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Arctic/Offshore Patrol Ship AOPS

I fully get there is no free lunch in ship design. But yes I would make sacrifices for those capabilities. We will have these ships for 30 years, and will end up doing stuff totally not anticipated. I also foresee a world that is not getting more peacefully and is likley to go through a historic churn, with Canada getting dragged into events. I also expect us to have no time to prepare for events and will have to react with what we have.
If these ships were designed and built post Ukraine invasion then possibly some of these capabilities would be built in to the base design. Except for some bolt on options that may or may not be effective I can't see any significant changes other than some sort of anti drone system. No one is looking at any changes at this time or anticipated any in the future.
 
But in that same vein, a Carrier Strike Group can make larger bad actors rethink their life choices, that don’t care about a small boat with some small guns.
Tell that to the Russians.

I take the point about the AOPS but I can't help but feel that a country that has thousands of miles of shoreline (some warm; some chilly) should be able to bring weapons to bear all along it. We certainly can't afford more CSCs. I'm not so sure we can afford the ones we're getting. And I don't trust the RCAF to do it for long.

I don't think the next conflict will give us the time to become the arsenal of the world again. I tend to think of the navy the way that I think of the army. We need a lot of it but only a part of it needs to be "forces in being" during peacetime - enough to generate the leadership and skilled experts that will be needed in time of conflict and enough crews to cater to the few discretionary expeditionary missions we choose to undertake in peacetime.

We do need a quantity of some cheap, quickly produced weapons carriers (anti ship, ant-air, anti-sub) that can be deployed (and built rapidly) in time of need that are simple enough to be manned with hybrid crews (or operate autonomously) and capable of operating reasonably on the high seas. Those and motherships to care and feed them. They need to be cheap so that a fair bit of redundancy built in. Some missiles will always get through. (See Falklands and Russia). And we need a domestic weapons building capacity.

That is all.

:giggle:
 
Yeah the short forms used across services aren’t always synonymous.



Ack. I’m not an Electrical Engineer so my understanding of what size/space limits exist for capacitors are fairly limited. Given what was learned from the AB departments, and that they haven’t hit the fleet yet, I’m guessing it isn’t yet there for conventional ships.
Relative energy densities for comparison: (ref)

Units: kWh/kg

0.001 - Electrical (std capacitor)
0.03 - Electrical (battery - lead acid)
0.15 - Electrical (super capacitor)
0.20 - Electrical (battery - Li-Ion)
0.50 - Electrical (battery - Li-S)
12.6 - Hydrocarbon (fuel oil/diesel)
13.1 - Hydrocarbon (gasoline)
16.4 - Hydrogen (combustion)
34.1 - Hydrogen (electrical fuel cell)
22,000,000 - Nuclear (highly enriched U235)


So, making the energy…the hydrocarbon/hydrogen electrical generation source for a directed energy weapon is 50-100 times more dense than the storage medium. Add nuclear power source to the mix and you’re 100,000,000-200,000,000 more dense than the electrical storage medium.

If you have nuclear power available, good on you. Use it. 👍🏼 👍🏼 👍🏼 If you have hydrogen (in the near future, ) 2 to 3x more dense than hydrocarbons. 👍🏼 👍🏼 Otherwise use hydrocarbons as your source.


Using that stored electrical energy (I didn’t dive into chemical lasers), there really isn’t much choice…capacitors can discharge their energy at rates many orders of magnitude (100s/1000s+) greater than any battery tech out there now.

If I were King for a day, I’d go nuclear for my electrical power generation, make some hydrogen while I was at it for a nice high-density portable/transportable source and for secondary electrical generation via fuel cell, and store any generated electricity in a fuel cell to power the DE weapon system in a super capacitor array.
 
Tell that to the Russians.

I take the point about the AOPS but I can't help but feel that a country that has thousands of miles of shoreline (some warm; some chilly) should be able to bring weapons to bear all along it. We certainly can't afford more CSCs. I'm not so sure we can afford the ones we're getting. And I don't trust the RCAF to do it for long.

I don't think the next conflict will give us the time to become the arsenal of the world again. I tend to think of the navy the way that I think of the army. We need a lot of it but only a part of it needs to be "forces in being" during peacetime - enough to generate the leadership and skilled experts that will be needed in time of conflict and enough crews to cater to the few discretionary expeditionary missions we choose to undertake in peacetime.

We do need a quantity of some cheap, quickly produced weapons carriers (anti ship, ant-air, anti-sub) that can be deployed (and built rapidly) in time of need that are simple enough to be manned with hybrid crews (or operate autonomously) and capable of operating reasonably on the high seas. Those and motherships to care and feed them. They need to be cheap so that a fair bit of redundancy built in. Some missiles will always get through. (See Falklands and Russia). And we need a domestic weapons building capacity.

That is all.

:giggle:

You want to bring weapons to bear invest in GBAD and GBLRPF. The tools are already at hand. They don't need to be on ships unless the ships are deployed away from home shores and coastal defences with its umbrellas.
 
Don't worry, Colin. He is Army - he doesn't understand.

He actually thinks of the defense of Canada in Army terms of people actually landing here in large numbers trying to invade the place. He doesn't get that one of the two largest countries in the world in terms of population (China) would currently have one hell of a hard time trying to invade another country of 24M inhabitants located across a straight that is about the same size as the English channel is, but somehow someone is chomping at the bit to come across 3000 Nautical Miles (minimum) of water to invade Canada.

I call it the Army delusion.

It's not their fault, nobody is communicating clearly what the threats to Canada are. And a mass landing/invasion is NOT, repeat NOT one of them.

They also do not understand combat on the naval scale. As I have mentioned in a previous post, someone who is an infanteer posted something about the "area" of responsibility of Army fighting formations based on their size/rank of the CO. As I recall, they had a 150 to 200 Km radius for the responsibility of a Lieutenant general in charge of a corps . That, of course made me laugh because at that radius, in the Navy, I am in what I called a knife fight. My area of interest as CO of a frigate is in the 1000 to 1200 Km because that is the threat I will be facing in 24 hours. I might be also be interested in what is a little further out, since I might face it the day after.

It is my firm belief that Army oriented people simply do not understand the scales at which we, sailors, work.
 
Don't worry, Colin. He is Army - he doesn't understand.

He actually thinks of the defense of Canada in Army terms of people actually landing here in large numbers trying to invade the place. He doesn't get that one of the two largest countries in the world in terms of population (China) would currently have one hell of a hard time trying to invade another country of 24M inhabitants located across a straight that is about the same size as the English channel is, but somehow someone is chomping at the bit to come across 3000 Nautical Miles (minimum) of water to invade Canada.

I call it the Army delusion.

It's not their fault, nobody is communicating clearly what the threats to Canada are. And a mass landing/invasion is NOT, repeat NOT one of them.

They also do not understand combat on the naval scale. As I have mentioned in a previous post, someone who is an infanteer posted something about the "area" of responsibility of Army fighting formations based on their size/rank of the CO. As I recall, they had a 150 to 200 Km radius for the responsibility of a Lieutenant general in charge of a corps . That, of course made me laugh because at that radius, in the Navy, I am in what I called a knife fight. My area of interest as CO of a frigate is in the 1000 to 1200 Km because that is the threat I will be facing in 24 hours. I might be also be interested in what is a little further out, since I might face it the day after.

It is my firm belief that Army oriented people simply do not understand the scales at which we, sailors, work.
Modern coastal defences in my mind consists of long range radars, satellites, underwater detection/listening systems within the EEZ, along with patrol aircraft. Backed by long range mobile Anti Ship missiles, complimented by some short range portable Anti Ship systems to guard places like Esquimalt. You may eventually need a AD system to protect the ship in harbour and infrastructure. Maybe even a Bofor's Mk3 at the entrance of Esquimalt in wartime.
Active defense is route survey and clearance of mines and patrols along the traffic routes. Main threats are mines, air and sea drones, brought into range by a Q ship or cruise missiles launched from offshore by other other Q ships. Subs are another threat, that the Frigates, subs and (soon) P-8s to find, suppress and destroy.
 
Don't worry, Colin. He is Army - he doesn't understand.

He actually thinks of the defense of Canada in Army terms of people actually landing here in large numbers trying to invade the place. He doesn't get that one of the two largest countries in the world in terms of population (China) would currently have one hell of a hard time trying to invade another country of 24M inhabitants located across a straight that is about the same size as the English channel is, but somehow someone is chomping at the bit to come across 3000 Nautical Miles (minimum) of water to invade Canada.

I call it the Army delusion.

It's not their fault, nobody is communicating clearly what the threats to Canada are. And a mass landing/invasion is NOT, repeat NOT one of them.

They also do not understand combat on the naval scale. As I have mentioned in a previous post, someone who is an infanteer posted something about the "area" of responsibility of Army fighting formations based on their size/rank of the CO. As I recall, they had a 150 to 200 Km radius for the responsibility of a Lieutenant general in charge of a corps . That, of course made me laugh because at that radius, in the Navy, I am in what I called a knife fight. My area of interest as CO of a frigate is in the 1000 to 1200 Km because that is the threat I will be facing in 24 hours. I might be also be interested in what is a little further out, since I might face it the day after.

It is my firm belief that Army oriented people simply do not understand the scales at which we, sailors, work.
Thanks, that was more on the nose that I was going to post but similarly I always point to the airforce as the first response to incursion into Canadian waters. If a ship can be in range in 24-48hrs that generally pretty quick in nautical terms.
When a 40 foot trailer with Missiles arrives let me know how your carrier group does.
Just fine. That 40 foot trailer can't swim. The carrier can sit just out or range and give them the finger all day long and still perform their strike or blockade mission. Likely their strike against the trailer.
 
Can the land based testing facility for the CSC in Halifax double as a AEGIS shore facility for ballistic missile defence if they had the launchers and SM-6's?
 
Can the land based testing facility for the CSC in Halifax double as a AEGIS shore facility for ballistic missile defence if they had the launchers and SM-6's?
Don’t know, but if they are supposed to exactly replicate an AEGIS/SPY 7 combo….yes?
 
Can the land based testing facility for the CSC in Halifax double as a AEGIS shore facility for ballistic missile defence if they had the launchers and SM-6's?

Given that it's a networked system, a CSC parked anywhere in the area could provide the launchers.
 
Thanks, that was more on the nose that I was going to post but similarly I always point to the airforce as the first response to incursion into Canadian waters. If a ship can be in range in 24-48hrs that generally pretty quick in nautical terms.

Just fine. That 40 foot trailer can't swim. The carrier can sit just out or range and give them the finger all day long and still perform their strike or blockade mission. Likely their strike against the trailer.
I worry about the Chinese arming maybe 1 in 5 of their fishing fleet with some sort of missile and drone. Not to mention deploying unmarked nets to act as an obstacle and a complication. If you don't sink some of them, then the threats remains, but if you do, you just given China a propaganda win. Not that they give a shit about the lives of their fisherman.
 
I worry about the Chinese arming maybe 1 in 5 of their fishing fleet with some sort of missile and drone. Not to mention deploying unmarked nets to act as an obstacle and a complication. If you don't sink some of them, then the threats remains, but if you do, you just given China a propaganda win. Not that they give a shit about the lives of their fisherman.
So what your saying is that the new P-8's get to shoot fish in a barrel?

Can the land based testing facility for the CSC in Halifax double as a AEGIS shore facility for ballistic missile defence if they had the launchers and SM-6's?
It sounds cool but not without significant modification. A test facility won't have 24-7 watches and certainly won't have the equipment running all the time. The entire point of it is to try out software and hardware configurations before you implement them on the ship, gather data on system performance and provide training to operators and technicians.

And you likely wouldn't situate the sensor there. Probably somewhere more north like Newfoundland...
 
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