UK’s Fleet Solid Support ship programme deemed on track despite steel supply concerns
Shipbuilders are saying the programme is going ahead on time as the government estimates 7.7 million tonnes of steel are needed for 2026 infrastructure projects.
The mad and murky world of submarines in Asia-Pacific (Opinion)
South Korea has built a number of conventional submarines such as this KSS-II, originally relying on German help.
Whatever problems can go wrong with military acquisitions, submarines seem to have ticked all the boxes in the Indo-Pacific region.
More than any other military platform in the Indo-Pacific, submarines seem to engender all manner of turmoil, head-scratching decisions, chicanery and corporate hanky-panky.
Whether it is OEMs illegally stealing designs and hawking them as their own, ill-equipped navies regarding submarines as their saviour in the battle for credibility, submarine acquisitions that are birthed and murdered by mind-boggling bureaucracy, or submariners who are too afraid to put to sea, Asia-Pacific has them all.
Indonesia is a good place to start. The Indonesian Navy suffered the tragic loss of KRI Nanggala on 21 April 2021, leaving the fleet with one Cakra-class
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