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Home Front: WoT
Navy Commissions Anti-Terror Force Unit
2006-02-03
IMPERIAL BEACH, Calif. (AP) - Six years after suicide bombers in an explosives-laden boat blew a hole in the USS Cole in Yemen, the Navy on Thursday commissioned its first active-duty unit with the job of thwarting a repeat of the attack that killed 17 sailors.

Naval Coastal Warfare Squadron Five will protect shipping lanes and U.S. forces overseas, defend harbors and provide port security with small, fast gunboats not seen since Vietnam. The squadron, expanding to 325 men and women, is expected to make its first deployment in 2007 to either Kuwait, South Korea or the Horn of Africa.
Interesting. I'd read somewhere that the Navy was looking for ways to use men who had tried out to be SEALS, or who were considered to be one step below the SEALS, in different ways. Is this one of them?
The squadron will deploy with a fleet of 18 aluminum-hulled boats equipped with machine guns and grenade launchers that can be loaded onto a C-17 transport plane and flown around the globe. In the water, they are capable of reaching speeds of more than 35 knots. Elements of the squadron can go ashore with a mobile sensor unit to provide surveillance of the operating area and relay communications.

Training scenarios include how to deal with a suicide bomber riding an explosive-laden Jet-Ski or in a fishing vessel, said Rear Adm. Donald K. Bullard, who oversees the squadron as head of a new Navy command for anti-terrorism and force protection.
Posted by:Steve White

#6  At first glance this looks mlike an ideal anti-smuggling/dope running/pirate counter force.
Spot a Pirate boat trying to board a vessel at sea, fly in the mini-PT's and swamp them for firepower.
Posted by: Redneck Jim   2006-02-03 13:46  

#5  Wow, and it only took six years!
Posted by: gromky   2006-02-03 11:33  

#4  This is odd to me. Our larger capital ships, such as aircraft carriers, already have 35 foot rigid inflatables (RIB's) that can act as pickets. But the navy security folks I've spoken to say they are never deployed overseas where they are needed because of political sensitivites. Now those conversations took place a couple of years ago, so maybe something has changed, but the Cole was old news then. I don't see what is different here.
Posted by: remoteman   2006-02-03 10:47  

#3  I suspect that this unit is experimental. That is, the Navy wants a large littoral fleet, capable of policing long distances of shoreline. The primary ships to do this are the 500-600 ton Streetfighter class, but at $90M a pop, not enough of them can be built to do the entire job. However, they can be used as heavy weapons platforms for a region of coastline.

But they need to be augumented with a lot of very small PT-boat style gunboats that could be modular and forward positioned for quick assembly, or flown in by plane; which would use a Streetfighter much like a "mothership".

One such "swarm" of boats could control either many miles of coast, or could police a heavily trafficked sea lane, deploy area denial mines quickly, and perform all sorts of other operations.
Posted by: Anonymoose   2006-02-03 09:47  

#2  Too short-legged a platform. DDG or similar (like USS Winston S. Churchill), a platform with more than a day's endurance, is much better choice.
Posted by: Bill   2006-02-03 08:04  

#1  first deployment in 2007 to either Kuwait, South Korea or the Horn of Africa.

Can I vote for pirate hunting around the Horn of Africa?
Posted by: trailing wife   2006-02-03 06:31  

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