like this, but security requirements for these weapons and their ammunition should be comparable to that provided for machine guns.

As noted earlier, if things get hot for PATFORSWA, the cutters there could benefit from having a Marine detachment aboard that can employ the Carl Gustaf.

Other than the PATFORSWA, the first Coast Guard units that should receive armament upgrades are the force protection units that escort Fleet Ballistic Missile Subs during surface transit.

“The United Nations declared June 5 an international day for the fight against illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing in late 2017. Yet, on the fourth observance of the annual awareness campaign, the global challenges continue to grow.”

The IndoPacific Defense Forum, which is sponsored by the United State Indo-Pacific Command (USINDOPACOM) is apparently telling the nations of their area of responsibility that the Coast Guard is ready to assist them in combatting IUU fishing. Specifically that we can,

• Promote targeted, effective, intelligence-driven enforcement operations.
• Counter predatory and irresponsible state behavior.
• Expand multilateral fisheries enforcement cooperation.

To paraphrase Roy Scheider from the movie “Jaws,” I think we are going to need more boats.

Earlier today, I passed along a story about one Coast Guardsman’s experience on D-Day on my CG Blog Facebook page.

Got a response from a reader who linked a longer tale of the Coastie’s ship, LCI(L) 85: The Four- Leaf Clover. This is the story of a very small ship, about the same size as a Webber class WPC, one that did not even rate a name, in a very big war. Several crewmembers were discussed including what happened to them after D-Day and after the war. Its a great story.

I’ve added both stories to my heritage page. There are several other D-Day stories there as well.

Thanks to Tom Wade for bringing this to my attention.

Below is information from the Acquisitions Directorate (CG-9) newsroom.

June 3, 2021 —

The Coast Guard awarded contracts to four companies today, in a step toward acquiring the next generation of Coast Guard over the horizon cutter boats, the OTH V. The awardees are:

• Blackfish Solutions LLC of Anchorage, Alaska
• Gravois Aluminum Boats LLC of Jeanerette, Louisiana (doing business as Metal Shark Boats)
• Inventech Marine Solutions LLC of Bremerton, Washington
• MetalCraft Marine US, Inc. of Watertown, New York

Each awardee will produce a single boat that will be operated to demonstrate the actual capability of each design. Following the demonstration, a single contractor will be selected to produce the OTH V over the next 10 years. This production supports new cutter deliveries and recapitalization of OTH IVs. The total value of the indefinite-delivery indefinite-quantity OTH V contract – which includes manufacture, delivery and logistical support – is approximately $100 million.

The requirements for OTH V are similar to the prior iteration, but are intended to incorporate technology improvements. The requirements include a minimum top speed of 38 knots, powered by a diesel engine with waterjet propulsion and a minimum range of 150 nautical miles. The OTH V will carry up to 13 people, with dimensions limited to 26 feet long by 8.5 feet wide, and a performance weight of approximately 8,700 pounds. The updated cutter boat will capture technology improvements for its waterjet, as well as upgraded versions of the scalable integrated navigation and automatic identification systems. This will also be the first Coast Guard boat to include a shock monitoring system providing the crew with real-time information about wave impacts on the vessel.

The OTH V will be deployed across the Coast Guard fleet, including national security cutters, fast response cutters, offshore patrol cutters, polar security cutters and legacy medium endurance cutters. Outfitted with a robust onboard navigation and communications system, the OTH V will provide a high speed capability to extend the parent cutters’ capabilities when deployed in support of multiple Coast Guard missions.

OTH Vs will support mission accomplishment in almost all mission areas, with emphasis on search and rescue, drug and migrant interdiction operations, living marine resources, defense readiness and ports, waterways and coastal security.

For more information: Boat Acquisition program page

Marine Link has an article discussing the importance of the Waterways Commerce Cutter program. Waterways Commerce Cutter: It’s Time For An Upgrade.

The author makes a case as to why these little vessels need to be better than might be assumed. That they are in fact multi-mission vessels. He sees a massive increase in the river cruise industry.

Its an inciteful look at trends on America’s rivers and well worth the read.

The US Naval Institute has an article discussing the Coast Guard’s difficulty getting qualified volunteers for sea duty, Demise of the Cutterman, Part II. This article makes reference to a 2015 post, The Demise of the Cutterman. I think both are currently accessible even to non-members, at least for a limited time.

I considered that perhaps there were other reasons for the difficulties. Was it possible the difficulties were due to the change in the manning requirements of the recapitalized fleet?

Are there more sea duty billets than there were before? I checked this and there does not appear to be great difference in the gross numbers.

I compared the previous fleet of 12 WHEC 378s, 28 WMECs, and 41 Island class WPBs (81 total) to the projected fleet of 11 NSCs, 25 OPCs, and 64 Webber class WPCs (100 total).

The requirements to man 64 Webber class (24 crewmembers each) compared to 41 Island class (16 crewmembers each) required 880 additional.

This was largely offset by the change from 12 WHECs (177 crewmember each) to 11 NSCs (122 crew members each) for a reduction of 782 billets.

There has been no change in the WMEC/OPC fleet yet but the shift from 28 WMECs (requiring a total of 2449 billets) to 25 OPCs (requiring approximately 2500 billets) should only add about 51 billets.

So it looks like the recapitalization should require only about 150 additional billets or an increase of less than 3%. But the specifics of the crews composition may have changed.

I don’t have enough information to investigate these in detail but I suspect three changes have effected our ability to crew the new ships.

Do we have fewer non-rates? I suspect the percentage of the crew who are non-rates has decreased. (It is not hard to fill non-rate billets.) This means that more of the crewmembers are married and have families at home. It also means fewer non-rates are being introduced to sea duty, so the number of prior sea service personnel advancing to petty officer will be reduced. Assuming no change in the proportion of non-rates choosing to return to sea as petty officers later in their career, this will effect the future talent pool as well. It will mean fewer salty first class, chiefs, and warrant officers.

More technical ratings? Again this is a supposition on my part, but presumably the new generation of ships require greater levels of expertise to operate. This means a higher proportion of the crew is mature with more responsibilities and more attractive job possibilities outside the Coast Guard. Increasingly, individuals in this demographic will seek shore duty or choose to leave the service, which is an option for most because they will have completed their initial enlistment.

More officers required? Also a supposition on my part, but at least in the case of replacing 41 WPBs with 64 WPC, we are going from 82 officers to 256, a 210% increase. Junior officers are probably not a problem, so I presume the problem is in getting middle grade billets filled, particularly O-3 and O-4 billets. While I doubt that there is a shortage of volunteers to command Webber class WPCs, I can understand why there would be a hesitance to volunteer for other O-3 billets afloat. If you have ambitions of command afloat, and you don’t get command of a Webber class, the feeling may be that your chances for future command afloat selection are extremely slim, because those who had Webber class command will inevitably be considered better qualified.

There is a cure for this that would provide incentive to take those O-3 billets. Make an O-3 tour, e.g. department head on “big white one” or buoy tender XO, a prerequisite for command afloat as an O-3 or O-4. The result might theoretically reduce the future pool of command afloat candidates, but the pool should still be large enough, and those selected for O-3/O-4 command afloat would be more experienced and will have passed an additional layer of vetting.

National Defense provided the first report I saw on the Presidents FY2022 budget request for the Coast Guard, reporting it as flat relative to the FY2021 budget as enacted.

The Navy League Magazine, Seapower, on line edition has a pretty good summary of what is included.

I found the budget justification document here, all 445 pages of it.

Actually I find the proposed budget encouraging. $13.1B is only 0.3% larger than the enacted budget for 2021, but that is only because the Congress loves the Coast Guard and has added on to the Administration’s budget every year I have followed the budget process. This 2022 budget request is actually 6.5% greater than the corresponding initial 2021 administration request.

The Procurement, Construction, and Improvement budget is down compared to 2021 enacted budget, but it does include everything we would expect, given the end of the FRC program and the expected pace of Polar Security Cutter and Offshore Patrol Cutter procurement. On the other hand there is a substantial increase in Operations and Support.

“Under Biden’s budget, the service would see a significant boost in operations and support funding in 2022. The $9.02 billion for O&S would be $535 million, or 6.3 percent, more than it received for 2021.”

This includes substantial increases to reduce the maintenance backlog for aircraft and cutters. If you would like to check out the “Program Changes,” follow the link to the full budget document. There are 37 program changes on 20 pages, beginning on the 72nd page of the pdf. The page is labelled USCG–O&S–34.

One of these (#17) indicates new homeports for Webber class in Saint Petersburg, Sitka, and Boston expected in FY2022.

I would not be surprised to see the Congress make some additions. I’ll venture a guess, that about $300M will be added, including a C-130J and three more Webber class to counter Illegal, Unregulated, and Unreported fishing in the South Pacific. If that happens, the resulting $13.4B budget would be a three percent increase over 2021.

After the new administration has had more time to look at the Coast Guard’s programs, I hope they will see fit to accelerate the building of the Offshore Patrol Cutters and/or perhaps add a class of cutters between the OPC and the FRC.

Not directly Coast Guard related but the Army Corp of Engineers is getting a big boost for maritime related work that impacts safety of navigation and risks of flooding.

Information on MARAD’s budget request here.

The US Naval Institute News Service has a report that may be of interest because of the potential for interaction with Venezuelan forces in the Caribbean.

“The seven missile craft aboard Makran are each approximately 57 feet (17.5 meters) long and match the Peykaap family of medium-sized fast attack craft operated by Iran. There are several variations of these craft in Iranian service, although all are generally similar. The latest Peykaap-II type (also known as the Bavar class) is 57 feet long and can carry two anti-ship missiles and two 12.75 inch torpedoes. The missiles could be of the Kowsar or Nasr types, which are derived from Chinese models with a quite modest range of around 18 nautical miles.”

An 18 nautical mile range may be “quite modest” to the Navy, but it is twice that of anything the Coast Guard has.

Had a question from a reader, how many 110s are still in commission with the USCG?. Figured I could get a quick answer here. We know about the four still with PATFORSWA. Looking at District web sites, I am not sure they are up to date.

The FY20222 budget anticipates decommissioning five more. So how close are we to seeing the last of these cutters in the USCG?

Looking at the Wikipedia page for “Sentinel Class Cutters,” which seems to have been kept up to date, at this point there are 20 Webber class that have not yet been delivered to the Coast Guard. Future homeports have not been associated with 17 of these.

If you know of 110s still in commission please add a note.