Production of the first of three new frigates for the Royal Danish Navy has started yesterday -- in Lithuania. The Baltija Shipyard at Klaipeda, Lithuania, is one of two companies in the Baltic Republics that have won a role as subcontractor to supply building block sections for the 138-meter (450-ft.)-long ships (see www.navalhistory.dk).

The other subcontractor is Loksa Shipyard in Estonia. The first building blocks are scheduled to arrive at the main shipbuilder, Odense Steel Shipyard in Lindo, Denmark, during May, and a formal keel laying ceremony is planned for early June.

Denmark is now officially calling its new surface combatants "frigates" -- previously, they had to be called "patrol ships" for political reasons. The name change appears to be justified: the new ships are described by senior program officials as the "largest, most powerful warships ever" for Denmark's navy, which marks its 500th anniversay in August 2010.

The first-of-class of these new ships is hoped to be officially presented during the celebrations for this event.

The three ships, reportedly to be called the Ivar Huitfeldt-class as this would be the name for the lead ship, have a more or less common hull to the two Absalon-class combat support ships built in recent years, which are now entering operational service.

The frigate program has an overall projected cost of 4.7 billion Danish kronor ($936 million, so $312 million per ship -- compare this to the staggering cost of U.S. Navy surface warships, even relatively small ones such as the Littoral Combat Ship...)

This provides three area air defense-capable ships to enter service between 2012-14. They are to replace three Olfert Fischer-class missile corvettes and ten Willemoes-class fast attack craft (the latter have already been decommissioned).

So far, the following contracts have been awarded associated with this program:

- the shipbuilding contract with Odense Steel Shipyard (which is part of the Maersk shipping group and routinely builds large merchant ships for Maersk while it has also built the two Absalon-class ships for the navy);

- the anti-air warfare system contract with Thales Nederland. This includes the Smart-L long-range 3D volume search radar and the APAR medium-range multifunction radar, plus the associated command & fire control systems. Thanks to the 400-km-range Smart-L radar, when positioned in the center of the Danish archipelago, a single frigate of this class can monitor the airspace over the whole of Denmark proper;

- the Mk 41 vertical launching system contract with Lockheed Martin;

- the contract for Ceros 200 radar/electro-optic fire control directors from Saab Systems of Sweden (these are to provide fire control for the various guns on the ship);

- the bow-mounted sonar contract with Atlas Elektronik;

- the contract for ballistic protection panels with Ten Cate/Roshield of Denmark

- the contract with Saab Danmark for the internal/external communications suite.

Yet to be awarded are contracts for the missiles (planned are Raytheon Standard Missile SM-2 Block IIIA, Raytheon Tomahawk, Raytheon ESSM); the main gun (planned to be of 127-mm. caliber), and the 35-mm. close-in weapon systems (planned to be Millennium guns from Rheinmetall/Oerlikon Contraves).