South Korea Offers Incheon-Class-Frigate to Philippines

South Korean defense manufacturer signifies interest to provide DND's frigate requirements

Incheon class frigate (photo : KDN)

MANILA (PNA) -- A South Korean defense manufacturer is now talking with the Department of National Defense (DND) regarding its requirements for two brandnew frigates.

A DND observer said that the company is offering the Philippines varieties of the "Incheon" class frigates.

"Some initial talks are now being held and hopefully, the company will get a chance to bid for our frigate requirements," he stressed.

He also pointed out that talks with the South Korean defense manufacturer came about when the DND decided to not go ahead with the planned purchase of the Italian "Maestrale" frigates due to questions of cost and hull aging.

The "Incheon" are coastal defense frigates of the Republic of Korea Navy with its lead ship launched on April 29, 2011.

The "Incheon" class frigates will replace the aging fleet of "Pohang" class corvettes and "Ulsan" class frigates, and take over multi-role operations such as coast patrol, anti-submarine warfare and transport support.

Later batches are planned to be specialized on anti-air and anti-submarine warfare.

"Incheon" class frigates are armed with the 127mm/L62 Mk. 45 Mod 4 naval gun.

Point-defense armaments include a single 20 mm Phalanx CIWS and a RIM-116 Rolling Airframe Missile Block 1 21-round launcher.

Anti-Submarine Warfare armaments consists of K745 LW Cheong Sahng-uh (Blue Shark) torpedoes.

Its anti-ship capability is provided by 16 SSM-700K Hae Sung (Sea Star) long-range anti-ship missile, each with performance similar to the US Harpoon while land-attack capability is provided by the recently-developed Hyunmoo IIIC (Guardian of the Northern Sky) cruise missile, which is similar to the US Tomahawk.

It has a length of 374 feet, speed of 30 knots, capable of carrying a naval helicopter and a complement of 140 officers and men.

"Incheon" frigates weigh around 3,000 tons and has cruising range of 5,000 miles.

Philippines News Agency

Comments

  1. S. korea is a leader in ship building ang an ally of the philippines. buying the new and much advance class of frigate will be a morale booster for the phil navy,knowing thsy had in them a superior ship that can defend our territorial rites againts intruders..lets give our military planners a second chance.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. the phil cannot afford it unless south korea offer it at a very very low price

      Delete
  2. Two Frigates is not enough. When a shooting war erupts, two frigates will just be a shooting ducks by the enemy who has more. It should be at least 12 or more Frigates for effective deterrent capability. Deterrence is still much better than a shooting war.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. we were very lucky if we could buy at least 2. your just dreaming buddy

      Delete
  3. The United States Navy started out in 1794 with just six frigates which were built better than the British Navy ships. In the War of 1812 the U.S. Navy frigates sank and or captured the British Navy frigates HMS Guerriere and HMS Java because the American Captains knew how to fight. They were not scared of the British even though the British had the biggest navy in the world at that time of the year 1812. The American Captains did it again in 1942 against the superior numbers of the Imperial Japanese Navy. The Philippine Navy needs the same fighting spirit in its Navy Captains and crewmen. The famous American Navy Captain John Paul Jones said that a warship is rated in effectiveness by the quality of the Captain and crew instead of how many guns it has.

    ReplyDelete
  4. We can consider the numbers, only if the government will allocate additional fund. Our defense spending is just around .9% of our GDP which is very low, however if someone in the congress and senate propose to be at least 2% of our GDP, meaning they must increase defense spending to purchase new military hardware. Two frigates is better than none, but still outnumbered only if each of this frigates has more advance technology on-board to match at least three counterparts, just like the Japanese Murasame class, Takanami class and Akizuki destroyers class which is capable of matching up to 3 Chinese destroyers or frigates against 1 Japanese destroyer.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Not enough. The Philippine Navy old ships will be the TARGET PRACTICE of Chinese Navy.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment