The US Navy has accelerated its Littoral Combat Ship Program, with construction scheduled to begin in 2005. This is remarkable, considering that ship designers do not know what warfare requirements the ship is to fulfill, or even the approximate size of the vessel the Navy wants. A part of the DD(X) program, it is intended as a small, cheap, and hopefully numerous class for use in littoral waters. It’s also been described as “expendable,” which is not an attractive feature. It will almost certainly have a modular hull design, with several variants having different weapon and sensor fits, focused on a single mission area. There just isn’t room in a small hull for a general-purpose combatant. One reason for the short time until construction begins may be to limit the inevitable growth in the size of the design. What starts out as 3000-ton vessel can grow by the end of the process to a ship twice that size, and you buy warships by the pound. Less time for designing means less time for growth. The AIM-120C-5 version of the AMRAAM is entering service with many of the US’s foreign allies. In addition to an improved seeker (ATA of 8.0/9.0), it has a 5-inch extension to the motor, so the range and speed is improved, although no figure has been announced. The improvement could be as much as 25% to 40%. Italy, Germany, Israel, Spain, and the UK will all receive units, starting in 2004. It entered service with the US in 2000. China is buying more ships from Russia. It will order another eight Project 636 [Kilo] diesel subs, and two Project 956EM Sovremennyy destroyers. The subs may or may not be standard Project 636 Kilos, but they will able to carry the Klub missile. The two new DDGs will follow Hangzhou and Fuzhou into service in 2006, but while the first two are Project 956Es, and nearly the same as the Sovremennyys in Russian service, the second pair may be radically different. According a drawing published in the March-April issue of Military Parade, their superstructure and hull resemble the Udaloy class more than the Sovremennyy, and will have improved armament, including as many as 16 Yakhont and also the vertically-launched SA-N-6C. The ships have an updated radar suite (including the Tombstone radar associated with the SA-N-6C). Construction of the first unit began in June, the second in July. Only photographs of the ships under construction will confirm whether they match the drawing. BT Back to The Naval Sitrep #23 Table of Contents Back to Naval Sitrep List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 2002 by Larry Bond and Clash of Arms. This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history and related articles are available at http://www.magweb.com