Continuing on Pak Navy's development in recent years.
The biggest win for PN has been to disperse its assets on a larger number of bases. Ironically that's thanks jehadi strikes on Mehran airbase.
Obviously, it makes targetting more complex for us, as previously all eggs could be found in Karachi.
PN has also increased the strength of Pak Marines, who protect these installations. They have been equipped with Chinese gun based air defence systems.
http://usiofindia.org/Article/?pub=Stra ... 1&ano=2704
On 03 September 2014, Pakistan’s naval chief Admiral Mohammad Asif Sandila commissioned a new air base PNS Siddique in Turbat, southern Balochistan. This marks another step by Pakistan Navy (PN) toward moving its assets away from the congested city of Karachi, a process which began after the Indian Navy’s attack and bottling up of PN units at Karachi in 1971.
Following the loss of Chittagong, Karachi was Pakistan’s only port. Strategic necessity dictated the creation of small ports with berthing facilities for PN ships at Jiwani, Gwadar, Pasni and Ormara, with reports of a new base at Khor Kalmat, between Pasni and Ormara, in the offing. Ormara eventually became the site for the PN’s second largest naval base (Jinnah Naval Base), commissioned in 2000. It was again in the news when the PN announced in April 2014 that it will shift its entire fleet of diesel-electric submarines there.
Till end August 2014, the PN had only two active Naval Air Stations, PNS Mehran (at Karachi, commissioned in 1975) and PNS Makran (at Pasni, commissioned in 1988). PNS Siddique, the newly commissioned third naval air station, is named after Vice Admiral Haji Mohammad Siddique Choudri, who took over from Rear Admiral Jefford in 1953 as the first Pakistani Naval Officer to become Commander-in-Chief of the PN and led the service for six years.
Located at Turbat, a relatively small town with a population of below 200,000, it is about 90 kms NNW of Pasni and about 117kms NE of Gwadar. The International Airport at Turbat (IATA Code TUK) is connected by air to Muscat, Sharjah, Karachi, Gwadar and Dalbandian. The town is connected by road to Panjgur and Kalat to NW, Pasni to SE and Karachi to the East. There is no rail connectivity.
Turbat has a runway length of 6000ft (1829m), more than sufficient for P-3C Orion (which requires a runway length of about 4250ft at Max Take Off Weight and below 3000ft at Max Landing Weight), Fokker F-27, Hawker 850 and ATR 72-212A fixed wing aircraft flown by the PN as well as its various helicopters. Not much is known yet about the facilities that have been created or which aircraft will be based there. An indicator may come from the press release, which states, “facilities such as the state-of-the-art hospital and educational institutions etc. at PNS Siddique will enable the local populace access to quality services at their doorstep and set of a new era of prosperity in the region”. The existence of these facilities points to a sizable naval contingent at Turbat.
Which aircraft are likely to be based there? The Arabian Sea is around 75-80 kms away from PNS Siddique. As such, any PN aircraft based there would have to waste at least 150 kms of their total range in transiting just to reach and return from their primary operating area, the sea. This consideration would appear to rule out the basing of helicopters from 333 Squadron (Alouette), 222 Squadron (Harbin Z-9EC) or 111 Squadron (Seaking) there. Not that these helicopters cannot use Turbat as a staging base for disaster relief operations in the hinterland; still it makes more sense to keep them at a coastal base and stage them through Turbat for peacetime operations.
Similarly, Turbat would appear to be unsuitable for anti-ship strike aircraft flown by PN pilots on the Mirage V’s owned by the PAF and currently based at Masroor. The Mirages are to be replaced by Chinese JF-17’s next year, but Turbat is too far from potential operating areas, which would have to be in Indian waters. Given the density of traffic in the nearby Persian Gulf and attendant difficulties in identification, permanent basing of strike aircraft at Turbat is unlikely. This leaves the Orions belonging to PN’s 28 Squadron, the Fokker F-27’s belonging to 27 Squadron and the ATR 72-212A, Atlantic and Hawker aircraft belonging to 29 Squadron. Any of these aircraft could be based at Turbat.
A complicating factor is the destruction of two P 3C Orions (Tail Nos 84 and 87) by Tehrik-i-Taliban terrorists at PNS Mehran on 22 May 2011. The crowded environs of Karachi were subsequently adjudged as indefensible against terrorist attack and reports indicate that the remaining Orions may have been shifted to Pasni. However, Pasni is on the coast and has its own vulnerabilities, particularly to a strike from the sea. The eventual basing of P-3C Orions as well as other long range aircraft at Turbat, sufficiently inland to preclude a commando raid but not so far as to make an appreciable difference in their time on task, would appear to make eminent sense. Certainly any new face in a relatively small town would be easier to identify and track than in a bustling metropolis like Karachi.
Dispersal has certainly complicated the Indian Navy’s tasks, but the induction of new technology and equipment still keeps a successful strike within the bounds of possibility. What is certain is that Indian Naval planners will watch developments at Turbat and PNS Siddique with considerable interest.
http://archive.defensenews.com/article/ ... om-Karachi
ISLAMABAD — The Pakistani Navy this week commissioned a new air base intended to move its air assets away from the vulnerable and congested city of Karachi, and to help protect the coast and Pakistan’s maritime territory.
The new PNS Siddique Naval Air Base is in Turbat in the southwest province of Balochistan, near the strategic new deepwater port of Gwadar and to the Iranian border. Chief of Naval Staff Adm. Muhammad Asif Sandila was the chief guest at a ceremony Wednesday that marked the base’s official opening.
According to the Associated Press of Pakistan (APP), “The Aviation Base will strengthen seaward security along the Makran coast and beyond and will also lead to commercial flying activities, which would act as a catalyst for economic development of the Makran division in general and Kech District in particular.”
The Navy would not comment on what type of aircraft would be based there.
However, the consensus among analysts is that they are likely to be rotary and fixed-wing patrol types, and at present, at least, this may be all the base is able to support.
Analyst Kaiser Tufail, a former air commodore with the Pakistani Air Force, said PNS Siddique is currently unsuitable to base strike aircraft as it is “too far to pay a visit to our neighbors [India].” He noted, however, that Pasni, an air base shared by the Air Force and Navy, is “just 70 kilometers from Turbat.”
There have been security concerns about the Navy’s aircraft since the May 2011 attack on PNS Mehran Naval Air Base in Karachi that destroyed a number of aircraft, including two new P-3C Orion patrol planes.
The Navy’s Orions are now based in Pasni, but any remaining naval aircraft in Mehran “must get out,” said analyst Brian Cloughley, a former Australian defense attaché to Islamabad.
Enveloped by urban sprawl, Mehran is difficult to defend. Until it was hidden by stacked shipping containers, the apron at Mehran was visible from a flyover on the road just outside the base.
Though the new base is far safer than Mehran, it is nevertheless “somewhere else to have to guard,” Cloughley said.
However, PNS Siddique will also be another instrument of the Navy’s successful civilian outreach program, like its presence in the port of Ormara. In April the Navy shifted the bulk of its operational fleet, including it submarines, from the congested and polluted port of Karachi to Jinnah Naval Base in Ormara. The development of Jinnah Naval Base has led to considerable benefits for the local population.
Likewise, “facilities such as state-of-the-art hospital, education institution, etc., at PNS Siddique will enable the local populace access to quality services at their doorstep and set off a new era of prosperity in the region,” according to the APP report.
(and said, sirjee, please please stop)
