Combat Fleets

In April 2007, the British Royal Navy handed over the retired mine countermeasures vessel ex-HMS Sandown to the Estonian Navy. Decommissioned from British service in early 2005, the vessel, shown here prior to transfer, has been renumbered M 313 and renamed Admiral Cowan in honor of the British admiral whose forces assisted Estonia in their 1919 fight for independence from Bolshevist Russia. Following training and some minor refurbishment at Babcock Engineering Services, the ship arrived in Estonian waters this summer. The Admiral Cowan's new operational configuration remains unknown, although it is expected that the vessel's previously fitted 30-mm gun will be replaced by three smaller 12.7-mm machine guns. Two additional mine countermeasures ships, ex-Inverness and ex-Bridport are also expected to transfer from the United Kingdom to Estonia by 2008. Still quite youthful by mine countermeasures standards, the ships are expected to have many years of useful service remaining.

France recently announced the names of its first batch of eight new multi-purpose frigates that form part of the international FREMM— Frégate Multi-Mission in France and Fregata Multi-Missione in Italy—program. They will be Aquitaine, Normandie, Provence, Bretagne, Auvergne, Languedoc, Alsace, and Lorraine. France plans to purchase eight antisubmarine and nine land-attack variants of the frigate. The Italian Navy is also involved in the program and expects to purchase ten FREMM frigates, with the first two named Carlo Bargamini and Carlo Margottini. Several other nations, most notably Greece, have also expressed strong interest in the design. Program warships are being built under joint ventures between DCN shipyard and Thales in France and between shipbuilder Fincantieri and Finmeccanica in Italy. The first of the class are expected in service during 2011.

This past June, the U.S. Navy and a number of allies completed exercise UNITAS Pacific 2007. This and its sister exercise, UNITAS Atlantic, which was conducted in May, included forces from Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Peru, Spain, and the United States. The exercises formed part of the multinational Partnership of the Americas deployment aimed at enhancing relationships and readiness while working with friendly navies to achieve the U.S. Navy's vision for an international 1,000-ship maritime force. This year's partnership deployment around South America and the Caribbean involved a core team of four ships: the USS Pearl Harbor (LSD-52), USS Mitscher (DDG-57), USS Samuel B. Roberts (FFG-58), and the Chilean frigate Almirante Latorre, pictured here. The Partnership of the Americas deployment will conclude this fall with multinational participation in the annual PANAMAX exercises in the Panama Canal region.

Mr. Wertheim, a defense consultant in the Washington, D.C., area, is the author of The Naval Institute Guide to Combat Fleets of the World, 15th edition, currently available from the Naval Institute Press at www.usni.org.