It’s the season for war in the Old Continent, and the Nordic countries are no exception, with the recent entrance of Sweden and Finland to NATO, to join founding members Norway and Denmark.
The Danish, in particular, have been seen as trying to flex their military muscle, going as far as conscripting women into the service.
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But as their military personnel and equipment started deploying around the world, the Royal Danish Navy is having trouble with two different episodes – one from today in the Baltic Sea, and one from early May in the Red Sea, but that was first reported today.
The failures are shinning the light on questions over the reliability of the ships.
To begin with, today an ‘activated but faulty missile launcher’ on a vessel triggered a closure of airspace and shipping traffic in the Great Belt strait.
Reuters reported:
“Denmark’s National Maritime Authority had earlier warned ships not to sail through the Great Belt strait, one of the world’s busiest sea lanes and the main maritime access to the Baltic Sea, due to the risk of ‘falling missile fragments’.
‘The problem occurred during a mandatory test where the missile launcher is activated and cannot be deactivated’, the military said in a statement.
‘Until the missile launcher is deactivated, there is a risk that the missile can fire and fly a few kilometers away’, the military added.”
Failures in real life battle are much more damning.
Now, if such an accident is bad enough during a naval exercise in European waters, just imagine how worse it would be in a real mission in the Red Sea, under attack by Houthi rebels.
Actually, you need not imagine that, because that’s just what happened on March 9, and we became aware today.
In a different Reuters report:
“A Danish frigate deployed to the Red Sea as part of a U.S.-led operation suffered malfunctioning of its weapon systems when attacked by drones operated by Houthi militants last month, the captain said on Thursday as the ship arrived in Denmark.
The failure, which until Thursday had only been reported by local defence media Olfi citing a confidential report by the ship’s captain, prompted the government to dismiss its top military official Flemming Lentfer on Wednesday.”
Defence Minister Troels Lund Poulsen said Lentfer failed to inform the ministry in detail about the incident on March 9. But Despite the malfunction, the frigate shot down four drones, as the vessel’s captain and commanding officer Sune Lund told Reuters.
“‘We had some system failure, or system degradation, which challenged a bit our engagement’, Lund said without elaborating. ‘But at no time during the engagement were we left defenseless. We had redundancies on board, so we were able to continue fighting and neutralizing the threats.”
Watch: Danish frigate shoots down Houthi Rebels’ drones.
Fregatten Iver Huitfeldt fra @forsvaretdk har nu lagt til kaj i Korsør. Oplev stemningen i skibets operationsrum, da skib og besætning skød fire droner ned, der var på vej mod dem fra Houthi-bevægelsen i Det Røde Hav.#dkfoprsvar #værdatkæmpefor pic.twitter.com/OIB4tgxs2f
— Forsvaret (@forsvaretdk) April 4, 2024
The post What Is Happening With the Royal Danish Navy Ships? Two Failures – One in the Baltic Sea and One in the Red Sea – Raise Questions Over the Vessels’ Reliability appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
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