Originally Posted by Evalu8er
'Give SH to the army' - oh dear. Whilst probably a viable thought in the FJ heavy (it seems now....) 70s/80s it would probably signal the end of the '100 year experiment' today. The SH force is now a large proportion of RAF manpower (not to mention, by far, the most decorated...), to lose it would inevitably drive claims for the AT/AAR assets by the RLC and the vestigial FJ by the RN. Not a good idea....
You worry that the departure of SH would leave the RAF too small to survive. I would point out that on 1 April 1918 the RAF was proportionally far smaller compared to its leviathan parents than a SH-less RAF would be next to the other services today. Why, if it was it a good idea to go independent then, would it not be a good idea to for a SH-less RAF to stay independent now? There are plenty of far, far smaller air forces in the world. The residual assets (ISTAR, AT, air defence, attack) would all have pan-environment utility and would attract competing demands from both Army and Navy - exactly the rationale for the creation of the helicopter-less RAF in the first place.
In any case, breaking up the RAF and redistributing it to the other services would not realise a great deal in the way of savings, which ultimately would be the only political justification for closing down the Service. Fewer blue uniforms, yes (although great swathes of the RAF seem to dress in combats on a daily basis, anyway). Fewer parallel training streams, yes (although that aspect is already being radically streamlined). Fewer bloated RAF HQs, yes. But all of these are a drop in the ocean compared to the vast expense associated with the equipment and its largely-civilian support organisation (of which the scope for trimming is unrelated to who actually flies the things).
I am a definite advocate of the independent air force. However I struggle to see how we have ended up in a position where the Navy has an organic SH fleet (being upgraded with ex-RAF assets), yet we can still argue that the RAF must dispense all of the Army's SH requirements. It doesn't make sense to me; one of these arrangements must be 'wrong' and it surely is illogical for them to co-exist. Both the FAA and the Army have operated RW from ships and from land, in high-threat and low-threat areas, and would presumably give at least as much priority to specialist roles (SF / JPR) as the RAF does, i.e. lots / nil respectively. I would be grateful if somebody more on-message than I could explain exactly why SH must stay as-is... it's a definite chink in my light blue armour.