MEKO A-200 Frigate Cost

Just a quick note ... For those of you who continue to believe that foreign shipbuilders can build naval vessels faster and cheaper than US builders, here’s a data point.  The newly specified MEKO A-200 frigates for the German navy will reportedly cost $1.9B(USD) each for four ships and you can bet your soul that cost will increase as work actually commences.  We’re looking at a $2 - $2.5B frigate!  Yikes!

"Existing Design With Only Minor Modification" Trap

More and more, the Western naval ship acquisition world is reverting to ‘existing designs with only minor modifications’ instead of new ship designs.  This is due to fear rather than combat requirements: fear of runaway costs, fear of schedule delays, fear of bad publicity and criticism, fear of innovation, etc.  Fear.  The Western naval world is acquiring ships as a reaction to fear of their own ineptitude. 
 
Instead of honestly and objectively assessing the reasons for acquisition failures and fixing the problems, Western navies have opted for the perceived path of safety over that of combat effectiveness.
 
The latest victim is Germany which has cancelled its F126 frigate acquisition program. 
 

The German Ministry of Defense has decided to discontinue the construction of six F126-class frigates …[1]
 
According to the BMVg, Damen Schelde Naval Shipbuilding (DSNS), the company initially contracted as the prime contractor, was unable to meet the agreed-upon time and budget constraints.[1]

The program began around 2015, depending on what one considers the starting point, and the first production contract was issued in 2020.  Lead ship delivery had been delayed until 2032 and costs were ballooning.
 
Burned by the failure and afraid of a repeat, Germany has opted to proceed with an existing design, the MEKO A-200 frigate.
 

Instead of planning a new ship, the decision was made to use a readily available, off-the-shelf vessel with only minor modifications.[1]

On a side note, this is yet another bit of evidence that the widespread belief among American naval observers that other countries can produce quality ships, on time, on or under budget, and cheaper than US shipbuilders is false.  But, I digress …
 
So, what is the problem with using an existing design with only minor modifications?
 
There are multiple problems:
 
The “minor modifications” never happens.  The existing design gets heavily modified, commonality disappears, and the costs balloon while the schedule slips.  The US Constellation program was a prime example of this.
 
Far more serious, though, is the trap that existing designs present.  If one never builds new designs, how do ships ever get better?  At some point, you have to move to a new design in order to incorporate new technology.  There’s a reason we’re not still building sailing ships.  Yes, you can upgrade individual pieces of equipment (though limited by ship’s utilities capacity, internal volume, weight margins, etc.) but you can’t improve or change the basic ship.  No amount of equipment upgrades could turn a Burke into a Visby-level stealth ship.  If you want a Visby-level stealth warship – and you do! – it’s got to be a new design.
 
Given the several year (or decade+)  build time for a modern naval vessel, even if the parent design was adequate when the program began, it will be obsolete by the time it enters service.  Of course, existing designs are not adequate.  Consider the MEKO A-200 that Germany now intends to acquire.  The original MEKO 200 design dates back to 1987 and even the MEKO A-200 dates back to 2001, making it already a 25 year old design which will be 30+ years old by the time the ships enter service.  Is a 30+ yr old design really what you want for your most modern, front line surface warship?
 
Take a look at the MEKO A-200.  It’s not particularly stealthy which is the major survival requirement for the modern battlefield.  Its electrical capacity for the perpetually ‘just around the corner’ lasers and rail guns is inadequate.  And so on.
 
Consider the US National Security Cutter (NSC) which is to be the basis for the next iteration of the Navy’s attempt at procuring a frigate.  The design dates back to the late 1990’s and is not even built to combat standards.  Assuming the project isn’t cancelled, the Navy is going to accept frigates whose base design is going to be around 40 years old by the time they enter service!  The NSC meets none of the requirements for success on the modern naval battlefield and yet the Navy has turned to them out of desperation and fear – fear of yet another ship acquisition fiasco.  We’re not designing for combat;  we’re designing for programmatic and career safety and public relations.
 
We cannot successfully build new designs until we objectively and honestly figure out why we keep failing.  Just to save Western navies decades of study, I’ll tell you why we keep failing:
 

• CONOPS, CONOPS, CONOPS
• Change Orders

 
There you have it, Western navies.  I’ve done your job for you.  Now, go build a new ship that actually belongs on the modern battlefield.
 
 
_______________________________

 
[1]Naval News website, “Germany is cancelling the F126 frigate project and procuring eight MEKO frigates”, Staff, 24-Jun-2026,
https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2026/06/germany-is-cancelling-the-f126-frigate-project-and-procuring-eight-meko-frigates/

Battle of Jutland Lessons

ComNavOps enjoys examining historical naval battles for lessons applicable to us, today.  One such battle is Jutland in WWI.  Jutland has been analyzed to death by a multitude of writers and historians and many of the lessons are obvious and repetitive.  Rather than repeat what’s already been thoroughly covered, I’d like to focus on just a couple lessons that may be less obvious.

 

To ever so briefly review, the WWI Battle of Jutland occurred between the Royal Navy Grand Fleet (Jellicoe) and the German Navy High Seas Fleet (Scheer).  As noted, the battle has been thoroughly described by many sources.  I won’t attempt to describe the battle other than as necessary to support the various points.  You can research the details of the battle for yourself, if you’re interested.

 

The Germans planned to break Britain’s blockade by enticing a portion of the Grand Fleet out, trapping it, and destroying it.  As it happened, both sides wound up luring sections of each other’s fleet into traps, generally unintentionally.  Thus, both sides wound up trying to execute the same plan!

 

In the end, the Royal Navy lost  

• 3 battlecruisers
• 3 armored cruisers
• 8 destroyers

 The German’s lost 

• 1 battlecruiser
• 1 pre-dreadnought battleship
• 4 light cruisers

 

Many other ships on both sides were damaged.

 

Following is a discussion of a few lessons that deserve special attention.

 

 

Submarines – The Germans attempted to lure the Royal Navy forces across a picket line of submarines.  However, poor timing, bad weather, and poor communications prevented the submarines from achieving much success.  In addition, British ASW efforts forced some subs out of their intended operating areas.

 

The obvious lesson is that submarines are very difficult (impossible) to communicate with and control in close combat and their limited sensor ranges make ad hoc independent operations by the submarines very difficult.  While some modern observers believe that submarines will instantly spot, identify, and target anything that moves, the reality is that submarines are still not able to be part of a ‘team’ combat effort.  Communication difficulties make friendly fire incidents highly likely or, best case, they paralyze the submarine due to uncertainty.

 

So many naval observers want to include submarines in naval battles but, in order to be effective, submarines must be deployed to areas with no friendly activity, leaving them free to maneuver and to assume that any contact is an enemy and that they can act accordingly.  Combat coordination between subs and surface ships is simply not feasible.

 

 

Confusion – This requires special attention because it is a constant of combat that the US seems to be ignoring.  Examples of confusion include,

 

• Both sides had a plan (very similar plans, as it happened) and both side’s plans fell apart immediately. 
• Beatty’s battlecruisers passed by the unprepared German submarine picket/trap line and showed up near the German ships long before the Germans expected them
• The German submarines were not ready when the operation began.  German submarines reported British ship courses incorrectly (they reported a leg of a zig-zag rather than the base course).
• The British 5^th Battle Squadron battlecruisers failed to receive course change instructions and, having not operated with Beatty’s ships before, did not know to maintain formation on the flagship and the overall formation was seriously disrupted.
• Groups from both sides appeared seemingly out of nowhere.
• The German commander, Scheer, had no idea the British Grand Fleet was even at sea until they appeared in front of him.
• The German fleet was sighted several times by Jellicoe’s screen while disengaging and escaping but the sighting reports were not received by the British.

 

The only clear winner was Murphy.  Confusion rules the battlefield.  All our vaunted and hyped networking won’t change that reality one iota when combat and Murphy come calling.

 

The terrain of the naval battlefield is confusion.  It’s what you hide in and it’s how you conceal yourself.

 

As has been said so many times, no plan survives contact with the enemy which emphasizes the importance of sound doctrine

 

 

Survivability – Survivability is paramount in battle.  So many British ships blew up so quickly.  If you can’t survive, you can’t contribute; you’re a waste of resources.  The US Navy has intentionally adopted unarmored, non-survivable warships – some of them designed to be abandoned after the first hit!

 

Related note:  You must exercise under realistic conditions (overheated steering gear jammed because no one stressed the gear during exercises).

 

HMS Queen Mary Exploding

Communications – German radio signals alerted the British that a major operation was happening and the British sailed before the Germans were ready.  It is a timeless lesson that communications are never as secure as believed.  Even today, our low probability of intercept, line of sight, encrypted, whatever communications are not nearly as secure as we’d like to believe.  The enemy doesn’t need to break our codes to discern our intentions.  Signals analysis (frequency of transmissions, locations of transmission sources, increase in comm traffic from HQ’s, departure from normal communications, etc.) will clearly tell at least the general concept of what’s about to happen and alert the enemy.  I’ve talked to current comms people and, while they won’t divulge any details, they assure me that communications are nowhere near as secure as believed.

 

An important aspect to note is our current habit of constant micromanaging which requires every level to continuously communicate with the levels one step above and below.  This verbal diarrhea cannot be concealed.  The sheer quantity assures that the enemy will detect it.  We must break ourselves of this habit and start practicing total communications silence.

 

The failure to train realistically and establish standardized doctrine resulted in communications issues even between ships of the same side.  For example, from Wikipedia,

 

… the battleships of the 5th Battle Squadron – which were too far behind to read his [Beatty’s] flags – found themselves passing the battlecruisers on an opposing course and heading directly toward the approaching main body of the High Seas Fleet.[1]

 

And, another example, a British ship-launched seaplane spotted German forces but was unable to relay the information to back to the ship.

 

 

Distances - Too many people today seem to think that ships will sail a hundred feet apart in combat.  On this blog, we’ve discussed the reality that a carrier group, for example, will be spread over a circular area 25-50 miles in radius.  Ships in combat will be miles apart, not a hundred feet.  At Jutland,

 

Beatty's ships were divided into three columns, with the two battlecruiser squadrons leading in parallel lines 3 mi (2.6 nmi; 4.8 km) apart. The 5th Battle Squadron was stationed 5 mi (4.3 nmi; 8.0 km) to the north-west … [1]

 

And this was before the advent of missiles with their much longer ranges.

 

 

 

Summary

 

As I said, this post touched on just a few lessons that bear added attention.  History is screaming lessons at us but our arrogance – and incompetence – prevents us from hearing them.

 

We have got to start preparing for high end naval combat – not the fantasy type of combat where everything we do works and nothing the enemy does works but real, confused, chaotic, up close, combat.  We’ve got to train for the kinds of things we think will never happen:  night combat, gun range combat, total chaos, loss of command and control, unanticipated enemy forces, and so on.

 

We need to start training without concern for stressing or damaging equipment.  We need to let our pilots apply maximum g’s and if the airframe can’t stand it then we need new, stronger airframes.  We need to maneuver our ships to the edge of their envelopes and if equipment fails we need better equipment.  While we can’t ignore safety, it can’t limit our training, either.  Accidents and deaths will happen and we have to accept that.  Our priority is not keeping everyone alive and healthy;  it’s preparing for high end combat where anything less than 100% preparedness is a guarantee of defeat and mass deaths.

 

We have got to either test our completely unfounded notion of secure communications and data transfer under realistic conditions and prove that it works or give it up as unworkable and learn to fight without constant communications.

 

We must start intentionally incorporating total confusion into our exercises.  Let’s, unannounced, ‘kill’ commanding officers and see what happens.  Let’s give intentionally incorrect orders and see who can adapt and overcome.  Let’s start providing intentionally false contact reports and see what happens.  And so on.  We must embrace confusion and chaos and learn to fight with them as our constant companions.  We must get familiar with them so that they no longer frighten or upset us.

 

We need the Van Riper’s of the world to humiliate us in realistic exercises and then thank them for doing so while we correct the identified problems.

 

 

___________________________________

 

[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Jutland

The German Navy Versus England

As we know, the WWII German surface navy never accomplished anything significant and most of it was expended in piecemeal fashion with little to show for the effort.  Many historical observers believe that there was little else the German navy could have done beyond what they did but is that true?  Let’s take look at how the German navy could have been employed and what lessons their actual and possible employment holds for us, today.

 

To ever so briefly review, following is the state of the German and British navies early in the war (around 1940-42 or so) or, at least, what they could have been without losses.

 

11 Aircraft carriers

3 Glorious class commissioned around 1916

1 Argus class commissioned 1918

1 Eagle class commissioned 1924

1 Hermes class commissioned 1924

1 Ark Royal commissioned 1938

4 Illustrious class commissioned 1940-1941

 

22 Battleships & battlecruisers, of which only two were post-World War 1.

 

5 Queen Elizabeth dreadnoughts commissioned around 1915

5 Revenge class dreadnoughts commissioned around 1916

2 Nelson class battleships commissioned 1927

5 King George V battleships commissioned around 1940-1942

2 Renown class battlecruisers commissioned 1916

2 Courageous class battlecruisers commissioned around 1916

1 Hood class battlecruiser commissioned 1920

66 Cruisers, mainly post-World War 1 with some older ships converted for AA duties.

184 Destroyers of all types and eras.

 

Note that the British carriers were barely worthy of the name, employing WWI era bi-plane Fairey Swordfish torpedo planes, Blackburn Skuas, and, later, Fairey Fulmars.  The carrier air wings were generally quite small by US standards.  That said, they accomplished some amazing feats.

 

In comparison, in the same 1940-42 or so time frame, the German naval order of battle could have consisted of the following.

 

4 Battleships

 

Bismarck
Tirpitz
Scharnhorst
Gneisenau

 

3 Battlecruisers

 

Scheer
Graf Spee
Deutschland (renamed Lützow)

2 Dreadnought Era Battleships

 

Schlesien (dreadnought)
Schleswig-Holstein (dreadnought)

3 Heavy Cruisers

 

Admiral Hipper

Blucher
Prinz Eugen

6 Light cruisers

11 Auxilliary cruisers

30 Destroyers

 

Comparing the two forces and, in particular, noting their ages, we see the following table which demonstrates the numbers and ages of the ships.  For this purpose, a modern (at the time) ship is considered one which was built post-1930.  Note not only the numbers of the two fleets but also the relative degree of modernity.

 

 

 

British – German Fleet Comparison
	British	German	British Post-1930	German Post-1930
Carrier	7	0	1	0
Battleship	17	6	5	4
Battlecruiser	5	3	0	3
Cruiser	66	20	?	6
Destroyer	184	30	?	30
E-Boat / PT Boat	115	100	115	100
Submarine	60	200	40	200

 

 

It is understood that various combat losses afflicted both fleets but for the purpose of this post, that is immaterial.

 

One aspect that jumps out from this comparison is the ages of the two fleets.  The German fleet is significantly more modern than the British, many of whose ships are obsolete or nearly so.  This makes the comparative strength much more even than a simple numerical comparison would suggest.

 

However, there is more to the table.  Recall that the UK had worldwide commitments and  ?half?  of the British naval strength was dispersed around the world. 

 

If we arbitrarily divide the British fleet size in half to account for the large, worldwide dispersion we get the following comparative table.

 

 

 

British – German Local Fleet Comparison
	British	German
Carrier	4	0
Battleship	8	6
Battlecruiser	2	3
Cruiser	33	20
Destroyer	92	30
E-Boat / PT Boat	57	100
Submarine	30	200

 

 

At this point, we see that the effective, local strength of the RN was roughly comparable to the local German strength and the German fleet retains the age advantage.  Further, we note the overwhelming German advantage in submarines.

 

The historical question, then, becomes, what could the German navy have done to take advantage of this roughly comparable size comparison and actual advantage in age?

 

Well, some possible operations might have included:

 

Destroy the British Home Fleet using combined surface navy and submarines.  There are any number of ways the Home Fleet could have enticed/coerced into a decisive fleet battle.  For example, a surface ship sortie against British ports along the English Channel would likely have sufficed to draw out the Home Fleet.  The larger point is that a major German surface action, coordinated with multiple wolf packs of submarines could have decimated the Home Fleet.

 

Blockade British ports to seal off convoys.  There would have been no need to try to destroy convoys at sea if they can be prevented from unloading at their destination ports.  It would have been much easier to seal British ports with mines and submarines than to try to find and engage convoys at sea.  The closer distance to the U-boat’s home ports would have also facilitated the support efforts for the submarines.

 

Seal the English Channel.  Had the German U-boats and E-boats been concentrated in the English Channel, it could have been sealed off with fairly minimal effort and resources.  Combined with mining, both ends could have been sealed thereby allowing the Germans to conduct cross channel naval bombardments, raids, and, ultimately, a cross channel invasion, all unhindered by English naval forces.

 

Bombard English coastal ports/cities.  The German surface navy could have devastated British ports, again, denying British resupply efforts.

 

Prevent the D-Day build up.  As we discussed in a previous post, the Germans could have prevented the Allied assault at Normandy by attacking the ports, camps, depots, etc. that were necessary for the Allied invasion effort.

 

Bismarck and Tirpitz - Operate As A Massed Force

Admittedly, all of these efforts would have required the support of the German air force but, early in the war, this was not only possible but the German air forces would have enjoyed parity, if not superiority, in aircraft performance.  By coordinating their efforts, the German navy could have operated with air cover and eliminated air bases and radar stations on or near the coast.  In turn, the German aircraft could have benefited from the concentrated anti-aircraft fire of the German ships.

 

What was not a good operational use was solitary commerce raiding. The allies had, for all practical purposes, an infinite supply of merchant ships. Sinking a handful was not going to impact the war.  In a similar vein, the submarine attacks on convoys was a hopeless effort.  The German submarine fleet could have been much more effectively employed, as described above.

The point of this post is not to discuss what specific missions the German navy could have or should have performed but to examine how Germany used its navy, what it could have done differently, and what lessons their actions, or lack thereof, offer us today.

 

So, what lessons can we take from this that apply to us, today?  Consider these:

 

Fleet In Being – Some historical observers have claimed that Germany’s surface fleet was most useful as a ‘feet in being’ by tying up Allied resources.  Is this true?  Absolutely not! The point of a military is to destroy the opponent's assets, not make them consume renewable resources. The allies, supported by the industrial might of America, had an infinite amount of resources, for all practical purposes. The Germans needed to use their naval forces to impose operational and strategic defeats on the allies - which they failed to do or even attempt to any great degree.  This should serve as an important lesson as we contemplate war with China and their resources.  Our Navy cannot become a ‘fleet in being’, unwilling to engage and unwilling to seek victory.  We must become offensive-minded as opposed to our current defensive mindset.  This starts with building a fleet that is cheap enough to risk in combat.  A $15B+ carrier is not an asset anyone is going to risk.  Billion dollar destroyers are not expendable assets.  And so on.  Currently, we have a 'fleet in being' rather than a combat fleet.

Solitary Ships Will Be Destroyed - Distributed force cannot succeed unless the sensing and communications network works flawlessly and the massing of firepower can be achieved.  Even then, the individual ships are subject to defeat in detail.  Germany’s commerce raiders demonstrated this.  Before we irreversibly commit to distributed lethality (if we haven’t already), we need to seriously wargame the concept of distributed operations using realistic conditions, not scripted games skewed to support a pre-determined conclusion.  We need to be 100% sure that distributed operations will work and I am certain that any realistic and unbiased assessment will demonstrate the folly of such operations.  History conclusively supports this.  The handful of distributed operations that were conducted in WWII pretty much uniformly resulted in disaster.

 

Offense – “The seat of purpose is on the land.”  This adage is the fundamental truth for navies but is too often lost in the fascination with ship-to-ship battles.  Navies exist to support land operations and they do that by conducting offensive operations oriented toward impact on land.  The Germans forgot this and never made any serious effort to support the strategic land operations and never made any serious attempt to conduct offensive operations.

 

Our Navy, today, is almost exclusively focused on defensive operations.  Consider the small, anti-ship Marine units.  Those aren’t offensive, they’re purely defensive.  Consider our aircraft – they’re short ranged, defensive assets intended to protect the fleet.  Consider our major surface ship, the Burke.  It’s main purpose is defensive anti-air warfare.  Consider our entire Marine Corps which has devolved from a middle weight, amphibious offensive force to a lightweight, defensive force.  Consider our major weapons development efforts like ballistic missile defense, Standard SM-6 anti-air missiles, LCS ASW and MCM which are defensive in nature, an FFG(X) which is supposedly focused on ASW and AAW, both defensive in nature.  Where’s our long range, hard hitting new weapons?  There essentially aren’t any.  We’re a defensive Navy.

 

 

Summary

 

Germany had a reasonable powerful and numerous fleet – or could have – that was squandered in piecemeal fashion.  Does this sound ominously like our current plans for distributed lethality?  WWII demonstrated that lone ships, or small groups of ships, are subject to defeat in detail and modern missile warfare will only exacerbate this trend.  Naval survival and victory will go to the side that can mass both offensive and defensive firepower.  Too many people, including the US Navy, forget about the need for defensive firepower as a mandatory adjunct to offensive operations.  We need to abandon the fantasy of a few scattered units bringing a powerful enemy to their knees through the magic of networking. Instead, we need to refocus on single purpose, powerful, survivable, ships that can conduct offensive operations in large groups.

The Battle of Heligoland Bight

In the recent Open Post, a commenter suggested doing an analysis of older (pre-WWII) naval battles.  That suggestion led me to wonder whether there were useful lessons to be learned or whether the subsequent advances in technology have rendered any lessons invalid and irrelevant.  Well, let’s take a look at the first naval battle of WWI, the Battle of Heligoland Bight, 28-Aug-1914 and see if it has lessons to offer us today.

To set the stage, at the outbreak of WWI, the British and German navies emphasized strong main battle fleets of dreadnoughts and older battleships supported by battlecruisers, cruisers, and destroyers.  The British implemented a blockade strategy of Germany’s northern coast but were forced to execute a distant blockade instead of a close port blockade due to the threat of submarines and mines.  Germany had several naval bases along the North Sea coast in a large ‘inlet’ of the sea.  The inlet area approach was called the Heligoland Bight and was protected by a series of islands, the most important of which was Heligoland which was heavily fortified.

The German naval forces remained in their protected bases while the British maintained their distant blockade.

As the two naval forces settled into their routines, the German’s developed the habit of sending regular nighttime and daytime destroyer patrols out into the North Sea.  These patrols were escorted out and then met and escorted back by cruisers.

The British developed a plan to ambush the returning destroyers with a locally overwhelming force.  Eight British submarines were positioned around Heligoland Island to act as bait to draw the destroyers out to sea where two destroyer flotillas of 15 and 16 destroyers would engage the Germans.  Two British battlecruisers were tasked with providing additional support for the destroyer flotillas.  In addition, several other British battlecruisers and cruisers were inserted into the action on a haphazard and largely uncommunicated basis.

As the British forces took their positions, the Germans were alerted by increased radio traffic and implemented their own plan which was, essentially, the reverse of the British plan.  The Germans planned to use their destroyers as bait to lure the British ships closer to shore and then have light cruisers engage the British ships.

Weather played a factor with fog and mist causing severe identification problems for both sides.

The battle became a confused, chaotic affair with ships entering the area and engaging and disengaging almost randomly.  Detailed descriptions of the sequence of events can be found in the reference links below. (1,2)  The individual events of the battle are difficult to follow and decipher.  Careful reading and reference to the accompanying maps are required to make sense of the battle.  The sheer confusion for those involved must have been nearly overwhelming.

At one point, in a friendly fire incident, a British submarine fired two torpedoes at the British light cruiser Southampton but missed.  The Southampton then attempted to ram the friendly submarine but failed.

The British lost no ships but suffered heavy damage to one light cruiser and three destroyers.  The Germans lost three light cruisers and a destroyer with several other ships damaged.

So, are there lessons to be learned from this battle?  I think so!  In no particular order,

• Fortune favors the bold – when the bold are backed by local numerical and firepower superiority.  Although the plan largely fell apart, the localized concentrations of British ships enable them to inflict more damage than they received.  Firepower/mass overcame confusion.  This is an important lesson for us, today.  We’ve begun to forego firepower in favor of data and networks.  When confusion comes calling (no plan survives contact with the enemy!), what firepower will we be able to call on to overcome the chaos?


• German destroyers were acting as distributed lethality assets.  Small patrols were sent out to search for targets of opportunity.  Unfortunately, this simply led to the German destroyers being isolated and defeated in detail, with little support.  Despite this lesson, the Navy, today, wants to implement exactly this isolated, distributed lethality operation.


• Submarines caused blue-on-blue engagements and served to increase confusion – this is the classic submarine communication issue.  Nothing has changed today.


• British radio communications were not secure and gave away the impending action, if not the actual details.  It was not, apparently, that the Germans intercepted and listened to the British communications but, instead, they detected a significant increase in radio broadcasts and deduced from this that an action was imminent.  This suggests to us, today, that our communications and data transmissions may not be as secure as we believe and that it is not necessary for an enemy to intercept and decode the transmissions.  They merely need to detect increased transmissions or, indeed, the mere presence of transmissions to glean valuable, actionable information.  We need to regain the ability to operate without communications as we did during the Cold War (EMCON – Emissions Control).  Of course, this directly conflicts with the Navy’s current concept of vast regional networks and fleets of unmanned vehicles all of which require continuous, high bandwidth transmissions.


• General chaos of battle versus our neat concept of perfect data is perfectly illustrated by the neat, tidy, logical British battle plan which disintegrated the moment contact was made with the enemy.  As has often been said, “No plan survives contact with the enemy”.  Despite this oft-repeated lesson, the Navy, today, is counting on perfect situational awareness to execute operational plans that depend on the perfect arrangement of every element.  This is lunacy!  We need to simplify our operational concepts and doctrine and learn to act within the context of confusion.


• On a larger level, the German navy’s refusal to leave their ports violates the adage that, “the seat of purpose is on the land”.  A navy that stays in port has no impact on events on land and is useless.  The modern US Navy runs this risk due to the risk-averse mindset of being unwilling to lose overly expensive ships.

Well, there you have it – a wealth of lessons, most of them seemingly timeless, for us to benefit from today.  It would seem, therefore, that there are lessons that transcend technology. 

This has been a fascinating exercise and I think I’ll try to apply a similar analysis to even older naval actions.  An action from the age of sail ought to make for an interesting study.

____________________________________

(1)BritishBattles.com website, “Battle of Heligoland Bight”

https://www.britishbattles.com/first-world-war/the-battle-of-heligoland-bight/

(2)Wikipedia, “Battle of Heligoland Bight (1914)”,

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Heligoland_Bight_%281914%29

Defective F125 Frigate Returned To Builder

We complain about the incomplete and, in some cases, damaged ships that the Navy accepts from the builders and we wonder why they don’t enforce any warranty repair actions (turns out that most shipbuilding contracts don’t have any warranties!).  We also wonder why every other country’s ships are better built than ours.

Well, the better built part is easy to explain – they aren’t!  We just are more aware of our ship’s problems because we have much more open information sources for our ships.  Other countries have the same problems but they just aren’t publicized.

Anyway, here’s a bit of news that addresses both the warranty and the quality of build issues.  Germany has just returned the lead F125 frigate to the builder, after delivery, for repair of defects found during trials – and there’s a lot of defects and they appear to be pretty serious.

Here’s some of the problems as reported by Naval Today website. (1)

• software and hardware issues
• problems with the frigate’s operations room
• listing problem - they list 1.3 degrees to starboard
• overweight

Here’s an amusing bit of related information.

“According to the German Navy, the new frigates will require only half the crew necessary to operate the Bremen-class frigates. They will be able to stay at sea for up to 24 months and thereby reduce the transit times for the crews. The crews will swap in regular intervals directly in the areas of operations which means that the ships will have to make fewer port visits.” (1)

Does that sound like the failed LCS program?  I anticipate that the German Navy will find the same thing we did – that minimally manned crews can’t perform well, will be overworked and undertrained, and ship maintenance will suffer.  Well, good luck to them.

F125 Frigate

Back to the main point …    Hats off to the Germans for sending a defective ship back to the builder.  Maybe their example will inspire the U.S. Navy to do the same.

It is also worth noting that this disposes of the myth that other countries build better ships than we do.  A lot of observers want the U.S. to buy and/or build foreign ships and use foreign shipyards.  I have no problem with that, in concept, but the reality is that no one is building problem-free ships.  We just document and hear about our problems more than other country’s.

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(1)Naval Today website, “Germany returns lead F125 frigate to builder, report”, 22-Dec-2017,

https://navaltoday.com/2017/12/22/germany-returns-lead-f125-frigate-to-builder-report/