File - MEDC - USS Porter Again, Grigorovich Aftermath, April 2017. Historical Scenario/Alternate History Scenario.

[broncepulido]

 

File Name: USS Porter Again, Grigorovich Aftermath, April 2017. Historical Scenario/Alternate History Scenario.

File Submitter: broncepulido

File Submitted: 09 Apr 2017

File Category: MEDC

 

 

A Harpoon Commander's Edition scenario for EC2003 Battle for the Mediterranean Battleset and the HCDB2-170407 new standard 1980-2025 Platform Database. This scenario is designed with advanced Scenario Editor and to be run with HCE 2015.008+ or later.

This scenario is designed to be played from the Blue/US side or from the Red/Russian side. You should play a few times first the Blue side to avoid spoilers, and only later play the Red side.

Image: USS Ross (DDG-71) fires a Tomahawk land attack missile the night 7 April 2017 against the Syrian airbase of Al-Shayrat. U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Robert S. Price, and in consequence in public domain, took from http://navylive.dodlive.mil/2017/04/07/u-s-navy-destroyers-launch-strikes-on-syria

In the very complex world situation of early 2017, and as consequence of a successive chain of events begun with the taking charge of Vladimir Putin as 4th President of Russia in 2012, USS Porter (DDG-78) was a very busy warship under the command of CDR Andria Slough, former deputy director for the Joint Maritime Ballistic Missile Defence Operations and Training.
After her participation in exercises Sea Shield and Dynamic Manta 2017 (Both depicted in previous Harpoon HCE/HUCE scenarios), on 6 April 2017 she and USS Ross (DDG-71) were called to launch Tomahawk missiles against the Syrian military airbase of Al-Shayrat.
Both were two of the four Burke-class destroyers forward-deployed at Naval Station Rota, Spain, for Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) tasks and SeaRAM, integrated in the new CTF-64, created in July 2015 (It was a crash program, as the four Rota destroyers are equipped with an older Aegis baseline that requires the ship to operate in a BMD mode or switch to the traditional aircraft and cruise missile defence role, and in consequence without SeaRAM are almost without self defence missiles, counting only with the Phalanx) and arriving the first ship at Rota in 24 September 2015.
The Tomahawk salvo of 59 missiles was ordered by President Trump to prevent Syria's President Assad to use again nervous agents against civilians in Syria, as employed previously a few days earlier on April 4 in the town of Khan Sheikhoun, where several dozen civilians, including many children and women, were killed by what appears to be sarin gas.
As was suspected the presence of Russian technicians in the Syrian base to be attacked, the missile strike was warned with time to Russia, the base evacuated before the arrival of the missiles, and the human victims were scarce or none.
In the attack aftermath, on 7 April 2017, agency news reports informed of the Russian Black Sea Fleet brand-new multipurpose frigate Admiral Grigorovich sailing from the Bosphorus Strait to Eastern Mediterranean, suggesting a possible Russian naval retaliation against the US ships launching the missiles.
The much-hyped in the news Admiral Grigorovich is the first Russian ship of Project 11356, a derivative of the old Project 1135/Krivak, and exported from 2003 to India as Talwar-class/Krivak V.
Of course that was a usual movement of Russian warships going to and fro, but this limited scenario speculates on the possibility of a Russian retaliation on those premises.

Enrique Mas, 9 April 2017.

 

 

Click here to download this file

[broncepulido]

Sources:

https://news.usni.org/2017/04/07/us-planned-executed-tomahawk-strike

http://navylive.dodlive.mil/2017/04/07/u-s-navy-destroyers-launch-strikes-on-syria/

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2017/04/07/russian-warship-steams-toward-us-destroyers-that-launched-syria-airstrikes.html

https://turkishnavy.net/foreign-warship-on-bosphorus/foreign-warship-on-bosphorus-in-2017/

http://www.public.navy.mil/surflant/ddg78/Pages/default.aspx

http://www.capitalgazette.com/news/nation_world/ph-ac-cn-usna-uss-porter-commander-0408-20170407-story.html

http://eutoday.net/news/putins-bluff

http://gonavy.jp/VP_Deploy71f.html

 

On the issue of SeaRAM installation in the four Rota forward-deployed Burkes:

https://news.usni.org/2015/06/24/surface-navy-concerned-reduced-destroyer-modernizations-will-increase-risk-in-future-fights

 

 

As currently configured, the four Rota destroyers are equipped with an older Aegis baseline that requires the ship to operate in a BMD mode or switch to the traditional aircraft and cruise missile defense role. The Navy’s new Baseline 9 ships can do both missions at the same time

[broncepulido]

Historical updates:

https://news.usni.org/2017/04/07/russia-sends-frigate-mediterranean-following-u-s-retaliation-strike-u-s-destroyers-remain-station?utm_source=USNI+News&utm_campaign=5dc6b7e5e5-USNI_NEWS_DAILY&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_0dd4a1450b-5dc6b7e5e5-231039869&mc_cid=5dc6b7e5e5&mc_eid=f9dfe1a0a1

https://news.usni.org/2017/04/10/russia-sends-warships-toward-syria-following-u-s-tomahawk-strikes

[broncepulido]

Aftermath of the aftermath, USS Porter returned to Rota (and a new great photo of cmdr Andria L Slough):

https://news.usni.org/2017/04/11/destroyer-uss-porter-returns-homeport-following-tomahawk-strike-uss-ross-remains-station

[CV32]

Two Gremyashchiy/Steregushchiy class corvettes, a tug and an oiler are joining the fray.

[broncepulido]

The Russian warships are apparently

 

 

The Steregushchiy-class corvettes, Soobrazitelny and Boiky, were joined later in the afternoon by a Russian support tanker and an ocean-going tug.

http://www.royalnavy.mod.uk/news-and-latest-activity/news/2017/april/15/170415-sutherland-escorts-russian-warships

[CV32]

Any word on the identities of the fleet oiler and tug? They apparently departed Kaliningrad so I am supposing Baltic Fleet but I have not dug any deeper.