Turkiye has donated the Doğan-class Fast Attack Craft TCG Volkan (P343) to the Maldives Navy to improve the oceanic island country’s defence capabilities.

The Turkish Ministry of Defence released a statement on the social media platform X regarding the donation of TCG Volkan and the training of Maldives’ personnel on simulators. Doğan had been a long-serving fast attack craft in the Turkish Navy. With the donation, the MNDF Coast Guard will have received its largest vessel to date.

Not long before TCG Volkan’s donation, the island country started operating Bayraktar TB2 armed UAVs.

Doğan-class Fast Attack Craft

Doğan-class is a development from Germany’s FPB-57 design for the needs of the Turkish Navy. Four ships have been built, three of them being built in Turkiye between the 1970s and 1980.

The ships, measuring 58 m in length, are armed with two to four RGM-84 Harpoon anti-ship missiles, an OTO Melara 76/62 mm naval gun, and an Oerlikon GDM-A 35 mm twin-barrel anti-aircraft turret.

Service of TCG Volkan in Maldives

Maldives is a very remote island country located in the Indian Ocean, and it mainly uses its exotic location to run a fruitful tourism sector. Due to its distance between the politically heated regions in the world, Maldives does not require a navy with high-end combat capabilities. However, this does not mean a security force is not needed, as there have been several cases of vessels passing near the country waters intended for illegal dealings (Gun running, drug trafficking...). Thus, Maldives’ coast guard fleet consists of patrol boats and landing craft to intercept and (if needed) respond to illegal parties effectively.

Doğan, as a platform meant for hit-and-run tactics against other ships in littoral waters, might be placed as a flagship of significant firepower when the armament is considered. Whether anti-ship missiles will remain or not is a question left to be answered by future spotting as such weaponry can be considered overkill as the anti-aircraft weaponry, and 76 mm naval guns are more than enough to scare off illegals mostly armed with small arms in proximity.

However, Turkiye’s moves to improve Maldives’ coastal security might not be limited to this. Alongside Bayraktar TB2 armed UAVs that can monitor the seas from above, the island country can be expected to acquire patrol boats armed with modern weaponry and sensors in the near future.

Author: Kaan Azman

Editor: Özgür Ekşi