a 7 week short embarkation is very different from a sustained work up, deployment that the RN used to do. I'm probably not far off the mark if I said that your 7 week deployment was the sole 2007 GR9 embarkation of any size?
Your original point was that the GR force was not capable of deploying on the carrier and operating to it's full potential due to HERRICK.
This is incorrect.
You then said that the GR force didn't deploy like the SHAR. As stated, that was because it was never planned to. The point is that during HERRICK the Harrier was still able to deploy to sea at a Sqn sized level and undertake full size exercises.
Thats the problem with the size of the available fleet once we went from SHAR to GR9 (a move which made a lot of sense to me) - a reduced FE@R meant we couldnt do both.
Yes, that move did make sense. The reduced fear came post HERRICK, not at the demise of SHAR. Yes, with 18 fear the force proved it could do both.