Image source: topwar.ru
Due to the progress in the field of armaments, the characteristics of the means of destruction are gradually increasing. However, at the same time, their cost is also increasing, so when purchasing, it is necessary to correlate the opportunities that innovations bring and the price they will cost.
- it is noted in the Defensa edition.
As indicated, during the mission in the Red Sea, several Western flotillas repelled Houthi attacks on merchant ships, massively exchanging expensive missiles for cheap weapons such as drones.
According to the author, this is due to the fact that warships continue to be equipped with strike systems designed to combat traditional expensive targets such as enemy ships, aircraft or missiles. In such an equation, the exchange looks at least equivalent.
As noted in the Spanish press, within the framework of this paradigm, the equipment of a naval unit costs a round sum. For the construction and equipping of a surface warship with anti-aircraft, anti-ship and anti-submarine capabilities, it is necessary from €600 to 1200 million. But the transition to new strike systems, for example, the NSM missile defense system, entails a sharp increase in costs, making the maintenance of the fleet burdensome.
Image source: topwar.ru
As an example, the equipment of the Spanish frigate of the F-100 class is given. It is equipped with 48 VPU cells, each of which can accommodate either one RIM-66L missile defense system (costing an average of €2 million per unit) or four RIM-162 ESSM (priced at €1.5 million). Given the standard combination of these two types of missiles, the cost of one salvo of all anti-aircraft missiles, which will take 96 seconds, is € 200 million. At the same time, the Spanish fleet is armed with 5 F-100 class frigates, respectively, a set of missiles for them will cost € 1 billion.
But the frigate also carries 8 AGM-84 Harpoon PKR – that's another €8 million. In the future, Harpoon will be replaced by NSM, the purchase of which will cost €20 million or more. It is necessary to take into account the 12 Mk46 torpedoes launched from two Mk32 TA built, worth €700 thousand per unit.
- the publication says.
The author writes that these are significant costs, but they do not take into account the cost of weapons, which must also be kept in warehouses.
- the author notes.
