Georges Leygues ASW ships

[uk 75]

The French Navy mirrored the RN Type 22 with its own ASW escort programme

Georges Leygues-class frigate - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

Comparisons are interesting and there were even 2 AD derivatives.
The French built three large ASW destroyers in the 70s.

Tourville-class frigate - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

These were closer to the Spruances in size and role.
I am posting them here to see if we can tease out any unbuilt versions or analogues

 

[orlovsky]

The story probably starts with the C65, Aconit. Towed sonar, Malafon, no Helo. 5 units planned, but the MN realises that this is a dead end.

The Tourvilles started as C67. Wiki says the program was started after the problems with Aconit; but in 1967 Aconit had not even been started while Tourville was laid down in early 1970. The more interesting question is probably why Aconit did not get cancelled.

C67 used steam plants and was quite big, carried 2 Lynx. The C70 Leygues class was to my understanding about putting the same package into a smaller codog ship. The armament is pretty similar, unless I am missing something. And its seems planning started already when the first Tourville was laid down.

I am not aware of any variants. Only that the AA derivative Cassard class went through many iterations on paper, but I have not seen anything specific.

 

[Archibald]

And you British poked fun at the name, calling it "George Legs"

Then again, during the Gallipoli campaign, one of these horrible Jeune Ecole French pre-dreads was named "Henri Quatre = Henri IV" and you rebranded it "Angry cat".

ROTFLMAO

More seriously, I only heard bad words about Aconit. It was indeed a dead-end, hence the C67 / 70.

According to this blog, Aconit fatal flaw was, it couldn't carry an helicopter.

Troisième échec du Grand programme de vaisseaux

Blog proposant souvent de suivre les programmes anciens, nouveaux de la Marine nationale et parfois de faire de même pour les marines étrangères.

lefauteuildecolbert.blogspot.com

It also underperformed with a troubled machinery.

French frigate Aconit (F65) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Malafon ASW system wasn't very efficient, and pretty overweight at 3000 pounds.

 

[uk 75]

France's equivalent of the Type 81 and 21 patrol frigates were the 17 ships of this class

D'Estienne d'Orves-class aviso - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

The only Leander, Rothesay and Whitby (Type12) equivalent were these 9 ships

Commandant Rivière-class frigate - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

The emphasis on the nuclear sub and carrier programmes as well as de-coupling from NATO in the 60s made the MN escort force very different from the RN.
However, since the 90s France unlike the UK built new and effective escort ships.

Floréal-class frigate - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

La Fayette-class frigate - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

FREMM multipurpose frigate - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

As a result of these ships and the two Project Horizon destroyers the situation between the MN and RN has almost been reversed, with the RN having to rely on an ever reducing number of T23s and 6 barely operstional T45s.

 

[Hood]

I am not aware of any other projects related to the C65/C67/F70 series.

There were some proposed ships that never got built. I've seen 1975 naval book references to plans for 24 F70s, 18 ASW and 6 AA ships. These were soon drastically cut back.
Even during the mid-1980s they were talking of an eighth F70 (a fourth F70/2 ship), but this too did not materialise. Of course the second pair of the F70/AA ships were halted for Aster to come along and were later dropped.

I would hesitate to pair up like-for-like between the RN and the MN, but the F70 in many ways would probably have been what the Ikara frigate/destroyer might have been had it been built alongside the Type 42.

 

[uk 75]

The three C67s always looked like ASW versions of the two Suffrens. I have waterline models of both classes. The F70 seemed more like the Type22.

 

[Archibald]

France has also an immense naval area to patrol. A collection of islands all over the world from Canada to Caribbean to Brazil to Pacific to Madagascar... each with a 200 miles zone around it. Make no mistake, the fleet is stretched pretty thin. The patrollers are antiquated, for a start.

I've seen 1975 naval book references to plans for 24 F70s, 18 ASW and 6 AA ships. These were soon drastically cut back.

That was the overambitious Plan Bleu pushed by Amiral de Joybert. The many escorts you listed, plus a couple of PH75s that were to replace old Arromanches and Jeanne D'Arc eventually.
Plan Bleu fell victim of the post first oil shock economic hardships.

 

[EwenS]

And you British poked fun at the name, calling it "George Legs"

That actually dates back to at least WW2 and the La Galissonniere class cruiser of the same name.

But the French also like a play on words. I was reminded last night the when Roy Jenkins was President of the European Commission between 1977 and 1981 he earned the nickname Le Roi Jean Quinze.

 

[Archibald]

Brilliant ! nowadays it would be that infamous meme - Lerooooooy Jeeeeenkins !

 

[Archibald]

As far as air defence go, there has been (broadly speaking) four generations
- MASURCA ships
- Tartar ships, T53
- Tartar ships, Cassard-class frigates
- ASTER ships (Horizon)

Main issue was these ships sometimes lasted waaaaaaay too long and the missiles ended utterly obsoletes. This was the case with the MASURCA ships (lasted well into the 90's if not the 2000's) and Tartar was even worse.

I was completely incensed when I red the two Cassards missile systems were taken from... scrapped T-53s !

By contrast the Horizons are terrific warships, but this time it is their numbers that is all wrong. Not enough of them.

Add to that the Crusaders that lasted way too long, and Foch that was never replaced... air defense of the French fleet was never up-to-date.

Maybe our admirals should read Tom Clancy masterpiece - Red Storm Rising "Dance of vampires". It would scare the sh*t out of them. Or not.

 

[JohnR]

I always liked the Suffrens and Tourvilles particularly the later which I felt were extremely elegant. I've wondered about a batch two variant with the steam plant replaced with gas turbines - as they were around the same size of T - 22 batch 2/3, the standard Olympus/Tyne combination would have been adequate. I also wonder about replacing B gun turret with a second Crotale launcher making it double ended like the Type 22.

How did Malafon compare to Ikara, how much space was taken up by the system.

 

[Archibald]

Some details here > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malafon

Much like the MASURCA, it was big and cumbersome. Then again, so was Sea Slug - and that Ikara, I still have no idea whatsoever what it was, but from what I've red here, members seems to have mixed feelings about it...

 

[orlovsky]

Main issue was these ships sometimes lasted waaaaaaay too long and the missiles ended utterly obsoletes. This was the case with the MASURCA ships (lasted well into the 90's if not the 2000's) and Tartar was even worse.

I was completely incensed when I red the two Cassards missile systems were taken from... scrapped T-53s !

The Tartar T47s were upgraded to RIM-66B, if I read that right. The system on the Cassards was RIM-66E.

Masurca also got upgardes, but no idea how good they were.

The Crusaders, well... that was just plain odd.

 

[uk 75]

Germany, Italy and the Netherlands as well as France were all able to update their single arm Tartar launchers to use Standard missiles. I assume the radars were updated as well. Italy also updated its three Terrier equipped cruisers to use Standard. Not sure whether Masurca was upgraded on the three French ships. I think it was.
The UK simply traded Seaslug for Seadart.

 

[orlovsky]

Masurca Mod 2 and 3:

Masurca

"- Le Mark 2 Mod 3 : autoguidé, ... Suivant une trajectoire de navigation proportionnelle, son autodirecteur semi-actif le guide vers la cible illuminée en permanence par un puissant faisceau électromagnétique provenant du bâtiment porteur."

 

[uk 75]

Italy does rather well with its more limited budget. No carriers or nuclear subs but modern cruisers, destroyers and frigates well suited to the Mediterranean. It does not develop an area SAM but does have its own Sea Sparrow (Aspide), excellent guns and the Otomat SSM.
The Georges Leygues ASW ships are matched by the Italian Lupos and Maestrales.

 

[JohnR]

Well they do have two carriers (Cavour and Guiseppe Garibaldi; to be replaced by Trieste) admittedly small but the equal of the RN's Invincible's. Also they are part of the consortium that has developed the Aster system and EMPAR radar.

 

[uk 75]

Well they do have two carriers (Cavour and Guiseppe Garibaldi; to be replaced by Trieste) admittedly small but the equal of the RN's Invincible's. Also they are part of the consortium that has developed the Aster system and EMPAR radar.

Sorry I was covering my fave period of the Cold War. The Garibaldi like the Invincible was an ASW carrier rather than a catapult "proper"carrier like Foch, Clemenceau and Charles De Gaulle.
Cavour is closer to a light fleet carrier as it will carry F35s.. I argued some years ago that the RN should have built 3 similar ships instead of the QEs. But thats a whole thread you can read under CVF.

 

[JohnR]

Well they do have two carriers (Cavour and Guiseppe Garibaldi; to be replaced by Trieste) admittedly small but the equal of the RN's Invincible's. Also they are part of the consortium that has developed the Aster system and EMPAR radar.

Sorry I was covering my fave period of the Cold War. The Garibaldi like the Invincible was an ASW carrier rather than a catapult "proper"carrier like Foch, Clemenceau and Charles De Gaulle.
Cavour is closer to a light fleet carrier as it will carry F35s.. I argued some years ago that the RN should have built 3 similar ships instead of the QEs. But thats a whole thread you can read under CVF.

I agree with you about the three smaller carriers. The QE's represent a more aggressive foreign policy, however the respective governments we had since the QE's were ordered have been unprepared to pay for the other components that are required. We have insufficient AA escorts, ASW escorts, General Purpose escorts and SSN.

 

[Hood]

A 1971 image of an original Tourville-class destroyer.
The most obvious difference is the large radome forward, presumably holding a DRBV22A air surveillance radar as fitted to Anconit?