South Korea pushes to build three more Aegis destroyers

The South Korean Navy has made a request to build three more Aegis destroyers to bolster defense against its Asian neighbors and North Korea amid increasing military tension due to territorial disputes, a military source said Wednesday.

 

South Korea currently operates three 7,600-ton Aegis warships, but the Navy has sought to increase its fleet to cope with rising regional tension in light of Pyongyang's third nuclear test conducted earlier this year and ongoing territorial disputes between China and Japan.

 

"The Navy made a request for three additional Aegis ships to the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) a year ago," the source said, asking for anonymity. "The JCS will discuss the plan in a meeting slated for next month."

 

If the plan is approved, the Navy will begin to build the ships between 2020 and 2025, he noted.

It is estimated to cost about 3 trillion won (US$2.8 billion) to build the three ships, according to military officials.

 

South Korea has built three Aegis destroyers since 2004 under a Navy buildup project to bolster defense against North Korea.

 

The 166-meter-long destroyer is equipped with the latest radar system as well as missiles and torpedoes in their vertical launch system. With 300 crew members, it can also carry two mid-sized helicopters and sail at a top speed of 30 knots within a range of 1,000 kilometres.

Opps ! - Cruiser collides with nuclear submarine during US Navy drills

A US Navy cruiser collided with a nuclear-powered submarine as both took part in exercises off the US East Coast. The cruiser's sonar dome was damaged in the crash, but the incident resulted in no injuries.

The Aegis-class cruiser USS San Jacinto hit the Los Angeles-class submarine USS Montpelier during naval exercises on Saturday, the Navy said in a statement.

Both vessels are part of a strike group led by the aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman. The military did not disclose the location or nature of the exercises.

The watch team aboard the cruiser saw a periscope rise from water some 100 to 200 meters ahead of the vessel, an unnamed Navy official told Reuters. The ship attempted to slow and reverse, but still collided with the submarine.

The impact crushed the rubber sonar dome on the cruiser’s bow, an underwater device housing electronic navigation, detection and ranging equipment.

No personnel were injured, and there was no damage to the submarine’s nuclear reactor, the Navy said. The scope of the damage is currently being assessed.

South Korea: Asia’s Other Rising Naval Power

With the world’s attention focused on a potential confrontation between China and Japan in the East China Sea, a third player has built what may be the most powerful ship-for-ship fleet in Northeast Asia.  Over the past fifteen years, the Republic of Korea Navy (ROKN) has expanded dramatically, acquiring a substantial fleet of modern, powerful warships. While the ROKN continues to prepare for the contingency of conflict with North Korea, it has become a force capable of significant foreign deployment.  If Seoul maintains its commitment to the Navy, the ROKN could become one of the world’s premier middle power navies.

Since 1953, North Korea has posed the central strategic problem for the ROKN.  The sinking of the Cheonan and the DPRK’s bombardment of offshore islands in 2010 served as harsh reminders of the maritime aspects of the North Korea dilemma.  New designs (especially frigates) suggest a renewed emphasis on anti-submarine warfare. However, many of the capabilities of South Korea’s new warships seem geared towards global contingencies, rather than being designed to meet specific North Korean threats.

The Aegis equipped Sejong the Great (KD-III) class destroyers, for example, compare favorably with American, Japanese, and Chinese designs, carrying more missiles in VLS cells than their foreign counterparts.  Although quite capable of engaging North Korea in a strike, air defense, or missile defense capacity, the three ships of the class represent a much more substantial commitment to surface warfare than the threat of the DPRK demands.

Similary, the Dokdo class amphibious warships suggest a maritime focus extending well beyond the Korean Peninsula.  Like many amphibious warships, the 18,000 ton Dokdo strongly resembles a small aircraft carrier. As British and French operations in Libya last year demonstrated, amphibious warships can become strike vessels through the addition of attack helicopters.  Although South Korea does not currently participate in the F-35B project, the prospect of flying the STOVL fifth generation fighter from Dokdo (or potentially from Dokdo’s successors) undoubtedly appeals to some South Korean defense planners.  However, even if the tremendous expense of acquiring and operating such fighters proves daunting, the light carriers could someday employ Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) optimized for strike and reconnaissance roles.  In any case, the Dokdos give South Korea a plausible expeditionary capability.

South Korea’s robust shipbuilding industry (the world’s largest) helps support and underwrite the ROKN’s expansion and modernization. Four Dokdos and six KD-IIIs are planned, although actual construction may not match these numbers.  If it does, however, this would represent one of the most potent naval warfare squadrons in the world, potentially capable of conducting many different missions in the region.  The KD-IIIs and Dokdos are supported by a force of nine modern large frigates (designated destroyers), all displacing from 3500-6000 tons and specialized for surface and sub-surface warfare.  Another fifteen 3000 ton frigates are in the ROKN’s plans.

Much like the PLAN, the ROKN has taken advantage of every opportunity to develop experience with distant, long-term deployments.  South Korea is a regular participant at RIMPAC, as well as other significant multilateral exercises.  Also like the PLAN and the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF), the ROKN has maintained a continuous presence in support of CTF 151’s anti-piracy operations off the coast of Somalia.

All of this suggests that the ROKN is built for exigencies well beyond war on the Peninsula.  Naval vessels of the sort operated by South Korea (small carriers and the modern-day equivalent of battleships) carry a high prestige value.  This signals to both domestic and international audiences that Seoul is to be taken seriously on the international stage.  However, the fleet also represents a hedge against the possibility that South Korean relations with its larger neighbors may deteriorate.  The capabilities the ROKN is currently pursuing could operate abroad in expeditionary and humanitarian relief operations, or could help protect South Korea’s maritime lifelines.  In any case, the tendency to focus exclusively on the navies of China and Japan misses out on one of the most important new players in the Northeast Asian maritime scene.

Navy: 4 missile cruisers to remain in service

Four Aegis missile cruisers scheduled to end their active careers in March will instead be kept in service, the Navy said Wednesday.

The ships — the Cowpens, Anzio, Vicksburg and Port Royal — were to be decommissioned as part of a budget drawdown.

But three of the four congressional defense committees objected to the cuts, expressing concerns about weakening the fleet.

The Navy, while acknowledging “fiscal and readiness implications” in keeping the ships in service, has agreed to keep the ships running — for now.

“The Navy will work with Congress to resolve these concerns,” Lt. Courtney Hillson, a Navy spokesperson at the Pentagon, said late Wednesday.

“The Navy intends to retain these ships in service pending completion of the fiscal year 2013 authorization and appropriation process, or other agreement with Congress,” Hillson added.

Completion of the 2013 defense bills has been put off and, before recessing for the elections, the House and Senate each approved a continuing resolution (CR) to keep the government running for six months through March 31. The CR does not specifically address individual ship deactivations.

In addition to the four ships, three more cruisers and two amphibious ships are scheduled to be decommissioned in 2014. The new agreement does not address the 2014 ships.

In the markups for their 2013 defense bills, three of the defense committees offer variations on a plan to keep the ships running.

The House Armed Services Committee prohibits early retirement of six of the cruisers and the two amphibious ships. The exception is the Port Royal, heavily damaged after grounding in Hawaii in early 2009 and, despite expensive repairs, still experiencing problems.

The House Appropriations Committee provided funding to keep in service three of the cruisers scheduled to decommission in March.

The Senate Appropriations Committee funds all four cruisers through 2013.

Only the Senate Armed Services Committee is silent on the issue — by implication not objecting to the early retirements.

Each of the cruisers has a crew of about 350 sailors. News that the ships will be kept in service will affect numerous individual personnel assignments.

The Cowpens, based in Japan, is currently underway in the Western Pacific.

The Norfolk-based Anzio is taking part in an international exercise in the Caribbean, while the Mayport-based Vicksburg is escorting the aircraft carrier Enterprise deployed around the Arabian Sea.

The Port Royal is believed to be at her homeport of Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.

Carrier Work Continues

Congress and the Navy have also agreed on a measure to avoid a serious funding problem caused by the lack of a regular budget that could have caused work on one aircraft carrier to come to a halt and prevented work beginning on another.

At issue was the refueling overhaul of the carrier Theodore Roosevelt. The ship is now in the later stages of a three-and-a-half-year nuclear refueling overhaul at Newport News Shipbuilding in Virginia. Without congressional approval for extra money to complete the work, funds would run out around mid-January for a job that will take until June to finish.

The next carrier to be refueled, the Abraham Lincoln, already has arrived in Virginia from her West Coast base, and her overhaul is to begin with fiscal 2013 funds.

But before adjourning for recess, Congress approved a Sept. 18 Navy reprogramming request, allocating $219.1 million for the two carrier overhauls along with some other work.

“With Congress’ assistance, we have sufficient funding to keep the aircraft carrier refueling overhaul program for USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN 71) and USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN 72) on track through the completion of the six-month CR period,” Hillson said.

According to a Congressional source, the reprogramming request included $68 million for the Roosevelt and $96.1 million to get the Lincoln overhaul started.

Another $55 million has been re-allocated to the DDG 1000 Zumwalt-class destroyer program to cover increased labor and overhead costs.

Congress agreed to the requirement for the additional destroyer program funds in the 2012 omnibus funding bill, but did not provide money for the program.

The funds for the programming, the Congressional source said, came from personnel accounts where budgeting assumptions “turned out to be lower than budgeted for.”

The accounts funding the $219.1 million reprogramming are Military Personnel Navy ($138.1 million), Military Personnel Marine Corps ($70 million) and Military Personnel Marine Reserve Corps ($11 million).

No programs are being reduced because of the reprogramming moves, the Congressional source said.