With regards to today's ST

last SG · 2004-11-04T21:13:17+00:00

Terrorism at Sea. In case you noticed, the Fokker-50 Enforcer targeted audience...is.. to send those Malaysian/Indonesian sea pirates a straight warning.....

SibeiSuayKia SG

i can imagine the look of the pirates when they see a Fokker-50 Enforcer around...

Using a 165,000 USD Harpoon to kill them is a big waste..

Furthermore, in comparison to helicopters which has side-mounted guns..
the AC-130 has a much longer range...can patrol all the way up and around

Up til south china sea..

or we can easily...

modify those planes from Youth Flying Club..

and equip them with machine guns...muahahaha use them for target practise

Twisted Evil

SpecOps87 SG

Yah,totally agree that AC-130 Spectre gunships are the way to go for such problems.Can loiter around the target area far longer then any chopper.Using the Spectre Gunship with is Gatling guns,105mm Bofors cannon,40mm AGL.Which pirate see liao balls won't shrink?Unless they have a handful of Stingers or Iglas then it would be a different ballgame.

Anyway,wonder if you guys know this.Read in a book written by a Vietnam Huey Gunship pilot,when they are patrolling the rivers at night and spot sampans who are suspected VC,they dropped a few kegs of nails onto them and sink them.Although the nails were bought with the pilots's own money as they devise strange ways to identify if an area has VC.They even stuff a grenade into those glassjars,remove the safety pin and drop them out of the aircraft and when it impacts the ground and explodes,the VC start panicking and fires at them,they will go in full force.That is what i can proactive measures. Laughing

SibeiSuayKia SG

Hehe, but i noticed quite a bit of an overkill...because last time i saw AH-64D Apache..

with just 30 mm cannon already can rip apart a person to shred..

105 mm cannon is like a flying tank..

Johnston SG

Contrary to your thinking, FSD is not an "air/sea/land" department.
FSD stands for "Future Systems Directorate", and their main job is to sit down and think.

Their head is someone big. And i do mean big.

sbst275 SG

1st thing, I mentioned RSAF dept right? 1 of them is featured in Oct pioneer

Johnston SG

Yes, i can just see US SOCOM releasing AC-130s to handle the problem of pirates.
A more logical action would be to use more helicopters. Needless to say, a Spectre is far far more expensive/valuable/a lot of things more than your normal helicopter.

By the way, AC-130s have never been armed with 40mm AGL, not even the AC-130A "Plain Jane" introduced in 1968. (there weren't no 40mm AGL)

The correct term is 40mm Light AA gun.
See below
http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/ac/equip/l60.htm
http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/ac/ac-130.htm

sbst275 SG

It is never cheap to maintain them... Each cost abt US$55M to maintain 1

sbst275 SG

IMO, other than air power and the EC-130 that we are talking abt… ASW, AEW and Anti Sea is also vital

SibeiSuayKia SG

wah so lucky sia...

Pirates can only use boats...no submarines for them =D

if not we have to get P-3C Orion to hunt them..

Anyway, do you all think that we should modify Fokker-50 with a side mounted machine gun...so that it can handle naval warships...
as well as a machine gun to tear apart sampans..

laurence82 SG

then what? still use Harpoons? Laughing

sgdiehard SG

No, stay in the sky and watch the fireworks. It would be nice even if it explodes in the day. If it blows up next to a supercontainer vessel, it should sink it leaving a few hundreds containers floating around; if it blows up next to an oil supertanker, phew, a greater fireball; all high rise building facing the sea will have their window shattered, singapore will be on the headline all over the world......in the meantime, we can continue to discuss if we should use Fokker 50 Enforcer or AC-130, should we mount Harpoon, machine guns, cannon or may be just use arrow. one arrow is enough to kill a pirate, sampan without pirates is okay, why need need guns, cannon, or missiles?

laurence82 SG

*clap clap*

SibeiSuayKia SG

ROFL, Just now about Terrorists and pirates using sampans is a joke actually..
Terrorists..can always provide the funds...note that Osama is a rich freak and Sampans..are what previous pirates use..

Pirates are getting richer and richer...think we may be seeing something more then a sampan when the years goes by..

Even terrorists in Middle east, are equipped with stingers and rpg-7..
with JI , in south east asia whom they continue their brothers...

I can evaluate that they might supply their brother with sampans...
another RPG or whatsoever..sinking a tanker is next best to crashing a plane into a building...

To sink a tanker through the porous indonesian islands...not a huge problem actually =D

Furthermore, most oil tankers do not carry weapons or defenses on board..
making them vulnerable...how can we eliminate terrorism, when piracy is a form of it..

Suggest we have AC-130 aircraft patrolling , after all , Singapore gets
$ 12 BILLION SGD per year from PSA...

Whats the cost of using 4 AC-130 Spectre gun ships...to guard and monitor the straits...

more and more pple might choose to cut the Isthmus of Kra over the next 50 years..provided southern thailand becomes more stable..

And we lose $12 billion dollars in potential revenue. How's that?

SpecOps87 SG

Yo Johnston,sorry for the wrong armament posted man.

Spectre if I'm not wrong is classes under the category as an aerial assault weapon and not a defensive weapon.If SG gets Spectre gunships,if may have a significant shift in airpower in a region and we may be perceived as a threat to the other countries in the region.This may result in a major arm conflict.So,its best to keep it a hush-hush affair.

Anyway,does anyone have any idea if a normal C-130 can be converted to an AC-130 Spectre by RSAF without sending the aircraft to the US?Thanks....

Lastly,think that chopper strikes are risky and not really suitable.As the only good thing about choppers is that their ability to hover thats all.And if they are working far from any airbase,they may need to be navy variants where they have to be able to land on out LSTs.Thus,i feel that an alternatve is to get A-10 Thunderbolts or AC-130 Spectre gunships.They are the terror in the sky if any pirates wanna screw around.

sgdiehard SG

Hello, what do you think the pirates use today? submarine? missiles gunboats? UFO? previous pirates use sampan and modern pirates also use sampan, equipped with OBM, or fishing boats, slightly bigger than sampan. It gives the pirate the speed to get near the ships. How much do we really know about pirates? and terrrorists operating from sea?
What is the real threat the Harpoon equipped Fokker is trying to counter? RSN or RSAF are not and should not be deployed to take on pirates. Is there a real terrorist threat from the sea? I don't think NCC know, just leave it to the pro.

Lets carry on with AC-130, it does not have all the equipment in the Fokker to do maritime surveilance so it is like a robot cop, heavily armed who can't see. I suggest we deploy a few leisure cruiseliners with police undercover on board, crusing along the straits to monitor the pirates activities; or deploy a few tens of leisure crafts, with women police wearing bikini to attract the pirates. If the pirates come, hahaha, got you!! like that sure got a lot of marine police volunteer for these duties one.

SibeiSuayKia SG

You are not a guy working for the intelligence services of singapore...
please try not to comment much =)

Real terrorist threat from the Sea?

RSN and RSAF are Singapore's primary assets, which would be used to defend our primary interests during peacetime/wartime..

What are our interests? SLOC.

Im sure the crew of USS Cole in Yemen during 2000 would flame you.
Definitely.

Just need to have whereby pirates can provide the logistics...and a clear and experienced pirate captain...whereby they just rent a boat from Riau..

Remember if they can bomb so many places in Indonesian...Jakarta , Bali Bombings...Why not pack a C4 into a boat and ram it ?

After all...If they can so easily board the ship and a pirate is driven by $$...
$$ is also what terrorist groups has..

Terrorists hires the pirates, remember that some of the pirates...might work with them...all in the name of Radical extremism.

Just need to knock out 1 major ship..

I think the average NCC cadet, can also give better suggestions then..

"deploy a few leisure cruiseliners with police undercover on board, crusing along the straits to monitor the pirates activities; or deploy a few tens of leisure crafts, with women police wearing bikini to attract the pirates. If the pirates come, hahaha, got you!! like that sure got a lot of marine police volunteer for these duties one"

Haha, you do know how RSN works...When Pirates ATTACK a ship...
Firstly, they will report of the incident to the nearest port, last time morse code was used..now..radio communication..

A likely scenario , would be pirates attacking oil tanker, and then the coast guard/navy is called in..

Yup and pirates may have binoculars , BUT they can't identify bikini women from a distance of miles apart...

What your mentioning is simply...CRAZY...wasting resources and stuffs..

What im suggesting is that a FASTER response time....AC-130 that could be swifty deployed...

or 24 hour patrolling around the Straits..AC-130 is reowned for the ability
to linger around the target area..

With 24 hour patrol...the plane could just provide air support for the crew
and chase the pirates away by firing warning shots...so simple

and for all we know..the joint patrols was for show only...

Johnston SG

Just so you did'nt put there "armed with 40mm M203"

Yes, C-130's are very hushable.
Even more hushable are the distinctive external difference between a normal Herk and an Spectre.

The answer to your question, if you wanna a mobile airborne disco, and you got the money, you can do whatever you want with a Hercules.

Hmm, your getting a bit over the top.
Thunderbolts?

Have you ever considered the possiblity of something else?
MI-24 Hinds.

nismoS132 SG

my friend's a sailor and he told me once his ship was boarded by pirates, they were so skinny and weak that a mere punch would kill them. all they wanted was food.

and then there're the times when you hear cling cling cling cling and you know some idiot's shooting an ak47 at you.

FiReDuKe SG

Gosh….Harpoons to take out sampans….dats like using a sledgehammer to wack an ant….too much of an overkill….I would think that perhaps something like the LCS or an armed hovercraft would do the job more effectively….the LCS and the hovercraft would have the speed to run down the pirates….on the other hand,they would have the capabilities to take out the suicidal martyrs at a distance….most importantly,there is no need kill the pirates to weed them out;after disabling their crafts,the embarked boarding party(maybe a cooperation with the PCG’s STS?)could take capture the pirates and/or terrorists who might provide valuable sources of information….all in all,a more effective way of battling the seaborne threat SG is currently facing….juz my 2 cents’ worth….

SibeiSuayKia SG

Hovercraft slow response....cause after a ship distress call...must rush there..

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