Another reason why the US needs to build some serious new bigassed icebreakers

Maritime News
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and quit building useless effing LCS’s and JHSV’s and other popgun stoopid Navee ships

[B]Cold, Cold War: Putin Talks Tough Over US Arctic Rivalry[/B]

ABC News By REBECCA BLUITT

Russian President Vladimir Putin said this week that U.S. military capabilities in the Arctic Circle leave his government little choice but to maintain a strong foothold in the frigid north, where tensions between the former Cold War adversaries in recent years have heated up as the polar ice thawe

During a meeting with students in Moscow on Tuesday, Putin was asked whether Russia and other countries might loosen their grip on Arctic territory for military exercises and exploitation of natural resources in favor of environmental preservation.

The Russian leader replied that the United States hasn’t slipped off the ice shelf and implied that his country’s national defense priorities will continue to outweigh conservation efforts.

“Experts know quite well that it takes U.S. missiles 15 to 16 minutes to reach Moscow from the Barents Sea,” Putin said, according to the Associated Press.

His comments came on the heels of a recent renewal of U.S. attention to the Arctic.

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel laid out the Pentagon’s revised Arctic Strategy at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia last month.

The U.S. policy blueprint calls for “building trust through transparency about the intent of our military activities and participation in bilateral and multilateral exercises and other engagements that facilitate information-sharing.”

But the Russian president’s statement suggested suspicion of American intentions in the region, and possible wariness that the U.S. is not being as forthcoming as it has pledged to be.

A Hagel aide said that Russia should adopt a cooperative policy.

“The Department of Defense Arctic Strategy recognizes that changes in the Arctic landscape create an opportunity for nations to work together through coalitions of common interest,” said Pentagon spokesman Carl Woog. “We will work together with Arctic nations to ensure that the region remains peaceful and free of conflict.”

Over the last several years both nations have increased their respective military presence in the Arctic, including U.S. naval and Russian air force operations.

Putin’s recent comments indicate uneasiness with U.S. military activity so close to Russian borders.

Putin’s mistrust of U.S. nuclear-powered submarines’ proximity to Russian borders is fueling Russia’s professed need for a strong military presence in the Arctic, Hans Kristensen, Director of the Nuclear Information Project at the Federation of American Scientists, told ABC News.

But Kristensen discounted the likelihood that Navy subs operating outside of the Barents Sea would have any real impact on any hypothetical use of U.S. nuclear power.

“Such a launch is technically possible but U.S. missile subs are thought to operate further back in the Atlantic,” Kristensen said. “Putin’s use of such a scenario to keep Arctic territories is flawed because they would not prevent such a launch, which would most likely take place in international waters.”

With many experts saying that global warming is expediting the melting of the Arctic icecaps, newly created water routes have opened up a possible treasure trove of commercial wealth to northern nations in the form of oil, mineral, and natural gases. There has been competition among countries for Arctic usage rights since the 1950s, but the accelerated melting of Arctic glaciers in recent years has resulted in the resurgence of a Cold War-like scramble reminiscent of the United States-Russia moon landing rivalry.

Both the United States and Russia have insisted that there will be no direct conflict between the two nations regarding the Arctic region. But Putin’s worst-case missile scenario suggests indirect conflict over Arctic occupation reminiscent of a bygone competition.

Kristensen called it “an unfortunate example of [Putin] thinking about geopolitical affairs in outdated Cold War terms.”

That EMMEFFING ex Soviet KGB agent ASSHOLE needs to be stepped on HARD!

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Calm down C.Capt. All Putin is saying is National Defense trumps environmental concerns.

The location of missile platforms is meaningless. Though a missile launched from the Artic can hit Moscow in 16 minutes, it would only take 6 more minutes for one launched from a silo in Kansas. The Ruskies have similar capability so the philosophy of mutually assured destruction still applies. No one can win a nuke war.

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we still need to build those icebreakers and stop building overpriced aluminum cans!

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[QUOTE=c.captain;125668]we still need to build those icebreakers and stop building overpriced aluminum cans![/QUOTE]

On that we can agree.

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Hey Canada, you can be 51-60. If we just make it official and take Canada, that would be the first step to upping our presence in the arctic. The athabasca oil sands wouldn’t hurt either.

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I was playing with a vintage “marksman repeater pistol” I found in my basement today… About equal to the foolish aluminum navy ships of today. Popgun for sure!

Nuclear icebreaker, a dozen of em. With missiles and torpedoes and other stuff though.

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Personally, I’m against all kinds of warmongerings and Arctic arms races, and can’t really think of a worse weapons platform than a polar icebreaker, but I guess arming the icebreakers and transferring them to the Navy is the only way the US will manage to build new polar-capable tonnage within my lifetime. The price will of course triple from the current estimates (making the ships about nine times as expensive as what an equivalent ship should cost), but who cares - it’ll still cost less than an aircraft carrier or one of those fancy stealth destroyers!

One of the potential problems I can see with “armed naval icebreakers” is that such vessels would be less likely (and probably less capable) of performing the primary task of icebreakers: escorting other ships. While the capability could still be there, how likely it is that a naval vessel would start towing a merchant ship through the ice field instead of doing… well, naval stuff?

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[QUOTE=z-drive;125675]Nuclear icebreaker, a dozen of em. With missiles and torpedoes and other stuff though.[/QUOTE]

INCLUDE a GREAT NUMBER OF HIGH CALIBRE NAVAL GUNS FOR NO OTHER REASON THAN TO LOOK EFFING FRIGHTENING!

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Yes! The idea is not to create war in the arctic, but that is the only way to get the US to spend money on a ship! None of the sissy tincan popgun stuff through…wwII style guns!

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fresh evidence of Vladimir the Impaler’s Arctic Powergrab

The Arctic threat

Capt. Max Hardberger

December 19, 2013

A convergence of climate change, political pressures, economic opportunities and technological advances has brought a new security threat to the shores of North America, this time to the far-north regions of Canada and Alaska.

Thinning pack ice, the increasing demand for hydrocarbons and cargo transportation and military opportunism are about to open the Arctic Ocean to operations that were unthinkable in the past.

With Russia’s huge fleet of muscular icebreakers, an Arctic coastline twice as long as that of the rest of the world, and with a leader apparently determined to restore Russian aggression to Soviet-era levels, the country is poised to take advantage of the opening of sea lanes and oilfields in the Arctic for both commercial and military purposes.

It’s been 50 years since U.S. and Russian submarines first began to patrol the Arctic under the ice, breaking through here and there to establish temporary bases. Without territory to claim, neither could assert control, although a Russian submarine did plant a Russian flag on the seabed at the North Pole in 2007. Now, Russia is positioning itself to extend its grasp of the Arctic from bases along the Siberian coast.

In a Sept. 14, 2013, article, RT.com reported that Russia has made its intentions in the region clear. Army General Arkady Bakhin, Russia’s Defense Minister, said in the article that the military airfield on Kotelny Island would become operable in October and would become the Russian Air Force’s main logistical hub in the region. “We have come, or rather permanently returned, to where we belong, because it is originally Russian land,” Bakhin said.

Russia watchers have taken notice of the country’s new attention to the region, although Western policymakers seem to be asleep at the wheel regarding this development. A Sept. 30, 2013, article on valdaiclub.com, a website devoted to Russian military topics, said that “Western experts have often described Russia’s Arctic policies as expansionist, aggressive and even jingoistic, or as [a] return to ‘gunboat diplomacy.’ ”

The Canadian Press reported on Aug. 19, 2013, that Russia is 50 years ahead of Canada in terms of infrastructure along the northern sea route. The article said that Canada has no Arctic commercial ports, mapping is so poor that cruise ships have run aground and captains must use old Soviet-era charts to supplement Canadian ones. Also, the Canadian coast guard’s six icebreakers are not available to accompany routine commercial voyages. Last year, according to the article, 421 commercial vessels entered Russian Arctic routes, compared to 61 that entered the Canadian Arctic.

The danger presented by this situation is not just to the Canadian economy. Alaska is vulnerable to Russian military threats in the region, and any expansion of Russia’s military control in any of the world’s oceans, especially under its current hardline government, is an existential threat to U.S. interests. It’s in our national security interest to develop the Alaskan Arctic coast and assist Canada in developing its own coastline in this strategically important region.

The 2007 planting of a Russian flag at the North Pole may have been purely symbolic, but that symbolism can only be ignored at our peril.

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[QUOTE=c.captain;125743]INCLUDE a GREAT NUMBER OF HIGH CALIBRE NAVAL GUNS FOR NO OTHER REASON THAN TO LOOK EFFING FRIGHTENING![/QUOTE]

Why have an expensive ice-breaking hull when you can fire 8-inch shells out ahead of you and clear the path that way?

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[QUOTE=PaddyWest2012;126526]Why have an expensive ice-breaking hull when you can fire 8-inch shells out ahead of you and clear the path that way?[/QUOTE]

First, that doesn’t work. Second. even if it did it would be too expensive.

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Lets build a couple nuclear powered icebreakers, but they don’t need big weapons.

We spend almost as much on our military “defense” as all the other nations in the world combined. Most of this money is wasted on what amounts to corporate welfare. Its about time the rest of the free world started paying its fair share of the expense of containing the aggressive military expansion of Russia, China, North Korea, Iran, etc. This is a threat to Europe and Asia, not to North America. Why should we pay for it al while all of our so called allies get a free ridel?

The only thing keeping Russia from absolute bankruptcy is its oil and gas sales to Europe. It cannot afford to attack Europe. The major thing driving the Chinese economy is their sales to Walmart. China cannot afford to attack us, their economy would collapse overnight if we stopped buying their crap at Walmart. If South Korea, after 50 years of massive US subsidies and protection cannot hold off the starving North Koreans, let the North Koreans have them. Let’s get out of their way and let Israel take care of the Iran nuke program.

Have you looked at you pay stubs lately? We are paying far too much in taxes and getting very little benefit in return from all these unnecessary military expenditures for too many weapons we don’t need, that often don’t work anyway. Look at the great job Lockhead Martin is doing with the TWIC card program in the name of security. What makes you think they do any better with military programs?

Yes, we ought to have a couple of nuclear powered ice breakers to facilitate development of our Arctic natural resources for our own benefit. But they don’t need weapons. I can just imagine what Lockhead Martin would charge for special “Arctic Ready” guns that probably would not work anyway in Arctic temps.

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[QUOTE=tugsailor;126533]Yes, we ought to have a couple of nuclear powered ice breakers to facilitate development of our Arctic natural resources for our own benefit. But they don’t need weapons. I can just imagine what Lockhead Martin would charge for special “Arctic Ready” guns that probably would not work anyway in Arctic temps.[/QUOTE]

actually, I don’t believe any of the Russian icebreakers are armed but I am sure it is designed into them to be so if it is every needed.

However, I am now and have always been a member of the “gun club” and wholeheartedly believe in the doctrine of the greatest broadside of the maximum caliber!

.

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[QUOTE=c.captain;126534]actually, I don’t believe any of the Russian icebreakers are armed but I am sure it is designed into them to be so if it is every needed.

However, I am now and have always been a member of the “gun club” and wholeheartedly believe in the doctrine of the broadside of maximum caliber![/QUOTE]

Ah yes, a man after my own heart… But let’s face it, that douche-nozzle you admitted to voting for twice hasn’t got it in him to go toe to toe with the ruskies. As big of a whore as he is, he’s still no Kennedy.

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Just for the record when I suggested (sarcastically) they be armed it was that it seems the only way the gummint goes for shipbuilding.

Nuke icebreaker with science facilities, require cadets and all civilian jobs, no civ-mar stuff just regular old employees. Only way to go I’d say.

Never will happen though.

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What’s up with the warmongering? Are you people that paranoid, that you think Russia is going to get you? A nation who uses more on the military then the rest of the World combined?

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[QUOTE=c.captain;126534]actually, I don’t believe any of the Russian icebreakers are armed but I am sure it is designed into them to be so if it is every needed.[/QUOTE]

Russian Border Guard has some armed light icebreakers (3,400 tons; 2 x 76 mm, 2 x AK-630 CIWS), but they are old, there’s only a few of them and they have only limited icebreaking capability. Just like the USCG Polar class and Healy, none of the Russian polar icebreakers are armed or fitted with mounts for any kind of heavy weapons. However, in a major conflict they could probably be fitted with containerized systems for e.g. convoy air defence along the Northern Sea Route.

I don’t really see any use for a heavily armed icebreaker. You can deliver the same “punch” with an air-launched anti-ship missile or even a long-range cruise missile.

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[QUOTE=Kraken;126552]What’s up with the warmongering? Are you people that paranoid, that you think Russia is going to get you? A nation who uses more on the military then the rest of the World combined?[/QUOTE]

YEA! and alot of that wasted on STOOPID tin toy ships that even the GAO says are overpriced and useless for their supposed mission.

If you are going to spend the money, then spend it on something impressive! A 500’ A6 classed nuke icebreaker is needed to just show Putin he will NOT own the Arctic!

Btw, the Canadians should pay half!

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[QUOTE=PaddyWest2012;126535]Ah yes, a man after my own heart… But let’s face it, that douche-nozzle you admitted to voting for twice hasn’t got it in him to go toe to toe with the ruskies. As big of a whore as he is, he’s still no Kennedy.[/QUOTE]

and wasn’t it Bush who looked into Putin’s soul and saw a “good man” in there?

For God’s sake man…leave the partisan politics out of this

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Us Patriots fans have beef with Putin over the ring incident. Enough said, all politics aside.

Big Nuke icebreaker, build one already.