After the negotiations with General Musharraf ended, Mu Haoyang took a day off and met Lieutenant General Aziz, commander of the Pakistan Navy on October 10th.

From the commander's rank, it can be seen that the navy's status is not high.

Although the performance of the Pakistani Navy was not bad in the three India-Pakistan wars, Pakistan must first ensure the army and air force, and the funds used for naval construction are very limited, and the situation can be imagined.

For a long time, the Pakistan Navy did not even have large ships.

Fortunately, this situation is changing.

More than ten years ago, Pakistan spent hundreds of millions of dollars to purchase four f-22p frigates improved from 053h3 from China, and the last one was built at the Karachi Shipyard. Later, Pakistan proposed to purchase the 054a frigate, but it was too expensive and it was not sold. Three years ago, when Huang Zhibo visited Islamabad, the Pakistani Navy once again proposed to purchase the 054a frigate and also proposed to build it in Pakistan. Although the price is still high, after Huang Zhibo agreed to some requirements put forward by Pakistan, such as the transformation of the use environment of the Pakistani Navy, the Pakistani Navy issued an intention order.

If everything goes well, construction will start at the end of the year.

When Mu Haoyang visited Islamabad, the main force of the Pakistan Navy was four F-22p-class frigates, as well as four Type 22 frigates purchased from the UK.

As for the three old destroyers, they were retired in 2015.

There are only eight frigates, which is no less than the Indian Navy.

To this end, the Pakistani Navy pays more attention to resources from Western countries.

Before the Second Korean War, the Pakistani Navy planned to purchase the British Navy's 23 frigates and sent a delegation to London. In the end, because the price was too high, the UK wanted to sell these second-hand frigates at the price of new goods, but failed to reach an agreement.

Subsequently, the Pakistani Navy began to think of American warships again.

At that time, a large number of warships in the United States were about to retire, including the last batch of Perry-class frigates, the first batch of Burke-class destroyers that served in the early 1990s, and several Ticonderoga-class cruisers. The Pakistani Navy was interested in the Burke-class destroyers, hoping to obtain several in half-buy and half-get. As a result, US-Pakistan relations cooled down and negotiations ended in vain.

In addition to Britain and the United States, Pakistan has a third option, namely, a warship made by France.

However, French goods are more expensive, and due to relations with India, the French authorities only agreed to sell hulls and do not provide supporting weapons and equipment.

After several encounters, the Pakistani Navy changed its mind and began to contact China.

The East China Sea War finally made the Pakistani Navy make the decision to purchase the Type 054a frigate from China.

Although several Type 054a frigates had almost no performance opportunities during the East China Sea War, neither participated in fleet operations nor encountered Japanese submarines, and neither of the two main tactical indicators were tested, the performance of the Type 054a frigates was very eye-catching in fleet air defense operations.

Practical combat has proven that the Type 054a frigate is a multi-purpose frigate with strong air defense capabilities.

More importantly, the Type 054a frigate has electromagnetic confrontation capabilities and will definitely surpass any warship of the Indian Navy in future naval battles.

During the first meeting, Aziz focused on this kind of frigate.

The first is the price issue, that is, the Pakistani Navy does not have enough funds and cannot afford expensive advanced frigates, and hopes that China can provide compensation.

Mu Haoyang was originally responsible for naval military construction and was more familiar with naval equipment.

After Aziz's proposal, Mu Haoyang proposed a compromise plan, namely, purchasing active battleships from the Chinese Navy and then improving according to the combat needs of the Pakistani Navy.

In this way, the procurement costs can be reduced by at least one third.

Procurement of second-hand warships is not a problem. Most of the 054a of the Chinese Navy was in service around 2010, and the ship was about ten years old. Based on the design life of 25 years, there is still a service life of about fifteen years. If the hull structure is appropriately enhanced during the improvement, it will be fine if it is used for another 25 years.

However, the cost of improvement is not low.

If the Pakistan Navy is required, the power system must be replaced by a gas turbine with a larger power, and the maximum speed must be increased to more than 30 knots; secondly, the power generator must be installed to drive a central air conditioner with a larger power; finally, the control end interface of the weapon system must be replaced to adapt to the basic standards of the Pakistan Navy and use the weapons and equipment of the Pakistan Navy.

With this change, the total fee is not much different from purchasing new warships.

However, buying second-hand goods for improvement is significantly more attractive.

First, the first warship can be delivered within one year, and the successor ship can be improved in Pakistan's shipyard, which means saving improvement costs and creating many jobs. Second, the combat effectiveness after improvement has been greatly improved, and the combat performance exceeds the basic requirements of the Pakistan Navy. Finally, the equipment structure of the Pakistan Navy can be adjusted through improvements to facilitate future cooperation with China.

Based on these factors, Aziz finally adopted Mu Haoyang's proposal.

According to the plan proposed by Aziz, the Pakistan Navy will purchase four Type 054a ships, the first ship will be improved at the Hudong Shipyard in Shanghai, and the next three will be improved at the Karachi Shipyard, with equipment and technical support provided by China. If the progress goes well, the Pakistan Navy will consider purchasing four more ships.

For the Chinese Navy, this is also a very cost-effective deal.

In the newly released naval military plan, the 054a is an elimination warship, mainly because it is too slow in speed and poor in endurance, making it difficult to conduct ocean-going operations. However, more than 20 054a ships are very short in age, and some are less than five years old, so the navy will continue to equip these warships. Only after 2025 will the Navy retire the 054a one after another. The retired warships will either disintegrate or sell them to friendly countries at a low price. When they can still sell at a good price, the navy can take back a lot of investment.

Helping the Pakistan Navy improve 054a, domestic shipyards can also benefit.

You should know that after the Chinese Navy placed an order for new warships, domestic shipyards did not have any extra ships to build new frigates for the Pakistani Navy.

Taking advantage of this opportunity, Mu Haoyang also promoted the 052c destroyer.

However, Aziz is not interested in this large warship.

Although the combat effectiveness of the Type 052c destroyer is very strong, especially its air defense capabilities. In the East China Sea War, the two Type 052c destroyers are the pillars of the East China Sea Fleet, as a navy that is active in the offshore, large air defense destroyers mainly engaged in ocean combat seem a bit redundant.

In a sense, there is no need to purchase large destroyers as long as the Pakistani Navy does not intend to own aircraft carriers.

In offshore operations, the fleet has to rely on the docking base air force to provide air defense cover, while the Pakistan Air Force's early warning aircraft is enough to undertake most air defense command tasks.

As for the sea-control ability of large destroyers, frigates can also provide it.

For Aziz, Chinese submarines are more attractive.

The next day, the two sides focused on topics related to submarines.

Although the Pakistan Navy has purchased four Type 041 AIP conventional submarines, replacing the "Agosta B" submarines purchased from France, the Indian Navy has purchased eight Type 877 submarines and four Type 209 conventional submarines. If India continues to purchase more submarines, such as introducing the Type 212 from Germany, the Pakistan Navy's submarine strength will be seriously insufficient.

To this end, the Pakistani Navy must purchase more submarines.

Conservatively estimated that at least eight submarines are needed for the Pakistani Navy to move freely in the Arabian Sea, otherwise it is likely to be completely blocked by the Indian Navy.

To challenge the Indian Navy, the Pakistani Navy must have at least twelve conventional submarines.

That's why the Pakistani Navy has joined the development of the Type 042 conventional submarine and will become the first user of this type of submarine.

What Aziz wants to talk about is whether China can speed up the development progress of the 042 model.

According to Aziz, if the Type 042 cannot be built within the year, the Pakistani Navy will not be able to obtain four submarines as planned.

The problem is that the Chinese Navy is transforming and focusing on the development of attack nuclear submarines and is not enthusiastic about conventional submarines.

Although the Chinese Navy has invested a lot of money in the Type 042 and has formulated a procurement plan, when the Type 095 attack nuclear submarine began to be built and the Type 097 attack nuclear submarine began to be designed, the Chinese Navy does not intend to purchase the Type 042 in batches, but only symbolically purchases several ships.

In this way, Wuhan Shipyard, which is responsible for the 042 design work, is not very concerned about it.

This is understandable. As an enterprise, Wuhan Shipyard must consider long-term development and focus on bidding for the next generation of attack nuclear submarines. If the 097 project is lost, Wuhan Shipyard is likely to not get a naval order in the next twenty years.

As a result, the development progress of the 042 project was much slower than expected.

In response to this problem, Mu Haoyang proposed a solution: renting a submarine.

To put it simply, before the Type 042 was put into service, the Pakistani Navy leased several Type 041 ships from the Chinese Navy to enrich the submarine force.

Since it is a rental, the cost will definitely not be much higher.

If you only rent it for five years, the Pakistani Navy will only pay a quarter of the procurement fee, and the remaining funds can be used to purchase more of the 042 model.

Because Mu Haoyang was wholeheartedly considering the Pakistani Navy, Aziz happily accepted the proposal and said on the spot that as long as the price was negotiated, four ships would be leased, and after the lease expired, he would consider purchasing these submarines.

In the end, the Pakistan Navy leased eight Type 041s and purchased four of them in 2025.

The other four ships were also sold to Iran at a higher price with the help of the Pakistani Navy, and the Pakistani Navy also earned an agency fee.
Chapter completed!