Rosobronexport started final talks in Hoshimin on delivering two Gepard ships to Vietnam
20.02.2006 17:53

It is certain that Vietnam refused from the project 20382 Tiger corvette offered by the SPb based Almaz. The Gepard project will be the first military export order for Zelenodolsk Shipyard since soviet times. The Vietnamese had already agreed on the specifications of the ships before the meeting with the ROE, therefore the contract may be signed even during this visit of the Russian officials to Vietnam. According to some rumors the reasons why Vietnam rejected the Tiger was that today this ship exists only on paper and the first model for the Russian Navy will be put in the water only later this year. However, according to Zelenodolsk engineers were asked by ROE to prepared the proposals on Gepard after the customer rejected Tiger, Tigers are still on the agenda and remain the competitors of Zelenodolsk in the future. Newspaper Kommersant insists that the two ships to be built in Russia will not be based on the two unfinished hulls, standing since 1992. According to the anonymous source of the newspaper the construction will take place from scratch, laying down two renewed hulls. One unfinished ship of the project 11661 now based at Zelenodolsk Shipyard, is to be commission with the Russian Caspian Flotilla under the name Dagestan. The upgraded Gepard for the Vietnamese Navy will be made under Stealth technologies. It will also use “newest Russian arms, which successfully passed tests and were allowed for export”. Some claimed names are air defense complex Palma-SU with new optic-electronic system and the missile complex Uran. The tests of the latter were finished last December. The ship will have Ka-28 helicopter. There are some plans to replace standard gas turbines with more powerful.

News source: Shipbuilding.Ru