Royal Canadian Navy Discussions and updates

[John Fedup]

I am thinking that specific hulls will not regularly embark with SM-2 and instead, a mix of ESSM and Tomahawk. It mentions in the documents provided above that all ships will have the capability to perform all missions, however, I think it is still likely that specific hulls will specialize in specific tasks during the course of their life with a change in capability if required. That all 32 VLS cells will be strike length also tells me that the RCN has future capabilities in mind and growth potential for weapons in the magazine.

There will likely be consideration given to the acquisition of SM-3s for BMD, not so much for need but to appease US concerns that Canada isn’t doing enough for NA air defence which is true. With all the new missiles under development, the RCN will be closely monitoring progress.

 

[John Fedup]

Why? ESSM is quad packed so for example a load out of 12 cells of ESSM gives you 48 missiles. You are not going to have a load out of 20 Tomahawk missiles in one ship, so maybe the remaining load out could be 12 or 16 SM-2 with the balance being Tomahawk. That's a more logical load out. Let's be honest, the Canadian government isn't going to invest in a large inventory of Tomahawk missiles is it?

Probably not unless stuff hits the fan. If the government is stupid enough to mess with the CSC program everything could be in doubt. Politically unlikely at this point hopefully. Junior would find it easier to throw the fighter replacement program under the bus rather than the CSC.

 

[Mattshel]

Why? ESSM is quad packed so for example a load out of 12 cells of ESSM gives you 48 missiles. You are not going to have a load out of 20 Tomahawk missiles in one ship, so maybe the remaining load out could be 12 or 16 SM-2 with the balance being Tomahawk. That's a more logical load out. Let's be honest, the Canadian government isn't going to invest in a large inventory of Tomahawk missiles is it?

Maybe they could go with 12-16 SM-2 per ship, with the focus of the RCN back towards Task Groups though I could see an eventuality where there could be ship(s) that carry no Tomahawks and load up instead with Anti Air missiles. Maybe it is a better idea to have your magazine of long-range anti-air missiles spread throughout the task group with all the ships having CEC in place of having them all in one dedicated AAW ship.

 

[Mattshel]

Probably not unless stuff hits the fan. If the government is stupid enough to mess with the CSC program everything could be in doubt. Politically unlikely at this point hopefully. Junior would find it easier to throw the fighter replacement program under the bus rather than the CSC.

The fighter replacement program is much more likely, they are being built somewhere else and it is not Canadian Voters that will lose their jobs in a Province that has gone both Conservative and Liberal in the past. The NSPS all but assures that something is going to be built to sustain an industry whether it is cost-effective or not.

 

[Delta204]

Maybe they could go with 12-16 SM-2 per ship, with the focus of the RCN back towards Task Groups though I could see an eventuality where there could be ship(s) that carry no Tomahawks and load up instead with Anti Air missiles. Maybe it is a better idea to have your magazine of long-range anti-air missiles spread throughout the task group with all the ships having CEC in place of having them all in one dedicated AAW ship.

From some of the comments coming from the RCN over the last while on the CONOPS of these frigates I would say it's likely that each will have a similar load out. The RCN talks about importance of these ships being multi-role; only having 3 of the previous Iroguois class was a significant vulnerability and limitation for the RCN. As already mentioned in this thread they have purposely gone away from having dedicated AAW specific hulls.

These frigates will spend a lot of time in far away places and the RCN wants the ability to send any of the 15 hulls into whatever situation / crisis that comes along - they don't want to shuffle frigates half way around the world to make sure the have the right capability for each threat that they may face.

 

[Albedo]

There will likely be consideration given to the acquisition of SM-3s for BMD, not so much for need but to appease US concerns that Canada isn’t doing enough for NA air defence which is true. With all the new missiles under development, the RCN will be closely monitoring progress.

Japan Considers Building Two Super-Sized Destroyers As An Alternative To Aegis Ashore

The two new warships are planned to combine a development of the Maya class hull with the AN/SPY-7 Long Range Discrimination Radar.

www.thedrive.com

After cancelling their SPY-7 Aegis Ashore, it seems Japan is considering building new Aegis destroyers using SPY-7 for the BMD role since they've already partially paid for the SPY-7 arrays. If Japan goes ahead with this and shoulders the developmental costs of integrating SPY-7/SM-3/Aegis on a ship-based platform, that would definitely make it easier for Canada to add a BMD capability to the CSC.

From some of the comments coming from the RCN over the last while on the CONOPS of these frigates I would say it's likely that each will have a similar load out. The RCN talks about importance of these ships being multi-role; only having 3 of the previous Iroguois class was a significant vulnerability and limitation for the RCN. As already mentioned in this thread they have purposely gone away from having dedicated AAW specific hulls.

These frigates will spend a lot of time in far away places and the RCN wants the ability to send any of the 15 hulls into whatever situation / crisis that comes along - they don't want to shuffle frigates half way around the world to make sure the have the right capability for each threat that they may face.

I believe a lot of the concerns with the Iroquois/Halifax-class split was with the ships themselves, where they were role specific in the fitted systems which couldn't be changed easily, and the knock-on limitation of only having 2 Iroquois on the Atlantic coast and 1 on the Pacific coast for Naval Task Group Commander and AAW roles. Those limitations are addressed by having all CSC be large ships able to embark a Command staff and having 32 strike-length VLS, but I don't believe that means role-specific tasking and loadouts are going to be eliminated.

It's true that Canadian navy frigates are often deployed for independent patrols, perhaps occasionally joining other ships for brief group exercises, where a general purpose/multi-role missile loadout is appropriate. However there will still be times where an AAW-loadout is appropriate such as when a frigate serves as Naval Task Group Commander for a Canadian Naval Task Group where she'll probably stay in the center with the JSS which needs protection, as Commander for a Standing NATO Maritime Group where ships from other navies might have less-effective AAW capabilities, or when she joins allied carrier battle groups and is assigned inner layer protection close to the carrier. These roles are generally known, planned for, and specifically trained for in advance, are of long-duration (for example I believe SNMG Commander is a 6-month role) and aren't likely to change in the middle of a deployment (I believe Canadian frigates deployed as a general member of SNMG have sometimes had to unexpectedly leave to serve other immediate Canadian needs, but I don't believe that's happened when the frigate is the SNMG Commander), so a multi-role missile capability isn't as necessary in those cases. And with 8 x NSM, a 127mm gun, torpedo tubes, and a Cyclone helicopter, even a CSC dedicated to AAW retains anti-ship, land-attack, and ASW capabilities.

The RCN tries to maintain a 1:1:1 ratio of ships in high-readiness (which I believe means deployed on missions), normal-readiness (which I believe means workups and can include lower intensity exercises with allies), and extended readiness (just returned from missions or refit) so at any one time I could see 1-2 high-readiness CSC with an AAW-loadout (perhaps 24 x SM-2, 32 x ESSM, 24 x CAMM), 3-4 high-readiness CSC with a multi-role loadout (perhaps 16 x Tomahawk, 8 x SM-2, 32 x ESSM, 24 x CAMM), 5 normal-readiness CSC with the multi-role loadout but half the missiles being warshots and half being training rounds although some empty VLS wouldn't be surprising, and the 5 extended readiness ships would of course be unarmed. For SM-2, that would mean up to 92 warshots are deployed at one time.

 

[John Fedup]

The US intention to equip the ABs with hypersonic missiles is another twist assuming a smaller version emerges that can fit into a Mk-41 VLS (not available at present). I would think the RCN would want to add this eventually to the CSC missile inventory.

 

[Calculus]

Canada – Standard Missile 2 (SM-2) Block IIIC Missiles | Defense Security Cooperation Agency

www.dsca.mil

With 15 ships, of which about a third are in extended readiness/refit, that means ~10 x SM-2 per deployed CSC, although loadouts will of course vary depending on mission.

What makes everyone think this is the only buy? We're building these ships over a 20 year period. I think it's pretty safe to say there will be additional buys over those 20 years. To assume that we'll only have 100 missiles divided amongst 15 ships over the life of that fleet makes no sense.

 

[John Fedup]

Probably maintaining an inventory to load up 10 CSCs (the other 5 ships will be in various stages of maintenance/upgrading) with a mixture of SM-2(6) and ESSMs would be more than sufficient unless the geopolitical situation dictates a larger inventory is necessary.

 

[Albedo]

What makes everyone think this is the only buy? We're building these ships over a 20 year period. I think it's pretty safe to say there will be additional buys over those 20 years. To assume that we'll only have 100 missiles divided amongst 15 ships over the life of that fleet makes no sense.

Yes, I admit it was a hasty, over simplified comment. When I tried to come up with a reasonable missile usage breakdown above though, I do think 100 SM-2 is a sensible number to maintain as a minimum SM-2 inventory for the 15 CSC.

I believe the way defence budgeting works in Canada is that the $56-60 billion CAD budget is for all the costs associated with the CSC from procurement project standup to FOC declaration of the last ship including the cost of requirements definition, running the competition, design, purchasing/building/transporting the equipment which includes that which is used on the ships themselves and the creation of a spares on-hand inventory, facilities and equipment for storage and maintenance, testing, and training but is not a full lifetime cost budget so would not include the cost of replacements when things are consumed. In the case of the SM-2, this purchase seems enough to create the steady-state inventory needed to operationalize the full CSC fleet. I don't doubt there will be additional SM-2 purchases over the life of the fleet to replace SM-2 consumed which will fall under the operating budget and not the CSC project budget.

I would agree it'd be better to maintain more than this seemingly bare minimum 100 SM-2 inventory, but I wouldn't be surprised if we're just going to rely on borrowing from the US until replacements can be procured if a sudden extended military campaign exhausted our inventory as I believe was the case with bombs during the Yugoslavia and Libya air campaigns. This would of course be problematic in a major powers conflict where US inventories are also under strain.

 

[Delta204]

I believe a lot of the concerns with the Iroquois/Halifax-class split was with the ships themselves, where they were role specific in the fitted systems which couldn't be changed easily, and the knock-on limitation of only having 2 Iroquois on the Atlantic coast and 1 on the Pacific coast for Naval Task Group Commander and AAW roles. Those limitations are addressed by having all CSC be large ships able to embark a Command staff and having 32 strike-length VLS, but I don't believe that means role-specific tasking and loadouts are going to be eliminated.

...
The RCN tries to maintain a 1:1:1 ratio of ships in high-readiness (which I believe means deployed on missions), normal-readiness (which I believe means workups and can include lower intensity exercises with allies), and extended readiness (just returned from missions or refit) so at any one time I could see 1-2 high-readiness CSC with an AAW-loadout (perhaps 24 x SM-2, 32 x ESSM, 24 x CAMM), 3-4 high-readiness CSC with a multi-role loadout (perhaps 16 x Tomahawk, 8 x SM-2, 32 x ESSM, 24 x CAMM), 5 normal-readiness CSC with the multi-role loadout but half the missiles being warshots and half being training rounds although some empty VLS wouldn't be surprising, and the 5 extended readiness ships would of course be unarmed. For SM-2, that would mean up to 92 warshots are deployed at one time.

I agree with your comment on system / capability - I wasn't trying to imply otherwise. Just that there has been no talk so far that I'm aware of regarding specific loadouts... but perhaps this isn't something most navies discuss in public forum. The article posted a few days ago by Calculus from the USNI discussed this a bit. Other sources have also emphasized the multipurpose nature of the CSC, but perhaps we're splitting hairs - it certainly isn't out of the realm of possibilities to have tailored loadouts as you've suggested. Also just wanted to point out that the idea of changing roles during deployment isn't my own, when members of the RCN talk about the CSC they seem to emphasis this point.

Just curious though, is it common for MK41 cells to be loaded and unloaded this frequently as you've suggested?

As for the SM-2 order, I would be of the same view as Calculus and assume this will be for the first batch (~5) of CSC? Would hardly think that 100 SM-2's is adequate total inventory considering our old SM-2's for the 3 Iroquois were around that amount if I recall correctly.

 

[Albedo]

I agree with your comment on system / capability - I wasn't trying to imply otherwise. Just that there has been no talk so far that I'm aware of regarding specific loadouts... but perhaps this isn't something most navies discuss in public forum. The article posted a few days ago by Calculus from the USNI discussed this a bit. Other sources have also emphasized the multipurpose nature of the CSC, but perhaps we're splitting hairs - it certainly isn't out of the realm of possibilities to have tailored loadouts as you've suggested. Also just wanted to point out that the idea of changing roles during deployment isn't my own, when members of the RCN talk about the CSC they seem to emphasis this point.

Just curious though, is it common for MK41 cells to be loaded and unloaded this frequently as you've suggested?

https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/36737403.pdf

Commander of Seventh Fleet (C7F) operational planners devote time and resources planning missile loadouts for Vertical Launch System (VLS) ships prior to their deployment in their Area of Responsibility (AOR). C7F has a number of warplans with missions allocated to each one and multiple ships to manage in their AOR. Planners need to consider the mission requirements, ships’ missile capability and VLS cells capacity, a limited number of VLS missiles in inventory, certain number of ships available to C7F’s AOR, minimal number of missiles on each ship, and missions’ risk and priorities.

How do operational planners accomplish this task now, and is there a better way? Operational planners decide missile loading by hand utilizing basic programming software like Excel Spreadsheet (from Microsoft Corporation, 2015) and provide missile loadout recommendations with no idea how much such plans might be improved. Under these circumstances, missile load planning is labor intensive. This thesis provides operational planners with a programming tool, the VLS loadout planner (VLP), to assist them reckon the ships’ optimal missile loadouts prior to deployment.

From the Executive Summary of the above thesis from the US Naval Postgraduate School, which I admittedly only skimmed, for USN ships the missile loadout of each ship is customized prior to deployment based on a variety of factors including area of responsibility, mission type, anticipated threat, what other USN ships are in the area and what they are armed with, the ships own limitations (not all ships are compatible with newer missiles like SM-3 or SM-6), what is available in inventory, what needs to be reserved for follow-on ships, etc. This loadout planning is currently done manually and the thesis proposes developing a computer program to create recommendations. So even with the much larger magazines of USN cruisers and destroyers, they try to optimize the missile loadout for the anticipated tasking rather than rely on a generic missile mix. We are surprisingly only the second country to use Tomahawks with the Mk41 after the US so there's no one else to compare to for examples on when Tomahawks should be equipped. Most other Mk41 users seem to only use them with anti-air missiles so probably have a fixed SM-2, ESSM mix.

As for the SM-2 order, I would be of the same view as Calculus and assume this will be for the first batch (~5) of CSC? Would hardly think that 100 SM-2's is adequate total inventory considering our old SM-2's for the 3 Iroquois were around that amount if I recall correctly.

The old SM-2 inventory may have been bought to service all 4 TRUMP refitted Iroquois and the Iroquois only carried SM-2 in their Mk41 whereas while there may be more CSC, some cells will be filled with Tomahawk, ESSM, and possibly SM-6 in the future since they're hiring engineers to integrate it into the CSC. Regardless, you and Calculus are probably right that a more realistic on-hand inventory of SM-2 is more than 100 missiles and more missiles are going to be ordered to enlarge the inventory once later ships are closer to delivery. Afterall, it'll likely be ~2040 until the last CSC is operational and will need missiles.

 

[John Fedup]

Why does the RCN need the purchase of 100 MK 13 launchers for the CSC which are to have the MK 41 VLS?

Canada spending $650 million on U.S. missiles for new warships

The total estimated cost of the purchase is $500 million U.S., according to the U.S. government, which posted details of the deal.

ottawacitizen.com

 

[Mattshel]

Why does the RCN need the purchase of 100 MK 13 launchers for the CSC which are to have the MK 41 VLS?

Canada spending $650 million on U.S. missiles for new warships

The total estimated cost of the purchase is $500 million U.S., according to the U.S. government, which posted details of the deal.

ottawacitizen.com

I believe the MK-13 launchers refers to the launch canisters that the missiles are shipped in. The purchase of the MK-41 would add significantly to the $500 Million as they are not cheap, especially not for 45 x 8 Cell Units.

 

[Mattshel]

Why does the RCN need the purchase of 100 MK 13 launchers for the CSC which are to have the MK 41 VLS?

Canada spending $650 million on U.S. missiles for new warships

The total estimated cost of the purchase is $500 million U.S., according to the U.S. government, which posted details of the deal.

ottawacitizen.com

I believe the MK-13 launchers refers to the launch canisters that the missiles are shipped in. The purchase of the MK-41 would add significantly to the $500 Million as they are not cheap, especially not for 45 x 8 Cell Units.

 

[Redlands18]

Mark 13 missile launcher - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

The Mark 13 is the single Arm Missile Launcher developed by the USN in the 1960s mainly used on the Adams class DDGs and the Perry,Cassard,Tromp and Van Heemskerck class FFGs. Compared to modern VLS systems they are obsolete and very few are left in service.
The mention in the above article of 100 being fitted to the CSC is almost certainly due to poor research by the author of the article.
I suspect John was being somewhat facetious with his question.

 

[John Fedup]

I was almost tempted to ask the reporter how the 100 MK 13s were to be placed on 15 CSC ships! This guy will be one of the leading mouthpieces decrying the CSC costs when the parliamentary report on the program comes out. Perhaps he envisions MK 13 launchers for an alternative budget frigate...but 100, duh.

 

[ngatimozart]

I was almost tempted to ask the reporter how the 100 MK 13s were to be placed on 15 CSC ships! This guy will be one of the leading mouthpieces decrying the CSC costs when the parliamentary report on the program comes out. Perhaps he envisions MK 13 launchers for an alternative budget frigate...but 100, duh.

So how do you contact the reporter in question? They don't exactly make it easy for you to email them. I will see if I can hunt him down on twitter.

 

[spoz]

The Mark 13 is (as previously suggested) also the canister used when SM-2 Block. II or III are loaded into a Mark 41 launcher.

 

[Calculus]

The Mark 13 is (as previously suggested) also the canister used when SM-2 Block. II or III are loaded into a Mark 41 launcher.

Yes. Exactly. Not a single-rail launcher. A cannister that adapts the Mk 41 to accommodate SM-2. Mk 25 is for ESSM.

MK 41 Vertical Launching System (VLS)

fas.org