Ministry Says French Firm May Build Corvette for Ukraine
The Industrial Policy Ministry has said that French company DCNS may be involved in the project to build a Ukrainian corvette, a Ukrainian military website has said. However, the project is being held up by uncertainty over the coming 30 September parliamentary election and nothing is likely to be decided before next year, it concluded. The following is the text of the article by Ivan Ryabchyy, entitled “DCNS: A miracle cure?”, posted on the Ukrainian military website Defense-Express on 27 August; subheadings have been inserted editorially:
Each nation should have its own ship, and ships should correspond to their ambitions and appetites. An aircraft carrier is for the French, and a corvette – for the Ukrainians. However, despite the fact that everyone knows what an aircraft carrier is, there are just some individuals who know the configuration of a corvette and the benefits our country will gain from it. It is not worth talking about undercover games surrounding the project: the nation is interested in its security, that is, in the absence of hostile machinery in the sky, on surface of water and underneath water, but not in those who are going to build this ship and the sum it will cost.
France and Russia vying for contract
Moreover, nothing depends on one ship. However, the right choice of partner in a filigree-complex area as the military-industrial sector becomes strategically important. If it concerns the one due to build a Ukrainian corvette – either Russia, which does not conceal its territorial claims to Ukraine, or France, whose interests do not extend further than the purely financial sphere – the choice is obvious for the people combining the features of patriots and specialists. The issue of choice is the one that has been of concern to all players recently in the Ukrainian defence sector in relation to the emergence of a new interested party in the “corvette case” – the French naval industrial corporation DCNS. Moreover, Ukrainian Defence Minister Anatoliy Hrytsenko made a statement on 21 August that certain types of armaments and equipment may be bought in accordance with the relevant tender procedures in other countries: France, Italy and Russia.
French company profiled
Despite being a capitalist country, France is subject to the scab of centralism anyway. Almost all major defence enterprises are under state control to this or that extent. Until recently, the name of DCNS was DCN – Direction des constructions navales (i.e. Directorate for Naval Shipbuilding), and it was a division of the country’s second most important defence organization after the Defence Ministry – the Directorate General for Armaments DGA. The DCNS controls the largest shipyards in France, and it recently acquired a competitor – the company Thales, with which a long epopee of rivalry between the two corporations, let us say, over the “second aircraft carrier” project had been related. The DCN has been transformed from a purely state entity into a quite independent agent of the market economy. This process went so far in 2002 that DCN and Thales established a joint venture company, Armaris, which had been controlling up to one third of the market for certain systems supplies. The process was completed in 2007 when DCN completed the takeover of Thales and Armaris, and in so doing became the only major shipbuilding company in France.
The abbreviation DCNS appeared in the news in Ukraine in June of this year. The Industrial Policy Ministry has made the following comment on the results of the ninth meeting of the Ukrainian-French commission for military-technical cooperation: Ukraine is reportedly considering the possibility of involving the French company DCNS in the development of a project to build a Ukrainian corvette. The speculation “originated” from the fact that the company’s representatives had been present at the aforementioned meeting. Of course, their presence was no accident. For this reason, people possessing some logic were sure to have made the following conclusion: the visit of high-ranking French shipbuilders was related to a corvette project. In addition, the statement by the defence minister was made in due time. Let us not argue, but better try to realistically assess the situation.
“Ukraine does not have and has never had a complete shipbuilding cycle, and this casts doubt on the capacity of the national defence sector to build a ship of this class on its own,” was the reaction of the sector’s media to the government’s resolution dated 9 August 2005 on allocation of 806m hryvnyas [about 160m US dollars] to start developing and building a new fully-fledged corvette. Indeed, if we talk about the capacity of the country’s military-industrial sector to build a ship, which complies with all of NATO’s requirements, as we seem likely to be going in this direction, we shall manage to fulfil not more than 20 per cent of the requirements.
Obstacles to corvette project
The obstacles hindering the implementation of the project are two- fold. On the one hand, this relates to the political situation in the country. Obviously, producers are afraid of the high chances that the leadership will be changed after the [30 September parliamentary] election, and this is why they are waiting. On the other hand, the companies and the countries interested in taking part in the project, hire lobbyists whose mission consists of promoting their interests in the news media and the state authorities. In the face of these conditions it is quite difficult to understand the difference between truth and slyness. For this reason, it is much wiser to weigh up everything and to draw conclusions on the basis of figures and dry facts.
Three countries have strong lobby in Ukraine
Sweden (Visby), Germany (MEKO) and the United Kingdom (Cougar) are among the major manufacturers of corvettes, but they do not figure in the story about the Ukrainian corvette. Italy, Israel and Russia act jointly on the Ukrainian “front” and have a strong lobby in Ukraine. Lobbyists put forward roughly the following: the Russians are building a new ship for resolving roughly the same tasks that the Ukrainian ship will have to carry out. What are these tasks? The first corvettes are known to have appeared during World War II. At that time they were merely anti-submarine vessels. Corvettes began gradually transforming into multi-functional vessels: means for fighting enemies in the air were reinforced, and anti-naval missiles, anti-aircraft units and rocket-powered missile units were installed… [ellipsis as published]
A corvette is currently classified as a multi-purpose surface vessel with a displacement of 1,000 to 3,000 tons, which resolves tasks for fighting on water, underwater and aerial enemies as well as others. It would be strange to assume that Ukrainian and Russian corvettes should fulfil any other functions, differing from the ones fulfilled by corvettes built in France, Turkey or Spain. We did not manage to find an explanation for the “peculiarities” of these tasks. The problem probably lies in the fact that we need not just an ordinary corvette, but a certain hybrid of a corvette and a frigate, i.e. a larger multi-functional vessel designated for both patrolling as well as carrying out combat actions, if need be. The Gowind corvette, which can be presented by the French as an example of successful fulfillment of works in a specific narrow sphere is undoubtedly not of this kind.
We are likely to get an answer to the question as to when Ukraine will finally have a corvette (or the vessel we name this way) next year at the earliest – after the election and, according to our traditions, after redistribution of the “feeding trough” [allusion to divvying up of state budget funds]. It will be only then that those on whom the implementation of the project depends will start to consider the major options in practice.
Of course, the French are not a miracle cure. Gowind is a corvette designated for “third world” countries. Ukraine is proudly unwilling to rank itself with this category of countries. Therefore, we have two ways: either to build a ship from start to finish on our own (which is impossible due to the reasons mentioned), or to continue the search for a worthy manufacturer abroad.
Originally published by Defense-Express website, Kiev, in Russian 27 Aug 07.
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