The last ship in Victory-class, RSS Vengeance (93), was launched in February 1990 and commissioned in to the RSN in May 1991.
Singapore is the smallest country in Southeast Asia but has the leading economy in the region. Thanks to a strong economy, Singapore’s defense investment is quite abundant. Currently, the Singapore Navy has six Victory-class corvettes, operated by the 188 Squadron. The Republic of Singapore Navy placed an order with Lürssen Werft for six missile corvettes in 1983.
The first corvette was built and launched in Germany. The remaining vessels were built domestically by Singapore Technologies. The last ship in class, RSS Vengeance (93), was launched in February 1990 and commissioned in to the RSN in May 1991. The ships have a displacement of about 595 tons, a length of 62 m, a beam of 8.5 m, and a draft of 2.6 m.
Victory Class is outfitted with a state-of-the-art enhanced combat management system. The system delivers superior performance, similar to that of Formidable Class frigates. It provides the corvettes with the ability to detect, track and engage various surface, underwater and air threats. These capabilities will allow the corvettes to deal with potential threats.
Regarding armament, the missile corvettes are equipped with Harpoon anti-ship missiles and Barak anti-air and anti-missile naval defence system. Harpoon can engage surface targets within the range of 100km. Barak is an Israeli point-defence missile, developed by Israel Aerospace Industries and Rafael Advanced Defence Systems. It can protect the ships from aircraft and missile threats. The missile has a range of ten kilometres.
Other weapons include an Oto Melara super rapid gun on the bow deck which can engage both surface and air targets within the range of 16km. The gun can fire at a rate of 120 rounds a minute. There are also 4 × STK 50MG 12.7 mm heavy machine guns. About anti-submarine warfare, the corvettes are fitted with two triple torpedo tubes for launching EuroTorp A244/S Mod 1 torpedoes, which has a maximum speed of 30-39kt and can strike submarines within the depth of 600m.
It can be seen that although they are only small warships, they are equipped with extremely powerful weapons. The countermeasures are provided by Elisra shipborne electronic warfare system, jammer, Plessey Shield chaff launchers and Rafael long range chaff launchers. The chaff can deceive incoming radar-guided anti-ship missiles.
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