A Canadian Brown Water Navy [ Champagne Navy- Book]

[Ex-Dragoon]

The Orca's are in essence a cabin cruiser with a .50...how effective do you actually think they will be at inshore patrol? All they will establish is a prescence not a deterence

 

[Colin Parkinson]

Well they certainly are an improvement over the YFP's and being armed with a .50cal is an improvement, personal in this day and age no naval vessel should be unarmed, at the very least equipped and setup to be armed on a moments notice. They make a good mother ship for RHIB's for the Olympics.

But their primary role will be navigation and basic seamanship training throughout most of their operational lives.

 

[chrisf]

Well they certainly are an improvement over the YFP's and being armed with a .50cal is an improvement, personal in this day and age no naval vessel should be unarmed, at the very least equipped and setup to be armed on a moments notice. They make a good mother ship for RHIB's for the Olympics.

But their primary role will be navigation and basic seamanship training throughout most of their operational lives.

So realistically, given that the primary task of the orca's is going training, they're never going to be deployed outside Canada, and if deployed inside canada, it'll be light patrol duties inside Canada...

Given that as the case, is the .50cal enough? Would the orca's feasibly be able to accomodate a 20mm?

 

[Colin Parkinson]

Personally I would love to see the Bushmaster marine mount on them, but I am just glad they can be armed, it represents a mindshift that was long overdue. The .50cal is in the system, reliable, wellknown, simple and the ammo is cheaper than the 25mm with a shorter max range which makes training more likely. A .50cal will make short work of most smaller vessels that they would encounter.

 

[Ex-Dragoon]

You want a 20/25mm then you want a craft that is built from the keel up for patrol duties.

 

[Colin Parkinson]

Historically most small patrol craft were not built from the keel up, but were requisitioned from civilian owners and many were armed. It would be nice if the designer foresaw the requirement and built redundancy into the design such as hard points, ammo storage, communication gear and develop a stability model to ensure that it can carry the added weight safely. Experience tells us that rarely does the design allow for such forethought as it adds cost to the design and may limit other goodies that they want, like a neato PT area or nifty wardroom.

Just about every vessel built for the Canadian government under 175’ over the last 2 decades suffered serious top hamper issues (the 47 and Arun lifeboats are the exception, due to the designs being from elsewhere) So there is a practical limit to what else you can put on a vessel and what may have to be removed to do so. The manual .50cal and mount are good because they have minimal impact on the vessel, anything above starts to add affair bit of weight.

 

[Halifax Tar]

Hello Folks,

I'm reading a book right now called Champagne Navy. Its a history of the Coastal Forces of the RCN during the second world war. Great read if you can get your hands on a copy.

Anyways I will get to my point. With the RCN doing things like anti-piracy patrols and OP CARRIBE right now would a small boat force of some MGBs be better suited to take on these tasks than the frigates and destroyers we currently use ?

Just a thought and trying to stimulate some conversation in the Navy section!  :nod:

 

[Old Sweat]

I'll second your recommendation. It is a great read and good history, which don't always go together.

 

[Ex-Dragoon]

Personally I would love to have a flotilla of FPBs for coastal ops but not at the expense of the frigates and destroyers.

 

[Privateer]

There is this old thread, on topic:  http://forums.navy.ca/forums/threads/66876/post-623511.html#msg623511  "A Canadian brown water navy"

Now merged.
Thanks for pointing it out to me,
Bruce
army.ca Cleaning Staff

 

[Halifax Tar]

Personally I would love to have a flotilla of FPBs for coastal ops but not at the expense of the frigates and destroyers.

I toatlly agree and thats not what I meant. I just wonder if a flotilla of FPBs wouldnt be better suited to OP CARRIBE, Anti-Piracy roles more than a major surface combatant.

 

[Stoker]

I toatlly agree and thats not what I meant. I just wonder if a flotilla of FPBs wouldnt be better suited to OP CARRIBE, Anti-Piracy roles more than a major surface combatant.

Actually since last year the MCDV's were been used for Carribe and was very successful in that respect. Apparently its going to be a yearly thing for the ships to do Carribe. I would imagine a patrol boat class of small vessels would be highly successful in that respect. I know the ships had a very significant effect on drug smuggling there.

 

[jollyjacktar]

I was once told by someone who was around when the MCDV's were being discussed and decided upon that there were two camps.  One wanted the MCDV's and one wanted MTB's as the replacement for the Gate boats.  The process was he said, long and bloody and the MTB camp lost the arguement and battle.  I think that small attack boats would be great for coastal work, but would they not have the legs to do anti-piracy ops?  You would have to have them at the very least staged out of central locale of some sort.  I can't see us getting into that sort of arrangement with a foreign host anytime soon.  But, hell yeah I'd love to see MTB's or some other fast littoral combattant make a comeback in the RCN.

 

[Stoker]

I was once told by someone who was around when the MCDV's were being discussed and decided upon that there were two camps.  One wanted the MCDV's and one wanted MTB's as the replacement for the Gate boats.  The process was he said, long and bloody and the MTB camp lost the arguement and battle.  I think that small attack boats would be great for coastal work, but would they not have the legs to do anti-piracy ops?  You would have to have them at the very least staged out of central locale of some sort.  I can't see us getting into that sort of arrangement with a foreign host anytime soon.  But, hell yeah I'd love to see MTB's or some other fast littoral combattant make a comeback in the RCN.

I guess the strength was the fact we could stay on station with little support and operate in littoral waters. We were in some really tight waters, and near some really "bad" places. Just being there disrupted what was going on.
There was talk of embarking a boarding team from another country but nothing came of it.

 

[Oldgateboatdriver]

First of all, Jollyjacktar, I'm happy you stumbled upon "The Champagne Navy". Great read that I recommend to all, but difficult to locate these days (it is more than 30 yrs in print).

I was once told by someone who was around when the MCDV's were being discussed and decided upon that there were two camps.  One wanted the MCDV's and one wanted MTB's as the replacement for the Gate boats.  The process was he said, long and bloody and the MTB camp lost the arguement and battle.  I think that small attack boats would be great for coastal work, but would they not have the legs to do anti-piracy ops?  You would have to have them at the very least staged out of central locale of some sort.  I can't see us getting into that sort of arrangement with a foreign host anytime soon.  But, hell yeah I'd love to see MTB's or some other fast littoral combattant make a comeback in the RCN.

As you can deduce from my username, I was one of the CO's consulted in the replacement of the Gate boats. From a historical perspective, the debate was not quite the one you describe above - the MCDV was a compromise ship that satisfied no camp.

Basically, in the lead up to the Mulroney government's White Paper, Marcom (as it was then) identified two (huge) gaps in its capability to face realistic threats to Canada that needed addressing: Coastal Defence and Mine Warfare. The task of dealing with coastal defence was delegated to the Naval Reserve and it was attacked with alacrity. Navres started from the old plans, including the old WWII Naval Officer in Charge organization and developed an updated MAOP on coastal defence (for all I know, still out there, on the shelves and available).  This lead to the establishment of Coastal Defence Areas, mostly corresponding to the Coastguard sectors to permit cooperation. The corresponding HQ's were minimally manned by PRL personnel and then fully staffed as required with PriRes personnel for exercises or actual operations. Many exercises were run to validate the concept and worked great.

The various workgroups and tiger teams working on Coastal Defence identified the need for three types of vessels to carry out the task: Offshore Surveillance Vessels for extended operations anywhere in the EEZ (reqs were for 1200 to 1700 tons - capable of 20 kts +); Inshore Surveillance Vessels for operations off to within 6 to 8 hours of a safe harbour or anchorage (reqs called for 250 to 500 tons - capable of 25 kts +); and, finally, Harbour Surveillance Vessels, a small patrol vessel in the 50 -100 tons range. Mine warfare did not enter the picture and it was felt that, if Marcom wanted this capability, it should acquire MCM's separately and man them with regular force.

The debate that then raged on was whether we should seek the acquisition of the Offshore vessels first or the Inshore ones. There was no argument, however, that Coastal Defence plans required the 70 ships identified as required (IIRC, it was 10 Offshore, 20 Inshore and 40 Harbour). In the end, Marcom insisted on a minimal mine warfare capability, which necessarily reduced the capabilities for patrol, and would not accept the larger number of hulls the Coastal Defence teams thought were required. Compromise was required since Marcom was also looking at the replacement of its old steamers and at the acquisition of nuclear submarines at the same time. The compromise was the MCDV's to act in the Mine warfare/Offshore/Inshore roles all by itself (in typical Canadian fashion, a "do-it-all" ship that can do none properly - My personal opinion here).

As for OP CARRIBE, MGB's "Champagne" Navy style would not be useful: Legs too short, can't take the weather of open ocean and remain effective and crew fatigue kicks in real fast on those type of vessels. However, patrol boats in the style of the Australian Armidale class would be great additions if they could be substituted here and there for frigates on a 12 to 1 ratio, or in any number if additional to current frigates strength. The ratio may seem high but, you need about four to six such ship in the operation area to effectively substitute for one frigate. This is due to the fact that their sensor suites and command and control facilities are much less capable, in particular, they have no ops room or other facilities to house an integrated data display (links) that gives them access to the big - whole fleet - surface picture or contribute to it. Also, they must rely on a home harbour facility for resupply as they cannot replenish themselves at sea. In the case of OP CARIBBE, that would likely mean Djibouti and thus, the need for the 12 to one ratio to maintain four to six deployed on operation at all time.

P.S. The Offshore/Inshore/Harbour method of operation developed then was certainly validated during the Vancouver olympics, with a Frigate "Offshore", an MCDV "Inshore" and the Orca's/RHIB's "in Harbour".

 

[Colin Parkinson]

Met a guy who commanded a Fairmile in WWII on the west coast, not a bad job considering.

Displacement hull generally means good seakeeping, comfortable and range. but slow speed

Semi-displacement means slightly more speed, but less of the other stuff

Planing hull means lots of speed, limited range, limited comfort and generally poor seakeeping.

One option would be for a number of sidewall dynamically supported craft. You get almost as much speed of a planing hull with the range. comfort of a semi-displacement. The cost is higher fuel consumption and maintenance.

 

[Oldgateboatdriver]

For more info on the Fairmile, the following link provides a good overview of the class and bears out Colin P's comments.

http://www.ww2ships.com/britain/gb-sc-001-b.shtml

In the late 70's, I remember seeing one around P.E.I. that had been turned into a yacht: The paint had been stripped to wood and marine varnished, with a shinny green hull. It was quite pretty as they had kept the wonderfully sleek lines of the original without building any extra structure above the water line.

 

[Colin Parkinson]

a few years ago there was one Fairmile and 2 ex-RCAF crashboats in Vancouver. All were being used by charterboat companies. I think though that recent TC requirements have done them in as charterboats, as you can't use a wooden boat for overnight charters.

See 2 fairmiles here, Kona winds and Gulfstream
http://www.google.ca/imgres?imgurl=http://www.oldsaltcharters.com/vanday/mv_kona.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.oldsaltcharters.com/day_motor.html&usg=__Al1A5ypu-PicMFM658vVT2HniEc=&h=150&w=250&sz=11&hl=en&start=282&sig2=_Kzdy1GsKw-yYVQhjr95LA&zoom=1&tbnid=K8Lr5dfRjVKbpM:&tbnh=67&tbnw=111&ei=TueETvOiLYyPiAfMstTDDw&prev=/search%3Fq%3Ddinner%2Bcruise%2Bvancouver%26start%3D273%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN%26tbm%3Disch&um=1&itbs=1

The crash boats were based on the British Powerboat company design, built by the "Canadian Powerboat company"
http://www.commandoveterans.org/cdoGallery/d/8187-4/Jones+13_001.jpg

The CPC boats
http://i181.photobucket.com/albums/x106/nortoi/RAF%20Marine%20Craft%20books/CPBCo%20production%20pond/PMR82-678.jpg
http://media.photobucket.com/image/canadian%20power%20boat%20company%20wwii/alross2/hsl_0001.jpg

There was also a 40' & 46"  wooden crashboats

models here
http://www.westbourne-model.co.uk/deans-marine-scale-model-boats-fast-launches-11188-0.html

 

[aesop081]

In the case of OP CARIBBE, that would likely mean Djibouti and

OP CARIBBE is nowhere near Djibouti. You are in the neighbourhood of 6500 nautical miles off target

 

[Oldgateboatdriver]

You are totally right CDN Aviator - I must have had a brain cramp or something - and I apologize to all for it.

The original post of Halifax Tar proposed these patrol boats for "anti-piracy" and "OP CARIBBE" . I intended to talk about anti-piracy - primarily in the Gulf of Aden/Arabian sea area - in my post, but for some reason got stuck on the "OP CARIBBE" thing.

Obviously, in the actual case of OP CARIBBE, many more support ports are available for patrol boats and would make their employment easier, but I stand by my other points concerning their use. After all, the US Coastguard has been using patrol boats for years in the "drug war" and yet had to turn to the Navy for the type of support that OP CARRIBE provides.