Vietnam receives more Pohang ships with stronger weapons configuration?
The Egyptian Navy has just received from South Korea a Pohang-class multi-purpose frigate of the latest generation with almost intact weapon configuration.
On information pages about the Middle East military situation, images have been posted about the Egyptian Navy officially receiving a Pohang-class light frigate donated by its Korean partner.
It is known that the original ship is the Sokcho with the registration number PCC-778, the most modern 5th generation (Flight V) of the Pohang class. It is armed quite strongly and comprehensively with 4 Harpoon anti-ship missiles, 6 Mk 46 light anti-submarine torpedoes of 324 mm size along with 2 Oto Melara Compact 76.2 mm guns and 2 Dardo rapid-fire guns of 40 mm size.
After the Egyptian Navy received it, the ship was given a new number, 1000. From the outside, it can be easily seen that although the missile launchers and torpedoes are gone, it still retains all four cannons and a guidance radar.
|
| The Pohang-class frigate Sokcho (PCC-788) is now in service with the Egyptian Navy. |
Thus, it can be seen that the Egyptian Navy has been greatly favored by the Korean side when providing it with a Pohang-class frigate, the most advanced variant and the youngest in service. The ship joined the fleet from 1991 until the end of 2017 when it was retired.
In addition, when compared with the PCC-761 Gimcheon of Flight III of the Pohang class that Korea transferred to Vietnam and is currently numbered 18, our ship only has 1 Oto Melara Compact gun in the front, 1 Dardo gun in the back and an additional 20 mm Sea Vulcan gun in the front.
In addition, the Vietnamese warship (and the one Seoul donated to the Philippine Navy) were both built in 1987-1988, much older than the Sokcho ship.
|
| Vietnam's 18th ship is the Gimcheon (PCC-761) of Flight III of the Pohang class. |
It is unclear why the Egyptian Navy retained almost all of its weapons configuration before handover by South Korea, however, through this event we can hope that in the future, if the Pohang ship is received, it will have a similar weapon system to the Egyptian ship.
In the near future, the Republic of Korea Navy is expected to retire its entire Pohang-class fleet and donate them to Seoul's partner countries in Asia and Africa.
After receiving ship 18, Vietnam expressed its desire to receive a number of more Pohang ships to replace the old Petya II/III ships. Even if they were only used as patrol gunboats, it would still be a significant addition to the force.
