Skip to main content

Vietnam To Have Submarine Fleet OF Six Kilo 636-Class Subs In 6 years: Report


Vietnam will have a submarine fleet within six years, the defense minister confirmed in reports on Thursday, as China's increasing maritime assertiveness causes regional concern. 

Russian media reported in December 2009 that Vietnam had agreed to buy half a dozen diesel-electric submarines for about two billion dollars, but Hanoi had not previously commented on the deal.
 
“In the coming five to six years, we will have a submarine brigade with six Kilo 636-Class subs,” Defence Minister Phung Quang Thanh was quoted as saying by the state-controlled Tuoi Tre newspaper.


Thanh said the fleet was “definitely not meant as a menace to regional nations,” according to Thursday's report.

“Buying submarines, missiles, fighter jets and other equipment is for self-defense,” he was quoted as saying, without specifying how Vietnam was paying for the naval investment.

“It depends on our economic ability. Vietnam has yet to produce modern weapons and military equipment, which are costly to import,” he said.
Economists say the country's economy is in turmoil with galloping inflation, large trade and budget deficits, inefficient state spending, and other woes.
Much of Vietnam's military hardware is antiquated but this week it received the first of three new coastal patrol planes for the marine police, announced the manufacturer, Madrid-based Airbus Military.

When news of the Russian deal first emerged, analysts said the acquisition aimed to bolster Hanoi's claims against Beijing in the South China Sea, where the two sides have a longstanding territorial spat that has recently flared.

Tensions were heightened in May when Vietnam accused Chinese marine surveillance vessels of cutting the exploration cables of an oil survey ship inside the country's exclusive economic zone.

Other nations in the region have accused China in recent months of becoming more aggressive in enforcing its claims to parts of the South China Sea.
The Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan also have overlapping claims to all or parts of the waters, believed to be rich in oil and gas deposits.

Read More AT:

http://www.chinapost.com.tw/asia/vietnam/2011/08/05/312368/Vietnam-to.htm

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Pakistani JF-17 A Thunder OR A Blunder

Pakistan has witnessed new defense acquisitions in this decade than any other, and in the center of it all is the new fighter which was designed by China with partial funding from Pakistan. It is formally known as JF-17 Thunder. When the fighter was in development, Pakistani online communities were jumping with excitement comparing it with its arch rival India’s modern combatants Su-30MKI, Mig-29S & Mirage-2000H. There were claims of it featuring western Radars and long range missiles, & Chinese ordering some due to its superior capabilities. But the reality is far from it. China having spent significant amount of money into a fighter which it is never going to use, most probably forced Pakistan to accept its avionics to offset some its development costs. Chinese who are known for their self reliance first and quality next, are further downgrading JF-17s capabilities with their poorly copy-pirated avionics. Along with their dubious weapons, any chance of JF

Pakistani F-16s Shoot Down RAF Eurofighter Typhoons During Air Combat Exercises In Turkey

Pakistani pilots flying modernised versions of the 1970s-vintage F-16 Falcon fighter have beaten the RAF's brand-new Eurofighter Typhoon superfighters during air combat exercises in Turkey, according to a Pakistani officer. Analysis: The RAF Typhoon, formerly known as the Eurofighter, should nonetheless have been vastly superior in air-to-air combat whether BVR or close in within visual range (WVR). The cripplingly expensive, long-delayed Eurofighter was specifically designed to address the defects of its predecessor the Tornado F3 – famously almost useless in close-in, dogfighting-style air combat. The Typhoon was meant to see off such deadly in-close threats as Soviet "Fulcrums" and "Flankers" using short-range missiles fired using helmet-mounted sight systems: such planes were thought well able to beat not just Tornados but F-16s in close fighting, and this expectation was borne out after the Cold War when the Luftwaffe inherite

India Planned Attack On Pak Navy Mehran Base To Kill Chinese Engineers

The terrorist attack on Karachi's Mehran Naval Station on May 22 was conceived and launched by India with the primary objective of killing the Chinese engineers present there, a Pakistani newspaper has claimed, citing 'informed sources'. Four to six Taliban terrorists had entered PNS Mehran on May 22, destroying two maritime surveillance aircraft and killing ten military personnel during their 17-hour siege of the naval air base. "India is the only country in the region that feels troubled by the Pakistan Navy, which had awfully beaten the Indian Navy in Operation Dwarka of 1965. Since then, it has been an earnest desire of India to harm the Pakistan Navy but it was perhaps not possible on the battle front, hence it struck the PNS Mehran," The News quoted sources as saying.