Mini battleships threaten world’s navies

Press, 16 January 1979, Page 12

Mini battleships threaten world’s navies

By

ANDREW WILSON

in London

When a small Egyptian patrol boat sank the Israeli destroyer Eilat with a Russian-built Styx missile in October, 1967, the world became aware that conventional values in sea war were changing. Today there are 750 fast missile boats (F.M.Bs) in service throughout the world, of which 150 are with the navies of the Warsaw Pact countries. Although most displace less than 500 tons, each can do as much damage as a broadside from an 8-inch gun cruiser during World War 11.

The Arab States in the Mediterranean will soon have as many as 77 F.M.B.s between them. Libya alone will have 41. The new situation has given birth to a new reference book — Brassey’s “Fast Attack Craft” — published in London by the oldestablished publishing house of Brassey, which works in conjunction with the Royal United Services Institute for Defence Studies. In the foreword the editor,

John Marriott, points to the history of the Mediterranean as a danger spot for the West: “One wonders how the United States’ Sixth Fleet would fare if an attack by the combined Arab boats in the Mediterranean were mounted against it.” The Sixth Fleet would almost certainly answer this proposition by saying that its air power can be deployed against attackers over a sufficiently wide area to prevent their concentration. Nevertheless, armed with a combination of long-range anti-ship missiles and wireguided torpedoes capable of sinking targets more than 12 miles away, F.M.B.s are likely to become the main craft of all but the largest navies in the future. Marriott echoes a not insignificant body of naval opinion when he questions the slowness of governments such as those of Britain and France to equip their navies with F.M.B.s: “It is surprising

that Britain has no armed fast attack craft at all and France has only just commissioned its Trident class.” Such craft, he argues, would have an important role in patrolling the English Channel and the Mediterranean.

The Russians, by contrast, have invested in a considerable number of F.M.B.s, although Marriott says: “It is far from clear what is the reasoning behind this ‘(Russian) policy, unless they are intended as escorts for military convoys forcing their way from the Baltic to the open sea, or to seize the Dardanelles.”

One theory is that in the North Sea the Soviet fast attack craft would be used from Norwegian bases after the overrunning of Norway. Brassey’s book covers all kinds of fast attack craft including corvettes, hovercraft and hydrofoils. It examines their weapons, their radar, their communications and their tactical deployment in wartime.

—O.F.N.S., copyright.