Could BD deploy air defence destroyer in rivers?

[UKBengali]

I was wondering if this idea could possibly work?

Indians have been bragging that in war that they could take out all BD defence assets in hours if not minutes.

So, why not deploy an air-defence destroyer or two in one of the country's major rivers like the Brahmuputra
in times of war? Not only will this protect the ship from enemy submarines but it will also be a very hard to hit a moving platform that could also provide air-defence to most of BD in times of war.

PS - I am talking about having this up and running by 2030 when BD military modernisation is complete.

 

[ChineseTiger1986]

Why you need to protect the mouth of a river with the air defence destroyers?

 

[UKBengali]

Why you need to protect the mouth of a river with the air defence destroyers?

Say BD would buy something like Type-052D next decade.

Deploying one of these with its 200km range HQ-9 SAM system in the middle of BD would provide defence
for nearly the whole of BD. BD has the mighty Brahmaputra that runs all the way through BD and I think it has the depth to allow ships of this size to sail all the way to the middle of BD at least.

As it is a constantly moving platform, the enemy would find it harder to hit than say an airbase or SAM location.

This may not work in practice due to reasons I have not thought of, but due to BD's unique circumstances
it may actually be a very good idea!

 

[ChineseTiger1986]

It is good if China can sell more Aegis destroyers to many other countries, since these countries will integrate with China datalink and combat coordination.

 

[UKBengali]

@gambit : Your thoughts would be most appreciated.

 

[Nilgiri]

Say BD would buy something like Type-052D next decade.

Deploying one of these with its 200km range HQ-9 SAM system in the middle of BD would provide defence
for nearly the whole of BD. BD has the mighty Brahmaputra that runs all the way through BD and I think it has the depth to allow ships of this size to sail all the way to the middle of BD at least.

As it is a constantly moving platform, the enemy would find it harder to hit than say an airbase or SAM location.

This may not work in practice due to reasons I have not thought of, but due to BD's unique circumstances
it may actually be a very good idea!

Problem I see is that the sea clutter algorithm, processor and post processor architecture will have to be changed to a ground based one. For a one-off the Chinese may not do it....or it will be quite expensive.....or BD will have to accept the reduced level of detection capability in such an environment...whatever that may be (my expertise is limited to top down remote sensing unfortunately).

 

[UKBengali]

Problem I see is that the sea clutter algorithm, processor and post processor architecture will have to be changed to a ground based one. For a one-off the Chinese may not do it....or it will be quite expensive.....or BD will have to accept the reduced level of detection capability in such an environment...whatever that may be (my expertise is limited to top down remote sensing unfortunately).

Yep that is a very good point.

The radar would have to be modified to work over land but I am sure that China will do it if BD was to order
2, and that would bring down the cost to something not too expensive.

Does anyone know if the radar could be easily configured to work over both land and sea ( switch mode as
and when required)?

 

[Nilgiri]

Does anyone know if the radar could be easily configured to work over both land and sea ( switch mode as
and when required)?

It will need a full analysis of the architecture in the fire control system (esp the bandwidth sizes)...which are highly classified to judge the "ease" of which it can be done and the compromises it entails.

Theoretically it can be, but you will get a compromise in the performance of each mode compared to using everything available to process on one optimized mode....keeping the hardware constant.

If you double the hardware available and have dedicated parallel streams for each....there will be no compromise....but the cost and weight penalties will be roughly double as well for the platform as a whole.

BD will have to decide which is more acceptable.

Mind you I am talking from my knowledge about 5+ years back....there may be new algorithms that China has developed that they already have in place and maybe even deployed in some way to give the ship ground capability. I mean some basic version of it would already be there to ensure its not a sitting duck near the coastline.

I am looking at the Nathanson table right now (he is the original expert on clutter data)...and it surprises me to see how much differences there are between various terrain types and sea "state" types. Maybe todays systems are much more resilient for this, but we can only form an impression of it since we have no idea about the FCS hardware processing specifics like I said.

Air search volume clutter will of course have no effect. Overall its a doable thing, but it might be cheaper and more effective (since you can easily optimise) to just integrate your C4I with a regular land based SAM network. A ship based system is really for a grander purpose.

 

[UKBengali]

It will need a full analysis of the architecture in the fire control system (esp the bandwidth sizes)...which are highly classified to judge the "ease" of which it can be done and the compromises it entails.

Theoretically it can be, but you will get a compromise in the performance of each mode compared to using everything available to process on one optimized mode....keeping the hardware constant.

If you double the hardware available and have dedicated parallel streams for each....there will be no compromise....but the cost and weight penalties will be roughly double as well for the platform as a whole.

BD will have to decide which is more acceptable.

Mind you I am talking from my knowledge about 5+ years back....there may be new algorithms that China has developed that they already have in place and maybe even deployed in some way to give the ship ground capability. I mean some basic version of it would already be there to ensure its not a sitting duck near the coastline.

I am looking at the Nathanson table right now (he is the original expert on clutter data)...and it surprises me to see how much differences there are between various terrain types and sea "state" types. Maybe todays systems are much more resilient for this, but we can only form an impression of it since we have no idea about the FCS hardware processing specifics like I said.

Air search volume clutter will of course have no effect. Overall its a doable thing, but it might be cheaper and more effective (since you can easily optimise) to just integrate your C4I with a regular land based SAM network. A ship based system is really for a grander purpose.

I guess that since this has never been done before then we cannot use a known example
to make informed conclusions.

Due to BD's unique geography and small size it seems to me to be an ideal way to
use an air-defence destroyer to provide air-defence over pretty much the whole country.
If it can have a radar that can be used over both sea and land with little compromise , then it may
actually save a little bit of money as you would then need to spend less on land based
SAM systems.

 

[Nilgiri]

Due to BD's unique geography and small size it seems to me to be an ideal way to
use an air-defence destroyer to provide air-defence over pretty much the whole country.
If it can have a radar that can be used over both sea and land with little compromise , then it may
actually save a little bit of money as you would then need to spend less on land based
SAM systems.

Maybe, but that will be a cost benefit analysis done at a high level.

You also have to take into account (on top of all this) the factor of concentrating defenses in one platform....compared to hedging it across many platforms.

This was the basis of game theory that RAND used in their nuclear war modelling against the USSR...ultimately they went for a relatively scattered model (for deployment and proposed ABM) because they figured they could not afford losing a concentrated unitary target.

I personally would hedge and keep an air defense destroyer optimised to what it was designed/optimised for by the OEM.....a land based SAM system is kind of needed anyway I feel given the extra advantage in radar when you have more than 1 of them working in tandem for signal processing (thats what I was bringing up in the other thread about the drawback of standalone radar in the BD finmeccanica radarset thread).

Maybe @Penguin @Vergennes @Taygibay and @PARIKRAMA have something to say and add about what you are proposing.

 

[UKBengali]

Maybe, but that will be a cost benefit analysis done at a high level.

You also have to take into account (on top of all this) the factor of concentrating defenses in one platform....compared to hedging it across many platforms.

This was the basis of game theory that RAND used in their nuclear war modelling against the USSR...ultimately they went for a relatively scattered model (for deployment and proposed ABM) because they figured they could not afford losing a concentrated unitary target.

I personally would hedge and keep an air defense destroyer optimised to what it was designed/optimised for by the OEM.....a land based SAM system is kind of needed anyway I feel given the extra advantage in radar when you have more than 1 of them working in tandem for signal processing (thats what I was bringing up in the other thread about the drawback of standalone radar in the BD finmeccanica radarset thread).

Maybe @Penguin @Vergennes @Taygibay and @PARIKRAMA have something to say and add about what you are proposing.

I completely agree with what you are saying about concentrating on just one expensive asset.
A destroyer like I have proposed goes for 700 million US dollars and that would not be small change to
a country like BD.

If it is feasible for the radar to work in both sea and over land with little compromise, then why not also use it in times of tension/war to defend BD itself? There would still be the land-based SAMs( maybe a little less required than without destroyer) and fighters defending BD as well. The destroyer will be there to provide an additional level of protection, with the added bonus that it will be a little harder to take out as it moves.

Let us see what others think of the idea as there may be a real flaw in this!

 

[Nilgiri]

If it is feasible for the radar to work in both sea and over land with little compromise,

Thats the thing. The feasibility of that has not been established. I have no information on the architecture and how it was designed from the ground up. That is very top secret, probably the most top secret thing on this system.

If a BD admiral or someone proposes this to the Chinese, the best thing available is to board one of their ships of the class and check for yourself its ground based capability and see what performance it entails in that mode and whether it will be adequate for BD needs if the ship is to operate in that role almost exclusively.

I personally would think its a waste, knowing how much money gets thrown into radar optimisation. For the military its 2nd only to space systems (which I worked on years ago) in various margins available for tweaking without having to do a complete ground up re-design.

There would still be the land-based SAMs and fighters defending BD as well. The destroyer will be there to provide an additional level of protection, with the added bonus that it will be a little
harder to take out as it moves.

This multi layered system would be a better bet. Yes an ADS could definitely harbour itself and add to the overall defense matrix so to speak....especially with good C4I infra in place. I mean BD does not have a blue water navy ambition anyway for forseeable future for the ADS to have a real role beyond that. Which comes to me asking....why even get an ADS in the first place unless your navy expands to a certain large size and role. You can invest the money in making a much better SAM network for cheaper than getting a stationary ADS to do effectively the same job for a much higher cost.

Its kind of like stationing a SSBN in harbour completely 24/7/365 just for its ICBM capability....might as well just save money and get an ICBM missile in hardened silo instead....or actually use the SSBN for what its designed for.

 

[Rajaraja Chola]

I am not sure why Bangladeshis harp up on a hypothetical scenario. India and Bangladesh wont be going to war. Period.

 

[Genesis]

I was wondering if this idea could possibly work?

Indians have been bragging that in war that they could take out all BD defence assets in hours if not minutes.

So, why not deploy an air-defence destroyer or two in one of the country's major rivers like the Brahmuputra
in times of war? Not only will this protect the ship from enemy submarines but it will also be a very hard to hit a moving platform that could also provide air-defence to most of BD in times of war.

PS - I am talking about having this up and running by 2030 when BD military modernisation is complete.

You know what else is moving platform? Air defense batteries. HQ-9 and other variants. In fact, it's speed far exceeds that of a destroyer, not to mention the far larger field it will have and the ability to camouflage which no destroyer will have in a river.

Have you also considered, an opponent can just leave the rivers alone and go for other places, then what are you going to do? You also have to consider depth, a river just may not have the depth to operate a ship of that size.

You can also have a few battalions of HQ-9 for the price of one destroyer.

The point of a destroyer is to offer protection on the seas, in land, it loses it's usefulness, as a land battery is far more efficient.

Even during WW2, they didn't park ships in lakes, they stripped the ships of their guns and used the guns only on land.

The cons just heavily outweigh the pros. If there are any pros.

 

[Nilgiri]

You know what else is moving platform? Air defense batteries. HQ-9 and other variants. In fact, it's speed far exceeds that of a destroyer, not to mention the far larger field it will have and the ability to camouflage which no destroyer will have in a river.

Have you also considered, an opponent can just leave the rivers alone and go for other places, then what are you going to do? You also have to consider depth, a river just may not have the depth to operate a ship of that size.

You can also have a few battalions of HQ-9 for the price of one destroyer.

The point of a destroyer is to offer protection on the seas, in land, it loses it's usefulness, as a land battery is far more efficient.

Even during WW2, they didn't park ships in lakes, they stripped the ships of their guns and used the guns only on land.

The cons just heavily outweigh the pros. If there are any pros.

Thanks, basically what I was trying to say. The costs are just too much for the operational requirement proposed.