DCNS Chief Blames UK for Carrier PostponementBy pierre tran
Published: 15 Sep 18:24 EDT (22:24 GMT)
PARIS - If British industry had shown more willingness to cooperate with France on new large aircraft carriers, the French government might have found it harder to postpone its decision on whether to build a second carrier to the Charles de Gaulle, said DCNS Chairman Jean-Marie Poimboeuf.
DCNS had worked hard to find a way to cooperate with British industry over the CVF for the U.K. Royal Navy and the Porte-Avions 2 (PA2) second carrier, Poimboeuf told journalists Sept. 15 at the start of a press trip ahead of the Euronaval trade show starting Oct. 27.
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But the French company had found no such willingness to cooperate on the British side, he said. "The political decision to postpone the second carrier would have been more difficult if there had been industrial cooperation," he said.
President Nicolas Sarkozy has decided to postpone a decision on whether to build a sister ship to the Charles de Gaulle to 2011 or 2012. That leaves hopes alive in the French Navy that the service will get a second carrier, which it believes is needed when the Charles de Gaulle goes in for its next extensive refit around 2015. That will immobilize the ship for around 18 months.
Poimboeuf said the further off a launch decision is made, the harder it will be to cooperate with Britain on a common carrier program.
The French defense budget is under severe strain as programs which have been under development for years are now entering the mass production and delivery stage. The white paper on defense and national security has reset priorities toward intelligence and reconnaissance, but it still maintains that force and power projection capabilities are needed.
A second French industry official said that because Paris has not launched its carrier at the same time as London, France has not had to pay the outstanding money for French access to the British design. The last tranche of a total of 150 million pounds ($269.2 million) was payable if France used the CVF's detailed design for the PA2. Perhaps only one-third of the total payment has been made, the second industry official said.
On the white paper's recommendation to cut the number of FREMM multimission frigates to 11 from 17, Poimboeuf said DCNS is in contract renegotiations with the Délégation Générale pour l'Armement (DGA) over the prices agreed for the order of a first batch of eight ships. That first contract had been based on a total buy of 17.
"Discussions are on the table," he said. "We hope to finalize by the beginning of next year."
The unit price of FREMMs, based on the full 17-strong purchase, was 388.5 million euros ($553.1 million), totaling 8.51 billion euros.
DCNS and the DGA hope export sales of the FREMM will bring down the unit cost of the ship, which was co-developed with Italy.
Poimboeuf said, if on top of the 11 French orders, DCNS signs foreign sales contracts for four to six FREMMs, the company will get back to the original pricing of the 17.
As long as DCNS maintains a production rate of one FREMM in under 12 months, the business case was sound, he said.
A third industry official said the sale of a single FREMM to Morocco had barely made money and was mainly a political gesture after Rabat rejected the Rafale fighter from Dassault Aviation and unexpectedly bought F-16 aircraft from the United States.
Adm. Jacques Launay, assistant chief of naval operations, said the mission of the French Navy extends to coast guard and maritime security rather than just military operations. That means maintaining a permanent naval presence around the globe, but planners are also thinking about a new generation of ships, perhaps a lighter patrol frigate, other than first-rank frigates such as the FREMM.
The white paper has recommended the Navy maintain a fleet of 18 first-rank frigates, composed of FREMM, two Horizon and five La Fayette ships.
Jacques Lajugie, the DGA's director for international development, said defense exports are a top priority of the French government, a view expressed by Sarkozy himself.
"It's very important for the trade balance and French industry," Lajugie said.
France hopes to sell the FREMM to Greece, which has bought German-built U 214 conventional diesel-electric submarines from HDW.
Source
http://www.defensenews.com/story.php?i=3725780&c=SEA&s=TOP
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