Because this is a thing now, apparently, let me recall the story of heavy cruiser, or "pocket battleship" Admiral Graf Spee, and why she ended up as a wreck off Montevideo back in late 1939, to avoid internment or disastrous battle against (notionally) superior forces. The date is December 1939. The place is the South Atlantic Ocean. German "Panzerschiff" (heavy cruiser or pocket battleship, YMMV) Admiral Graf Spee does what she was designed to do, ie sink hostile civilian cargo traffic ("Handelsstoerer").

Right, I am off work (yes some of us "soldiered" on during Christmas), so got some time to put down coherent thoughts on a range of events. First of all, the Trumpian battleship. Which as part of Trump's "Golden Fleet" even got its (her) own website. 🧵

goldenfleet.navy.mil As folks including myself noted, this really is a tale of two ships. One of which had been a longstanding requirement for USN, and one of which comes from the fever-dreams of the present administration, primarily from Trump himself, or so it seems. Let's wind back the clock...

And we're off to the races. #ChinaParade XJPs limo remains aesthetically superior to the atrocity Putin is being carted around in.

A few notes on the SEA 3000 decision that broke overnight and was then confirmed by official sources early Australian time.

This is inevitably to some degree a hottake, same as everyone else's responses, given the timing & known unknowns. 1/10🧵

https://x.com/AlexLuck9/status/1952531050170868097

First of all, I would like to congratulate MHI and ATLA for bringing this one home for Japan. I sincerily hope they manage to run a successful program management in coordination with Australian partners, bringing capability to RAN as per the ambition for SEA 3000. 2/10

GE imagery update of Qingdao First Submarine Base, with several nuclear powered boats visible. Red Type 09I (likely training boats/MTS), green Type 09III(A), blue Type 09IV SSBN, yellow unidentified hull, 09IIIA or possibly 09IIIB, purple unidentified hull in dock. Close-ups. 1) 2x 09I SSN. 2) 09III(A) SSN. 3) 09III(A) SSN bottom, 09IV SSBN top, 4) unidentified SSN.

Some comments now on a notional blockade being an act of war under international law. I recommend reading this dated but relevant State Department memo addressing "Legal and Practical Consequences of a Blockade of Cuba" by the United States, Oct 19, 1962. irp.fas.org/agency/doj/olc… x.com/TaiwanMonitor/… The tl;dr is: "It's complicated.", because it boils down to decision-making on the matter at the UNSC. If that body is in deadlock, you may not get a clear cut answer. In practical terms an enacting country however may want to avoid the term "blockade" (see US on Cuba).

Some of my dreaded remarks on inaccuracies in this piece. The details matter because SEA 3000 continues to be a SEA of mystery and opacity, thanks to government saying as little as possible about it and forbidding vendors to behave differently.

aspistrategist.org.au/mogami-class-o… First of all, this is now a competition between two variants of MEKO A-200 and the 06FFM, previously known as "New FFM". Mogami is not even considered anymore. MHI terms 06FFM as "Upgraded Mogami" for the sheer sake of SEA 3000 and to notionally stay in line with the "exemplars".

Another article emphasizing technological change and making assertions on operational conditions in submarine warfare, that is unfortunately deeply problematic regarding basic research into the topic it features. A quick thread.

foreignpolicy.com/2024/12/16/sub… Submarines do not feature significant signature optimisation against radar, because radar doesnt work underwater. The writer overstates the limited utility on masts used at periscope depth. Hull shaping in recent years emerged as a response to minimising returns on active sonar.

One aspect that has surfaced in the Australian submarine debate, which I find somewhat irritating, is the assertion that larger submarines (in this context SSNs) are easier to detect. They're really not. Quite the contrary. 1/7 Generally speaking the first thing engineers want to have more of when incorporating signature reduction measures (in submarines these are mostly acoustic, both for radiating noise and signal returns via active sonar) is real estate, ie size. 2/7

"China now is demanding that it pay only Russia's heavily subsidized domestic price for the natural gas, and China will not commit to buying a substantial quantity of such gas every year."

File this under how to gauge the supposedly improving relationship.jdsupra.com/legalnews/chin… As I mentioned previously: China is in it mostly for China. Russia remains extremely wary of its "partner" for myriads of reasons (economic, military etc). The "partnership" is really not that, and IMO the forces working against developing it into one will persist.

Australian government just axed substantial parts of the LOTE (life extension) efforts for Collins submarines, while going ahead with the overall program. A few thoughts on the matter. Official statement here. 1/9
minister.defence.gov.au/media-releases…
Key aspects:
1) Government received advice from Defence in consultation with US that adding Tomahawk to Collins is not viable and does not represent money for value.

No details. But torpedo tube launched Tomahawk is currently out of production. 2/9

A few thoughts on the issue of China's new corvette/light frigate sized combatant and what its point is, may be, and pertinently, has been stated to be, going off this article in TWZ.

twz.com/sea/chinas-mys… We do have one image from the yard giving this design an official purpose. Text declares the celebration of the launch of a project for a "comprehensive test platform". The design is partially visible in the graphic (minor differences but its clearly intended to be the same ship)

Thankfully the actual report by the German audit office is free to read, so I just looked at that instead. Link can be found here (pdf). Bullet points follow, as a comedy in eight acts: 1/
bundesrechnungshof.de/SharedDocs/Dow…

https://twitter.com/AlexLuck9/status/1732769420475347409

Effort to replace MCM capability by 2027 dates back to 2014. A standing commitment to NATO is to provide 11 boats with improved capability by 2031. Navy estimated original funding requirement at 2.7 bln Euros. 2/

"According to the US Congressional Research Service, the US navy has 9,000 missile vertical launch tubes to deliver long-range cruise missiles, compared with China’s 1,000."

This is false. Greg Austin's claim of this as a CRS-estimate is also misleading.
theconversation.com/the-us-navy-is… Actual source for these 1,000 cells for PLAN is Nick Childs, of IISS, himself cited in a CNN piece linked here. It is not immediately clear from that piece how Childs arrives at his claim, but it demonstrably wrong, unless "or so" is doing a lot of work. edition.cnn.com/2021/03/05/chi…

Mal ein🧵auf Deutsch, weil es nun wild durch die lokale Diskussion geht bzgl "neuer" Eroeffnungen, angeblicher oder tatsaechlicher Skandale zum Thema F-35, Triebwerkproblemen, Block 4-Modernisierung. Was sind die Fakten?

gao.gov/products/gao-2… Teil 1 - Die Bloecke: F-35 ist ein Programm, das, wie viele vorherigen Entwicklungen in Evolutionen stattfindet. Strukturelles Kern-Element hier sind die "Blocks", die neue Faehigkeiten integrieren. Das ist nicht unaehnlich zu Eurofighter mit seinen "Tranchen", siehe EF T1 vs T4.

Rheinmetall announces they will in collaboration with Ukroboronprom start to refurbish Fuchs APC for delivery to Ukrainian forces. Related joint venture will commence work by July. In second step full local production is intended.
esut.de/2023/06/meldun… Rheinmetall & Ukroboronprom previously announced signing strategic cooperation agreement for local manufacture of defence materiel. While observers (and CEO Papperger) named MBT, assembly of Fuchs may be more logical first step. UA said to have "four to five digit"-requirement.

Still not a fan of "MBT are outdated."-take on Russian tank losses.

Yes, the Russian Army lost a metric shit ton of them.
Because they threw a dramatic amount of materiel, clearly without coherent operational plans, into a grinding war of attrition. Not because tanks dont work. Problem with such analysis tends to be that people fixate on "popular" weapon systems vs all the other stuff the Russians also lost immense amounts of.

Quite similar to the eternal "aircraft carriers are obsolete"-takes in naval discussions. Far less often a case for IFV or DDG.

Marles: "The Defence Strategic Review has observed that navies around the world are moving in the direction, to put it kind of crudely, of having a larger number of smaller vessels,"

Not supported by any evidence. In fact combatants are growing in size.

msn.com/en-au/news/aus… Throw a rock in a random direction and it will land in the backyard of a navy building corvettes over 3,000 tonnes, frigates and destroyers blowing past 10,000 tons & shedding small specialist hulls for large multipurpose ones.

Just to put some more context on these issues, as they stand right now (and attract some interest in AU for the desired used Virginia SSN to be bought). There are three principal factors in play over the next few years:

https://twitter.com/ryankakiuchan/status/1641993788037156865

1) There's Virginia Blk I-IV & theres Virginia Blk V aka the one fitted with the Virginia Payload Module. VPM comes with a notable increase in VLS capacity. It also comes with a notable increase in construction hours. One Virginia Blk V equals 1.25 regular Virginia in build time.

Sharing for sake of coherent coverage. Apparently "discussions" continue on recapitalisation of Bundeswehr Tiger-fleet. No decision taken yet on choice of H145M (as per older media claim). Notably all options are still considered. H/t @bttr01438851

behoerden-spiegel.de/2023/03/29/vip… Personally, as I said elsewhere, this smells to me more like usual indecisive attitude in Berlin than serious consideration of available options. Article mentions even Tiger upgrade still considered, which I'm not sure is even feasible anymore, after ESP/F walked away from Mk 3.

German Navy just published a force structure-plan dubbed "Zielbild der Marine ab 2035" (Target posture of Navy from 2035), & it presents quite interesting figures. To call concept aspirational is an understatement. Short thread follows. H/t @naval_gazing
bundeswehr.de/de/organisatio… I will provide a complete summary of all that is written in an actual article for @navalnewscom later this week. For this thread lets just focus on this fascinating graphic outlining new structure from 2035. With the old target for 2031 seen left of the new figures.