The La Fayette class (also known as FL-3000 for "Frégate Légère de 3,000 tonnes", or FLF for Frégate Légère Furtive) is a class of general purpose frigates built by DCNS in the 1980s/90s and still operated by the French Navy today. Derivatives of the type are in service in the navies of Saudi Arabia, Singapore and Taiwan. The ships were originally known as "stealth frigates" due to their unique stealth design at the time. Their reduced radar cross section is achieved by a clean superstructure compared to conventional designs, angled sides and radar absorbent material, a composite material of wood and glass fibre as hard as steel, light, and resistant to fire. Most modern combat ships built since the introduction of the La Fayette class have followed the same principles of stealth. All information gathered by the onboard sensors is managed by the Information Processing System, the electronic brain of the operation centre of the ship. It is completed by an electronic command aid system. The ships are designed to accommodate a helicopter in the Panther or NH90 range (though they are also capable of operating the Super Frelon and similar heavy helicopters). These helicopters can carry anti-ship missiles AM39 or AS15, and they can be launched during sea state five or six due to the Samahé helicopter handling system. France ordered five ships of the La Fayette class in 1988, the last of which entered service in 2001. In the French Navy, they will be incrementally superseded in "first-rank" functions by five frégates de taille intermédiaire (FTI, "intermediate size frigates") from 2024. French version Background In the late 1980s, the French Navy (Marine Nationale) started the studies for frigates adapted to low-intensity conflicts in the post–Cold War era. The ships were to serve in the large French exclusive economic zone (EEZ), be adapted to humanitarian operations or low-intensity operations in support of land troops, and replace the aging s, which tended to prove too focused on naval operations and were ill-suited for joint operations. Conventional warships used in low-intensity or humanitarian relief operations proved costly, with their heavy equipment and large crew. Hence came the requirement for lightly armed frigates with economical engines and small crew. In Italy, the same requirements led to the development of the and type corvettes, built according to both civilian and military standards. These ships were limited to because the limited size and depth