HMAS Whyalla (J153/B252) wearing her British Pennant Number, c. 1944
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Brunei defense budget surges by 32%, with focus on intel, targeting By Gordon Arthur
CHRISTCHURCH, New Zealand — Brunei, a small Southeast Asian sultanate bordered by Malaysia, is significantly raising its 2024 defense budget amid concerns over how to protect its territory.
In the coming fiscal year, the government has allotted 796.3 million Brunei dollars (U.S. $594 million) for defense. This represents a 31.6% jump over last year’s allocation of 605.2 million Brunei dollars.
This rise in military spending heavily surpasses the 5.5% increase in overall government outlays during the fiscal 2024/2025 time period.
When the budget was discussed at the Legislative Council on March 2, the secondary defense minister, Halbi bin Mohammad Yussof, warned Brunei faces a complex and unpredictable security landscape. (The country’s sultan serves as the primary defense minister.)
“The Ministry of Defence and Royal Brunei Armed Forces are actively working to improve intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition and reconnaissance, where a new system will be used in the near future,” Halbi said, without providing specifics. “Attention is also focused on the ability to monitor and detect underwater threats to ensure an effective response in maintaining the territorial integrity of Brunei.”
The International Trade Administration, which is part of the U.S. Commerce Department, notes opportunities for American defense contractors in Brunei, having updated this information Feb. 22.
“Brunei has stated its intent to acquire new defense equipment, including surface/maritime surveillance radar, airspace surveillance platforms, maritime patrol aircraft, fixed-wing transport aircraft, medium-range air defense systems, and related assets,” the organization’s website reads. “Military services may also be interested in non-lethal equipment, which may be procured through vendors registered with the Ministry of Defense.”
Brunei considers tensions in the South China Sea, where it and several other nations dispute territorial ownership, as a major security challenge. It also identified other threats in its 2021 defense whitepaper, including regional and global instability; terrorism, extremism and transnational crime; cyber and technological threats; natural disasters; and “the influence of major power dynamics in the region.”
“Tensions over overlapping claims, [and over] illegal fishing, and the security of sea lines of communication (SLOC) from those who seek to exploit internationally recognised laws, all have placed continued and growing demands on Brunei Darussalam’s security forces to secure and police its sovereign maritime borders and territory,” the document noted, using the formal name of the country.
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Brunei has already filled some maritime surveillance gaps. It received Insitu-made Integrator drones in 2022 and subsequently set up its first drone unit, No. 39 Squadron.
Furthermore, the Navy received two refurbished Fearless-class patrol vessels in 2023. Singapore donated these secondhand, 500-ton vessels.
Another important purchase in December 2022 was four Airbus C295MW tactical transport aircraft. The first two aircraft were commissioned Feb. 14, with the manufacturer Airbus saying they would “strengthen the country’s air capabilities, and can be deployed on a wide range of missions, humanitarian assistance and disaster relief operations, medical evacuations, noncombatant evacuations as well as search and rescue operations.”
In addition to new equipment, Brunei’s military plans to carefully husband its current assets.
“The replacement, upgrading and service life extension programs for capability systems and infrastructure will be done in stages based on the level of priority, before moving on to new acquisitions in the future,” Halbi said.
Gordon Arthur is an Asia correspondent for Defense News. After a 20-year stint working in Hong Kong, he now resides in New Zealand. He has attended military exercises and defense exhibitions in about 20 countries around the Asia-Pacific region.
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Elite Marine security team deploys to Haiti amid gang crisis By Irene Loewenson
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A Marine from the 1st Fleet Antiterrorism Security Team stands guard outside the U.S. embassy in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, in 2010 after a magnitude 7.0 earthquake hit the country. (Sgt. Richard Andrade/Army)
An elite Marine security team has deployed to Haiti because of a deteriorating security situation there, according to a defense official.
The fleet antiterrorism security team’s deployment to Haiti ― which is in the middle of a power struggle between gangs and the prime minister ― occurred sometime this week, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the sensitive issue publicly.
The Marines were deployed at the request of the State Department, according to the defense official. Marine Corps Times asked the State Department for further details Thursday and didn’t receive a response within a few hours.
Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry is struggling to stay in power as he tries to return home, where gang attacks have shuttered his country’s main international airport and freed more than 4,000 inmates in recent days.
Henry remained in Puerto Rico as of midday Wednesday. He landed in the U.S. territory on Tuesday after he was barred from landing in the neighboring Dominican Republic, where officials closed the airspace to flights to and from Haiti.
In 2023, more than 8,400 people in Haiti were reported killed, injured or kidnapped, more than double the number reported in 2022. The U.N. estimates that nearly half of Haiti’s 11 million people need humanitarian assistance, but the 2024 humanitarian appeal for $674 million has received just $17 million — about 2.5% of what’s needed.
On Wednesday, the U.S. embassy in Haiti urged Americans in the country to depart as soon as possible and said it would be on limited operations Thursday.
“Embassy operations may be further affected during the week because of gang-related violence and its effects on transportation and infrastructure,” the embassy said in the security alert.
The Corps’ fleet antiterrorism security teams, often known as FAST, are deployed around the world for limited periods of time to reinforce or recapture U.S. assets.
FAST Marines receive specialized training on noncombatant evacuation operations, close-quarters battle, military operations in urban terrain, convoy operations, shipboard operations and specialized security operations, according to a page on the Defense Visual Information Distribution Service.
The teams are part of the Yorktown, Virginia-based Marine Corps Security Force Regiment.
In 2019, fleet antiterrorism security team Marines embarked a U.S. merchant vessel to provide security as it transited the Strait of Hormuz, located between Oman and Iran.
In 2010, after a devastating earthquake struck Haiti, they were sent to assist the Marine security guards who already had been guarding the U.S. embassy in the capital Port-au-Prince.
At a press conference Wednesday, Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, denied that the United States was considering sending U.S. forces to Haiti.
Jean-Pierre said noted that Kenya had agreed to send police officers on a security mission to Haiti.
“So, that was recently signed, and that’s going to move forward,” she said. “But there is no plan to bring U.S. forces into Haiti.”
In 2021, President Joe Biden sent Marines from the Marine Security Guard Security Augmentation Unit to the Port-Au-Prince embassy “out of an abundance of caution” following the assassination of the Haitian president but insisted sending U.S. forces to stabilize the country was “not on the agenda.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Irene Loewenson is a staff reporter for Marine Corps Times. She joined Military Times as an editorial fellow in August 2022. She is a graduate of Williams College, where she was the editor-in-chief of the student
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Gone fishing: See how military divers recover an armoured vehicle from a frozen lake 7th March 2024 at 3:39pm
As British Army divers approach the end of an ice-diving course in the Arctic, they faced one last and rather large challenge – recovering an M113 armoured personnel carrier from beneath a frozen lake.
The task was taken on by 27 divers from five different countries, including soldiers from the Royal Engineers, as they reached the end of the specialist course led by the Norwegian army.
Before even attempting to recover the vehicle, personnel had to figure out what they were looking for and build a dive site on the ice – all before plunging into the freezing waters.
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Bataan ARG, 26th MEU Heads Home After 8 Months Deployed – DZIRHAN MAHADZIR MARCH 6, 2024 10:06 AM
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A bow view of the experimental stealth ship SEA SHADOW underway in San Francisco Bay.
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USS Iowa 1943
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Skull Island Tomahawk – A 45th Fighter Squadron Curtiss P-40N Tomahawk, “Lackanocki,” is seen refueling from an F-2 type servicing truck pulled by a Cletrac M2 high-speed tractor while at Funafuti Airfield, Nanumea, Gilbert Islands.
The 45th, formed at Wheeler Field, Hawaii Territory in December 1940, was decimated during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor a year later.
Reformed with newer P-40N “Sand” models, it deployed to the Gilbert Islands in November 1943, operating in turn from Funafuti, Abemama, and Makin Fields in the chain until it was recalled to Hawaii some 80 years ago this month in early March 1944– dating the above image nicely. Of note, the 45th FS during this period claimed the destruction of 11 enemy aircraft on 26 January 1944 near Aur Atoll in the Marshall Islands.
The 45th would remain in Hawaii for almost a year until February 1945, when, reequipped with late-model P-51 Mustangs to perform very-long-range bomber escort missions, it forward deployed to Iwo Jima in March 1945, where it finished the war escorting B-29s over Japan, a task that earned it a Distinguished Unit Citation.
The squadron lived on into the jet age, flying F-86s, F-100s, F-84s, F-4s, A-37s, and A-10s, the latter of which it has been pushing out of Davis–Monthan since 2009.
Of note, the 45th of the above Gilbert Islands period surfaced in the 2017 film, Skull Island, in which a 45th FS pilot, LT Hank Marlow (Will Brittain/John C. Reilly), parachutes in 1944 onto the uncharted island where a giant ape serves as the big banana and survives 29 years until an expedition arrives in 1973.
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How a Michigan Beach Town Became Home to a Highly-Decorated WWII Submarine
MUSKEGON, MI – An 82-year-old piece of storied World War II history has called the Muskegon Lake channel home since 1987, thanks to strong community support and the formation of a new museum.
The USS Silversides fought in the war from April 1942 to July 1945. Painted on the side of the ship like a tattoo are 30 Japanese flags representing the enemy ships the submarine sank during its 14 patrols. The submarine ranks third highest among all WWII submarines in ships sunk, today it is the nation’s most famous surviving WWII submarine.
The submarine was originally designed to run alongside a Navy fleet but when the U.S. fleets were depleted after Pearl Harbor, the submarine’s mission changed to “hunter killers,” said museum preservationist Matt Kervin.
Unlike modern-day submarines, the Silverside does not have a round exterior. Instead, the ship has a flat surface and looks similar to a fleet ship.
The USS Silverside was in the war from April 1942 to July 1945. Painted on the side of the ship like a tattoo are 30 Japanese flags representing the enemy ships the submarine sank during its 14 patrols. The submarine ranks third highest among all WWII submarines in ships sunk. Today it is the nation’s most famous surviving WWII submarine.
After WWII, the Silversides was brought to Chicago for training. After years of sitting in decay a team of volunteers helped restore the vessel. The submarine was moved to Chicago’s Navy Pier in 1979, but with the city wanting to revamp the pier, the submarine needed a new home.
In 1985, residents of Muskegon started a campaign to get the decorated submarine to their home port. In August 1987 that became reality as several boats helped escort the submarine to its permanent location in the Muskegon Lake channel.
Walking the length of the 312-foot vessel, visitors can picture different scenes of life at war, from the stacked cots next to torpedoes, the galley kitchen outfitted with a massive coffee tank, to the lights and levers of the control room.
People get a sense of how nimble and agile the crew must have been — especially the crew manning the elevated conning tower 36 feet up who would jump down the hatch and into battle position in 30 seconds.
However, they won’t envy the lack of privacy these men endured with only three showers and four toilets among them.
Today the Silversides serves as the centerpiece of the USS Silversides Submarine Museum located at 1346 Bluff St. in Muskegon.
The two-story submarine museum next to the vessel details the many adventures of the USS Silversides throughout World War II, its significance in battle and personal accounts from its crew. Also docked next to the Silversides is the USCGC McLane, a prohibition-era Coast Guard cutter, that is also open for tours seven days a week.
“We don’t want to cater only to the history buffs,” Executive Director Bethann Egan said.
“We want to make you curious about it afterwards. This isn’t a place you have to know something about World War II, you’re going to learn when you come here. You don’t have to be intimidated.”
The museum allows overnight stays for groups who want to fully immerse themselves in history. Groups up to 72 people can stay onboard, hang out below the water line and sleep next to torpedoes.
For more information about the museum and hours and admission, visit their website here.
©2024 Advance Local Media LLC. Visit mlive.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
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Back at sea for the first time in four and a half years is HMS St Albans – the penultimate Royal Navy frigate to undergo a massive overhaul.
The Type 23 warship left Devonport Naval Base today on the first stage of its regeneration to return to front-line duties later this year.
The vessel will spend the next few weeks flashing up its systems and testing improved/refurbished machinery in the Channel to ensure all the work that has been carried out is effective.
The ship’s 178-strong crew moved back aboard in mid-November, since when they’ve been working hand-in-hand with contractors and engineers from defence firm Babcock, which has overseen the entire refit program.
“Going back to sea is a huge milestone. Today is the result of a real team effort where Ship’s Company, Babcock, other specialist contractors, shore-based support organisations, Devonport Naval Base and even some people from other Devonport-based ships have come together to help us transition from engineering project back to being a warship,” said HMS St Albans’ Commanding Officer Commander Helen Coxon.
After nearly 20 years of constant service in the Atlantic, the Mediterranean and the Gulf, St Albans arrived in Plymouth in 2019 to begin preparations for the refit, known as the life extension (LIFEX) upgrade.
The upgrade will help carry the class of Duke-class frigate into the middle of the next decade, while their successors – the Type 26 City-class currently under construction on the Clyde – enter service.
Revamping the 23s have been a massive undertaking stretching back a decade. Work on HMS St Albans alone has demanded more than 1.2 million working hours by sailors, civilian engineers and shipwrights, software specialists and many more.
All four diesel generators were replaced, meaning the ship can produce more power, the main engines removed, overhauled, and reinserted—a complex engineering feat, and a first for the project team.
More than two dozen new pumps with four kilometres of pipework have been fitted, and some 10,000 square metres of paintwork refreshed – that’s the size of a football pitch.
All weapons and sensors have been upgraded, not least the installation of the Sea Ceptor air defence system which can provide protection to an area the size of Greater Manchester against incoming threats in the skies.
As a dedicated submarine hunter, the ship has been fitted with Sonar 2150 in place of 2050, which can detect underwater threats at greater range and is easier to operate.
After the initial trials in the Channel, St Albans will return to base for any necessary tweaks to the work carried out in refit, before starting the work-up to becoming fully operational again, which culminates with Operational Sea Training off Plymouth.
Just one Type 23 frigate is left to complete the LIFEX program: HMS Sutherland, which is currently in Devonport’s frigate refit complex.
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