Royal NAVY destroyers
For
some years the Royal Navy's frigate fleet centred on the very
successful Type 12 (2,560 tons) and the even more effective follow-on
Leander class (2,700 tons), which incorporate helicopter facilities,
variabledepth sonar and long-range radar. The Leander design was in
production for ten years, with many improvements embodied in the
various batches, and in addition to the Royal Navy's 23 Leanders a
total of 20 are in service with the navies of Australia (two), Chile
(two), India (six), New Zealand (four) and the Netherlands (six Van
Speijk class). The Royal Navy also took delivery of eight Type 21 or
Amazon class (3,250 tons) frigates, the first Royal Navy warships for
many years to have been designed by civilian naval architects.
Successor
to the Leander class is the Type 22 (4,200 tons Batch 1; 4,900 tons
Batch 3), and like the Type 42 destroyers, the design of later examples
has been stretched and considerably altered in appearance; 14 have been
ordered.
The
successor class is the Type 23 frigate, the first of which had been
ordered by the beginning of 1986.
There
has been considerable controversy
over this design, the arguments centring on the efforts to reconcile
the lessons of the South Atlantic war with the problem of keeping
expenditure within the limits set by a very restricted national defence
budget The Royal Navy's 1986 front-line strength in these two classes
was 13 destroyers, with 44 frigates an( four building.
The
Japanese Maritime SelfDefence Force (JMSDF) has built up a remarkable
destroyer and frigate fleet by following a clear policy of constant
improvement in a succession of interrelated classes. Destroyer
development is following two separate mission-oriented lines, one for
air defence/ surface warfare and the second for ASW, and the destroyers
tend to be large, handsome, well armed and equipped with very
comprehensiv!
electronics,
as would be expecte( from a nation with such a strong electrouics
industry.
Of
the 34 destroyers in JMSDF service in 1986 the main current designs
were the Hatsuyuki (3,800 tons) and Hatakaze (4,600 tons) classes. All
the more recent destroyer classes have excellent helicopter facilities,
with the surprising
exception of the very latest air defence type, the Hatakaze class, but
this appears to be a temporary aberration and one unlikely to be
repeated.
Japanese
frigates are of less than 2,000 tons displacement and include 18 ships
of four classes in service, the latest being the Yubari class (1,690
tons). These ships are also well equipped for their size, although none
of them carries a helicopter.
The
French Navy is steadily becoming more important in international
maritime matters, not least in the field of destroyers, where it has a
great tradition of imaginative and effective design, and, like the
Japanese, the French have followed a policy of gradually improving a
fairly large number of small classes. They have also begun to produce
separate antiair and ASW designs, the latest being
the Georges Leygues (ASW) and Cassard (AA) classes, which use the same
hull with two different weapon/ sensor fits. The total number of
destroyers in service in 1986 was 19. French frigates (avisos) tend to
be somewhat different in concept from those of other navies, being
built with the colouial policing role very much in mind and being
rather small but very well armed and with long ranges. There
were 25 in service in 1986, with more building.
The
Italian Navy also has a long history of large, effective destroyer
designs, and has produced a series of classes since the war. The four
destroyers currently in service include two of the very impressive
Audace class (4,400 tons). There are also 16 frigates of four classes
in service, the latest of which, the Maestrale (3,040 tons), is well
armed and equipped and, like all Italian ships, exceptionally fast.
The
other navy with a siguificant fleet in this area is that of the
Netherlands, which had produced a series of exceptional designs in
order to be able to operate three balanced task groups as part of
NATO's EASTLANT conimand. Initially, the Dutch built six
Britishdesigned Leander class frigates as the van Speijk class (2,835
tons), following them with two large and very powerful frigates of
their own design, the Tromp class (4,308 tons), which are equivalent in
every way to the destroyers of other navies.
An
attempt to agree a collaborative venture with the British having
failed, the Dutch then produced the Kortenaer class (3,630 tons), of
which they have built ten for themselves and two for Greece, while a
further six have been produced to a slightly modified design in West
Germany as the Bremen class (3,600 tons). Two antiaircraft frigates
under construction in 1986, the Jakob van Heemskerck class (3,750
tons), mount specialized antiaircraft weapons and sensor fits on the
Kortenaer hull, and a further four frigates of the new 'M' class (3,050
tons) were on order.
The Royal Canadian
Navy built a series of very adventurous and unusual frigate designs in
the 1950s and 1960s, of which 19 remain in service, and four equally
unusual destroyers of the DD 280 class (4,700 tons) in the early 1970s.
There was then a complete gap in shipbuilding, primarily as a result of
budgeting problems, and many of these ships are now very elderly. At
last, however, anew Halifax class (4,254 tons) of six destroyers has
been announced, to be commissioned between 1989 and 1992.
China
produces its own destroyers and frigates, many still based on Soviet
designs, and a number have been exported. Some other nations have
produced their own frigates, including Denmark (two Peder Skram class,
2,720 tons, and three Niels Juel class, 1,320 tons); Belgium (four
Wielingen class, 2,820 tons); Spain (six Descubierta class, 1,479 tons,
and five Baleares class, 4,177 tons); the Federal Republic of Germany
(four Hamburg class, 4,680 tons); and Norway (five Oslo class, 1,745
tons).
A
large number of destoyers and frigates are in service with the smaller
navies, most being export versions of other nations' designs and the
majority originating from the United States, the Soviet Union, the
Uuited Kingdom, France, Italy, Spain and China. One interesting trend,
however, is that some Western shipyards are offering destroyer and
frigate designs specifically for export, because the home navy designs
are either too complex or tQO expensive (and frequently both) for Third
World navies' needs. Thus, the West German MEKO series, the French
F2000 and the British Vosper Thornycroft series of frigates are in
service with several foreign navies, but not with their own.
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Evertsen (F 819), one
of six Van Speilk class ASW frigates built for
the Royal Netherlands Navy in the 19608. Based on the British Leander
design, they have since undergone numerous modifications, including the
funnel m suppressor caps.
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