Want to know more about the technology that drives the Philippine Navy? Technograph recently spoke to a couple of officers from the armed service. What emerged was a picture of hilariously deplorable conditions.
BRP stands for Barko ng Republika ng Pilipinas or Ship of the Republic of the Philippines in English
As related by our sources, the flagship of the Philippine Navy is the BRP Rajah Humabon (PF-11), an escort destroyer of the Cannon class (pictured above) that was commissioned in the US way back in 1943. A visiting American naval officer actually said that her sister ship was already on display in a museum! Obviously, the Rajah Humabon’s technology was state-of-the-art during World War II. Now however, our seamen have to participate in naval exercises where they have to rely on manual fire control, compared to the computer-driven mechanisms of their American and Malaysian counterparts.
Hueybravo.net has more information on the BRP Rajah Humabon, and its history as the USS Atherton and JMSDF Hatsushi.
On said gunnery exercise, firing the guns would actually rattle the rust off the bulkheads. And in one particularly notable case, caused both electric generators of the ship to fail, leading to a blackout. Modern amenities are available, such as air-conditioning. The problem is that the luxury only reaches certain parts of the ship, and has a faulty control system. One of the officers had to sleep in a room that was frosting from the extreme cold. On another ship, the budget for food is a mere Php 40 ($1) per head for all three meals. Most alarming was the story that sailing through a typhoon was a “near-death experience.”
http://technogra.ph/2008/02/29/the-technology-of-the-philippine-navy/
Sending a WWII era vessel into a modern hostile area did not work out too well for the Argentinian Navy circa 1982 when they sent the Admiral Belgramo, a relic WWII US cruiser, to the Falklin Island crusade. I suspect this ship would have similar results in any battle with a modern navy.