Not a million years ago there would have been a brace of CH47 parked on the ground in Malta by now on the planning assumption that commercial means would manage to get most, but not all, EPs away (JWP 3.51). This would be a stopgap whilst HMS Ocean/Illustrious/Ark Royal steamed into to the area such that helicopters could operate a shuttle to the ships holding 12.1nm off-shore.
It would be naive to think that PJHQ haven't been tasked with looking at other options (above Cumberland etc) but it would be interesting to see whether there is a 'capability required' vs. 'capability available' gap.
