Australia's fleet of Anzac frigates, once colourfully dismissed as little more than floating targets, are to be upgraded with an advanced missile defence system.
But it's taken more than a decade, with the $650 million upgrade project encountering numerous difficulties since it was launched in 1999.
Defence Minister Stephen Smith said the ANZAC Anti-Ship Missile Defence (ASMD) system had been trialled on HMAS Perth and proved so successful that the government had now given the go-ahead for the other seven Anzac frigates to be upgraded.
"At the moment our ANZAC frigates can track and destroy one target at a time," he said in a statement on Monday.
"The new system is able to identify, track and guide missiles to multiple targets at the same time."
Australia's Anzac frigates entered service from the mid-1990s, equipped only with basic weapons systems.
That prompted coalition government defence industry minister Bronwyn Bishop to describe them as floating targets which would be fixed under a major upgrade project.
That project was launched in 1999 but encountered delays and technical problems.
It was placed on the "projects of concern" list in January 2008.
Defence Materiel Minister Jason Clare said the project was now a great Australian success story, involving cutting-edge technology developed by Canberra firm CEA Technologies.
The ASMD upgrade program was a good demonstration of how the projects of concern process could effectively manage difficult projects and deliver successful national security outcomes, he said.
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