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Since 02-01-06
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Northrop Grumman Gets Toledo Contract
EB officials are disappointed
New London Day, 31 Jan 06
EB Loses Repair Work To Newport News
Layoffs May Go Up After $35 Million Toledo Job Goes South
By Anthony Cronin, New London Day, 1 Feb 06
Navy snubs Electric Boat; no jobs relief
By Ray Hackett, Norwich Bulletin, 1 Feb 06
War Protesters, Pro-Navy Activists Meet Outside Chamber Of Commerce Luncheon
PENINSULA DAILY NEWS (WA) 31 JAN 06
By Jeff Chew
"Don't Ask Don't Tell" Rule Being Challenged
From WFSB, 31 Jan 06
Sailor Absent From Sub Arrested On Other Charges
New London Day, 1 Feb 06
Navy’s Proposed Sonar Range Creates Concern
Comment Period Comes To Close, But Controversy May Just Be Beginning
The New Bern Sun Journal (NC) 1 FEB 06
By Patricia Smith
Sub Spying in Latin America: An Incredible Story
By William M. Arkin, Washington Post, 31 Jan 06
Walker wins literary prize: Author describes Confederacy’s primitive submarine,
which sank a 200-ft. Union vessel
By Diane Strand, The MidWeek - DeKalb,IL,USA
Malacca Strait Attack Would Rock World Economies
The New York Times (01FEB06)
Care of submarines in life-long contract
The Advertiser, 1 Feb 06
Northrop Grumman Gets
Toledo
Contract
EB officials are disappointed
New London Day, 31 Jan 06
The U.S. Navy has awarded Northrop Grumman Newport News a nearly $35 million contract for maintenance-related work on the USS Toledo submarine, which is vital work that Electric Boat in Groton had hoped to win.
EB officials said they were disappointed with the announcement by Navy officials for the maintenance-related work and said the decision to award the $34.7 million contract to the Newport News shipyard in Virginia means that EB's total layoffs this year will likely be toward the higher range of 2,400 workers.
In early December, EB announced that it would reduce its overall work force of some 11,500 by between 1,900 and 2,400 this year because of a continuing dearth of future submarine-related design work as well as sub maintenance and repair work.
On Monday, the shipyard announced that 222 workers would be laid off, mostly within its Marine Draftsmen's Association union, where 169 received layoff notices. Smaller numbers of union workers in the Metal Trades Council received notices as well as a small number of salaried workers.
EB had said it would bid on maintenance-related work for both the USS Toledo and USS Miami subs. The Navy has told EB that it plans to award future maintenance-related work after those two jobs to its four publicly owned shipyards around the country, including its Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery, Maine.
EB has already lost maintenance-related work on the USS Philadelphia, which was awarded to the Navy-owned yard in Maine. Navy officials said the Toledo work, which includes alterations, repairs, maintenance and other routine work on the submarine will be performed in Newport News, Va., and is expected to be completed by October of next year. The Navy calls such work a "depot maintenance period." EB said the hoped-for Toledo work would have provided a significant amount of work.
EB Loses Repair Work To
Newport
News
Layoffs May Go Up After $35 Million Toledo Job Goes South
By Anthony Cronin, New London Day, 1 Feb 06
Groton- Electric Boat officials said Tuesday they were disappointed with the Navy's award of nearly $35 million in submarine maintenance work to the Northrop Grumman Newport News shipyard in Virginia, saying the loss of the work will push layoffs this year toward the higher end of a projected range of layoffs.
On Monday, the Navy awarded the $34.7 million contract for maintenance, repair and alteration work on the Toledo to Newport News. Navy officials expect the work to be completed at the Virginia shipyard by October of next year.
EB officials said in a statement that the decision to award the work, called a depot maintenance period, was disappointing news for the company and its employees. On Monday, the shipyard announced it would lay off 222 workers at the end of March because of a continuing lack of future submarine design work and maintenance and repair jobs.
In early December, EB told legislators, municipal and business officials that it would reduce its overall work force of about 11,500 by between 1,900 and 2,400 workers. Most of the 222 workers who received layoff notices Monday were in the Marine Draftsmen's Association, which represents unionized administrative, technical and design workers.
EB officials said they will continue to support maintenance efforts at the Naval Submarine Base in Groton, where it has assigned about 450 workers. In addition, the company has said it will continue to aggressively pursue new work in engineering, design and construction.
EB had hoped to win maintenance-related work on the USS Toledo as well as upcoming work on the USS Miami. The Navy hasn't announced who will perform the Miami maintenance and repair work.
This past November, EB lost out on a bid for similar work on the USS Philadelphia to the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, the Navy-owned yard in Kittery, Maine. As a result of that loss, EB said it would lay off about 150 workers this year, which are part of its overall year-long jobs reduction.
The Navy told EB officials last year that it would award remaining maintenance and repair work after the Toledo and Miami jobs to its four publicly owned shipyards around the country, including Portsmouth and its yard in Norfolk, Va.
EB officials said the Toledo contract had been part of the company's workload projections, and would have represented a significant amount of work. EB officials also said that Monday's announcement about the Toledo would accelerate its exit from that type of business.
Earlier this month, EB officials were buoyed by news from the state's
congressional delegation that the Navy would award $85 million for “post
availability shakedown” contract for the USS Texas, the second of the Virginia
class under construction. The post-construction work would begin next year. EB
is already doing post-shakedown work on the USS Virginia at its Groton shipyard.
Navy snubs Electric Boat; no
jobs relief
By Ray Hackett, Norwich Bulletin, 1 Feb 06
GROTON -- Electric Boat's hope of reversing a Navy decision to send maintenance work to Naval shipyards has been dashed, putting greater strain on the Groton shipbuilder as it prepares for major layoffs this year.
The U.S. Navy awarded the $34.7 million maintenance contract for the USS Toledo to the Northrop Grumman shipyard in Newport News, Va. -- work EB had planned to have as the company prepared its initial layoff estimates of 1,900 to 2,400 in 2006.
"It's a nightmare," said Metal Trades Council President Ken DelaCruz, whose union members would have performed the work. "It just adds injury to insult. That would have been 10 months of work. Now we've got to scramble and hope we can pick up smaller jobs."
The Toledo contract would have provided work for nearly 800 employees in 2007. It is unclear how the loss will affect the overall work force projections this year and next. EB officials termed the Navy decision "disappointing news" for the company and its employees.
The Navy notified EB last month its services were no longer needed. It said future depot-level maintenance work would be given to Navy-owned shipyards, because there wasn't enough to keep two East Coast shipyards busy.
"Today's announcement will accelerate our exit from the business," EB spokes-man Robert Hamilton said Tuesday.
Hamilton said the decision on the Toledo would have no effect on planned layoffs this year, because that work would have been done in 2007. It likely will mean the total layoff in 2006 will be closer to 2,400 than 1,900, however, he said.
"I blame the Navy for cutting EB out of the overhaul and maintenance program," said Larry Drake, an EB employee for 23 years before getting laid off in 1999, the last time EB laid off workers.
Drake was able to transfer to the company's Quonset Point, R.I., facility.
"That really is important to the sub base, EB and the Navy, not to mention most important to our economy, which really does need the help," he said.
The first wave of layoff notices went out Monday to 222 workers. The layoffs take effect March 31. The next round of layoffs likely will come this summer.
The Navy also announced Tuesday EB has been awarded a $1.4 billion contract as part of the multi-year procurement program that began in 2004 for the Virginia class submarine. That news will have no bearing on the pending layoffs.
"That work was anticipated," EB President John Casey said Monday, when announcing the first wave of layoffs, "and was taken into account in determining the numbers of layoffs."
War Protesters, Pro-Navy
Activists Meet Outside Chamber Of Commerce Luncheon
PENINSULA DAILY NEWS (WA) 31 JAN 06
By Jeff Chew
PORT TOWNSEND -- Protesters carrying signs with anti-war messages met military supporters with ``Welcome Navy'' signs in front of the Fort Worden State Park Commons building on Monday.
It was a scene that resulted in some quiet, non-violent discussions on war and peace just before Navy Capt. Jonathan Kurtz, commander of Naval Magazine Indian Island, addressed more than 150 people attending Monday's weekly Port Townsend Chamber of Commerce luncheon.
The more than 50 war protesters included representatives of the Port Townsend Peace Movement, Women in Black and Buddhists.
They were met by nearly as many military supporters -- from Jefferson County Republicans to veterans and former submariners -- who showed up to hear Kurtz speak about plans to service nuclear submarines at Indian Island, across the bay from Port Townsend.
“We're here to support our good friends at the Naval Magazine,” said Jim Hagen, Jefferson County Republican Party central committee vice chairman.
Standing next to Hagen near the entrance to the Commons was Annette Huenke, co-owner of the Ancestral Spirits native art gallery in Port Townsend.
She was dressed in a long black coat, the trademark of the Port Townsend's anti-war Women in Black.
She stood next to a sign: ``Lead by example, America, stop the killing.''
Supporting `my guys'
Across the walkway was retired Navy master chief electrician Larry Carter of Port Ludlow, who proudly talked about how he had worked for 20 years on nuclear submarines.
``I'm here to support my guys in the Department of Defense -- and the Navy in particular,'' said Carter, sporting a Seahawks jersey and waving a large American flag.
``I know those guys and I love 'em.''
Carter was joined by Vincent Bell, manager of the Port Townsend American Legion Hall, who held up a black Prisoner of Wars-Missing in Action flag.
``As long as we stay fragmented, we will never get anything done,'' lamented Bell, adding that he saw the concerns about the new presence of nuclear submarines at Indian Island as a ``fear tactic.''
``They say that submarines will make us a bigger target, but the target is already over there [at the Bangor nuclear submarine base on Hood Canal],'' Bell said.
Among the crowd outside The Commons was Darlene Durfee, Port Townsend Peace Movement president, who said her group was actually ``joining forces'' with military supporters to strike up a positive conversation.
``We are so divided,'' said Durfee.
``It's just too bad. We need to start communicating and talking. I think we all want peace.''
"Don't Ask Don't Tell" Rule
Being Challenged
From WFSB, 31 Jan 06
Groton -- An apprentice at the Naval Submarine School in Groton is challenging the "don't ask, don't tell" rule. He's 19 years old and wants to stay in the navy, but he says it's important to know he is gay. That admission could get him kicked out of the armed services, but some local politicians may support his fight.
Saying he still wants to be a sailor, Seaman John Graff knows under the current rules and laws he'll lose that privilege.
"Part of why I'm doing this is for hopefully to get the do not ask do not tell policy repealed," said Graff.
Graff joined the service last February and is a seaman apprentice at the naval submarine school in Groton . He says about 3 weeks ago he decided to come out knowing he would be discharged.
"By keeping it to myself I'm just participating with the policy which I think is wrong and change isn't going to come that way."
John has some political backing for now. The local chairman of the Groton Democratic Party wants to take the issue to a resolution before lawmakers.
A spokesperson at the sub base would not talk about the don't ask don't tell policy saying the issue itself is something being dealt with by the Department of Defense.
Graff is still on duty and he says he will stay around the area and work toward repealing the don't ask don't tell policy.
Sailor Absent From Sub Arrested On Other Charges
New London Day, 1 Feb 06
Groton - A Navy man absent from the submarine to which he is assigned was arrested early Tuesday on warrants obtained by Groton town and Stonington police.
Groton town police arrested Todd Johanssen, 20, at 110 Georgia St. They also arrested a resident at that address whom they said tried to hide Johanssen.
Johanssen was wanted by Groton on a charge of second-degree failure to appear in court. He was wanted by Stonington police on a charge of first-degree failure to appear in court.
Police said Thomas Bardazon, 20, told them that Johanssen was not at the Georgia Street residence and that a person who was there was not Johanssen. Police later identified the person as Johanssen and charged Bardazon with hindering an arrest.
Lt. Mark Jones, a spokesman for the Naval Submarine Base, said Johanssen's absence from the submarine was unauthorized but that he could not determine whether the Navy had charged Johanssen with a violation of the Uniform Code of Military Justice.
Navy’s Proposed Sonar Range
Creates Concern
Comment Period Comes To Close, But Controversy May Just Be Beginning
The New Bern Sun Journal (NC) 1 FEB 06
By Patricia Smith
MOREHEAD CITY - The comment period for a proposed Navy sonar range off Camp Lejeune ended Monday, but the controversy over the facility may just be starting.
A group of about 25 to 30 charter boat captains, commercial fishermen, scientists and environmental activists met last week to begin discussing what to do next, said Joe Shute, an Atlantic Beach tackle shop owner and charter boat captain.
“It was just an organizational type meeting,” Shute said.
Another meeting date has not yet been set, but Shute hopes it draw even more people.
Shute said he is concerned with what effect the sonar range may have on fish. The Navy has admitted that sonar may temporarily interfere with fish orientation and communication.
“If they do that 161 days a year, there’s not going to be anything out there,” Shute said.
Capt. William Toti, officer in charge of the Navy’s Fleet Anti-submarine Warfare Command, said that is a popular misconception that he wants to clear up.
“Establishing a range does not create any new training burdens,” Toti said. “All it does is improve the quality of training that we have to conduct.”
While a draft environmental impact statement does estimate the sonar range would be used for 161 events per year, an event does not necessarily equal a day, Toti said. Some events are as short as two hours, and multiple events can be accomplished in a day, he said.
Additionally, the training is already going on, Toti said. The estimate of 161 events was based on historical training needs, he said.
He said the number of days on which this training occurred varied, and he could not give an estimate of a typical year.
“The training is going to be conducted anyway, regardless of whether the range exists. It’s just not going to be as effective,” Toti said.
Another misconception Toti fears the public has is that there will be whole fleets of ships out on the range at once activating sonar. This is not true, he said.
Typically, training will involve one ship against one submarine or one airplane against a submarine, Toti said.
“It could be up to two ships working in conjunction,” Toti said.
If there are public misconceptions, then it is up to the Navy to answer them in its environmental impact statement, said Frank Tursi, Cape Lookout CoastKeeper with the N.C. Coastal Federation.
If 161 events will not add up to 161 days, the Navy needs to tell the public how many days the sonar range would be in use, Tursi said.
And, while much of the public concern has focused on the acoustic effects on marine life, there are other issues as well, Tursi said.
For instance, the Division of Marine Fisheries has commented on its concerns for the effects building the sonar range might have on coral reefs on the sea bottom.
Morehead City resident Christine Miller said she faxed to the Navy Monday a petition with 700 signatures that asks for an extension on the comment period along with more public outreach and more research on possible environmental and economic impacts.
“Dead dolphins and stuff on the beach are not going to be good for tourism,” Miller said.
Shute said there’s just too many questions about what the effects on marine life will be.
“It’s just too big of an area and too important of a resource to go by ‘maybe’,” Shute said.
Sub Spying in Latin America:
An Incredible Story
By William M. Arkin, Washington Post, 31 Jan 06
Last August, the USS Virginia, first of a class of new nuclear-powered attack submarines, slipped out of its homeport in Groton, Connecticut, for a 90 day clandestine deployment in support of the global war on terrorism.
The brand new submarine can operate either in the ocean depths or along a muddy coast. It can shoot Tomahawk cruise missiles hundreds of miles away. It can launch Navy SEALs on covert commando missions.
The USS Virginia is the best any defense industry anywhere can build. The 377-foot long boat is so advanced it can be driven by only two sailors. The control room is modern and networked. Perhaps most radical is the elimination of the conventional periscope. The boat instead has a series of cameras and antennas embedded within its tower, housing intelligence collection equipment that can eavesdrop on enemy signals while the sub sits covertly under the sea.
This week -- thanks Hans Kristensen of the Federation of American Scientists for tipping me off -- The New London Day reported the boat safely back in port, ready to tell the "incredible story" of its first sailing and its magnificent capabilities.
Incredible indeed! I know that The Day is hometown booster for the submarine team, but clearly the newspaper failed to see the irony that we built a $2.4 billion submarine bristling with Cold War capabilities, and where do we send it on its first deployment: to South America to spy on cell-phone conversations.
"There's relatively little al-Qaida activity in this hemisphere, in Latin America. There is some, and there is some fundraising that takes place for other terrorist organizations, Hezbollah and the like."
That's Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, appearing on the Hugh Hewitt radio show just last week.
Contrast this softball statement about the "threat" of Islamic terrorism with the alarmism of Rumsfeld and company just after 9/11, when they spoke of the "tri-border" area of Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay as if it were the Afghanistan-Pakistan mountains.
"The large Arab community in the TBA is highly conducive to the establishment of sleeper cells of Islamic terrorists, including Hizballah and al Qaeda," a comprehensive 2003 Library of Congress report (pdf) even concluded.
And just last January, an Army Latin American specialist wrote in the official Military Review journal that "The TBA's dangerous combination of vast ungoverned areas, poverty, illicit activity, disenfranchised groups, ill-equipped law-enforcement agencies and militaries, and fragile democracies is an open invitation to terrorists and their supporters."
"The potential for terrorism in the TBA and elsewhere in Latin America is clearly no myth," he concluded.
Whether Latin America is Rumsfeld's host to "relatively little" terrorism activity or is a hotbed that constitutes yet again a soft underbelly of threats to the United States, the USS Virginia deployed to the Caribbean and south Atlantic waters between August and November in support of U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM), the Miami-based warfighting command that covers Central America south of Mexico and all of South America.
They don't call it the silent service for nothing, so we don't know whether the boat made us of its special operations capabilities to launch some covert raid on a FARC gathering in the Columbia jungles or an al Qaeda camp in the Brazilian jungles.
Undoubtedly the boat collected radar and communications signals and proved its "enhanced littoral intelligence-gathering capability," carrying onboard special eavesdropping equipment configured especially for Latin American signals and targets. Did it listen in on the governments of Venezuela or Bolivia or some other special event?
My guess is that more likely the USS Virginia "practiced." It practiced what it might do in real war because its safe deployment to Latin American waters wasn't meant to really put the new boat into harm's way, and any terrorist threat from Latin America, if there even is one, can't really be handled with a submarine anyway.
When the USS Virginia returned to the United States, it entered the Groton shipyard for a year of post-construction work, additional billions.
Just this week, General Dynamics Electric Boat received lead funding for construction of the eighth, ninth and tenth Virginia class boats. That's a minimum of a cool $24 billion, a truly incredible story.
Walker wins literary prize:
Author describes Confederacy’s primitive submarine, which sank a 200-ft. Union
vessel
By Diane Strand, The MidWeek - DeKalb,IL,USA
A DeKalb author of children’s books has won the nation’s top honor for children’s non-fiction – the Robert Sibert Award presented annually by the American Library Association. The ALA’s top honor for fiction is the Newbery Award.
Sally M. Walker, who has written 40 volumes of children’s literature in 15 years, is being honored for Secrets of a Civil War Submarine, Solving the Mysteries of the H. L. Hunley.
Walker did extensive research on the primitive submarine that was developed by the Confederacy. The Hunley sank a 200-foot Union vessel on Feb. 17, 1864, before itself sinking to the ocean floor near Charleston, S.C.
Before winning the Sibert Award, the book, published by Carolrhoda Books, Inc., of Minneapolis, was a Junior Library Guild selection. It is available at Border’s Books, Music, Movies and Cafe for $18.95. The book is appropriate for grades 5 and up.
Walker, who grew up in New Jersey, has been a DeKalb resident for 23 years. She has given expert book presentations at local schools, including Gwendolyn Brooks and Jefferson elementary schools, as well as Clinton Rosette Middle School.
Walker has a degree in physics and planetary sciences, a specialization in geology and archeology. She had known about the award only 48 hours before being interviewed and admitted to being “extremely excited. I have a constant feeling like I’m walking on air — it’s what an author dreams of.” The award will be presented at the midwinter conference of the ALA.
“Everyone said that they call you at 6:30 a.m., but they called me on Sunday evening. First they call the publisher and then the author,” Walker said. “In 2005, there was a bumper crop of phenomenal non-fiction.” She knew her book was respected, because it received two starred reviews, one from the School Library Journal and another from Booklist.
“It’s the best book I have written so far,” Walker said. “It’s history and science, showing kids that we live in an interdisciplinary world.” She told a class of children that a bookstore declined to carry the submarine book because “children don’t read books over 100 pages.”
“A fifth grade boy stood up and said, ‘Well, I have two words for them: Harry Potter.’”
The Hunley was filled with sediment and the eight skeletons of the crew members who manned it, and it weighed 40,000 lbs.
“They’re still trying to figure out why it sank,” Walker said. “There was no sign of damage from the impact.
“I interviewed the Navy diver who raised it in 2000, the archeologist who excavated it and the forensic anthropologist” who participated, she said. The submarine was four feet tall and 40 feet long.
The motivation and support behind the effort came from the organization, Friends of the Hunley. Cooperation was needed from all the scientists as well as from mathematicians to make sure nothing was destroyed in the recovery process.
Walker said, “They had to get every step just right. People weren’t allowed to touch her (ships are traditionally referred to as female).”
One of the people Walker interviewed was an 83-year-old World War II veteran submariner. She asked if he would have liked to serve in the Hunley. He responded, “If I had my druthers, I wouldn’t.”
“He has become a dear friend,” she said. “It amazes me — the people who are interviewed in the story.”
She said the Confederacy’s Captain George E. Dixon, 24, piloted the sub.
“I read his war records. He had a war wound” that would have been more severe if it hadn’t been deflected by a gold coin. “We found the coin (with Dixon’s skeleton) and there was a particle of gold in his femur. It was the most moving experience I have ever had, because there was a message inscribed on the back of the coin: “Shiloh, April 6, 1862. My life preserver. G.E.D.”
She said the current value of the coin is estimated at $12 million.
The submarine and the coin are both owned by the U.S. government, Walker said, but she was given easy access to the scientists involved in the project. “They asked only for an outline and what my intention was for the story.
To review the war records, “it was merely a question of people opening the National Archives,” she said, adding that she could be totally happy with a pizza, potato chips, a cot, a gallon of water and the freedom to wander through the archives.
“They are a treasure trove of stories.”
Another great source of children’s stories is the DeKalb Public Library, she said. “I have lived in metro areas like New York City and Halifax, Nova Scotia, and the DeKalb Children’s Library is second to none. We should treasure it.”
Walker’s husband, James, is a professor of geology and environmental geoscience at NIU.
Malacca Strait Attack Would
Rock World Economies
The New York Times (01FEB06)
SYDNEY (Reuters) - A maritime terrorist attack in the Malacca Strait could send economic shockwaves around the world even it was not a major strike, the commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet said on Wednesday.
Admiral Gary Roughead said the risk of a terrorist attack in the strait shared by Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia and Singapore, one of the world's busiest sea routes, continued to rise along with the increase in global shipping and continued piracy.
``The Strait of Malacca is the heaviest trafficked strait in the world, and for that reason any disruption to that commerce, not only would it affect the region, I would suggest it would have global implications,'' Roughead told Reuters in an interview.
``I am not sure it would have to be of great magnitude. The fact that a vulnerability has been demonstrated is enough to affect trade,'' Roughead, head of United State's biggest naval fleet, said on the sidelines of a major naval conference in Sydney.
The narrow, strategic Malacca Strait is a 500-mile waterway linking Asia with the Middle East and Europe and carries some 50,000 vessels a year.
It also carries some 40 percent of the world's trade, including 80 percent of Japan's and South Korea's oil and gas and 80 percent of China's oil, according to a U.S.-Indonesia Society 2005 study on the impact of a terrorism attack in the strait. The London insurance market in 2005 classed the Malacca Strait a ``war risk'' zone -- adding the sea lane to a list of 21 areas such as Iraq and Colombo that it deemed high risk and vulnerable to war, strikes and terrorism.
Roughead said piracy -- a major problem for ships using the Malacca Strait, along with drug and human traffickers on the high seas -- could be used by terror groups to launch an attack.
``The terrorist movements and their network can use those same criminal lanes that others use,'' he said. ``I think activity on the ocean is increasing and terrorism is a part of that.''
Indonesian waters pose the world's great piracy risk, accounting for almost 30 percent of reported attacks in 2005, said The International Maritime Bureau, an ocean crime watchdog.
Global piracy fell in the past year, from 329 attacks in 2004 to 276 in 2005, with Indonesian attacks down from 94 to 79 and attacks in the Malacca Strait falling from 38 to 12.
The bureau acknowledged anti-piracy operations by Indonesia, which saw gangs of pirates captured in 2005, for the fall.
Roughead said there was still a need for greater cooperation among navies to combat maritime terrorism, citing operations already under way in the region.
The four Southeast Asian nations guarding the Malacca Strait began joint air patrols over the sea lane in September 2005 to combat piracy and terrorist threats.
But the weak link in maritime security was a lack of information on ships and cargoes, said Roughead, who called for
global information sharing similar to the aviation industry.
``You can look at an airplane flying in the world today and in almost every instance you know where it came from, who's on it, where it is going, what cargo it has, what time it left and what time it arrives,'' he said.
``The immediate need that I see is the ability to build that maritime domain awareness. To share that information so we can look at the maritime picture and determine those ships that are of no concern and focus on ships we are more concerned about.''
The Pacific Fleet is the U.S. navy's largest fleet covering the Pacific, Indian and Arctic Oceans, with some 200 ships, 2,000 aircraft and more than 239,000 sailors.
Roughead, who became commander of the Pacific fleet in December 2005, said the ``war on terror'' was changing the shape of the world's navies, forcing them to become more streamlined and capable of rapid, inshore deployment.
``In the U.S. Navy, we have become much more flexible and much more unpredictable in our deployment patterns,'' Roughead said.
``I believe navies of the future will be much more agile. I believe they will be more lethal, pound for pound,'' he said.
``But navies of the future will have to operate against a wider range of threats
than what we have been used to dealing with in the past -- from the
transnational criminal and terrorism all the way up to the high end of combat.''
Care of submarines in life-long contract
The Advertiser, 1 Feb 06
ADELAIDE submarine builder ASC has signed the first agreement to provide life-long support for the six Collins-class boats.
It announced yesterday a contract worth $3.5 million a year with specialist platform contractor Weir Strachan & Henshaw Australia.
WSHA will provide a core maintenance support team dedicated exclusively to Collins-class submarine maintenance work at ASC's South Australian and Western Australian operations.
ASC managing director Greg Tunny said the Through Life Support (TLS) contract also included transferring to ASC the existing support contract between the Federal Government and WSHA. "Contracting directly through TLS ensures WSHA is able to maintain a long-term skills base for Collins-class maintenance, which is becoming increasingly important as demand for resources continues to rise," Mr Tunny said.
ASC recognised the importance of ensuring continuing "support of original equipment manufacturers, in addition to small/medium enterprise suppliers, and is in discussion with other subcontractors to offer similar TLS contracts".
The new contract allowed ASC to prioritise maintenance and eliminate negotiations prior to work being undertaken, Mr Tunny said.