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Smaller and agile than KCR thoNot KCR but KSR.
agree on the matters to add more patrol vessels, but our maritime agency also need to contemplate that "SIZE MATTERS", go big or go home for me, we're cooperating alot with norwegian, this 10.000 ton 140 meter patrol vessels would do much favor for our coast guard during ocean going operation, while we are not operating in arctic or icy water, those reinforced ice breaker hull specification can gives us advantage against foreign white hull in bumper car event.With the previous drama involving Iranian super tanker I think we need more OPV for our Coast Guard and it must be equipped with hanggar + helicopter, modifying the current 80m design is fine.
those class are famous due to battle of arafura sea.Today i went to a close friend of my family who just passed away to give my condolence. He was a retired Indonesian Navy officer. I took a photo of a FAC he once served in. Anyone knows what type of FAC these are?
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torpedo boat?those class are famous due to battle of arafura sea.
torpedo boat?
I don't think they are allowed to offer missiles with a range of more than 300km under the MTCR regime.Whats the odd they would offer us SCALP too?
Oh there are some options out there already. If you want something low-end, you could go for either ACV phase 1 vehicles or the Turkish FNSS Zaha. Korea also have been producing KAAV-7A1 until very recently, though I'm not sure if its still in production. If you want something more fancy you'll need to wait a few years. KAAV-II will be delivered to ROKMs for initial operational testing. Japan is working on the FAT-R and US will continue to ACV phase 2 once they are done fulfilling some urgent AAV-7A1 replacement demands.That amphibious KG biscuit box really need to be replaced but there is no such thing available in the western market, if not buying it from Russia maybe we can develop the replacement locally with foreign help.
Considering KSR's size, this thing really needs a mothership to work in terms of endurance and targe acquisition. So the mothership in my view is more like an organic part of the system. But this makes me wonder if Indonesia really needs such mothership vessel that can deploy smaller missile attack crafts. Indonesian doctrine and diplomatic relations really projects no serious regional military/security threat from other countries but more of counter piract operations in Malacca, more focus on freedom of navigation in nearby waters, fishery resource disputes, especially with the Chinese, internal operations and stability.Mothership for KCR![]()
LIMA 2023 - Following the agreement in Indonesia, Kongsberg promotes its Vanguard system in Malaysia - EDR Magazine
LIMA 2023 allowed Kongsberg of Norway to promote its Vanguard system, based on a mothership/fast attack boats concept, to Malaysia.www.edrmagazine.eu
Considering KSR's size, this thing really needs a mothership to work in terms of endurance and targe acquisition. So the mothership in my view is more like an organic part of the system. But this makes me wonder if Indonesia really needs such mothership vessel that can deploy smaller missile attack crafts. Indonesian doctrine and diplomatic relations really projects no serious regional military/security threat from other countries but more of counter piract operations in Malacca, more focus on freedom of navigation in nearby waters, fishery resource disputes, especially with the Chinese, internal operations and stability.
Only real "threat" comes from territorial disputes with Malaysia in Northern Borneo and Natuna Sea overlap with 9-dash lines. I really don't think that this mothership-KSR system has much use in any of those scenarios. If you give me the choice, I'd rather use that money to build more Bung Karno like ships, but not as presidential Yacht but as an actual patrol boat. Or reallocate that fund to KPLP so that they could actually build more class 1 patrol boats and build a fleet that is capable of patrolling the vast Indonesian EEZ. If they don't want that, just build a frigate instead of this thing. Frigate's welcome considering Indonesia is trying to build a regional force-projection navy.
Wait wait wait. Are you telling me that this mothership-KSR thing is not some concept or offer but an actual TNI program? My god...There's some questions that needs to be answered first in regards to this mothership-boat concept. For a reported $900M, the practicality seems very questionable. The Mothership reportedly carries 4 of this tiny mosquito boat, with SATCOM and INS based navigation and communication, the thing is our SATCOM navigation aren't that robust and if you put the heavyweight electronic attack player like USA, China, Australia there's every reason to be worried if we could operate these concept in dense EW restricted environment. Kongsberg promised robustness in its GNSS, but then again I'm expecting that to be overwhelmed as well.
Basically. Though we should consider one thing. As we all know, effective utilization of FAC/missile boats needs external C4ISR and sensor-shooter network. What this mothership-KSR concept looks to me is the smaller version of idependent sensor-shooter unit that can operate without the need for substantial external tactical data link and sensors network. It's biggest benefit will be a possible physical seperation of the sensor platfor and the shooter while not suffering from problems the traditional manned missile boats suffer. Small size and bad endurance and bad survivability against air threats, which applies the same for USVs but without the human casualty.And then there's the issue of the missile boat and its practical endurance before reaching bingo fuel. I don't have the numbers but just a quick look and I don't think the boat could keep up far away from the mother ship for day long operation, at some point the mothership commander will have to calculate just how far and just how long this boat operate from its mothership else it loses contact.
Then there's also the question regarding the motherships own size, at 100m long, 18m beam, this ship would be the size of the current Martadinata, but with rooms inside the ships occupied by decks, its questionable how many liters of fuel it could carry on its own + for its missile boat , consider the ship itself have questionable fuel tank capacity.
Last but not least this naval MUM-T has yet to be adopted anywhere in the world, with only testing like the IBP 21 conducted by the US navy in 2021. I'm not sure if its wise to adopt the concept without proper testing first. Anything that sounds good on paper, may not work in real life , case in point is the multiple failure of Ukraine drones against the Russian navy. Even though suicide drones are once hailed as the 'game changer'.
The question in my head is for such a concept, isn't it just better if Indonesia invested on an LHD instead, with its rotary air wing providing a larger coverage area than the LOS limited sensors on the missile boat ? I mean the price of an LHD like the Mistral is less than $900M. I'm sure the sortie rate of a helicopter based missile launch is a lot higher than that of crappy missile boat. Recent development in fact has pointed that fixed wing aviation/drones like Mojave could be launched from LHD without much modifications. I mean if the Indonesian navy is really desperate to be tech savvy, why not use an aerial drone instead of crappy missile boat.
What do u think ?
Yes, there's some disparity in future TNI AL surface fleet after the planned modernization. There needs to be some workhorse frigates that are smaller than AH140/FREMM under discussion for acquisition. Also, I'm mentioning KPLP especially considering that, to me, one of the most threatening entity to Indonesian interest in the regional waters is the ilegal Chinese fishery. You wouldn't want to use TNI AL ships in anti-ilegal fishery operations not only because its an overkill, but also because of political implications ("military warship captures Chinese ilegal trawler" compared to "Indonesian coast guard ship captures Chinese ilegal trawler"). Also, I think OPVs are not really optimal for Indonesian security implications but rather corvettes. I think you were talking more about traditional corvettes as well. Something like Brauschweig class or Steregushchiy/Gremyashchiy class.It is ! in fact other than the need for large +4000 tons frigate, the most pressing need of ships for us is now ships the size of Diponegoro or Bung Tomo. It's not overly large and expensive to operate but able to at least able to defend itself in case of attack and able to patrol for a long time, I agree with you that securing ships from piracy isn't a mothership strong suit, a simple coast guard OPV is suffice, and when it comes to facing of China, its survivability itself is questionable. Lose the mothership, lose all 4 missile boat. The PLAN would find the mothership notably defenseless without proper air defense and in heavy Chinese naval and air superiority it would not survive for long.
I hope they increase the OPV 90 order into 10-15 ships. And each of those OPV should be equipped with 12 VLS (Mica) as minimum. While the larger AAW ship like the Merah Putih be equipped with 32 or more VLS (Aster). In the future Indonesia really need to consider air defense ship with VLS in the triple digit, consider the missile heavy doctrine of the PLA, good for additional layer of air defense and reduce burden to land based launcher. The investment on those ships will provide a greater return for the safety of Indonesia's overall economic and population from attacks. Can't see missile boat offering the same bargain.