Unmanned aerial vehicles take lead role in coastal security drill

The efficacy of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) as an early warning mechanism against enemy sneaking in aboard hijacked or rouge vessels was demonstrated during Exercise Gemini-2, the second edition of integrated coastal defence drill for Kerala and Lakshadweep. The 48-hour-long drill drew to a close at 6 a.m. on Saturday.

The Heron and Searcher UAVs of the Navy’s air squadron No. 342 based at the Southern Naval Command in Kochi took to the skies relentlessly, picking out at least a few suspect vessels on each flight and alerting the defence forces to the threat.

“They proved quite useful in searching for rogue boats, which made it easy for us to instruct interceptor boats on patrol to check them out,” said a Navy officer. “Given the flight safety restrictions imposed by commercial aviation, they couldn’t be flown at high altitudes. But they did a good job,” he said. 

While the highs and lows of the drill, conducted periodically to review security mechanism, can only be found out after a thorough debriefing, Gemini-2 showcased the near-impenetrability of the region’s coastal security armour, characterised by a robust network of static coastal sensors, surveillance data relayed by the UAVs and Dornier maritime recce aircraft, helicopters on watch, Navy, Coast Guard and Marine police parties on patrol and members of the Kadalora Jagrata Samithi (a collective of fishermen acting as the eyes and ears of security agencies).

Coastal security stakeholders pooled in their resources to play out a simulated security scenario during the exercise. While enemy teams launched from hijacked mother ships were tasked with carrying out improvised assaults on designated targets (which were not disclosed to the policing forces), the defence forces, to their credit, were able to neutralise all attacks barring two in Thiruvananthapuram. 

The assailants were successful in making their way into the railway station at Thampanoor and the passenger terminals of the international airport.

Heightened alert at vital installations — including Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC); National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC), Kayamkulam; International Container Transshipment Terminal (ICTT) at Vallarpadam; and the single point mooring by BPCL off Kochi — made it impossible for the attackers to reach anywhere close. 

The assailants were asked to use their ingenuity in launching attacks at crowded places like some shopping malls in Kochi, tourist spots, and sensitive establishments. But the protective forces used a mix of coastal patrol and on-shore combing to thwart them. Inland waters were to be used by the attacking teams, but none could do that, said an official. 

The massive exercise saw the Coastal Police alone mobilise 17 boats for patrolling. In all, nearly 100 vessels, including those of the Navy, Coast Guard, Marine Enforcement Wing, and Customs besides fishing vessels, were part of the patrol. 

Security of the Lakshadweep archipelago proved to be the toughest for the inimical forces to crack, said an official. 

Coast Guard stations at Kavaratti and Fort Kochi coordinated the exercise in their respective regions, while the Joint Operations Centre at the Naval Base oversaw the overall proceedings.

Small Navy, Strong Navy

Our friends at the Center for International Maritime Security are running a “Maritime Futures Project” and requested some input on the following question, among others: “What advice would you give to a smaller nation on the maritime investments it should pursue, and why?”

Response –

Lesser maritime nations often seem to assume they have to compete symmetrically with the strong in order to accomplish their goals. That would mean that, say, a Vietnam would have to build a navy capable of contending on equal terms with China's South Sea Fleet in order to fulfill its strategic aims. That need not be true. Here at the U.S. Naval War College we sometimes debate whether small states have grand strategies, or whether grand strategy is a preserve of the strong. Small coastal states do have grand strategies. In fact, there's a premium on thinking and acting strategically when you have only meager resources to tap. Our Canadian friends, for instance, take pride in operating across interagency boundaries. Small states can't simply throw resources at problems and expect to solve them. They have to think and invest smart. That's my first bit of advice.

What kinds of strategies and forces should the weak pursue? Here's the second bit of advice. They should consult great thinkers of the past. The French jeune ecole of the nineteenth century formulated some fascinating ideas about how to compete with a Royal Navy that ruled the waves. Sir Julian Corbett fashioned a notion of active defense by which an inferior fleet could prevent a greater one from accomplishing its goals. In effect it could hug the stronger fleet, remaining nearby to keep the enemy from exercising command of the sea. Mao Zedong's writings about active defense also apply in large part to the nautical domain. The notions of sea denial and maritime guerrilla warfare should resonate with smaller powers today. Clinging to an adversary while imposing high costs on him is central to maritime strategies of the weak.

And third, what does that mean in force-structure terms? It means smaller maritime powers should look for inexpensive hardware and tactics that make life tough and expensive for bigger powers. I have urged the Taiwan Navy to downplay its sea-control fleet in favor of platforms like missile-armed fast patrol boats that could give a superior Chinese navy fits. Such acquisitions are worth studying even for a great naval power like Japan. So long as Tokyo caps defense spending at one percent of GDP, it has to get the most bang it can for the buck. Sea denial should be in its portfolio.

Bottom line, lesser powers should refuse to despair about their maritime prospects. They should design their fleets as creatively as possible, taking advantage of the home-field advantage all nations enjoy in their immediate environs. That may mean a navy founded on small craft.

Moscow fires warning shot across bow of US naval-based ABM

The guided missile cruiser USS Lake Champlain

A top Russian official says a US missile defense system near Russia’s border is strategically destabilizing and may prompt an arms race.

Speaking to SW on the threat of mobile naval-based elements of the US missile defense system  “suddenly appearing” on Russia’s coastline, Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said such an event would trigger “the harshest reaction from Russia."

"We must consider the effective protection of our strategic nuclear forces," Rogozin said in an interview with the magazine Voyenny Parade (‘Military Parade’).

Rogozin, while not elaborating on what Russia’s response would be, noted that Russia is taking definite steps to counter American ships “equipped with the Aegis integrated naval weapons system.”

Russia has warned its US and NATO partners on numerous occasions that unless the two sides can reach an acceptable agreement over NATO plans to unilaterally build a missile defense shield in Eastern Europe, another arms race is inevitable.

Ironically, it was US President Barack Obama – the same American leader who pushed for a “reset” with Moscow – who introduced the current missile defense plans that may include stationing Aegis missiles aboard US warships in the Black Sea.

Washington says the missile defense system, which is capable of intercepting short- to intermediate-range ballistic missiles, is vital for protecting Eastern Europe from “rogue states,” like Iran and North Korea. At the same time, however, the western military alliance ignores Moscow’s concern the strategic balance may be upset. In fact, NATO even refuses to provide Moscow with written, legal guarantees that the system will not in the future target Russian territory.

Judging by Rogozin’s strong words, it seems that another arms race has already begun.

"U.S. missile defense in its current form is obviously destabilizing and prompting an arms race between Russia and the U.S. and NATO," Rogozin noted.

Russia is considering ways of “suppressing and penetrating” the missile defense system in ways that will guarantee “unacceptable damage to any aggressor, and force it to resist the temptation to test Russia's strength,” the Deputy Prime Minister added.

Rogozin, who served in a previous capacity as Russia’s NATO envoy, explained his use of blunt language.

"We must be frank about this. I was the Russian envoy to NATO for four years and I know what language they understand best of all," he said.

US Navy pulls two aircraft carriers from Syria shores

Two aircraft carriers stationed off the Syrian coast were sent back to the US this week in a move that the Obama administration thought would ease tensions, but angered Turkish officials who hoped for significant US military presence in the region. 

The USS Eisenhower aircraft carrier and the USS Iwo Jima Amphibious Ready Group and its 2,500 marines were recalled after being stationed on the Syrian coast, allegedly in preparation of potential military invasion. 

The USS Eisenhower, which has the capacity to hold thousands of men, joined the other warship during the first week of December, ready to launch an American-led military intervention “within days” if Syrian President Bashar al-Assad were to use chemical weapons against the opposition, Time reported. But as the violence escalated in the past few days, the warships took off and headed back to the US.

The US usually has two aircraft carriers stationed in the Persian Gulf at all times, but will only have one deployed this month –  the USS John C. Stennis, which is stationed nowhere near Syria. By recalling the USS Eisenhower and the USS Iwo Jima Amphibious Ready Group, the US simply outraged its key ally in the region – Turkey. 

An unnamed senior Turkish officer told Israel's DEBKAfile that America’s removal of the aircraft carriers is “hard to understand and unacceptable to Ankara.” Turkey became one of the main opponents of the Assad regime on the international stage and fears that the Syrian missiles with chemical weapons might be used against it. Syria never recognized that it has a chemical stockpile. Nevertheless Syrian officials repeatedly said that their country would never use such weapons "even if they had them." 

None of Syria’s neighbors, which include Turkey, Jordan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Israel, have officially criticized the Obama administration for its recall of its naval forces, but unnamed officials told DEBKAfile that Turkish officials are very upset about the move. 

According to the Israeli news outlet, Washington hoped to “to appease the Turks” by sending to the region US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta to sign a deployment order for the Patriot Air and Missile Defense System, which would be stationed at the Syrian border. While Panetta visited Turkey on Friday, the defense secretary allegedly visited an air base where US strike aircraft are stationed alongside Turkish warplanes. 

But the US attempt to ease tensions and calm Turkey had little effect: Turkish officials remain outraged at the US abandonment at a time when violence with its neighbor has escalated and relations with Iran and Syria are at its worst. 

Meanwhile  the deployment of the Patriot missile interceptors has escalated tensions between Turkey and Iran. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad canceled a trip to Turkey for an annual ceremony this week, claiming the missile interceptors might lead to a “world war.”

Watch a Robotic Navy Boat Shoot Missiles for the First Time Ever

Killer robots have officially gone out to sea. For the first time, the Navy has fired missiles from a remote-controlled boat, as shown in the video above.

The firing came as part of a test off the Maryland coast on Wednesday. Six of Rafael’s anti-armor Spike missiles got fired off a moving inflatable hulled watercraft, aiming for a floating target about two miles away. The missile firings and the boat’s controls were all handled remotely by Navy personnel on shore at the Navy’s Patuxent River base.

It’s the “first significant step forward in weaponizing surface unmanned combat capability,” Mark Moses, the Navy’s program manager for the armed drone boat project, tells Danger Room. Sure, the U.S. military has no shortage of armed robotic planes and — soon — helicopters. But it doesn’t have weaponized drones that patrol the seas, either above it or below it. The Navy’s early experiments with robotic submarines  are for spying and mine clearance , not for attack. Until this week’s tests at Pax River, the Navy didn’t have a robotic surface vessel capable of firing a weapon — the fulfillment of a goal the Navy set for itself in 2007 .

The Navy’s been tricking out this 11-meter inflatable boat for the past several years at its base in Newport, Rhode Island, to do just that. Mounted on the boat is a dual-pod missile launcher and an Mk-49 mounting system, all made by Rafael and fully automated, which the Navy’s calling a “Precision Engagement Module.” The Navy seems the module as the sort of thing that could protect U.S. coastline without danger to sailors or coastguardsmen, or prevent pirates or Iranian sailors from maneuvering  their small, fast boats between targets that Navy Destroyers can’t risk hitting.

The Precision Engagement Module “could be used in a number of applications including harbor security, defensive operations against fast attach craft and swam scenarios, which is of primary concern for the Navy,” says Moses. “However, it is probably most effective when targets try and hide among commercial vessels –for example, congested waterways.”

In three days’ worth of tests at Pax River this week, the Navy shot off the long-range version variant of the Spike, a 30-pound missile with an effective range of about 2 and a half miles. The video above shows six of the remote firings — and while they looked to our untrained eyes like near misses, the Navy says that’s a trick of the camera angle, and they actually hit their targets.

All this is just a demonstration; it’ll be years and many more tests before the Navy decides if it wants to purchase a fleet of remote-controlled, missile-packing boats. But “the increase in attention and effort for water borne technological advancements coincides with the drawing down of U.S. military resources in the land locked campaign in Afghanistan,” Mark notes, “and a strategic refocusing to problem regions where unconventional maritime threats must be accounted for.” In other words: put the robo-boat off Iranian or Somali waters, and let sailors at a safe distance aim and fire its missiles, much like the Air Forces drone pilots do.

PIRACY - Israeli navy boards activist ship en route to Gaza

Israel’s defense forces have boarded a ship attempting to break through the Gaza blockade in “a peaceful operation.” The vessel was carrying Palestinian activists, parliamentarians and humanitarian cargo, said a mission spokesperson.

­Six Israeli naval boats surrounded the SV Estelle’ 38 nautical miles from Gaza while it was still in international waters.

A spokesperson from the Israeli Department of Defense said that they were forced to intervene after the vessel ignored numerous warnings to change course and cooperate with the Israeli authorities.

"After the passengers ignored calls to change course, the decision was made to board the vessel and lead it to the port of Ashdod,” said the spokesperson, adding that no one was injured when the marines seized control of the ship.

The organizers of the activist mission to Gaza announced over the radio that their vessel had come under attack shortly after it was approached by Israeli ships.

There were about 30 people from eight countries on board, including Israeli citizens, lawmakers from Norway, Sweden, Greece and Spain and a 79-year-old former legislator from Canada.

The activists are being transferred to Ashdod port where they will be handed over to police custody and then on to the immigration authorities. Previously, activists caught trying to break through the blockade have been deported from Israel immediately.

The Swedish-owned, Finnish-flagged vessel was reportedly carrying 41 tonnes of cement, books, toys, medical equipment and two olive trees.

A senior Defense Ministry official said that Israel was well within its rights to “operate at sea to prevent the smuggling of arms to terror organizations," reported Ynet. He denounced the activists as "provocateurs who are drive by hatred for Israel" and dismissed the “humanitarian crisis in Gaza,” maintaining “more than 1,500 trucks carrying tons of goods enter Gaza each week through the land crossings.”

In 2010, Israeli forces boarded a Turkish ship attempting to force its way through the blockade. Soldiers killed nine activists, sparking international outcry and condemnation from the UN for use of “excessive force.”

The UN has called for the six-year blockade on Gaza to be lifted on numerous occasions on the grounds that it represents “a denial of basic human rights in contravention of international law.”

Victoria Strand, one of the organizers of the mission, calls the Israeli blockade of Gaza “illegal and unfair.”

“We have to challenge this siege as long as the international community does not do so. WHO, the UN, the EU, everyone is saying that the siege is counterproductive, but nobody is doing anything about it, so we have to take civil action against it,” she told RT.

Strand stressed that Israel needs to realize “the blockade is not helping anyone.”

“It does not help people in Israel, it does not help Palestinians and it has nothing to do with the security of Israel, because weapons are floating in through the tunnels,” she explained, adding that Israel also blockades any export from Gaza, meaning the Palestinians can`t produce anything.

DCNS to unveil new FREMM Frigate variant, updated BRAVE supply ship design at Euronaval 2012

At the 23rd EURONAVAL show to be held from 22 to 26 October 2012 at the Paris-le Bourget exhibition center, DCNS will unveil several new designs of submarines and surface vessels. Among them are the new FREMM-ER (for Extend Range) Frigate dedicated to Air Defense missions and an updated design for the BRAVE replenishment ship which was first unveiled two years ago at Euronaval 2010.

                         

The FREMM-ER was designed with a focus on Air Defense and possibly Anti Ballistic Missile Defense. The hull and general platform of the vessel is almost identical to the French Navy's and DCNS' FREMM class. However the two masts (Herakles radar and electronic warfare) found on the current FREMM (such as the Aquitaine frigate) is replaced by a new radar by Thales called SF 500 (or Sea Fire 500). The new Thales radar seems to be similar in concept to the Lockheed Martin's AEGIS - AN/SPY-1D multi-function phased-array radar system with its four fixed arrays noticeable on all 4 sides of the main mast.

Contacted by Navy Recognition DCNS and Thales representatives would not give details on the new radar system, explaining details would be made public during Euronaval. Regarding the vessel itself however, DCNS told us that a FREMM-ER would be able to fulfill the exact same missions as the current FREMM. Indeed, FREMM-ER has the same multi-mission capabilities as FREMM, in particular extensions capability can be installed on FREMM-ER such as:

FREMM-ER's CIC (Combat Information Center) shares the same characteristics as the CIC found on FREMM:

- Large workstations

- Multipurpose Consoles

- Modular configuration

The SETIS modular CMS (Combat Management System) developed by DCNS and the CIC area can implement new and future innovations as they become mature. In FREMM-ER, sailors for example will be able to use augmented reality in the fight against asymmetric threats.

                         

At the 23rd EURONAVAL show to be held from 22 to 26 October 2012 at the Paris-le Bourget exhibition center, DCNS will unveil several new designs of submarines and surface vessels. Among them are the new FREMM-ER (for Extend Range) Frigate dedicated to Air Defense missions and an updated design for the BRAVE replenishment ship which was first unveiled two years ago at Euronaval 2010.

The new BRAVE replenishment tanker and support vessel. Note the new inverted bow design.

                         

DCNS presented during Euronaval 2010 its new-generation underway replenishment tanker and support vessel named BRAVE (Bâtiment RAVitailleur d'Escadre).

At Euronaval 2012, DCNS will be showing an updated design for the BRAVE class. As you can see in the images above and below, most of the redisgn work has been focused on the bow and stern of the ship. The bow is now inverted for better sea-keapping and there is now only one helicopter spot while the previous design had space for two helicopter spots. The sole spot is still able to accomodate heavy helicopters however (35 t). There is still space for two helicopters in the hangar.

Developped in association with STX-France (based on the same principles that made the BPC Mistral class a success), the design should answer French Navy needs to replace the Durance class. BRAVE will also be available to international customers.

                         

At the 23rd EURONAVAL show to be held from 22 to 26 October 2012 at the Paris-le Bourget exhibition center, DCNS will unveil several new designs of submarines and surface vessels. Among them are the new FREMM-ER (for Extend Range) Frigate dedicated to Air Defense missions and an updated design for the BRAVE replenishment ship which was first unveiled two years ago at Euronaval 2010.

Artist impression of a BRAVE vessel underway replenishing a FREMM frigate and an Aircraft Carrier

The BRAVE main missions include:

» Refuel and support all types of vessels at sea (Aircraft carriers, large & small surface vessels, submarines);

» Support force projection operations;

» Command and control of maritime operations;

» Support humanitarian operations.

The vessel's defense system is designed to be modular and can be adatped to customer requirements.

For more details on the FREMM-ER, Thales Sea Fire 500 radar, the new BRAVE design and other new developments by DCNS, make sure to check Navy Recognition's Euronaval 2012 online coverage from 22 to 26 October 2012.