TSAMTO, September 9th. The issue of Project 636 submarines, which Vietnam is very interested in, will be discussed at a meeting of the Russian-Vietnamese intergovernmental commission in October.
This, according to RIA Novosti, was announced by Dmitry Shugaev, Director of the Federal Service for Military-Technical Cooperation (FSMTC) of the Russian Federation.
"We have scheduled a meeting of the intergovernmental commission in October... All issues, including those related to naval equipment and the submarine fleet, will be discussed in detail there... The 636 project is something that the Vietnamese side is very interested in," Vesti news agency quotes D.Shugaev as saying.
CAMTO Reference
As part of the fundamental modernization of the country's Navy, Vietnam has become one of the largest customers of Russian naval equipment.
As of the early 2000s, there was an obvious imbalance in the structure of the Vietnamese Navy due to the fact that much less attention was paid to the construction of the submarine fleet than to surface ships. Vietnam turned to Russia for help in creating a submarine fleet.
The contract worth about $1.8 billion for the supply of six Project 636.1 diesel-electric submarines equipped with the Club-S missile system to the Vietnamese Navy was signed on December 15, 2009 during a visit to Russia by Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung. The total cost of the agreement, including the creation of the necessary infrastructure for operation, is estimated at 3.0-3.2 billion dollars.
As part of this program, Vietnam received a loan from Russia for the construction of not only a submarine base, but also for the purchase of various types of surface ships.
It should be noted that the submarine forces have become a new structure within the Vietnamese Armed Forces.
Russia completed the transfer of six Project 636.1 diesel-electric submarines to Vietnam in January 2017. In accordance with the approved schedule, on January 20, the Dutch transport vessel Rolldok Sea arrived at the Vietnamese port of Cam Ranh with the sixth and last submarine HQ-187 "Baria-Vung Tau" project 636.1 on board.
The lead diesel-electric submarines HQ-182 "Hanoi" (Ha Noi) were delivered to Cam Ranh on December 31, 2013. The act on the successful completion of technical tests and the transfer of the submarine was signed at the Admiralty Shipyards on November 7, 2013. The official acceptance ceremony of the diesel-electric submarines into the Vietnamese Navy took place on April 3, 2014.
The second diesel-electric submarine of the HQ-183 Ho Chi Minh series left St. Petersburg for Kaliningrad on January 19, 2014, where it was loaded onto the Dutch transport vessel Rolldok Sea and left for Vietnam on February 3. The diesel-electric vehicle arrived in Cam Ranh on March 19, 2014. The technical acceptance certificate was signed on January 16, 2014, and the Vietnamese Navy was commissioned on April 3, 2014.
The third diesel-electric submarine HQ-184 Hai Phong was laid down on March 28, 2012, launched on August 28, 2013, and the technical acceptance certificate was signed at Admiralty Shipyards on December 4, 2014. The diesel-electric submarine departed for Vietnam on December 14, 2014 and arrived at Cam Ranh port on January 28, 2015.
The fourth submarine, HQ-185 Khanh Hoa, was laid down on October 23, 2012, launched on March 28, 2014, and entered factory sea trials in the Baltic Sea on August 21, 2014. From St. Petersburg to Vietnam, the submarine aboard the transport vessel Rolldok Sea was shipped to the customer on May 14, 2015 and arrived at its destination on June 30, 2015.
The fifth diesel-electric submarine HQ-186 Da Nang was laid down at Admiralty Shipyards on July 1, 2013 and launched on December 28, 2014. The diesel-electric submarine HQ-186 Da Nang completed two weeks of sea trials on May 28, 2015 and returned to the port of Svetly in the Kaliningrad Region on June 8. The diesel-electric submarines were shipped to the customer on December 16, 2015. The HQ-186 diesel-electric submarine arrived at Cam Ranh port on February 2, 2016.
The sixth submarine, HQ-187 Ba Ria-Vung Tau, was laid down on May 28, 2014, and launched on September 28, 2015. On December 19, 2015, the diesel-electric submarine began sea trials. Like the previous submarines, the sixth submarine entered service with the 189th Brigade of the Vietnamese Navy's submarine forces, stationed at Cam Ranh base.
