Quote:
Originally Posted by kool maudit
Side note: wouldn't you like to see something like this built in and docked at Halifax, and flying the Maple Leaf? This is the Visby corvette, the world's first fully stealth attack ship, built right here in Malmö.
I am increasingly of the view that these things matter.
We did the Halifax frigates in the '70s, but that was quite a while ago now.
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Our National Shipbuilding Program is an attempt to address the bolded issue.
As for the Visby, well its a nice inshore craft, lots of problems integrating the armaments, no organic helicopter. Our navy is a blue water navy and we need multipurpose frigates to be able to carry out the multitude of duties and responsibilities that the GoC demands of the RCN.
We did have a vibrant warship building program in the 50's and early 60's which produced various classes of ships we called the "Cadillacs" due to their luxurious accommodations for the crew at the time.
These ships brought in new designs such as a rounded bow to counteract icing and a pre-wet system for transiting through a nuclear fall-out area. Canada also pioneered the operations of large helicopters on small deck ships. An idea that our allies thought was impossible.
We built a bunch of these ships in batches that allowed us to upgrade the capabilities rather cheaply.
Restigouche Class
Chaudiere
Gatineau
St. Croix
Restigouche
Kootenay
Terra Nova
Columbia
Mackenzie Class
Mackenzie
Saskatchewan
Qu'Appelle
Yukon
St Laurent Class (converted from a DDE to a DDH)
St. Laurent
Fraser
Saguenay
Skeena
Margaree
Assiniboine
Annapolis Class (first purpose built aircraft carrying destroyer for the RCN)
Annapolis
Nipigon
At the same time we built the Avro Jetliner the first passenger jet aircraft in NA
And then there was the famous Avro Arrow, which was a marvel of engineering that started to be designed in March of 1955 and rolled out of the production facility in October 1957 an amazing 31 months later!
Then Sputnik happened, Canada decided that medicare and social services were more important than having a large military. The engineers from AVRO went to NASA and the CAF unification put a death knell on our warship building industry.
Those were heady days for a nation riding an unsustainable high (?) caused by our performance in WWII. If we spent more energy encouraging and building our regions up instead of screaming how stupid our brothers and sisters in Western/Prairie/Central/Atlantic/North of 60 are maybe we could reach those heady heights again?