The World Still Loves Amphibious Ships

The global trend of rising powers adding new, modern amphibious ships continues, with the latest news coming from India.

In order to add more teeth to its amphibious warfare capabilities, the navy is planning to induct four Landing Platform Docks (LPD) to join the fleet alongside INS Jalashwa.

"We are looking to add four more LPDs in our fleet to operate alongside INS Jalashwa, the only LPD currently in service," navy officials told PTI.

The procurement procedure has already begun with the release of the Request for Information (RFI) by the defence ministry, they said.

The four warships would be procured under the 'buy and make (Indian)' category of the defence procurement procedure under which the Indian shipyards, both private and public, would be required to form a partnership with foreign shipyards for the contract.

The navy wants the ships to be produced within the country itself and has sought response only from Indian shipyards, having their own infrastructure and capability of building LPD class of ships, they said.

The article goes on to say the design should be 200 meters long and capable of transporting all varieties of vehicles including tanks. An amphibious ship of 200 meters would end up roughly the size of the South Korean Dokdo class, for comparison purposes. My only advice to India is this, if you are not designing the ship to be heavy in aviation capabilities, then invest in insuring the ship has really good cranes.