Originally Posted by Swerv-o

And that's an excuse to waste billions of dollars worth of tax payers money?


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Originally Posted by Zen10

Since when has any government not done something to cause at least one constituency to accuse it of wasting money?

Originally Posted by Swerv-o

Never, but I think this is an order of magnitude worse!


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Originally Posted by Swerv-o

Not sure I can agree with that - The U-216 is an evolution of the very successful Dolphin that a number of navies have purchased.

It's a double hulled design, so is more survivable, and much quieter, and it also embodies AIP for the diesel electric engine so that it doesn't need to snorkel to feed the engine like the Collins does. Snorkelling is WWII tech really.

In terms of armaments, the U-216 also offers a vertical launch system, which the Collins doesn't/can't. But the crucial point is that of crewing.

But the real challenge for the Collins II is crewing. The U-216 requires a crew of only 33, compared to the 42 for the existing Collins. Crewing has been one of the reasons that the Collins class rarely put to sea - the Navy has been unable to fully crew all of their boats, yet the crew estimation for the Collins II is 58! We can't fully crew the 6 boats we already have.

This is a long read, but it accurately highlights the issues and savings that could be had.

Sailing into deep water

Of course - as you rightly point out - buying Viginia class boats from the US would be the best alternative, but given that Australian governments of all flavours are nuclear adverse, that simply isn't going to happen.

But given that the existing Collins doesn't fit the existing mission profile either, there's no need to throw good money after bad 'just because' - it's just a complete waste of tax payers money.


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Originally Posted by Zen10

I'm not following it closely so it would be wrong for me to express a strong opinion on this specific case. My general view is that Australia should have a strong naval presence in the north. Whatever is the most efficient, low-cost to taxpayers way of doing that, I support. Over the next few years we will see China expand into Indonesia to protect some of the straits there, and so a strong US-Australian presence will be necessary.

Originally Posted by ROMFT_WO2RN

An evolution yes but still only a concept and therefore carries the same risk as an evolution of Collins, except for the fact the Germans have been evolving their designs since day 1 and getting the first foreign customer of each evolution to take the design risk.

Crewing will always be a problem as it is for every submarine service out there. Subs are sh!t and all the extra pay in the world wouldn't make me go on one

Snorkelling will still be required as the AIP only lasts 4 weeks or 28 days out of a standard 90 day patrol cycle.

Without nuclear the best option would be moving the RAN's sub operating base, although that brings its own cost penalty.

The staged procurement described in the article could work but anyone who thinks MOTS is a cheap easy solution has never seen the effects of "national requirements", on a MOTS project (see the RANs Italian MCMV buy)

Originally Posted by Swerv-o

Part of the major problem is the government's insistence that the submarine fleet be conventional, which in itself flies in the face of strategic necessity given the vast patrol areas required.

The article suggests buying existing Dolphins now, so that existing capability can be restored. Of the six existing Collins, we can generally only put two to sea because of maintenance issues, and occasionally only one. This does seem to make sense, and means a known, proven design could be adopted in the short term, while sensible decisions on a future craft are made.


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Originally Posted by Swerv-o

The article I posted advocated a joint US/AU submarine facility in WA, to blunt the nose of any Indonesian aggression. Sadly this would involve nuclear attack boats, which the current government won't consider. Australia's problem is that it has a lot of area to patrol, and realistically it can't do it with diesel-electric subs.

Apparently, Yudhiono last week made a speech that outlined how he thought that the Indonesian military needed to be able to overcome Australias. This didn't even make the news here, but considering that they have just bought a load of old Russian Kilo boats, and also ordered a squadron of SU-35s, it seems likely that they are following through with this.


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Originally Posted by ROMFT_WO2RN

Seems to make sense but would also mean buying a new combat system, require new spares etc etc and is the U214 compatable with Mk48/ These are the "little issues", which invariably drive up costs of a MOTS project.

From a skimmers point of view, bin the sun dodgers and buy more shiny frigates/AWDs for swanning around the far east in

Oh and no maintenance issues with the system I've re-analysed

Originally Posted by Zen10

Australia has one of the largest maritime territories in the world, so I totally agree with you about this. The speech you mention sounds very aggressive - do you have any links for it? I've had a quick look but not found anything. Certain theories predict Indonesia will behave in this way (not subscribed to by those Marxists I was talking about), which is why they're always wrong, so while I'm not surprised this is Jakarta's intention, I am surprised it should be voiced in this way by a political leader. Usually they get military men to say this stuff out loud, like the Chinese always do.

Originally Posted by Swerv-o

I can't find any links to it either - it was reported by a Russian colleague of mine at the weekend - I'll press him to see if I can find it...


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Originally Posted by bcworld

Originally Posted by bcworld

Originally Posted by ROMFT_WO2RN

Seems to make sense but would also mean buying a new combat system, require new spares etc etc and is the U214 compatable with Mk48/ These are the "little issues", which invariably drive up costs of a MOTS project.

From a skimmers point of view, bin the sun dodgers and buy more shiny frigates/AWDs for swanning around the far east in

Oh and no maintenance issues with the system I've re-analysed