Category: Marines from all over the world

Azerbaijan: Russian navy visits Baku

Certainly planned for a long time, but nevertheless to be seen in the context of the invasion of the Armenian-populated enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh in Azerbaijan: an informal friendly visit by the frigate Tatarstan to the harbour of Bakú, the capital of Azerbaijan. Even if only for two days with an emphatically culturally guided tour of the city and a football match, it was an unmistakable signal from Moscow shortly after the military intervention and the expulsion of the ethnic Armenian inhabitants of the region. The FK frigates Tatarstan and Dagestan are two variants of the Gepard class (project 11661, 102 m, 2000 tonnes), which were planned in the early 1990s as the successor to the Koni class, mainly for export. From...

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Argentina: Maritime surveillance with Norwegian P3 Orion

The Argentinian navy has already been able to significantly expand its maritime surveillance capabilities with the purchase of the four French Adroit OPVs alone. In order to complete this further, Argentina is now purchasing four Lockheed P-3C/Ns that have been decommissioned in Norway for around 60 million euros. The P-3N, which is equipped more for Norwegian SAR tasks, differs from the three P-3C sub-hunting aircraft in terms of the sensors installed - but none of them will be allowed to keep their NATO-compatible data link systems. Argentina hopes to be able to procure such systems elsewhere. The USA agreed to this transfer, just as it agreed to the transfer of 24 Danish F-16 Fighting Falcons for the Argentinian air force...

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Regionally rooted, globally committed!

For the German Navy, too, this means a return to a focus on national and alliance defence. In an interview with marineforum, Vice Admiral Frank Lenski, Commander of the Fleet and Deputy Chief of Naval Operations, talks about the resulting willingness to take on responsibility, current problems and the importance of reserve service personnel. Admiral, how do you currently assess the situation on NATO's northern maritime flank - especially with regard to the Baltic Sea? As you know, NATO's northern flank is our operational centre of gravity. It already was, but our presence here has been further strengthened. In the Baltic Sea in particular, we have everything...

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Spain: Armada aims to expand its fleet to 12 frigates

The Armada currently has eleven frigates: Six slightly modified replicas of the American OLIVER H. PERRY frigates of the SANTA MARIA class (F80, 138 metres, 4,000 tonnes) from the 1980s/90s and five frigates of the ALVARO DE BAZÁN class (F100, 146 metres, 6,200 tonnes, German-Dutch-Spanish design, built by Navantia) from 2002 to 2012. As the newbuildings of the BONIFAZ class (F110, similar to the new American CONSTELLATION class) planned to replace the six ships of the SANTA MARIA class have so far only been planned in the amount of five units, an important flagship would be lost in the total number. In order to counter this development, the Spanish Navy has now launched the...

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Spain: Tactical drones from Alpha Unmanned Systems

Not only large companies are benefiting from the significant increase in Spanish defence spending, but also the small drone manufacturer Alpha Unmanned Systems (AUS), based in San Sebastián de los Reyes north of Madrid. It manufactures the Alfa 900 miniature unmanned helicopter, which the Spanish Navy was able to demonstrate to the partner nations during this year's NATO manoeuvres in operational use, both in terms of integrated data exchange and integration into the command and control system. The demonstrator platform was the FUROR (P-46), which as an OPV (Offshore Patrol Vessel - Buque de Acción Marítima (BAM)) was ideal for initial trials and integration. All elements...

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