France may sell cutting edge navy ship to Russia
source: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091123/ap_on_bi_ge/eu_russia_france_navy_ship
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- HowdyDo
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A cutting-edge French warship sailed into St. Petersburg Monday to show off its capabilities to potential buyers in the Russian navy, whose pursuit of an amphibious assault capacity is frightening some neighboring countries.
Russia's once-mighty navy was severely degraded after the fall of the Soviet Union and it currently has no big ship with the power to anchor in coastal waters and deploy troops onto land.
Russian officials announced this year that they were planning to make their first arms deal with a NATO country by buying a French vessel like the Mistral, a 23,700-ton (21,500-metric ton), 980-foot (299-meter) vessel able carry more than a dozen helicopters able to haul hundreds of troops directly onto enemy territory.
The head of the Russian navy has said that a Mistral-class vessel could put as many troops in Georgia in 40 minutes as the Russian Black Sea Fleet took 26 hours to land during the nations' August 2008 war. Moscow declared the Russian-allied breakaway Georgian territory of Abkhazia an independent nation after the war and sent thousands of troops there. Russia, Georgia and Ukraine all have Black Sea coastlines, as does Abkhazia.
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remanns
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CLASS STATS-
Name: Mistral
Builders: Brest arsenal and St-Nazaire dockyards
Operators: Marine Nationale
Preceded by: Foudre
In commission: December 2005 - Present
Building: 1
Planned: 3 or 4
Completed: 2
Active: Mistral, Tonnerre
General characteristics
Type: landing platform helicopter
Displacement: 16,500 tonnes (empty)
21,300 tonnes (full load)
32,300 tonnes (with ballasts)
Length: 199 metres (650 ft)
Beam: 32 metres (100 ft)
Draught: 6.3 metres (21 ft)
Installed power: 3 Wärtsilä diesels-alternators 16 V32 (6,2 MW) + 1 Wärtsilä Vasaa auxiliary diesel-alternator 18V200 (3 MW)
Propulsion: 2 Mermaïd electric motors (2 × 7 MW), 2 5-bladed propellers
Speed: 18.8 knots (35 km/h)
Range: 10,800 kilometres (5,800 nmi) at 18 knots (33 km/h)
19,800 kilometres (10,700 nmi) at 15 knots (28 km/h)
Boats and landing
craft carried: 4 CTM (chaland de transport de matériel)
alternatively, 2 LCAC (Landing Craft, Air Cushion)
Capacity: 59 vehicles (including 13 Leclerc tanks) or a 40-strong Leclerc tank battalion
Troops: 900 (short duration)
450 (long durations)
150 (serving as operational headquarters)
Complement: 20 officers, 80 petty officers, 60 quarter-masters
Sensors and
processing systems: DRBN-38A Decca Bridgemaster E250 navigation radar
MRR3D-NG air/surface sentry radar
2 optronic fire control systems
Armament: 2 x Simbad systems
2 x 30 mm Breda-Mauser guns
4 x 12.7 mm M2-HB Browning machine guns
Aircraft carried: 16 heavy or 35 light helicopters
Aviation facilities: 6 helicopter landing spots - 2 years ago
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remanns
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remanns
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The French will be French. (America has a similar problem with its arms pimp habit).
- 2 years ago
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remanns
