I see that USS
Nimitz is being extended in service until next year, instead of decommissioning this year. Presumably this is to avoid a reduction in carrier numbers until the second of the
Ford class enters service. If only we could do the same with frigates.
Originally Posted by
Not_a_boffin
Hmmmm. The reason the frigates are being retired early, is because they have been run to something like twice their design life and to allow them to keep going would require very intrusive and expensive refits. Said refits would also take a very long time so the additional ship time available would be small. In other words, very poor bang for buck.
Originally Posted by
Not_a_boffin
Unless I missed something, the idea that they can't be manned is a bit of throwaway speculation in the NL article, rather than the "fact" that some seem to be taking it as.
Interestingly, if you add up the complements of both carriers, the 19 nominal DD/FF, 11 submarines, 6 MCMV (plus spare crew) and eight OPV, you end up with about 8500 billets. Add in another 1000 for the 9 or so NAS and another 1000 or so for RFA and you get to 10500. From a trained strength of about 28000 including Royal. So easily a sea/shore ratio of 1:1. Which as we know means that it's not a raw numbers game as some are suggesting, less still caused (along with famine, pestilence, disease, poverty, global warming, crime epidemics and the cost of living crisis) "by the carriers".
It's actually shortage of specific roles particularly in engineering trades stemming from some piss-poor personnel policies and initiatives ever since Topmast. Compounded by an ever more prescriptive training system where the shortage of seagoing billets (see knackered frigates) is making it harder to grow those people.
Sorry for a late reply - what do you make of these comments by a serving RN ME Officer?
A frigate has a crew of 190 or so; a destroyer more than 200. Further, we have few of each. The RN has undertaken to maintain a global presence and is obliged (by the Defence Plan) to keep a ship in the Falklands: even were we to discount the second ship in the Far East and hand the Caribbean back to the RFA, that's three frigates tied up overseas on a permanent basis, more if we want to rotate hulls. We can't afford to do that with current designs or current personnel availability: one of the reasons SPEY is replacing LANCASTER is because B2OPV has a total crew of 80, against LANC's dual crew of nudging 400.
Further, as I've argued elsewhere, the RN needs ships to act as training wheels. It takes 6-8 months to bring a trainee Officer of the Watch up to speed to attempt the qualifying exams: that becomes much longer if the Ship is in hostile waters when giving the con to a trainee is seen as unacceptably risky. You can only realistically train four at a time; replacement by sim training would require the Marime & Coastguard Agency's (MCA) approval. This burden used to fall on the MCMV flotilla, which has halved in size: we have increasingly few places to train watchkeepers. Conversion rate is not 100%, either. The fewer hulls additional to FF/DD numbers we have, the harder it is to sustain a watchkeeping cadre.
If you work on the assumption that a third of complex warships will be in refit or the like at any one time, than having eight fully manned and reasonably ready might be considered the same as having eleven (the post integrated review number) with a third in refit or similar.
Some may be interested in this thread:
The (absolute) state of the Naval Service
The same guy quoted above pointed out that:
A carrier is essential for fighting a serious war at sea, so we also need escorts and supply vessels to match. Fine. In that case, we need to fund enough vessels to provide a carrier strike group plus everything else we want to be able to do.
Note that "enough" is ideally thrice what you want to have at sea at any given time, to allow for adequate maintenance and unreasonable things like leave. "Twice" is too little and will result in gaps opening.
My own heretical view is that we've insisted on top end capability and worn out very capable hulls on routine constabulary tasks. That said, I don't think the higher echelons of power understand that machinery will eventually fail when run hard; and that life is an inverse function of stress imposed.