Unmanned vessels continue to make stunning advances in naval warfare. From a Breaking Defense website article,
A new US Navy task force recently completed its first at-sea exercise featuring unmanned vessels sailing in concert with friendly foreign ships, US 5th Fleet announced on Tuesday.
“During the two-day training exercise, Task Force 59 integrated and evaluated new MANTAS T-12 unmanned surface vessels (USV) that operated alongside manned U.S. patrol craft and Bahrain Defense Force maritime assets,” according to a Navy statement. (1)
Wow! Unmanned vessels in a Navy task force! Operating with US patrol craft! This is full-fledged naval combat taken to the next level. This is the future of naval warfare.
Here’s a photo of the event.
 |
| Unmanned Canoes With Coast Guard |
Uh … is it just me or does the future of naval warfare seem a bit … well … small? Those aren’t the unmanned combat ships I was envisioning from the Navy’s description of the exercise. Instead, those are unmanned canoes. The US Coast Guard patrol boat in the photo dwarfs the unmanned canoes. Those canoes appear to have a single ?sensor? (FLIR or optical camera, maybe?). How is a canoe with a single, small sensor going to contribute anything to naval combat?
The exercise was a stunning success by Navy standards as described in this official statement,
“This is a significant milestone for our new task force as we accelerate the integration of unmanned systems and artificial intelligence into complex, cross-domain operations at sea,” Capt. Michael Brasseur, commander of Task Force 59, said in a written statement. (1)
Does Capt. Brasseur have a regular salary or is he paid by the buzzword?
I understand that advances begin with baby steps but if this is the extent of our advances after a decade of unmanned efforts, we’re in trouble and there’s nothing worthwhile about unmanned assets.
____________________________________
(1)Breaking Defense website, “Navy’s Unmanned Ships Sail With US Ally In The Middle East ”, Justin Katz, 27-Oct-2021,
https://breakingdefense.com/2021/10/navys-unmanned-ships-sail-with-us-ally-in-the-middle-east/
Well, looking at it in the best possible light ....
ReplyDeleteThe main thing that's new with the unmanned ships is the AI navigation and control system, which is just software in a computer. The rest of the ship is relatively conventional. Doesn't require a big ship to hold a computer these days. So if the exercise is mostly focused on exercising and proving out the software, they may have decided that it's more cost effective to build small cheap ships (for testing) rather than actual warships. Once the software is proven out, they can put the computer in a real ship.
I wonder what "Bahrain Defense Force maritime assets" actually are. Tugboats?
ReplyDeleteOther pictures from the event would imply the involvement of at least 1 missile boat.
DeleteSo the low radar reflection canoe can cruise at 20kts, sprint at 45, and fire a hellfire.
ReplyDeleteKind of pricey for a single small shorter ranged shot on a ship.
Bring the price down to be able to buy 100 per group off of a Puller, along with some disposable UAVs to find the Chinese...and you may have something
Those look like Jeffersonian gunboats.
ReplyDeleteLutefisk
Worse really thay don't even have a 32 or 42 pound gun.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteWait. Why is that a USCG Patrol boat in the Persian gulf anyway. Somebody might think the USN is abdicating its job so it can still will and can buy useless LCS ships and than retire them early but not building a Cyclone replacement.
ReplyDeleteI would think this should read something like USCG tests unmanned floating drones to further enable life saving missions, drug interdiction or finding human trafficking in the in US waters. Were successful.
Also if the navy is retiring the cyclones and expects the Sentinel class to pick up the job the USCG is being left out in the cold. Were I on one of those boats I much rather more fire power and some missiles and a team trained to use a stinger... than those drones if I'm supposed to face the Iranian republican guard small boat assets in the water
ReplyDeleteThese “canoes” don’t seem much different from the model of QinetiQ Hammerhead that the R.C.N has been toting around and using for target practice for years. Since the Hammerhead can already "be controlled in large swarms of up to 40 vehicles in order to adequately replicate a coordinated attack by multiple naval ships and can use a variety of operational guidance plans, including straight-on high-speed attacks, crossing patterns, zig-zag patterns, and other evasive manoeuvres” it doesn’t seem like the U.S. Navy is advancing the state of the art very much.
ReplyDeleteWhile there’s no report of any sensor package being used on these Hammerheads they do come with an Electronic Counter Measure (ECM) Payload (to make it more interesting for those trying to hit them) that might be useful in an offensive role if only to confuse an opponent while the real weapons carrying platform is taking its shot.
https://www.naval-technology.com/news/newsqinetiq-target-systems-to-supply-over-40-hammerhead-targets-to-canadian-navy-5925606
https://www.qinetiq.com/en/what-we-do/target-systems/sea-targets/hammerhead
file:///C:/Users/Windows/Downloads/Hammerhead%20Product%20Sheet.pdf
This is just so sad.
ReplyDeleteTo think, this is what we are coming to.
We're building these, while the chinese build warships...
ReplyDeleteThe Navy is STILL caught in George W. Bush and Donald Rumsfeld's delusion we can win war on the cheap, by "skipping a generation" in military technology. The Chinese Navy is simply doing what the USN did during the 1980s and 1990s, putting potentially useful technology through rigorous trials to determine if they're actually useful. The USN during the 2000s to now, however, seems determined to use the technology DESPITE the fact it would take an actual generation to "skip a generation," as the F-35 development program demonstrated.
Delete" putting potentially useful technology through rigorous trials to determine if they're actually useful"
DeleteNot entirely clear China is do that any more than Russia.
They certainly put their Type 052 class destroyers through more vigorous trials than the USN did. Instead of splurging an astronomical amount of money on a dozen unproven ships, as the USN did with the LCS, the Chinese Navy built Type 052 class destroyers two at a time, each successive duo incorporating new technology, so if the new technology didn't work, the service would get two marginally useful ships instead of a dozen absolutely useless ones- until they made the Type 052D, a winning platform the Chinese Navy is making like hotcakes.
DeleteIf the USN had used that format- e.g., to build the Arleigh Burke replacement that would become the Zumwalt class, start with mating the Integrated Power System (unproven technology) with the Arleigh Burke hull (proven, so we know it works), and once the unproven is proven, add the Advanced Gun System to the next ship in class, and then the dual band radar, and then the tumblehome hull- we'd either have a dozen Zumwalt's that are actually useful in war against a peer competitor. That, or we'd learn the unproven technology is proven to be absolutely useless, and quit before we spent $22.5 billion on three absolutely useless ships.
I liek the little flags. I think they give them an extra bit of class and makes it look like a little regatta. Regattas can win wars, right?
ReplyDeleteSorry, it's late Friday and my snark is overflowing.
Warheads on foreheads.
ReplyDeleteI can't see anybody or anything in the photo doing much of that.