Maritime Coastal Defence Vessels (MCDVs)

[NearingZenith]

Some thoughts. 1000tons and fit all that? First Strike length VLS normally won't fit into a hull that small, second 90m proper warship is going to be approx 2000-2500 tons (Gowind class corvette, River class OPV) etc... so I think the tonnage expectation is off the mark, but if length is the limiting requirement then that's going to be just fine.

Besides fitting everything they want in a <105m ~1000 ton hull, the 40 person crew + automation target seems problematic. The Red Sea conflict is showing the need for proper manning to avoid burnout when operating high tempo 24/7 operations. The HMCS Protecteur fire showed the large amount of crew needed to keep DC teams rotating to fight a hours long fire. If money is invested in equipping the CMMC as a full featured ASW, ASuW, AAW warfare combatant as proposed, it should also be manned as a proper combatant rather than at OPV-levels.

 

[DBNSG]

I am not especially convinced by vague hand gesturing to outsource RCN duties to contracted ships, who's contracts might never materialize in the first place or be easily cut in the future. Considering how badly the Govt managed to get sponged with the Asterix lease, I don't have high hopes for any future endeavors.


Agree entirely on the point of the Kingston class.

As for the CMMC/CSC plan, building at Irving is simply not feasible. Interspersing CMMC construction with CSC construction will only serve to delay both programs, making a scrambled mess of their respective supply chains and destroy any efficiencies inherent to long term, high number shipbuilding. CSC is far too vital to be delayed, stopped, etc by any other program, especially CMMC. Irving is going to struggle with CSC for sometime, switching it up when they are just getting into their stride is sup-optimal.

Another yard besides the big three needs to be brought in to build CMMC, especially if they want them at anything approaching the frankly insane timelines they have put forward. That will require a sub-1000t ship or NSS to be changed to permit another combatant builder to come onboard.

CSC is expensive but any built in Canada CMMC will likely not be especially cheap either, especially coming from an inexperienced yard. I'd be skeptical of it being a truly "cost effective" endeavor.

The Irving's switched the Former Saint John Shipyard property to a wallboard plant. The Drydock is still there . And Dry.

 

[JLB50]

I agree with you that with President Trump there’s no such thing as successful appeasement and everything is a moving target. At the World Economic Forum last week Trump announced that Saudi Arabia agreed to invest $600 Billion in the US over 4 years and in the next breath said he wants it to be $1 Trillion instead. It takes a lot of gall to shake down Saudi Arabia and the Crown Prince in public. Yes, Trump might have been partly joking and $1 Trillion wasn’t a hard demand, but it’s also clear that if Saudi Arabia thought $600 Billion was enough to buy them 4 years of good will with Trump, that’s not going to be the case. Similarly, if the Canadian government went down to Washington to sign a major defence purchase agreement with Trump, by the time they got to the post-signing press conference I’d expect Trump to promote the huge defence purchase in one breath and in the next breath announce that negotiations had begun for the next major defence purchase agreement.

We need to increase defence spending for our own sake and invest in things that make sense for our own defence needs including supporting Canadian defence production where there’s long-term value in doing so. Yes we need to collaborate with the US with continental defence in mind and buy American defence products as necessary, but we shouldn’t be beholden to getting a whole bunch of kit and buying American simply to try to satisfy Trump.

I’ll go one further. We’ve been too polite and too accommodating for too long. We need to reduce our dependence on the Americans and start buying more kit from the Brits, the Europeans, the South Koreans and the Japanese.

 

[deepblue202]

Well if we go KSS III submarines we should look at there FFX batch IV frigates

Hanwha Ocean to Build First Two FFX Batch-IV Frigates - Naval News

South Korean shipbuilder Hanwha Ocean won a contract for the construction of the 1st and 2nd ships of the new FFX Batch-IV...

www.navalnews.com

 

[quadrapiper]

The shore side support footprint for a fleet of AB would itself break the RCN before a single ship left the jetty.

What's unique about the AB shore support?

Or is it more about training pipelines and so on to support the larger ship's companies?

 

[Furniture]

What's unique about the AB shore support?

Or is it more about training pipelines and so on to support the larger ship's companies?

Every aspect of the AB is staffing intensive. The USN has sailors and contractors to throw at every problem.

Have you been to Pearl Harbor or San Diego? They have maintenance facilities that dwarf Halifax and Esquimalt combined.