The Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA) awarded 6 small business qualifiers firm-fixed-price, indefinite-delivery/ indefinite-quantity multiple award contracts with a combined maximum value of $151.1 million to suppport and maintain US Navy barges.

The companies will provide management, administrative and production services, materials, tools, equipment, facilities and required support for depot level troubleshooting, repair, renewal, refurbishment, modernization, maintenance and testing of Navy living barges and their auxiliary systems (hull, mechanical and electrical), including the potential of periodic docking. Living barges have crew living quarters and galleys.

Four firms will service barges in the Norfolk, VA area, and 2 will service barges in Jacksonville, FL…

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LPD-17 cutaway
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LPD-17 San Antonio class amphibious assault support vessels are a new class of ship which is just entering service with the US Navy. Much like their predecessors, their mission is to embark, transport, land, and support elements of a US Marine Corps Landing Force. What changes are the capabilities and technologies incorporated to perform that mission. This new ship class includes significant internal technology and design upgrades, and is designed to operate accompanying platforms like the V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft and the Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle amphibious armored personnel carrier.

Between 10-11 scheduled ships of this class are slated to assume the functional duties of up to 41 previous ships, including the USA’s older LSD-36 USS Anchorage class dock landing ships (all decommissioned as of 2004, LSD-36 and LSD-38 transferred to Taiwan) and its LPD-4 USS Austin Class ships (12 built and serving, LPD 14 Trenton now India’s INS Jalashva). The San Antonio class ships may also replace 2 classes of ships currently mothballed and held in reserve status under the Amphibious Lift Enhancement Program (ALEP): the LST-1179 Newport class tank landing ships, and LKA-113 Charleston class amphibious cargo ships.

Welcome to Norfolk…
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Replacing that many existing ships is already a very tall order. While its design incorporates notable advances, the San Antonio Class has also had its share of teething problems. So, too, has the New Orleans shipyard to which most of this contract has been assigned. The number of serious issues encountered in this ship class have been much higher than usual, and more extensive. The initial ships have been criticized for sub-standard workmanship, and it took 2 1/2 years after the initial ship of class was delivered and accepted before any ship of class was sent on an operational cruise. Whereupon the USS San Antonio promptly found itself laid up Bahrain due to oil leaks. Meanwhile, costs are almost twice the originally promised amounts at over $1.7 billion per ship – 2 to 3 times as much as many foreign LPD classes, and more than 10 times as much as Singapore’s 6,600 ton Endeavour Class LPD.

DID’s FOCUS articles offer in-depth, updated looks at significant military programs of record. This is DID’s FOCUS Article for the San Antonio Class, detailing the ships’ unique features and capabilities, its program innovations and issues, ship timelines, and related contracts throughout the program’s history. As has become DID custom, the most recent additions are highlighted in green type. The latest developments include a contract to Raytheon that could be worth over $175 million, and the imminent commissioning of the LPD 21 New York, which contains steel from the destroyed World Trade Center…

• LPD-17 San Antonio Class: Capabilities and Features
• LPD-17 San Antonio Class: Process & Issues
• LPD-17 San Antonio Class: Program, Budgets & Timelines [updated]
• LPD-17 San Antonio Class: Contracts and Events (1996-Present) [updated]
• Appendix A: Additional Readings & Sources – LPD-17 Ship Class
• Appendix B: Additional Readings & Sources – News and Views
  
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SM-2 Launch w. AEGIS
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Variants of the SM-2 Standard missile are the USA’s primary fleet defense anti-air weapon, and serve with 13 navies worldwide. The most common variant is the RIM-66K-L/ SM-2 Standard Block IIIB, which entered service in 1998. The Standard family extends far beyond the SM-2 missile, however; several nations still use the SM-1, the SM-3 is rising to international prominence as a missile defense weapon, and the SM-6 program is on track to supplement the SM-2. These missiles are designed to be paired with the AEGIS radar and combat system, but can be employed independently by ships with older or newer radar systems.

DID’s FOCUS articles offer in-depth, updated looks at significant military programs of record. This article covers each variant in the Standard missile family, several years worth of American and Foreign Military Sales requests and contracts, key events, and the budgetary and technical background that can help put all that in context. New material is indicated in green type.

The latest addition includes a $47.8 million order for engineering and technical services to support the Standard Missile program…

• The Standard Missile Naval Defense Family: Missiles and Plans (SM-1 to SM-6)
• The Standard Missile Naval Defense Family: Budgets [updated]
• The Standard Missile Naval Defense Family: US Contracts & Events
  • FY 2010 [updated]
  • FY 2009
  • FY 2008
  • FY 2007
  • FY 2006
• The Standard Missile Naval Defense Family: Exports & Related Key Events
  • CY 2009 [updated]
  • CY 2008
  • CY 2007
  • CY 2006
  • CY 2005
• Additional Readings
  
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Bridge to the future?
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In its 2009 White Paper, Australia’s Department of Defence and Labor Party government looked at the progress being made in anti-shipping surveillance-strike complexes, and the need to defend large sea lanes, and dropped something of a surprise. They proposed increasing Australia’s submarine fleet to 12 boats by 2030-2040, all of which would be successors to Australia’s a current fleet of advanced Collins class submarines.

The Collins class was designed with the strong cooperation of ThyssenKrupp’s Swedish Kockums subsidiary, and built in Australia by state-owned ASC. The class has encountered a number of issues, including significant difficulties with its combat systems, issues with acoustic signature, major cost growth to A$ 5+ billion, and schedule slippage. Worse still, reports indicated that the RAN can only staff 2 of its 6 submarines put a huge crimp in the fleet’s usefulness. High-level attention led to 29 recommendations aimed at improving conditions and staffing on Australia’s submarines, and those are now being implemented. Their long term effect remains to be seen.

So, too, does the nature of Australia’s future submarine project – and its eventual cost…

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F125 Concept
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There is general acknowledgment in global naval circles that many future operations are going to involve shallow littoral chokepoints for maritime trade, operations in and around failed states like Somalia, and expeditionary stabilization operations. That realization has driven a number of approaches to naval construction.

In the Netherlands, Royal Schelde’s Sigma Ships are designed in block modules, which can be added or subtracted to build anything from an offshore patrol vessel to a large frigate. Denmark is already building its Flyverfisken Class and Absalon Class ships, which pioneered the mission module concept and can be used in roles ranging ranging from mine or sub hunting, to anti-ship warfare/ land attack, to carrying troops. Sweden’s Visby Class stealth corvettes are attracting renewed American attention, and helped to inspire the American concept of the Littoral Combat Ship – which has been criticized for its cost, and for packing less punch and having less high-end armament flexibility than any competitor.

Germany’s response has been the F125 frigate, which might best be described as an “expeditionary frigate” design. It doesn’t use the Danish or American mission module concept. Instead, it includes a number of features aimed at making it a strong contributor to long international deployments in littoral environments, and to naval support for stabilization operations.

The latest addition involves a key merger, and a satellite terminal contract…

• The F125: Key Features
• F125: Contracts and Key Events [updated]
• Additional Readings
  
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Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC) received a task order from the Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA) to provide the Program Executive Office for Integrated Warfare Systems (PEO IWS) with engineering support services. The order has a maximum value of $160 million if all options are exercised.

The PEO IWS manages surface ship and submarine combat technologies and systems, and coordinates Navy open architecture across ship platforms.

Under the task order, the SAIC team will provide enterprise services for systems engineering, ship integration and product development. The team will also help oversee the design, construction and maintenance of surface ships.

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Right now, in many American ships beyond the top-tier AEGIS destroyers and cruisers, the detect-to-engage sequence against anti-ship missiles requires a lot of manual steps, involving different ship systems that use different displays. When a Mach 3 missile gives you 45 seconds from appearance on ship’s radar to impact, however, seconds of delay can be fatal. Seconds of unnecessary delay are unacceptable.

Hence Raytheon’s Ship Self Defense System (SSDS), which uses software and commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) electronics to turn incoming data from several systems (radar, radar warning receivers, combat identification, electro-optics) into a single picture of prioritized threats. SSDS will then recommend an engagement sequence for the ship’s crew, or (in automatic mode) fire some combination of jamming transmissions, chaff or decoys, and/or weapons against the oncoming threat. The entire ship’s combat system concept, including the sensors and weapons, is known as Quick Reaction Combat Capability (QRCC) – and SSDS is the key element that ties it all together.

Recent developments involve ongoing PEA contracts…

• SSDS: Current Versions
• Contracts & Key Events, 2008 – Present [updated]
  
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“Slick 32”
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The US Navy’s AN/SLQ-32 ECM (Electronic Countermeasures) system uses radar warning receivers, and in some cases active jamming, as the part of ships’ self-defense system. The “Slick 32s” provides warning of incoming attacks, and is integrated with the ships’ defenses to trigger Rapid Blooming Offboard Chaff (RBOC) and other decoys, which can fire either semi-automatically or on manual direction from a ship’s ECM operators.

The “Slick 32” variants are based on modular building blocks, and each variant is suited to a different type of ship. Most of these systems were designed in the 1970s, however, and are based on 1960s-era technology. In an era that features more and more supersonic ship-killing missiles with better radars and advanced electronics, that won’t do. Hence the Surface Electronic Warfare Improvement Program (SEWIP)...

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Tomahawk launch from
USS Farragut [DDG-99]
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Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC) received a task order from the Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) to support the Tomahawk weapons system program.

The task order has a 1-year base period of performance, 4 one-year options, and a total value of more than $60 million if all options are exercised. The task order was awarded under the US Navy’s SeaPort-e contract.

The Tomahawk is a submarine or ship-launched land-attack cruise missile…

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As part of Britain’s Defence Industrial Strategy, the Labour Party government and Ministry of Defence actively sought to reduce the number of companies involved in naval surface ship building and maintenance. In fact, they wanted just one company to deal with. Monopolies tend to drive prices up and effectiveness down, but the Ministry of Defense believed that a long-term partnering arrangement with performance guarantees could counteract that natural tendency. They also believed that the expected volume of warship construction and maintenance could no longer support more than one sizeable firm. Rather than force the merger, they dangled a sizeable carrot: they would not issue contracts for the planned CVF aircraft carrier program until they had a single entity to deal with.

Almost a year after the original July 25/07 Heads of Terms signed by BAE systems, VT Group, and the UK MoD, BAE Systems plc finalized a legally binding Framework Agreement with VT Group plc (‘VT’) to establish the BVT Surface Fleet Ltd. joint venture as the UK’s premier provider of surface warships and through-life support. The firm would become the UK Government’s strategic partner for the design, build and support of future warships, and will also pursue export opportunities. The joint venture targets total net savings to the government in excess of GBP 700 million (currently about $1.4 billion) to be shared 70/30 between the MoD and the BVT. These net savings, and the extent to which the parties will actually benefit, remain to be seen in practice.

The joint venture is now a single venture again, as BAE Systems buys out its partner…

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