The new US defense-budget plan includes funding for an a floating unmanned aircraft base that also could be used as a launching pad for commandos.
The vessel—called an “afloat forward staging base”—would be a platform that could be configured to carry and refuel small patrol boats, helicopters or pilotless aircraft.
It would also give the U.S. military the ability to stage a small strike force offshore—without obtaining a permission slip from another country for access to a land base.
Senior officials want to provide military commanders with affordable sea-base options without necessarily sending a big-dec k aircraft carrier and a full complement of escort
A defense official said the floating staging base was more like a freighter that would be outfitted for different kinds of missions, from countering mines to launching remotely piloted aircraft. It also could be used as a platform for launching commando operations.
USS Ponce in the Suez Canal
This possibility came to light when the Military Sealift Command posted a bid request “to retrofit the USS Ponce, an amphibious transport docking ship, on a rush-order basis.” The Ponce was set to be taken out of commission after operating for 41 years but now Navy officials say the conversion of the aging warship is moving along with unusual speed and they hope to be able to send it to the Middle East by early summer.
The official said that another option for the ship is a version of the Mobile Landing Platform, a logistics ship that is being built by General Dynamics NASSCO, a San Diego-based shipyard owned by General Dynamics Corp.
It isn’t clear what kinds of unmanned aircraft might operate from the ship. Special-operations forces in the Middle East have used the Fire Scout, a robotic helicopter, for surveillance operations in the Middle East. The Navy disclosed last year that two Fire Scouts had operated from a guided-missile frigate as part of an international task force fighting Somali pirates.
The sea base described in the Pentagon’s budget rollout has some historical antecedents. During U.S. military operations to protect Kuwaiti oil tankers from Iranian attacks in the late 1980s, the U.S. repurposed two oil platform construction barges, the Hercules and the Wimbrown VII, as bases for countering Tehran in the Persian Gulf.
Sources: The Washington Post, The Slatest