Building scale at speed for the sea – is the combat cargo container the future of naval warfare? ⬇️
The War Zone had an interesting article on a medium sized Chinese cargo ship spotted decked out with a potent cargo – 60 vertical launch tubes and what appears to be radars and advanced communications systems. For reference, Australia’s planned Mogami class frigates will have 32 vertical launch tubes.
Containerised vertical launch systems are a way navies can extend their arsenal and build scale at pace. Even the world’s best shipyards will struggle to turn around capital ships at a faster rate than they will be sunk or severely damaged in combat. China displaying the capacity to turn a cargo ship deck into an arsenal ship will certainly heat up the innovation arms race!
The US Navy has also been experimenting with combat containers with testing from landing decks from in service littoral ships and unmanned naval vessels. Naval News had a short read in 2025 outlining how the United States is looking to leverage uncrewed surface vehicles and containerised systems to enhance combat capability:
“The U.S Navy is seeking a wide range of new medium and large USVs as part of its Modular Attack Surface Craft program, an effort started as the end result of NAVSEA’s Future Unmanned Surface Vessel request for information which sought an open ocean high endurance, non-exquisite, autonomous vessel that could be delivered to the fleet to rapidly expand the surface fleet’s capacity and capability.”
In WWII, despite Australia scaling our shipyards and mobilising the national economy for the war effort it still took until 1942 before the first Australian built River class destroyer was launched. Today’s more complex and capable surface ships can’t be manufactured in months. But a containerised vertical launch system can – and as the Chinese are showing, it doesn’t need to be a vessel built for combat that becomes the platform for missile launch systems.
Food for thought as always!
📷 via The War Zone and articles mentioned in the post are in the comments.