The U.S. Navy and Coast Guard have expressed interest in the 30-ft.-long Protector, which comes mounted with a machine gun and could be retrofitted for commercial use.
Robots versus pirates — it’s not as stupid, or unlikely, as it sounds. Piracy has exploded in the waters near Somalia, where this past week United States warships have fired on two pirate skiffs, and are currently in pursuit of a hijacked Japanese-owned vessel. At least four other ships in the region remain under pirate control, and the problem appears to be going global: The International Maritime Bureau is tracking a 14-percent increase in worldwide pirate attacks this year.
And although modern-day pirates enjoy collecting their fare share of booty — they have a soft spot for communications gear — they’re just as likely to ransom an entire ship. In one particularly sobering case, hijackers killed one crew member of a Taiwan-owned vessel each month until their demands were met.
For years now, law enforcement agencies across the high seas have proposed robotic boats, or unmanned surface vessels (USVs), as a way to help deal with 21st-Century techno Black Beards. The Navy has tested at least two small, armed USV demonstrators designed to patrol harbors and defend vessels. And both the Navy and the Coast Guard have expressed interest in the Protector, a 30-ft.-long USV built by BAE Systems, Lockheed Martin and Israeli defense firm RAFAEL.
The Protector, which comes mounted with a 7.62mm machine gun, wasn’t originally intended for anti-piracy operations. But according to BAE Systems spokesperson Stephanie Moncada, the robot could easily fill that role. “Down the line, it could potentially be modified for commercial use as well,” she says. Instead of being deployed by a warship to intercept and possibly fire on an incoming vessel, a non-lethal variant of the Protector could be used to simply investigate a potential threat.
A favorite tactic of modern-day pirates is to put out a distress call, then ambush any ships that respond. The unmanned Protector could be remote-operated from around 10 miles away, with enough on-board sensors, speakers and microphones to make contact with a vessel before it’s too late. “Even without the machine gun, it could alert the crew, give them some time to escape,” Moncada says.
The 55-mph Interceptor could become the long-range patrol boat of the future, while the jetski-size Sentry (inset) could help prevent a terrorist plot such as Al Qaeda’s attack on the USS Cole in December 2000.
Read more about the pirate-hunting robot boat and other stories from our friends at Popular Mechanics in an exclusive feature on Military.com.
– Christian
Took long enough to “consider” it.Now,if they could also just program & modify it to be a sub hunter,then we’d finally once again have anti-sub capabilities.I just don’t understand why the Sec.Def.s from Cheney to Rumsfeld killed off our anti-submarine capabilities.
unmanned systems are for warfighting. manned systems are for peacemaking. Will these systems be useful? Absolutely, but they fall short of filling all the roles the expectations have placed on them.
The Navy is about to learn the limitations of its unmanned systems strategy. They are excellent for conventional warfare stuff, but as we have learned in Iraq, it is hard to be the peacemaker without manpower at the point of interaction.
As I’ve blogged in the past, the Navy needs a new plan if they intend to follow through on their new Maritime Strategy.
Could turn the Perry class into a “drone mothership” and assign five or six to it to control the ocean.
This should be LCS’ job…but until they get that crap sorted out an unmanned coastal patrol capability is required.
I will throw out some additional scenarios
–Patrolling Iraq’s oil terminals, keeping away suicide boats.
–Convoy escort for oil tankers, keep away Iranian missile boats (like the ‘80s)
–Singapore buys them and uses them in the Straits of Malacca
–Ports in the US (Los Angeles, San Diego, Seattle, etc) use them for security duties
There’ll be a good market for these boats, moreso for the port mission and patrol of the straits. Expeditionary deployment or bluewater might be out of the picture for a while.
I agree with all comments below.
These craft should be purchased and integrated into the regular Navy
as quickly as possible as scouts, sub hunters, and as an extention of force protection.
They will be good for peacekeeping in the respect that if they find somthing wrong, humans will soon show up.
But these allow for our survalance on the sea to be greatly expanded. It will also give a buffer between our ships and suicide bombers.…
But knowing the Navy, I am sure they will buy these in ten years and use them poorly.…Or am I just being cynical?
They should consider making Q boats (used by the Germans during WWII) as an anti pirate platform. Running up against a heavily armed vessel would surprise the terrorists/pirates.
Howdy Boys,
Re: Charles idea of a FFG-7 (BTW, now that they’ve de-nutted the FFGs in removing the missiles, shouldn’t they be just “FF“s now?).
FFGs would make good motherships… as would any ship provided some money is thrown at them for conversion. A more capable platform would be an amphib with a well deck, enabling Mother to take her little ones inside when the weather gets nasty. It would also make life easier for the snipes who maintain/repair them.
However, what continues to puzzle me about this “new” problem with piracy is how this came to be a problem the U.S. is now expected to “do something about.“
First, piracy is anything but a new problem. Pirates have been around since man first learned to sail.
Second, dealing with piracy at sea is not the exclusive task of the United States Navy. The governing body for the subject is the International Maritime Organization, another eunuch child of the United Nations. The UN in the guise of the IMO passed the International Ship and Port Security Code several years back with the notion that it would serve to improve the safety and security of ships and ports worldwide.
The ISPS Code is an incredibly soporific bit of turgid prose. There are a bazillion requirements, standards, regs, and warnings. There are plans to be written, certificates and seals, inspections, re-inspections, fees, fees, fees, and bureaucrats a go-go. Every ship is required to have a Ship’s Security Officer, every shipping company is required to have a Company Security Officer, and every port is required to have a Port Security Officer. There are more than 150 IMO member nations with about 50,000 ships, 80,000 ports, and more than a million seafarers in those ships. More than 90% of the world’s trade carried in some part by sea.
But somehow dealing with the pirates is Uncle Sugar’s problem. Naturally.…
Though the IMO is quite good at byzantine regulation it is, by its own admission, completely incapable of enforcing ANY of its treaties and regulations. Well, it can always refer an offender to the UNSC for a stern talking-to and the threat of a real, honest-to-goodness use of the word “deplore” in a future, non-binding draft resolution (to be torpedoed by France or Guinea-Bissau).
The IMO (like its milquetoast progenitor) is most strongly against piracy and any sort of violence against ships. But it is even more strongly opposed to its members’ ships doing anything to whatsoever to defend the ship against said pirates and their rather uncivilized use of violence.
It will probably not come as any great shock to DefenseTech’s readers that the IMO believes that using force to repel boarders would only serve to make them rather more angry, crazed, and murderous. The IMO does however require a ship’s master to radio for help, keep good statistics and metrics about the pirates, serve them tea and petit-fours, and be sure to say “thank you” when they depart with the valuables and hostages. (I think there is also a codicile requiring the master to give them a ring and lower the Jacob’s ladder the next time the vessel sails through… but I could be mistaken).
Right!
Now, perhaps I am a touch grumpy and never quite learned to play well with others, but it seems to me that, perhaps, maybe, a ship and her crew might fare just the tiniest bit better if an alert watch was kept and the pirates’ boorish attempts to drop by for a coffee were met with several bursts of tightly grouped and well-placed 7.62 NATO (or better, .50 BMG) and generous round of grenades (pretty gros grain ribbons on the grenades let them know that the crew has put time and love into their preparations).
I understand the IMO’s fears about how this might upset the pirates and ruin a perfectly harmonious cultural exchange, but I can’t help but feel that sinking their boats and tying a fathom or two of chain to bodies before sending them down to meet Davy Jones wouldn’t hurt. But I’m no Martha Stewart! So what do I know about hospitality?
Cheers,
Chief B.
During WWII, blimps used as flying observation platforms against submarines sucessfully escorted 89,000 ships across the Atlantic and Med, without loss to surface action.
Now, update that.
Build totaly rigid shelled, AMPHIBIOUS, 200mph, ALL WEATHER, solar powered airships. (no blimps/no zeppelins)
The perfect interdiction vehicle. Able to linger for weeks on station, with unlimited range, enough speed to respond to events in a timely manner, faster than surface ships, able to carry offensive weaponry, or to carry a dozen security personnel…hover over a ship..and fast-rope them aboard.
Re: Roy on Pirates
Hell, I just thought they were a bunch of pansies.
And, BTW, it only takes a few boardings to permanently disabuse one of romantic daydreams about tramp steamers or life at sea as a merchant seaman. Poor, Filipino, semi-literate, and serf are descriptors that I recall most readily. Holds full of half-dead sheep en route to arab tables from Australia, ghee, rats, ill-tempered Russians, and the penetrating aroma of funk, fuel, and feces. I recall our boarding engineer asking for the ship to send over several cans of AFFF to float over the ankle-deep fuel oil in the bilge of the boarded dhow. And his subsequent request to choke the life out of the dhow’s engineer when he started pumping the AFFF over the side.
Not that all merchies are anywhere near so destitute by any measure.
In the end, Roy, I’m sure there’ll be some fabulously expensive “aid and recovery” package put together for the pirates when we finally break them. Which bring to mind crazy images of UN camel caravans on a relief mission to the Barbary coast to relief the suffering corsairs and to investigate the human rights abuses of Stephen Decatur, William Eaton, and Pressley O’Bannon.
Cheers,
Chief B.
This is an interesting article and I have seen a couple of the techno gadgets demonstrated. None have competed with a well trained crew embarked on a small high-speed craft. The amount of intel and coverage provided by a boat crew well exceeds the ability of these high tech “toys.“
My opinion? Save money buy another RHIB. Train the sailors. Get them on the water doing the job they are supposed to be doing. Gone are the days of ships hiding off the coast keeping a watchful eye with electronic sensors. We are facing smaller contacts, that many times are undetectable by electronics. Not to mention the amount of time and money it will cost to keep these craft running. After all, when was the last time you heard of anyone repairing a circuit board on a boat this size in a harsh mari-time environment?
Train to fight. Train to win. Sailors will always be the Navy’s best asset. Use them.
Ya know, as a former Infantry Grunt, walking “Point”…I’d have loved to have a mechanical “dog” out there in front of me.
How much were Americas’ Armed Forces ‘downsized after WWII? How ’bout Korea ? How ’bout Vietnam ?
IF you are afraid of being “put out of work”, consider you this: maybe you won’t need to zip as many of your “little guys” into body bags.…
Dum-dum!
Not a replacement for troops or sailors the unmanned equipment is an extension of the eyes and ears of trained troops. It reduces the risks of ambush during the initial contact thus allowing the main party to act rather than react to a threat. It is another valuable tool or weapon in the armory for use in the war against terrorism, read piracy.
I chose the Perry because it was small and because the Perry seems to be the one assigned to this littoral patrol stuff to begin with-the destroyer is already tasked with *enough* missions and doesn’t need another.
Drones should complement manned vessels-in this case you have the drones running defense and put the manned vessels on counter-attack or counter-boarding…at least until we get drones that can board vessels.
Hi
Here we are again at the brink of “machines rule”.
We never really thought machines could have and develop personalities. Most now have human intervention via some person trained to control things with PC game like joy sticks. On the other hand the machine Id’s and prepares to destroy via the push of the joystick “fire” button.
You would think with present day technology, satellites and all. We should be capable of tracking every piece of driftwood afloat in our oceans. Then as needed have a person controlling six drones at once on search missions locate and then destroy anything that is identified as a threat to peace. I believe this could be accomplished with cruse missiles
Yes! be positive the grunt has every piece of technology to date, that will bring him home in one piece. However, if we can preform highly acts of bravery with a machine, leaving the human injury statistics behind, why not? So what if a few go haywire and destroy an airliner or two, or get into the wrong hands and do there job on us.
Maybe the army should just go around and put friendly chips in good things. Then we could just launch a barrage of drones to destroy all else.
Maybe we should remake that movie where machines start talking to each other. Only use current technology?
Not so sure why these merchant ships cannot use the time proven method of flame throwers, or am I just too simple? When these pirate clowns come close enough, spray them with a little jelled gasoline and light up! Would definitely retard repeat offenders, and is quite simple to use.
Escort all the tankers! and send a sparrow to the pirate ships cheaper and good practice,wich makes perfect..
Escort all the tankers! and send a sparrow to the pirate ships cheaper and good practice,wich makes perfect..
I am going to ask my congressman and senator, what the heck we are doing there in the first place. Are we the navy, coast guard, army, for the whole world?
And they probably feel the same way about Keira Knightley,as far as getting held up by her as a pirate goes.
Question is “who clears the unmanned machine gun when there is a stoppage?”
It all goes to the idea of being POLITICALLY CORRECT. Don’t hurt these poor, misunderstood, prank playing boys.
Bull corn. Open fire and tear them a new butt hole a few times and even a donkey will learn.
Hey, anything that works! Piracy in that part of the world is nothing new. International Maritime has been aware of it for years ( read: Mayaquez). The Malacca Strait, Gulf of Thailand and the shipping lanes around Malaysia and Indonesia are rampant with these High-Seas thieves and Murderers. It is just recently that the US Navy has begun to assume the role of Shipping cops with the help of the Japanese. For years private sloops and yachts have been pirated in these waters with corrupt governments turning a blind eye. Now, international shipping piracy is hitting large companies/countries in the pocket book. World econonmies are at stake and international shipping lanes are being terrorized by a few bands of third world thugs. I say go for it, use whatever means necessary to put the “fear” into these creeps…Blow them out of the water…that will get their attention!
Sounds like a safe and resonable weapon, but why arn’t all ships equipped with IFF gear like airplanes so they can be identified as friend or for before they get within lethal range?
Merchantmen used to always be armed. In our current Global Society and in the corporate boardrooms it’s not –yet– acceptable for ‘civilians’, merchant marines, to be armed and responsible ultimately for their cargoes. This is truly strange. US Flagged ships are staffed by the U.S. Merchant Marine and all the officers are U.S. Naval Reservists. The corporations should be encouraged to begin self defense programs against these high seas gang bangers. A Fifty-Cal port and starboard, one on the fantail and the bow and four trained gunners mates would greatly diminish the issue. The very small price of required training and equipment vs the U.S. and other navies having to track these clowns down is a slam dunk winner on return on investment.
For that matter, what of Federal Sea Marshalls. Former or active duty Spec Ops guys could ride these ships in known pirated routes, holding training for the crew and ready to coordinate “Repel Boarder” actions.
I love the idea. I am retired Navy, and sailing around the world on my own boat now. I miss FFG 5 the Richard L. Page, The Thomas C Hart, and the Peterson, but now guys when you answer a distress call you may be saving the gonads of one your own. So that is why I hope you will think it is the job of the US to protect those crazy yachters. Over half of us are Americans, and the best of us are Navy.
Fair winds and following seas. Kill a pirate for your buds.
Yes, we need to police the worlds oceans and make them safe for world commerce!
The USA should organize an international collition anti-pirate force adequate to the job and deploy it immediately wherever piracy is evident — worldwide.
It should be equipped with adequate numbers of personnel and forces including ships, airships and submarines as appropriate to perform the mission. These forces should include the US Navy.
The mission should be to stop all piracies worldwide by finding, identifying and destroying all pirate vessels and killing all pirate personnel at sea.
Also, the anti-pirate force should attack and destroy all known pirate ports and other support assets vigorously from afar.
After stopping piracy in its tracks, the mission would be to continually resist and prevent piracy over future time. A permanent anti-pirate force that can mobilize immediately to inderdict and disrupt pirate activities worldwide.
Ask for a UN resolution but act without one if necessary. Cooperate with other nations: Japan, NATO, China, Korea, Taiwan and others but do not be held back for lack of resources. Use our own US Navy and marines as tha main force!
There is no need to occupy pirate vellels, merely destroy all pirate assets. Of course one must be sure that the identified pirates are the actual pirates. Use the best intelligence resources that can be brought to bear and use good judgement.
However, don’t hesitate to destroy the pirates assets no matter how innocent they might seem to be or how protected by foreign governments they seem to be.
Use approprtate overwhelming force to eliminate the pirate problem. Do it aggressively and proudly!
Also insist that cargo ships have a minimum of self protection ability to qualify for anti-piracy protection.
If necessary set up an international court to hear piracy cases and execute the guilty pirates.
Im glad the little sissy navy is finally doing something. Let them worry about Pirates While the ARMY and MARINES worry about the War. Good Job Navy
As a Brit ex-Grunt, I’m glad the US Navy can be relied upon to intervene in the commercial World’s best interest.
No one else will.
No one else has got the ‘bottle’.
God Bless America
We’d be lost without you.
JoeF
Id add Hidden Guns & add some rockets, rocketlaying mines & rocket fired harpoon hooks to jam pirate escape boats.
Jam pirates Comm gear./
& Id deploy them in pirate waters or sail Concealed as Yachts etc
See 007 movie THUNDERBALL.
Yacht splits apart to reveal 2,3 USVs.
But hide in Cargo ships for quick Launch.
Id tripke the Range & Speed using same engine.
Weapons to add:
MiniGun
40mm cannon
20mm cannon
M60 MG
50 cal MG
Rotory shotgun
Rockets.
mini missiles
Mines
Torpedoes in tubes (10).
& EW array.
Nice.
Why not just bring back privateering and hire merchant marines to go out and collect the pirates booty. It proved useful 250 years ago perhaps now would be a great time to try some old tricks. In the end it would save money more than hiring merc’s, while deterring actual criminal acts of piracy. Simple rule you hijack a ship or its cargo and you get hijacked dead and then the privateers get your boat and some of the cargo.
Why all this high tech equipment to deal with an old problem. During WWI the British developed Q-ships. A U-boat would surface to sink a lone merchantman with gunfire rather than expensive torpedoes. As the U-boat drew near some bulkheads on the merchantman would be lowered revealing heavy guns. The out gunned U-boat either withdrew or was sunk. Let these pirates feel the power of an old 5.38.
Morning Boys,
For my good friend “joe” who has emerged from the paint locker to post a comment: Go pack sand. Not sure how you’ve missed it, but the beloved USN and our little brothers and sisters in the USAF have been in country and in the fight for some time now. Convoy escort, PRTs, SEALs, JTACs, brig detainee ops, riverine and intracoastal patrol, oil rig & port security, MIO, and Embarked Security Teams. (Probably missed all kinda AF stuff that SMSgt Mac will likely correct shortly.) Now, son, go back in the paint locker and huff a little more formula 150.
Cheers,
Chief B.
P.S.: If I’ve undermined anyone’s human worth, made anyone feel inadequate, or otherwise unfairly introduced facts or reality into anyone’s day, then I will try do be more sensitive in the future.
I just left an Oceanographic operation that for years carried AR-15s, shotguns etc. and trained often. In recent years, UNOLS, the guiding consorteum for American research ships that ply the third world’s seas, deemed that any weapons on board were more of a threat to themselves! So now they train without weapons, and instead follow naive UNOLS guidline training procedures to repell pirates with fire hoses, door locks,and dialog. Bring it on Blackbeard — wet t-shirt contest, if you’re tough enough!
Put some of those machines guns like they have on those choppers. They are hell on wheels.
All I got to say is get out of my way..
Theirs not a any-body in their right minds that would go up againest that.
Hu-RAH
One idea could be tp have commercial shipping carry an Apache helicopter & crew on their helipad. The US Gov’t could charge the companies for the service. In case of trouble, the Apache could patrol ahead of the ship or sink pirate gunboats. Also, a razor wire entanglement at the stern could make a boarding pirates life more difficult.
All I can to say is Chief B needs to run for president. The only solution that makes any sense is to arm the merchant ships and let them defend themselves. Even with the USN involved they can’t be everywhere. It’s time the rest of the world starts to stand up and act like Americans, take care of your own problems the simple way. If somebody tries to steal your shit… kick their ass.
Dear Old Crusty Chief!
Couldnt agree more with your sentiments, wat the world need is more honest no bs polticians who have the measure to commit and deliver on all fronts, and not just the ones in the news headlines.
It is amazing how some senior enlisted mentioned an idea very similar to this at least a decade before the USS Cole attacked. I can remember a senior officer once told me when I first donned my kahki uniform. Now when you talk, they will hear you and listen. B.S. too many senior officers walk around all knowing. Kudo’s to those who have listened after our shipmates were killed, I am sure nearly a decade later this was an officer’s idea. Better late than never!
Gunner
There isn’t a pirate problem. There is a law problem.
As long as every anti-pirate action can be labeled a violation of human rights and reviewed in international courts the nations of the world won’t let their navies do very much.
Right now the pirates have to be caught almost in the act and the level of proof is set very high.
Once pirates have control of the ship they can’t be attacked because that endangers the crew. Or the cargo is too valuable, etc.
Every decade the restraints on the navies grow and every year so does piracy.
Pirates find another line of work when they can and will be hanged at sea. It will not be necessary to catch every single one.
Why doesn‘t the Navy reinvent the COAST GUARD?Answer the Gunnersmate can clear the weapon!The Coast Guard has this act covered but ideas and even scuttlebut can sometimes be helpful and save lives (of the innocent).Hanging Pirates from the Yardarms sounds like an option,some enlisted men have fared less.