JMSDF Discussion Thread

av8rmongo · Post by **av8rmongo** » Wed Aug 29, 2007 9:31 pm

Some eye candy for friends of the JMSDF. Theses were taken in Sasebo several years ago.

Murasame class

Abukuma class

Asagiri class

Hatsuyuki class

I'll try to dig out my picture of the Osumi model tonight.

Paul

paul · Post by **paul** » Wed Aug 29, 2007 10:43 pm

Great pics. Glad to know they are on our side.

chrisswim · Post by **chrisswim** » Wed Aug 29, 2007 11:17 pm

Well, any one ready for Harpoon? Want to use this fleet. Most of the ships are a little older. They have eight destroyers similar to Arliegh Burke class. Japan does have a little worry across the sea, CHINA.

Ben · Post by **Ben** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 2:21 pm

Hi Paul,

a big thank you!! The JSDF in general is one of my special interest themes

...

Best regards,
Ben

av8rmongo · Post by **av8rmongo** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 6:33 pm

Ben,

I'll post pictures of each of the "Other Guy's" japanese ships so you can see what they offer. Gimme til this afternoon and I'll have something up here.

Paul

paul · Post by **paul** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 7:11 pm

Paul, what kind of information do you have on the Chinese naval force? I know they stole our ageis software. Is there any indication the Chinese have been able to implement a comparable system?

China's military growth has got to be making Japan nervous.

av8rmongo · Post by **av8rmongo** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 7:35 pm

They get a lot of help from a lot of sources. The Israelis have had some pretty high profile dealings with them over the years and through a round robin effect the Turks are also involved. Add to that the purchase from Russia of the four Sovremenny DDGs in the 90s and they have made tremendous strides in improving capability. Reading the specs on the latest generation of DDGs they're producing they are very capable ships. My own personal estimate is that they have essentially skipped a generation capability. Where they used to be at least two generations behind they may be only one generation behind, maybe less. Its hard to tell from paper specs. Without a full shooting war you just never know.

The thing that impresses me about the Chinese is that its not really about the "force on force" matchup. They're building ships and planes etc. because you need that to be taken seriously and they'll need the experience and tradition of professionalism when they take over the role as the world's policeman. Their strategic writings are much more nuanced than the old days of human wave attacks. And I think their approached is much more balanced between political/economic moves and direct military actions. In many ways I think they may be doing to us what we did to the Soviet Union. A sleight of hand routine where they build more and more capable hardware forcing us to do likewise. But their real efforts lie in political approaches with neighboring nations that will ultimately make US presence in the region unwanted. With closer ties to Myanmar and Thailand in recent years they might actually be able to pull off a kind of Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere without ever firing a shot.

The real check on their power and expansion - the real startegic competitor is probably not the US or even Japan - its India. Large populations, growing industrial bases, growing technological bases, nuclear powers and they're both interested in the economic development (exploitation) of the expected gas/oil depsoits off Myanmar/Thailand. Hence they are both actively courting those two countries with economic and military assistance packages. The next 20yrs will be very interesting since both China and India are developing aircraft carriers and will probably end up with similarly sized fleets.

Paul

chrisswim · Post by **chrisswim** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 9:25 pm

Both India & China have had booming economies, which helps finance a lot of upgrades and research projects.

av8rmongo · Post by **av8rmongo** » Fri Aug 31, 2007 12:57 am

Here are some of the JMSDF ships offered on the market. I apologize in advance for the crudeness of some of these pictures. They were taken with the models sitting on my car seat, no tripod etc. I'm going to clean the mold flash before finishing the models' deck paint decals etc.

Here is the Osumi model as promised.

Here is Kongo in a darker primer.

Here is Haruna.

Here is Shirane.

Here is Hatakaze.

Here is Hatsuyuki.

Here is Mochizuki.

Here is Amatsukaze.

Here is Tachikaze.

Here is Asagiri.

The pictures don't do the castings any justice - then again neither did my paint job.

Paul

chrisswim · Post by **chrisswim** » Fri Aug 31, 2007 6:42 am

Paul, where did you get those Japanese destroyers?
I have a matching set of ship.

paul · Post by **paul** » Fri Aug 31, 2007 8:32 am

Got an itch today and went to the Chinese military site I have found. It looks like with the Russian help India (they do a great job of covering India) has developed some superb anti-ship missiles which have know been mounted on trucks. Also read that India plans to have several thousand T-90's by 2020. After reading Av8's post I can understand why China is concerned with India.

chrisswim · Post by **chrisswim** » Fri Aug 31, 2007 8:40 am

India was going to produce their own Arjun tank. But it will not get out of development stage. Pakistan bought 300 T-90's, so India had to counter that since the Arjun is not going to happen. I do not think that several thousand T-90's in the works. They have bought some T-80 or T-90s to counter the Pakistan tanks. If they got a 1000 T-90, I would be surprised.

Ben · Post by **Ben** » Fri Aug 31, 2007 1:53 pm

Moin Paul,

thanks a lot for posting the photos of the models!

chrisswim wrote:India was going to produce their own Arjun tank. But it will not get out of development stage. Pakistan bought 300 T-90's, so India had to counter that since the Arjun is not going to happen. I do not think that several thousand T-90's in the works. They have bought some T-80 or T-90s to counter the Pakistan tanks. If they got a 1000 T-90, I would be surprised.

This is OT here but I think referring to Pakistan you are talking about the Al Khalid MBT-2000 / Type 2000 MBT (the Pakistani version of the Chinese Type 90-II) - I would say that T-90 is a bit misleading here.
Pakistan also operates some T-80UD purchased from the Ukraine. India operates lots of T-72 and T-90 (from Russia and license built) but no T-80.

Nevertheless the Chinese are kicking out some good looking stuff at the moment

.
My favourite is their new LSD...

Kind regards,
Ben

paul · Post by **paul** » Fri Aug 31, 2007 8:42 pm

Here is an excerpt from one of the posts

In early October 2006, India Defence and papers in India reported that the Indian Army intends to acquire nearly 1,000 locally produced T90S 'Bhishma' main battle tanks by 2020, in addition to the 310 T90 MBTs already procured from Russia. Their belief in the continuing importance of armored shock and speed has led to an Army plan to have 21 regiments of T-90S and 40 regiments of upgraded T-72 M1 'Ajeya' tanks, leaving the 1.13-million man Army with a tank mix of around 3,800 T-90S and T-72s. Careful observers will note that India's problem plagued 30+ year long indigenous 'Arjun' tank program (and see further program history) is nowhere to be found in this mix; India Defence and other sources believe it has effectively been relegated to technology demonstrator status, though other reports continue to claim that 124 Arjuns will eventually be produced.

Here is the site www.china-defense.com

Not sure how accurate everything is but they do have quite a bit of Chinese military photos