On the 9th of October, 2023, the Public Accountability Committee (PAC) declassified their report on the much-maligned Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) programme.
Navy to receive last ship in 2029
The report revealed that the Navy will only receive the last ship in 2029 instead of the original projection of 2022, a seven-year delay. In layman's speak, you only receive your Samsung Galaxy Note 22 phone that you booked in 2022 in 2029.
In techno-babble, the equipment that Boustead had bought but yet to build into the ships will already be obsolete even before the ships go for their sea trials. This single point beats the very purpose of needing to procure the LCS in the first place, i.e. having state-of-the-art, highly capable combat platforms for our Navy sailors to defend our sovereignty over an increasingly contested South China Sea (SEA), which ironically, has the same LCS initial in Malay.
Only Five
The following disturbing point from the PAC report is that they mentioned that the Navy will only receive the fifth and last ship in 2029. The PAC statement more or less affirmed the speculation that the government had reduced the number of ships from six to only five.
That means at any time, if one ship is out for maintenance or resupply, the platform's readiness will reduce by 20%.
Increasingly Contested Waters
Malaysian territorial waters and Economic Exclusive Zones (EEZ) facing the South China Sea are increasingly under threat. Despite the Hague's 2016 decision that declared none of the South China Sea contested 'islands' are water features that could extend the sovereignty of any claimant's claim, the temperature over the South China Sea continued to simmer with the COVID pandemic providing the only temporary respite.
China's Nine-Dash-Line underscored their claims over part of our territorial waters and EEZ, with the nearest point about 80 kilometres from Bintulu. But they are not the only potential threat. A powerful Vietnamese Navy to challenge us in the same area. On the Northeast front, the increasingly strengthened Philippines Navy would not only contest the same waters but may one day also be strong enough to challenge their claims over Sabah.
That said, the threat is not purely from China alone. The ASEAN neighbours' claim indeed complicates the ability of the body to come up with a united front to stave off China's claim.
Ageing Fleet
If we only talk about a couple of ageing ships that need to be retired, the situation would be overblown. Only some of the Navy's current platforms can sustain high-intensity modern conflict. Only two, the Lekiu class, already almost 30 years in service, are missile-capable. Similarly, the two Kasturi class corvettes can launch French-made Exocet MM40 anti-ship missiles. But the six newer Kedah class, while capable of using a missile system, are not equipped with missiles due to the misguided FFBNW operational concept. All four Laksamana class no longer carry their Italian-made Aspide and Otomat Mk 2 missiles.
Other Challenges
The Navy has two other key operational areas.
Strait of Malacca
The first is the Strait of Malacca, from Singapore to Pulau Perak. The busiest strait in the world, the threats here come from piracy. Once a bane, piracy here is currently under control. Should both the Malaysian and Indonesian Navy fail to control the piracy threat, this might result in the US Navy pushing their fleet to implement anti-piracy measures here.
Ambangan Laut (Ambalat)
Both Malaysia and Indonesia claim the area. Several confrontations had occurred in the past. Malaysian Navy vessels nearly collided with Indonesian Navy vessels in the area. The situation only cooled down via diplomatic channels.
However, there are rumours that the Anwar administration has relinquished Malaysia's claim over the area. The current administration is tight-lipped on this matter, and since the rumours mainly come from the opposition, it might be wise to put this aside.
Solutions
There are three possible solutions to the current impasse.
Getting Second-Hand Vessels
Getting second-hand vessels is the fastest way for the Navy to return to operational capacity. However, we have now returned to a Cold War status. The best quote on this came from Singapore's Foreign Minister, Vivien Balakrishnan, who said that the post-World War 2 peace dividend is over in his speech in March this year. The war in Ukraine triggered many nations to restart building their militaries. With US-China relations on the rock, it is unsure if even the US would have excess military vessels to be retired.
Buying New from Overseas
The government is looking at this approach based on the current development, with Turkish shipbuilders as the primary target. However, buying new vessels at the moment is also challenging. The same risk also loomed over this option.
On the same note, even if we buy the vessels from a Turkish shipbuilder but contract the building to BNS, the same issues will recur. BNS derived the LCS design from the French Gowind design, and previously, the Navy procured the Kedah class from BNS, derived from the German Meko 100.
The Ukrainian Approach
The Ukrainian Navy is practically nonexistent as their Black Sea bases fell at the beginning of the Russo-Ukraine war. Despite having no operational ship today, they managed to sink the Russian Navy capital ship, the Moskva, and seriously damaged several other Russian Navy ships, including a Kilo-class submarine. So bad that the Russian Navy had pulled their naval platforms away from the frontline.
The Ukrainians succeeded using land-based or air-launched antiship cruise missiles and drones.
The much larger South China Sea at 3.5 million square kilometres might dwarf the Black Sea at only 436,402 square kilometres, but the area that we need to defend is only our territorial waters and EEZ.
There is only one hitch. We are not in an active war. The Ukrainian area/access denial strategy can only be achieved in wartime. Applying this tactic in peacetime can be construed as a threat of war. The tactic would also mean the Navy not patrolling in the area, and some parties might construe it as relinquishing territorial sovereignty over the area. And suppose we try to contest the claims at the International Court at the Hague. In that case, we will lose the sovereignty claim by not exercising our control over the area, a lesson we learned the hard way in the Pulau Batu Putih / Pedra Branca island issue.
No Easy Solution
There's no easy solution to this matter. The current administration needs to look into this issue to find ways to fix it.
Danny Liew is a content creator under the Newswav Creator programme, where you get to express yourself, be a citizen journalist, and at the same time monetize your content & reach millions of users on Newswav. Log in to creator.newswav.com and become a Newswav Creator now!
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