The Royal New Zealand Navy (RNZN) is required to monitor this vast EEZ, which is even larger when the maritime territories of the Cook Islands and Niue, which are in free association with New Zealand, are added.

However, the country’s navy is very small for the tasks allotted it. The RNZN possesses nine vessels, of which just five are currently operational, a navy official told Naval News. Three vessels are tied up at Devonport Naval Base in Auckland under “care and custody”: two offshore patrol vessels (the OPVs HMNZS Otago and Wellington) plus the inshore patrol craft HMNZS Hawea. Simultaneously, the frigate HMNZS Te Mana is undergoing a communications upgrade programme, which means just five vessels are available for service.

The key reason for the low availability of vessels is attrition of personnel, Commodore Garin Golding, the Maritime Component Commander of the Royal New Zealand Navy, told Naval News. Cdre Golding’s post puts him operationally in charge of the fleet’s vessels. He elaborated about attrition: “Obviously, the biggest impact is the ability to crew all of our ships.” He said annual attrition rates peaked at 17% around two years ago, but they have since dropped to a more manageable 9%. Middle-management ranks, where a lot of experience lies, were the worst-affected. Many personnel were frustrated by having to perform quarantine management tasks during COVID-19, while others were attracted by a higher-paying civilian job market.

“But we’re starting to get on top of attrition. We’ve got hollowness in there that we’re now going to have to get after. It creates problems in the sense that that’s where we had a lot of experience and qualified people. You can recruit your way out of it, but it’s going to take time for that hollowness to clear through the system.”

Various remedial efforts are being implemented, including recruitment, creating a workforce environment where people want to stay, and improving retention thanks to better remuneration. The latter has been helped by a new interim sustainment allowance for personnel deploying overseas for significant lengths of time. Incidentally, Cdre Golding said these efforts are already bearing fruit, since some former personnel have returned to the RNZN now that ships are deploying more regularly. These efforts are likely to be enhanced too by a tightening economy in the private sector.

Despite its personnel woes, the Royal New Zealand Navy is buoyant about its future, especially as it anticipates a raft of new vessels entering service. In fact, Cdre Golding pointed out, all but one of the Royal New Zealand Navy’s current vessels (the tanker HMNZS Aotearoa, which was commissioned in 2020) are due for replacement in the next decade.

Having so many vessels due for replacement – two frigates, two OPVs, an inshore patrol craft, multirole vessel and hydrographic survey/diving support vessel – provides a unique opportunity for the Royal New Zealand Navy to craft and customise its future fleet. It is this context that explains why, on 7 September 2023, the Royal New Zealand Navy issued a request for information (RfI) entitled Maritime Fleet Market Research for the Defence Capability Plan. This industry engagement exercise investigated how the navy can better manage its fleet using the limited dollars available.

READ MORE

• Why NZSAS and the Defence Force are struggling and what it will take to fix
• Government commits $571m for Defence Force pay, helicopter and vehicle upgrades
• Defence Force cuts: ‘We’re already operating on the smell of an oily rag’
• NZDF reduces Seasprite helicopter fleet

The maritime fleet renewal programme will look at the best way forward, and the Maritime Component Commander added, “We undertook a study a couple of years ago, knowing that all but one of our ships will be replaced in the next decade. And then just how do we get after the problem set that we’ve got with nine ships, six different classes of ships, and the problems that brings as far as a maintenance training and operating perspective.”

After soliciting responses to the RfI, this maritime fleet renewal transformation programme was formally initiated in February, the commodore explained, although it is “in early stages of work”. Furthermore, the earlier industry engagement exercise plus current studies will be incorporated within the country’s Defence Capability Plan, with this important document expected to be delivered to the government within the next couple of months. “It provides options to government; the government will select the option set that they wish to invest in, and then that will flow down to what that means for our fleet going forward.”

Cdre Golding enthused: “So it’s quite exciting times when you look at the ability to almost design the future navy that will be significantly different, and how do we transform our navy as a result of it.”

Interestingly, the fleet renewal may mean that ships are not necessarily replaced in the order in which their end of life approaches. CdreGolding shared: “The next ones coming up for end of life are Canterbury, the patrol vessels, Manawanui and the frigates, but the maritime renewal programme will look at what is the best way in how we get after the replacement. So it might not work out that Canterbury is the first to go, for example. That’s what the programme is designed to work through.”

The Anzac-class frigates, both commissioned in 1999, are the oldest vessels in the fleet, followed by HMNZS Canterbury (commissioned in 2007), inshore patrol vessels (2009) and OPVs (2010). The second frigate, HMNZS Te Kaha, is to have its communications system upgraded next year, and this pair of warships should remain operational through till the mid-2030s.

The navy officer said current research is also exploring “what the future around crewed/uncrewed looks like, and how do we support our partners and allies with a new fleet”. For example, in December 2023 the RNZN initially leased a 6.8m-long Bluebottle unmanned surface vessel from Ocius Technologies in Australia, and the navy will eventually procure this craft as it extends its battle lab in the next phase of trials.

New Zealand possesses an exclusive economic zone spanning 4.3 million km², which the government claims is the world’s fifth largest.

Cdre Golding said: “The future fleet is a combination of crewed and uncrewed, and so the ability for us to understand what are the limitations, but also the benefits of uncrewed systems going forward, is a unique opportunity.” Uncrewed systems may prove helpful for maritime domain awareness, as well as direct warfare functions such as supporting anti-submarine warfare or electronic warfare. The Royal New Zealand Air Force now has four P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft, and these could cooperate with unmanned systems in the future.

Uncrewed systems are not the only way the navy is seeking to leverage technology. Cdre Golding explained: “We’re trying to innovate our training, using new technologies such as virtual reality. We’ve undertaken a number of training reform projects to try and redesign, particularly our technical training, to make it faster and more effective.” The commodore gave the example of using virtual reality to initially train helicopter controllers who supervise helicopter landings and take-offs from flight decks. This means training can continue even if the tempo of ship and helicopter deployments is not high.

Facing a shortage of crews, the Royal New Zealand Navy is being forced to explore new ways of doing things. Cdre Golding said: “It’s well documented that we haven’t been able to crew our offshore patrol vessels in supporting the Pacific, so we’re looking at different ways of providing that effect. An example was a deployable boarding team that we embarked on the Royal Navy’s Tamar, and we supported the government of Fiji to provide fisheries support.”

To illustrate how the Royal New Zealand Navy, despite its small size, punches above its weight, Cdre Golding pointed to current deployments at the time of the July interview. At that point, the replenishment vessel HMNZS Aotearoa had just arrived in Hawaii to participate in Exercise RIMPAC. After RIMPAC, the ship will help enforce United Nations Security Council sanctions against North Korea by conducting surveillance and refuelling allied ships. The vessel’s five-month deployment will encompass 30,000nm.

This tanker constructed by South Korea’s Hyundai Heavy Industries had experienced microbe biological contamination of bulk fuel, as well as some coating and corrosion issues. Cdre Golding said the former had been remediated and, for the latter, “We are systematically going through and remedying that in planned maintenance periods as we can. We’ve got an investigation into these issues, which is nearing completion, and then we’ll just work through that investigation.”

Furthermore, to illustrate the versatility of the RNZN, in July the hydrographic/ diving vessel HMNZS Manawanui with a clearance diving team returned from Operation Calypso in the South Pacific. This eight-week operation included working with Australia’s navy off its east coast, disposing of WWII bombs in Vanuatu, and surveying the seafloor in the Tongan island group of Ha’apai. Demonstrating the versatility of this commercially built vessel, HMNZS Manawanui had hosted a mine countermeasures team, uncrewed surface vessel team and Littoral Manoeuvre Craft crew at various points in the deployment. The ship’s captain, Commander Yvonne Gray, said, “This illustrates the flexibility and significant capability that enables the Royal New Zealand Navy to conduct our tasks and helps inform what this might look like in our future fleet.”

Cdre Golding added that, next year, New Zealand will lead the Bahrain-headquartered Combined Task Force – 150 and deploy a frigate to the Middle East. He also mentioned the significant milestone of the first SeaCeptor missile firings. “Te Mana last year conducted two firings – the initial test firing and then they conducted another firing in a defended-asset profile. Both firings went smoothly and we’re very happy with the outcome, as the missile performed very well.” In August 2023, the New Zealand government released three important documents: the Defence Policy and Strategy Statement, the National Security Strategy 2023-28 and the Future Force Design Principles. Cdre Golding noted the importance of this current period: “It has given us a really good framework as a nation to orientate ourselves towards. So the objectives from a defence, and therefore a navy perspective, are about promoting and protecting defence interests, particularly in the Pacific, contributing to collective security and then being able to respond as a defence force for navy.”