Future Carrier (Including Costs)
 

Edit (July 2022): With a new Cold War/era of Violent Peace, the West must once again look to protect its sea lines of communication. Much has been written about carriers and their value to NATO, but this ARRSE thread is especially to the point as it discusses little else:

1977 US Congress Report: The US Sea Control Mission (carriers needed in the Atlantic for Air Defence and ASW - due to Maths/Physics/Geography)

Two major conclusions can be reached:

A. Sea Control (ASW, air defence/AAW, and anti surface warfare) is a major mission for the carrier and the carrier group. It was during the Second World War and the Cold War, and it is again now in a renewed era of peer adversaries and contested seas.

B. Sea Control is difficult to achieve without carrier aviation. Geography, Mathematics, and Physics show that attacking aircraft are best dealt with using fighters to kill the archers, not the arrows, and that the best chance of stopping anti ship missiles is to engage the launch platform. Similarly constant helicopter ASW operations are best supported by a big deck with multiple helicopters, and Physics shows that modern long range sonars need to work in conjunction with dipping sonar to achieve their potential - and vice versa.

Edit (November 2012): Following the 2010 SDSR, when the politicians caused a lot of problems by retiring the Harrier something like a decade earlier than planned and leaving a gap without having British jets on British decks, it is worth looking at the various topics (including problems and potential solutions) discussed on this PPRuNe thread: Decision to axe Harrier is "bonkers"

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This thread is intended to be a focal point for discussing issues relating to the Royal Navy's future aircraft carriers and the aircraft that they will carry (JCA/JSF/F35, Merlin, MASC and others). It is also intended to be a successor to the Sea Jet thread and other Shar ones as well as various CVF threads including this one.

I first became aware that planning was starting for the new carriers from the media back in 1995. Eleven years later the first steel has not been cut, is this a record? The same year I became aware of what is to the JSF/F35 project — including the STOVL version for the USMC and RN (the RAF came onboard later). Before the 1997 general election the Conservative Government committed themselves to building two new carriers, when the current Government was elected they said they would hold a wide ranging review of defence. This review, the SDR, committed the Government to building two new carriers, for entry into service in 2012 and 2015.

Since the SDR (which contained cuts for the RN in return for a promise of new carriers) many of the SDR commitments have been dropped. The 2004 cuts involved the RN losing roughly 20% of its front line strength, thousands of personnel and having virtually every major project cut, cancelled or delayed. At the time of writing CVF has not passed the main gate milestone.

On of the major frustration of this sort of debate is the fact that carriers are frequently labelled as a legacy of the Cold War, often by those who either are ignorant or those that have an agenda. This idea is untrue. In 1966 the Cold War was in full swing, yet Dennis Healy decided to scrap the carriers. In 1981 the Cold War was still going and tensions were rising, yet John Nott still saw the RN contribution to NATO as a legitimate area for cuts. The Cold War role of the RN was primarily focussed on ASW in the North Atlantic - including the CVS/Sea King/Sea Harrier. However, the end of the Cold War has seen British forces involved in a number of conflicts around the World, and this has included carrier deployments.

Perhaps the best open source of information on CVF etc is Richard Beedall's Navy Matters, and in particular the following sections.

Carrier Strike

JCA

MASC

Where are we now? What do we need to do to make this a reality?

The Royal Navy’s Super-Carriers

masc
 

Well, the link to "Sea King Asac. Mk7" shows an AEW Mk2, which I suppose is related to the lengthy timescales you mention WEBF! At least they now admit the existence of something called a "Sea King AEW/Asac", which they inexplicably denied the last time I spoke to the IPT.

What is needed to make it happen? Simple - crack on and order the bloody things!! I've been involved on the fringes with this thing off and on since 1994 and have seen the thing progress from ST(S) via smart procurement to the current iteration of the design. There are an awful lot of things one could improve in the design (putting cats & arrester gear in for a kick off) as it stands, but frankly as long as its a big deck, with plenty of F44 and mag capacity, it can be incrementally improved once in service.

The problem appears to be that no-one is in charge! Some people in town are nominally i/c the requirement, whereas there's another gentleman in ABW who is i/c the technical and build issues. A senior gentleman is alo nominally i/c of delivery, but appears to have no staff, budget or power to make things happen.

The biggest risk to the project is inertia. It ain't going to get any cheaper (and frankly isn't that expensive compared with a number of other projects - Typhoon, FRES, DII, FSTA), so the old smaller is cheaper arguments should be shelved once and for all. Thankfully, the industry team and the IPT seem to have come to the sensible conclusion that small is pointless. The CVS do a great job of banging off a ten-ship mission twice a day, but struggle to do much more than that due to their lack of deck area and servicing points.

CDP just needs to take a deep breath and get Reid to approve the Manufacture contract. I know the current uncertainty about JCA doesn't help, but at the end of the day "if you build it, they will come". Ideally, "they" would be a combination of F35C, E2D and (what would be really nice) some low-time S3B from the boneyard for COD, tanking, ASuW / ASW and anything else you could think of. If we decide that we can't live without the access to F35 software etc, then at least there is a fallback (Rafale), rather than GR9 for the STOVL variant. I know the support arguments will rage on and on, but ultimately that is do-able, its jsut another embuggerance to deal with.

Rant off, over.

Personally I reckon all this tech-transfer argument over JSF is a blind to cover the fact that the MoD budget simply cannot afford all the current programmes. Something has to give, we apparently can't get out of Typhoon T3, JSF/CVF are the likely candidates. We can bin them and blame the Yanks.

Capability
 

Not meaning to troll, but what capability will CVF/JSF Really give us? As I understand it, we are only ordering 2. Now, the Yanks can afford to have a carrier battle group on station permanently covering pretty much every likely trouble spot, but with only one to position we will either have to be prescient or we will be projecting our air power at fast walking pace. Having worked in a large US HQ in Iraq, I have some understanding of what NCW really is, and I don't see how that reduces the 'sensor to shooter' link. The old arguments about host nation support were, I hope, put to bed after Afghanistan, when permission for Ocean to dock at Karachi was refused and the RMs on board had to sail to a friendly island to be inserted by AT. I know the ships involved did some very good work, and I'm not decrying that, but could we have done Afghanistan without them? YES.
What I'm wondering is whether anyone has really done an investment appraisal of spending money on big ships unlikely to see action (let's face it, we're not likely to go up against a credible maritime air threat nowadays, are we?) against investing in AT lift, AAR and stand-off weaponry - all aof which allows us to project air power RAPIDLY. Yes, I am familiar with the study that we could mount a more sustained bombing campaign against somewhere like Poland from a ship in the Baltic that we could from Germany, but a) the scenario was chosen to show the desired result and b) having seen how modern wars are fought, I don't rate weight of effort and permanence of air power as that great a concern except in the initial phases when you need to get there FAST - days not weeks.
Just a thought...:ok:

Slightly off topic, but anyone know why they've chosen the names "Queen Elizabeth" and "HMS Prince of Wales" rather than using two of the more recent carriers' names?

Those names were chosen with ominious prescience, as they were also the names of the planned CVA01s, and CVF will likely meet the same fate.

It's to try and stop the government cancelling them. Scrapping a programme named after the current monarch doesn't look good.

Having said that they scrapped CV01 so maybe I'm talking bolleux.....:confused:

'HMS Tony Blair' doesn't quite have the same ring to it.

but HMS Cherie Bliar ?

Thats a silly name for a warship, for a start is she full of seamen?

"HMS Jam" and "HMS Tomorrow"? :E

So how can we persuade the Government to speed up the decision making process?

No one likes seeing cut backs. However, if we have to be careful what we spend then more C17s and the FSTA are a must.

We will never have the money or resources to operate carriers effectively. With only 2 how are we going to make sure they are in the right place at the right time? No matter where the next battle is we need our AT/AR Fleets to have suitable numbers to do the job. Unless we put mini-tankers on the Carrier we will need AR cover regardless!

More C-17s, FSTA (and in proper numbers), more recce, more SEAD, addressing the shortfall in helicopter lift and a new generation of LCDWs are, or should be, a higher priority than the carriers.

Yep - more airlift and more tankers (that are reliable). These assets are big force multipliers that can get airpower where it needs to be and quickly (20 knots aint really gonna hack it). Our current fleets are an embarrassment (the aircraft - not crews/engineers!!)

Recce - not really a priority and not difficult, should be a side mission that anyone can pick up if "other assets" arent available.

SEAD - rather have more DEAD
:)

But 20 knots = 480 nautical miles per day. 25 knots = 600 nautical miles per day. And that's carrying all your engineering, logistics and other support facilities with you.

This isn't the way the Government do there sums but....

Estimated cost of CVF = £15 000 million
Predicated lifespan of CVF = 50 years
Therefore cost for two ships per year = £300 million.
Cost for ship per year = £150 million.

Which is cheaper than a frigate, and less than three Typhoons.

Something to think about.

When (if) the CVF enters service. Will we still have a Queen Elizabeth and a Prince of Wales? Or should they be renamed HMS King William and HMS Queen Kate ?

Fanatic,

Your point is.... pointless! Typhoon and the frigates will work out to be cheaper over their lifetimes, because you have only considered the capital (outlay) cost without considering associated fixed and variable costs such as fuel, resuppply, provision of battle groups, manning, maintenence, upgrades and refits, etc.

However, I'm sure you're arguing the case for CVF, so I'll let you off ;)

They're to be named QUEEN ELIZABETH THE SECOND and THE PRINCE OF WALES because no flagship has yet been named after HM and this bucks tradition somewhat, especially given her (to date) 54-year reign. THE PRINCE OF WALES is a concession to the fact that if we don't name a capital ship after Prince Charles now, he might never get the chance!

There is a way off setting these costs. As most warfare is BVR there is no need to paint the CVFs a dull grey. Instead they can carry advertisments for various companies. When in port a 100 ft advert for Pepsi, Vodaphone etc will work wonders for the companies in question. The revenue can pay for fuel, body armour, boots and other basics so often in short supply.

Its not being named after Prince Charles.....Otherwise it would be called HMS Prince Charles. Its being named after the Prince of Wales, so it could be the Black Prince...or that barking mad one...

Besides, when the CVF project gets binned at next years Defence review, the problem will be solved.

The Empire...Gone ???? Good God Carruthers. whatever next ?

However, I totally concur with dogfish. We don't need aircraft carriers, we have plenty of them in the shape of CVN's. and coupled with the CVN 21 programme, there will be plenty of them for many more years.

We are a tiny nation with a small Armed Force - Manchester United get more people to watch them every weekend than there are people in the Navy, the RAF and even the Army's meagre 110G is looking sad. (In fact.....even Chelsea get more people to watch their weekly diving competition than there are people in the RAF)

We have to admit it and stop trying to be some sort of world policeman and marching across foreign lands wealding our swords.

We should be concentrating more on defence of the homeland and in particular littoral manoeuvres.... scrap the CVF and buy 40 brand spanking new LCS's.

Can anyone tell me what the Tory plan on this is and defence in general should they truimpf in a few years.:hmm:

Instead of looking at the PROJECTS we should cut why dont we look at THE PEOPLE...
1/ RAF - 1 officer to 2.5 men
2/ RN - 1 officer to 4.5 men
3/ Army - 1 officer to 8 men
... Its about time we had a management weed out in the RN and RAF I think.
i'm sure one or two of you out there could think of others.

Methinks althenick is fishing - sorry, gotta bite.

The RAF ratio is so high because (in the main) it is our officers that fly. In the current climate of manpower cuts, any fat is being trimmed and that means all the support etc is being civilianised wherever possible. What will not change is the number of crews, because that is directly linked to capability. Hence, the supporting trades/branches where most of the airmen reside will reduce and the aircrew numbers will remain static. This ratio is likely to get worse in your eyes, but is the way we are headed.

The Army are different because their capability is all about eyes/boots/SA80s on the ground and hence the ratio needs to remain high.

I do agree that there is scope for a little bit of a senior management cull tho.... :E

Cancel CVF???!!! Gents, the world has moved on considerably. We are now structuring our Armed Forces around an expeditionary, littorally capable, mission-tailored force. The whole shebang has to be self-sustaining (so no plan to rely on the US to provide top-cover - yes we all know we wouldn't be fighting a major theatre war without 'em but that's a different story) in the round. Hard to produce that OC without your own go anywhere strike - ie a carrier, etc. You can't always rely/plan for Host Nation support for those fancy Typhoons, so I guess those mates may have a sore back after an 8 hour flight to the scene and then back (or maybe they won't get used - wouldn't that be a bugger? Another thread possibly!)

In case people have got a bit dumber lately; we only need 2 carriers because there's always a lead-in time to a conflict/crisis. This allows the players to position if not in advance then fairly soon after startex. No-one's claiming the Brit's are a world superpower, but we (along with the French) are a big influence in that bad ol'world. Therefore even our iddy biddy CV fleet can be in the right place at around the right time. Once there, you shouldn't underestimate the influence/effect these ships will have. Against most opfor the CVF and associated tailored battle group will have few real competitors (standfast China/N.Korea/Russia?) - although I'm not talking about "liberating" an entire country here.

As ever, it's not usually the military capability that is found wanting, it'll be the politicos dithering that gets everything FUBAR'd. That's the element of the military that needs some money spending on it. It took NATO an excrutiating 30 days (ie standard time) to get into Pakistan post earthquake - not much help if you've been hanging on by your fingernails waiting for assistance. Likewise if the Rwandans are chopping each other to bits then it's not normally spontaneous. Someone knew about it but did jack le cack.

What we actually need is political cojones, much more than stealth fighters who will never actually fight a remotely similar enemy. (Think I may have gone a bit off-thread here!)

I think alot of the points mentioned are Valid. Tech Transfare could be used cancel the F35 with the knock on that the Carriers are cancelled for the royal navy but with the one then being built sold to France. The Euro Navy will then have France supplying the carrier force UK/Neth supplying the Amphib force and the rest supplying the escorts.

However with the UK shift to expiditionary/littoral warfare The carriers actually become more important to provide CAP and CAS to landing forces.

And where is the Carriers AR support going to fly from? E3Ds? ASTOR? R1s etc? Where are aircraft with weapons 'hang ups' going to land?

A carrier is a detterent on it's own, but thats about it.

A carrier is a detterent on it's own, but thats about it.
 

FF - What a gross and poorly informed understatement. As you are probably aware, the same restrictions on hang-ups apply to the jets today and we've managed deepwater/no HN support ops perfectly well.

As to AR, MASC or some other coordinated battle space awareness asset will be well on the table by the time the CVF achieves FOC. The CVF is way more than a deterrent, it will be a genuine influence on events ashore.

However, no sensible commentator would say that the CVF is the be all & end all - it's merely a (significant) part of the whole shebang.

Nursey - although CAS/CAP are key elements of the any organic capability, it's the Strike bit (not always a jet with bombs) that will enable the battlegroup (not just the CVF) to influence events. The ability to drive an effect home from X miles away is something we simply do not currently have. We need to see the package as a whole...

...relatively safe Sea Base with activity to support whatever effect the Commanders want to achieve, including utilisation of the CVF's Strike a/c to zap whatever. It's too narrow minded to see this as a Royal Navy operation, the whole caper is totally joint (and probably combined - ie multinational).

To go back to the Typhoon dig - someone please tell me how that jet will play a significant part in an expeditionary operation many miles from a HN? Good to know it will be interdicting the skies over the UK for homeland security though. Mind you if they cancel JSF they could always take up BAe's offer to marinise the Typhoon right?!!! (Yes I know this has been done to death on several other threads!)

When was the last time a RN carrier operated indepedently against a credible force?

When was the last time a RN carrier operated indepedently against a credible force?
 

Apart from say, 1982? Which was, if I'm not mistaken, the last time since WW2 that any carrier had been under a genuine threat from ashore. (I guess some would argue Gulf 1)

What exactly is the nub of your argument? That we shouldn't improve our capability because you don't think the old CVS was capable enough? Presumably you subscribe to the moving Australia to justify the V-bomber force line of argument as well?!

Funny as the moving Australia act was, I'm not sure that the navy is above such tactics themselves. :)

I seem to remember an inside documentry of the SDR on BBC2 in around 1998 where the naval chappies were justifying the building of new aircraft carriers to some senior ministers. Two of their arguments were

a) you can close down a land based airfield just by driving a land rover into the middle of the runway.

and

b) any given attack on an aircraft carrier only has a ten percent chance of sinking the carrier.

The counter arguments of a) move the land rover, and b) attack ten times, never seemed to come up!

The better question....when did the RN last have a credible carrier?


Such as the FI squabble....and if one of the carriers is in drydock undergoing overhaul....and the other is on the wrong side of the world with some sort of committment?

The US is down to 12 from 15 large carriers....and they become in short supply often enough as it is.

SAS - concur, but the US is keeping the peace on a global scale, whereas the Brit/French level of ambition is much lower. We know our place (sort of!).

JTIDS - absolutely!

But seriously, since the politicos want the global influence (independent of the US) the only way to achieve it is to drive the airfield (and all the other stuff) to the crisis. That is the salient justification for the CVF. If someone comes up with a better way to achieve the desired effects over an adversary then you can bet we'll go that way instead.

We need to bear in mind that the Brits cannot even conceive of doing anything major without US top cover - and we all know they don't need the hardware, just the political support. What we're talking about here is a Sierra Leone-plus style op within our OC.

the USN only has 11 Carriers and 12 airgroups right now (despite <I believe> a law saying they must have 12). The Queen Elizabeth, Prince of Wales, CDG, and PA2 will be most useful in boosting coalition carrier capabilities.

A quick question for all: Name the other coalition partners who had assets on site in Op Corporate in 1982?

Nope, still 12, JFK hasn't been laid up yet.

The Navy wants to retire her, Congress hasn't made up its mind; lots of jobs/votes associated with such a move.

brick,

I hear she alongside with arrestor gear problems. Fit for take off but not landings. Sounds like an obituary to me.

IIRC, those who were against decommissioning JFK early have now been placated with promises of more funds for CVNX and moving a CSG or ESG from Norfolk to Mayport.

On that point, the new US LHA(R)s will carry 20 or so F35B as well as Ospreys, somewhat diulting the argument that CVF/PA1/2 will be a major addition to any 'coalition'.

If we're only going to do Sierra Leone - type ops on our own, isn't CVF a bit overkill? Surely 'Ocean-plus' would be a more cost-effective solution?

Navaleye/Lazar,

Didn't know the former and have heard the latter, but until she's decommissioned, she's still on the books. Moot point, she IS going, just a matter of how soon......

Didn't mean to insert thread creep; we now return to your regularly scheduled "Future carrier" thread......(hope you get them!)