Russia Hands Over $1.5Bln Warship to China

Dub13

http://www.mosnews.com/money/2006/09/29/chinadestroyer.shtml

On Thursday, Sept. 28, Russia handed over to China a destroyer equipped with state-of-the-art weaponry. The handover, which took place in St. Petersburg, finalized the $1.5 billion deal, which analysts say will boost Beijing’s clout in its standoff with Taiwan.

“The handover act was signed today, and a Chinese flag was hoisted on the ship,” a Russian defense industry source told Reuters, requesting anonymity.

The warship was the fourth Project 956E ’Sovremenny’ (Modern) class destroyer built at the Northern Shipyard in Russia’s St. Petersburg and sold to China under a 2002 deal through Russia’s state arms trader Rosoboronexport.

In the late 1990s China bought two such ships under a separate contract.

“Rosoboronexport is interested in further sales to China, and we are not talking only about ships,” the defense industry source said. “The company is actively promoting its output in China. But there have been no new orders for ships.”

Defense analysts say the destroyers boost China’s military might in the Pacific region and against Taiwan, the island to which Nationalist forces fled when Communists took over the mainland in 1949 at the end of the Chinese civil war. Beijing considers Taiwan a breakaway province and has vowed to attack it if it declares formal independence.

Washington is bound by law to defend Taiwan and analysts say a conflict in the Taiwan Strait could quickly become a battle between Chinese and U.S. forces.

“Concern about these ships in both Taipei and Washington is justified by the fact that Taiwan and perhaps even the U.S. Navy lacks an effective defense against the ship’s SS-N-22 Sunburn (3M-80E Moskit) supersonic anti-ship missile,” Washington-based think-tank the International Assessment and Strategy Center said on its Internet site www.strategycenter.net. “This missile travels at about three times the speed of sound and can perform violent manoeuvres that can defeat most defenses designed to ward off subsonic anti-ship missiles.”

Apart from anti-aircraft missiles, the destroyer also carries a Ka-28 helicopter armed with rocket-propelled antisubmarine torpedoes.

In 2004-06 Russia built and sold to China six Kilo class diesel-electric submarines.

Thomas_S_Hunterson

They're perfectly entitled to build theire defence forces

Dub13

sean_keevey wrote:

They're perfectly entitled to build theire defence forces

Of course they are,I think this is "news" because it could trigger a mini arm's race in the region.

Thomas_S_Hunterson

Dub13 wrote:

Of course they are,I think this is "news" because it could trigger a mini arm's race in the region.

Now's our chance to invest in Lockheed then I suppose

Manic Moran

For the sake of being picky, that contract has the destroyers going for about $400,000 each: The contract was for four warships, to add to the two already in service.



Not the prettiest of Russias warships.

NTM

neilled

sean_keevey wrote:

They're perfectly entitled to build theire defence forces

Of course they are. They're defending themselves buy building up a vast assortment of weaponry to use against that little democracy next door (Taiwan) should they consider going the route about the self determination of their nations future by changing the ROC constitution. Its about the size of three of irelands provinces with 22 odd million people living there.........

Thomas_S_Hunterson

neilled wrote:

Of course they are. They're defending themselves buy building up a vast assortment of weaponry to use against that little democracy next door (Taiwan) should they consider going the route about the self determination of their nations future by changing the ROC constitution. Its about the size of three of irelands provinces with 22 odd million people living there.........

I assume then by the same token that you entirelly object to the US's constant building of it's own military and to the fact that they posess vastly more nuclear weapons than every other country on the planet combined

neilled

sean_keevey wrote:

I assume then by the same token that you entirelly object to the US's constant building of it's own military and to the fact that they posess vastly more nuclear weapons than every other country on the planet combined

Of course i do! Have you ever been to some of the socially deprived areas of the united states? Done a wee bit of time over there as a teenager in one of the areas nicknamed "the projects" Its argueably the most advanced and wealthy nation and earth and yet the conditions in some of their own cities.......

I have yet to fathom why on earth they haven't decommissioned most of their nuclear arsenal.........what kind of enemey needs wiping of the planet a few hundred times?

And yes i'm well aware that the united states has squashed democractically elected governments before to further its own interests.

Manic Moran

sean_keevey wrote:

the fact that they posess vastly more nuclear weapons than every other country on the planet combined

I challenge you to back up that statement with some numbers. (I feel safe in issueing that challenge since I had been pretty sure Russia had more than the US, and I just looked around to make sure)

I have yet to fathom why on earth they haven't decommissioned most of their nuclear arsenal.........what kind of enemey needs wiping of the planet a few hundred times?

Cockroaches. Hordes of cockroaches. Evil cockroaches. Cats too, while I think of it.

Seriously, though, the US nuclear holding is decreasing rapidly. The high point was 32,000 in the 1960s, it dropped to about 28,000 in 1988 before plummeting to the current 10 or 11,000 and levelling out for a while. The SORT treaty signed in 2002 will drop the US holdings to somewhere around 4,000, split more or less evenly between tactical and strategic. For what they do, they're extremely cost-effective.

NTM

Thomas_S_Hunterson

Manic Moran wrote:

I challenge you to back up that statement with some numbers. (I feel safe in issueing that challenge since I had been pretty sure Russia had more than the US, and I just looked around to make sure)

I stand corrected
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_with_nuclear_weapons


However, at least those in the posession of russia aren't under the control of an egotistic president who's integrity has been long compromised.

cushtac

sean_keevey wrote:

However, at least those in the posession of russia aren't under the control of an egotistic president who's integrity has been long compromised.

No, they're under the control of a president who's trying to limit democracy & free speech in Russia, who bullies the countries around him & who's brutally suppressed Chechnya.

There's a Politics section for Bush-bashing, this is a military section.

therecklessone

sean_keevey wrote:

However, at least those in the posession of russia aren't under the control of an egotistic president who's integrity has been long compromised.

:eek:

Understandable I suppose, don't think Michael Moore's got around to a documentary on Putin yet.

cushtac wrote:

No, they're under the control of a president who's trying to limit democracy & free speech in Russia, who bullies the countries around him & who's brutally suppressed Chechnya.

Here here.

AbusesToilets

Like it or lump it,an arguement could be made that the US's economic strengh,and thus the rest of the worlds,is built on the shoulders of it's military

Manic Moran

Actually, I'm not sure how much of that is true.

I think the main advantages are its size (encompassing a large amount of natural resources) and its relative isolation from anywhere that could damage it: Whilst central Europe was being bombed to dust in WWII, people were living fairly peaceful and industrious lives in the US. Yes, the military industry provides a lot of business, but it's all circular: Army spends a gazillion dollars buying B2s from Northrop with money that was collected in taxes instead of being spent in the local economy on other businesses.

The country's relative youth probably also has something to do with it. It doesn't have centuries of hostile history with anyone to distract it.

NTM

AbusesToilets

What i was more refering to is the projection of power and influence that the military provides it.The Governments ability to use it to quell potentially confrontational situations ie. the Strait of Formosa,with China and Tiawan,where the US military protection of Tiawan keeps Chinas aggression in check.

Manic Moran

Gotcha. That seems reasonable enough, but I submit that the economic benefits of even a peace caused by superior firepower are passed through to other countries, not just the US.

NTM

AbusesToilets

Oh i agree with you.I guess what i was trying to say is that the world at large benefits from a strong US military,keeps things in balance for the most past

Dub13

www.telegraph.co.uk/ne...hina04.xml

China tried to poach supergun inventor
By Nick Squires in Sydney
(Filed: 04/10/2006)



Chinese secret agents have made repeated attempts to poach an Australian scientist behind the invention of a high-speed gun that could revolutionise warfare.

The gun with its electronic firing mechanism, called Metal Storm, was invented by Mike O'Dwyer, who is based in Brisbane.

He claimed this week that Chinese government agents offered him more than $100 million to move to China and work on the gun.


A high speed photograph of a 40mm projectile emerging during tests of the revolutionary firing mechanism
"What I was expected to do in Beijing was to divulge all the knowledge I had to enable prototypes to be built for the weapons system to be developed," he told Channel Nine television.

"[They] said 'We don't need any Metal Storm weapons, we don't need any of the paper work, the history — what we want is you. We want you and your family in Beijing'."

Mr O'Dwyer kept details of all the approaches, made over the past decade and passed the information to the Australian government, which has invested around £4 million into the project.

Last year the Chinese made another attempt. An Australian-Chinese businessman, Jun Yang, said an agent told him: "The Chinese Liberation Army wants to buy Metal Storm. It's very advanced technology. When you return to Australia we want you to purchase it for us."

Mr Yang cut his ties with the agent and revealed details of the plot after joining the Falun Gong movement, which opposes the Communist regime.

Mr O'Dwyer has retired from Metal Storm Ltd, but the industrial espionage tactics were confirmed yesterday by company executives. They said fresh approaches had been made in the past few months.

"We get inquires all the time but the implication of these was that the technology would end up in China," said the chief operating officer, Ian Gillespie.

Metal Storm was reaching the final prototype stage after successful testing by the US military, he said. "We expect production to start in 12 to 24 months."

Hailed as a revolution in weaponry, Metal Storm's firing mechanism is initiated electronically rather than by the traditional percussion method. It has almost no recoil and no moving parts, meaning that stoppages are less common than in normal firearms.

Bullets or grenades can be fired at a rate of one million per minute, either from a single weapon or multiple barrels grouped together in pods.

In comparison, an Uzi machinegun fires at a rate of 3,000 rounds a minute.

The company claims the technology can be applied to almost any calibre of weapon. Much of the project is secret, but it is believed that hand-held or remote-controlled weapons would be powered by long-lasting battery packs.

"You'd get multiple firings from one battery and they'd last a long time," said Ian Bostock, an analyst with Jane's Defence Weekly.

"Very few firearm revolutions have taken place in the last 60 or 70 years but this is one of them."

A multi-barrelled Metal Storm gun would direct withering fire at an enemy infantry or tank advance, or enable a warship to fend off a missile attack.

"You can put a lot of lead in the air very quickly," Mr Bostock said. "You could have a pod of 60 barrels, each with 20 bullets, and send out a cloud of gunfire in one or two seconds."

China was conducting a worldwide search for new military technology and it was no surprise it had targeted this new weapon, Mr Bostock said.

"I don't doubt for a moment that they'd try to poach it. They have a long and successful history of reverse engineering — acquiring kit from India or Russia or wherever, pulling it apart, and building their own version," he said.

AbusesToilets

I wouldn't have thought Metal Storms' work wasn't that big of a secret.Their products are often on the history channel and such,i'm sure you could find it on youtube

Manic Moran

I want to know where the journalist found that Uzi.

NTM

AbusesToilets

3,000 rounds a minute? By Uzi he wouldn't happen to mean Gatling Gun by any chance would he? :rolleyes:

TerrorFirmer

In comparison, an Uzi machinegun fires at a rate of 3,000 rounds a minute.