Daily Archives: March 8, 2013

Former submariner to sign copies of his new book in Plymouth

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A FORMER Royal Navy submariner will be signing copies of his new book later  this month.

Ian Franklin, from Newton Ferrers, has said proceeds after costs from the  book, Stand By To Surface, will support a submarine museum exhibit.

HMS Alliance, Mr Franklin’s first submarine, is undergoing a £6million refit  at the RN Submarine Museum.

He will be signing copies of his book based on life aboard HMS Orca in the  60s, between 11am and 1.30pm at Waterstones, New George Street, on March  23.

Source – This is Plymouth

US operating five submarines in Persian Gulf

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File photo shows USS Springfield.

File photo shows USS Springfield.
The number of US submarines deployed to the Persian Gulf and the Sea of Oman has reached five with the dispatch of the USS Springfield (SSN-761) to the region.

The USS Columbia (SSN-771) is operating west of the Strait of Hormuz, which is a key oil transit route. The US has also stationed eight minesweeping ships in international waters of the Persian Gulf and the Sea of Oman.

The United Kingdom has also deployed HMS Trenchant, a Trafalgar-class nuclear-powered submarine, to the Sea of Oman.
Financial woes in the United States have forced Washington to reduce its military presence in the Persian Gulf.
The news comes after the US administration was forced to sign into effect the spending cuts known as the sequester last Friday, which will take USD85 billion from the US federal budget in 2013.
About half of the cuts, or USD46 billion, will affect the US military sector, the most sensitive of which will be altering plans for the deployment of Pentagon’s naval assets.
While the Pentagon had been previously considering plans to assign two of its 10 aircraft carriers to the Persian Gulf, the giant budgetary cuts have now forced the Department of Defense to deploy only one of those aircraft carriers to the region.
Source – Press TV

Russia, Vietnam agree on submarine fleet deal

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cam_ranh_naval_base_concept__si

Artist’s concept of ships in port at Cam Ranh Bay, Vietnam.

Vietnam will get its own submarine fleet as soon as this year, said Russia’s defense minister while on a visit to Hanoi.

“This year a new page will be opened in the history of the Vietnamese Navy – it will get a fleet of submarines,” Sergey Shoigu told reporters following the meeting with the Vietnamese Defense Minister Phung Quang Thanh.

The Russian minister said that they reached an agreement on synchronization in preparing both the submarines and their crews, and also decided that Russian military schools would train more Vietnamese specialists in the nearest future.

In earlier comments Shoigu called the cooperation with Vietnam one of the priorities of Russia’s foreign policy and promised that Moscow would renew active military cooperation with Hanoi.

In particular, the two sides discussed the possibility for Russian specialists to use the naval base and the military airport in Cam Rahn. All talks were held in secrecy, but Shoigu’s visit to Vietnam started from a trip to Cam Rahn, which was once used by Soviet and then by the Russian Navy, but was abandoned in 2002 due to lack of funds.

Russian experts are divided on the possibility and necessity of putting Russian military bases in Vietnam. Colonel-General Leonid Ivashov, former head of the foreign cooperation department of the Russian Defense Ministry, told the Nezavisimaya Gazeta daily that such a step is simply necessary as it would seriously strengthen Russia’s positions in the South East Asia.

At the same time, the Interfax news agency quoted an unnamed source in the Russian Navy HQ as saying that the return of the Cam Rahn base is not necessary and the issue is not even on the agenda.

News of Russia’s future role in the beefing up of the Vietnamese navy comes on the background of the major international row over the South China Sea and its major oil and gas deposits.

In the latest developments, Vietnam has commenced exploratory drilling on the sea shelf, but China replied with a note demanding it to stop. Soon after that China declared that the oil under the South China Sea was its national asset. Other neighboring countries, such as the Philippines and Malaysia also voiced claims to the resource-rich region.

Source – RT dot Com