Big Ships, Big Challenge

Each ship will be able to carry about 1000 combat soldiers with all of their weapons, ammunition, vehicles and supplies; and of disembarking them with helicopters and watercraft. An air group of 16 to 24 helicopters can be embarked, perhaps a mix of Navy and Army multi-role MRH-90s, Navy MH-60R combat Seahawks, and Army Tiger Armed Reconnaissance Helicopters. The LHDs will also embark Army CH-47 Chinooks, which while too large for the helicopter deck can operate from the flight deck.

That flight deck, incidentally, will include a ski-jump ramp to facilitate the operation of STOVL strike/fighters. Embarked STOVL aircraft provide unique capabilities, but they also provide enormous logistics problems. The ADF has no plans to acquire ship-capable strike/fighters.

It should be self-evident that a fully-loaded LHD will constitute a formidable weapons system. It should also be self-evident that any operational deployment outside Australian waters will demand the best possible protection. The loss of an LHD and its embarked forces would be a national disaster of the highest order.

There are suggestions that the LHDs will be used only in “permissive” environments. This is a flawed concept. Even if a deployment started under permissive conditions, the task force would still have to be prepared for non-permissive operations, to guard against the possibility of a change of circumstances during transit, or even after arrival. Any inability to deal with a suddenly-emerging, non-permissive environment could compel the Australian Government into an embarrassing, even dangerous, back down.

This means that any operational deployment would need some degree of protection from a range of potential threats, including strike aircraft, submarines, surface ships, stand-off missiles, ISR systems and, possibly, non-state (terrorist) attacks. It would be an unforgiveable omission to discount the importance of this.

For example, the emerging Chinese-built DF-21D anti-ship missile has a 1500 kilometre range, hypersonic speed, and precision guidance. So great is its perceived threat that, in the most recent edition of the US Navy’s professional journal, Proceedings, two senior officers, one from the Navy and the other from the Marines, argued that the DF-21D will be so potent it will bring the era of aircraft carriers to an end.

The point here is that a large ship is just that: missiles don’t care whether their target is an aircraft carrier, a cruiser – or an amphibious assault ship. Suddenly, the development of a concept of operations for Australia’s LHDs sounds like headache material.

There is also the politics of operating a weapons system of this magnitude. It needs to be understood that any Government decision to deploy an LHD operationally will constitute an extreme expression of foreign policy. The appearance over the horizon of an LHD with embarked troops and Army and Navy aviation, probably protected by air warfare destroyers, submarines, Anzac-class frigates, AEW&C, F-35/F-18 fighters, AP-3C Orions, and KC-30 tankers, will inevitably generate a strategic effect, regardless of what may be intended.

Things do not get any easier when the training implications are considered. Manoeuvring hundreds of armed people on a (perhaps) pitching deck, while helicopters and watercraft are arriving and departing, is a very complex and potentially dangerous business. Additional on-deck management difficulties are created by the fact only one of the four helicopter types mentioned above, the MH-60R, has automatically folding rotor blades.

Command and control of the air group constitutes another complex challenge. How is air defence coordinated? When does the control of embarked helicopters transfer from the maritime commander to the land commander? And so on.

There are good reasons why only the best defence forces are able to operate Amphibious Assault Ships. The ADF is of course one of the world’s best, but it has almost no experience in this business. It is clear that there are major issues related to training and preparedness that need to be addressed sooner rather than later.

In summary, the LHDs are a very big deal. The Williams Foundation is concerned that the political, strategic, and operational implications of bringing them onto the ADF’s order of battle are not well-understood.

Any one of the challenges outlined above warrants serious attention; in combination, they constitute a compelling case for action at almost every level of Defence planning.