SHAH ALAM: Plan B, Whither the LMS? As it appears that the LMS contract will be honoured, PM Tun Mahathir Mohammad yesterday announced that a committee has been set to look into the government processes.
The Investigative Committee of Administrative Affairs, Procurement and Finance will be headed by former auditor-general Ambrin Buang. The first ministry Ambrin has been tasked is the Defence Ministry, Mahathir says.
It is not known yet whether the committee will investigate the LMS deal though several quarters have already asked that the deal be reviewed or cancelled.
On 23 March 2017, BHIC signed two formalised a contract worth RM1.17 billion with the Ministry
of Defence to supply four units of Littoral Mission Ships (LMS) in collaboration with a partner shipyard in China. All three signings were witnessed by Dato’ Seri Hishammuddin Hussein
Despite the talk that the LMS contract is continuing there is no word yet on when the steel for the first ship of the class will be cut. It was supposed to be last month but it has not been done yet.
The delay does not bode well for a project already losing its lustre due to the connections with the previous administration apart from the calls for it to be cancel of course. Despite the newly setup committee, I think the LMS’s fate will hinge on what the government do with the ECRL project. If its cancelled or even reviewed, the LMS is doomed. Not a bad thing, really.
— Malaysian Defence
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View Comments (30)
My suggestion is we built the LMS like the new training vessel model. Cheaper or effective i do not know but i think we already have the know how and expertise to built one. It should be try.
Personally I hope that the CSIC LMS68 would be cancelled. Probably to replace that with a credit line of the same value (USD272 million) from China to buy other military equipments.
So no loss of face from both parties.
Am a twit when its naval matters. But why the reservations regarding the LMS?
Reply
The cost and the fact that we cannot put any Western military equipment on board so we will be stuck with China made ones.
Yea..Safe the money. Why not buy the 11 fearless class pv from the sg rsn? They are consider very young ships.
Its better not to cancel the LMS, as a diplomatic gesture as we are in the midst of deferring/ canceling ECRL and Bandar Malaysia project may also be canceled. Just go on with it but no more orders. Although we are in territorial dispute with the Chinese, they are also our 2nd largest trading partner..so it a delicate balancing act.
@ tomahawk
In all probability, a lot of weapons and equipments such as the 76mm oto melara main gun from the fearless class already canibalised and transferred to the LMV ships. So what you get is just an empty hull. The expensive part of the ships is the equipment inside.
Not sure wut equipmen bougt new or transfer to lmv. But if u wanting good to go hull and 11 sship 2 go..esp stop gap for cople of year...
I heard the first steel cutting for the LMS is supposed to be held this July at the Chinese shipyard, is it possible to even terminate the project at this late hour without incurring heavy fines from contract violations as likely the case with Singapore HSR, not to mention jeopardizing RMN's long-gestated effort of transformation. Renegotiation on pricing and contract terms maybe, complete termination will be a serious affront to the Chinese government, after all the announcements to review (& terminate) other mega projects involving China. Btw, I thought RMN Chief said that the LMS will have a mixture of both Chinese and Western equipment? The Thai navy's Chinese-made frigates seems to have no problems being fitted out with Western weapons and equipment. Just an odd suggestion, despite the mismanagement and technical/build quality problems encountered in the previous Kedah-class project, now that these issues have been more or less overcome, should the LMS be cancelled, why not just continue built more 'improved' Kedah-class, given the shipyard would be more experienced now?
@kerberosWXIV
I think the Kedah class and the LMS are in entirely different classes. From the financial perspective the LMS is approx USD60M (RM240M), whereas the Kedah costs more than 1.2B (!) due to all the issues encountered. Plus the fact that all the additional cost on the Kedah class was borne by the government.
Since you mentioned this, I'm thinking of why don't we standardised on the Damen 1800 as 1, it costs less than the LMS, 2, it has the tonnage of the Kedah! We're talking about a bare bone OPV here, and what is so great about the Kedah class that a Damen 1800 1/8th the cost can't do?
Hornet,
Main difference is weight, i.e. displacement. Even though the DAMEN 1800 is a slightly smaller ship compared to the KEDAH class, it is heavier due to use of mild steel instead of high tensile steel. This impacts on speed and also payload capacity and capability. The DAMEN 1800 could be 'navalised' but then maybe better from a cost perspective to use the DAMEN 2400 SIGMA off the shelf design as the basis.