AW&ST:
Opinion: U.K. Defense Planners Deliver More ‘Hurry Up and Wait’ Decisions
Christmas came early for the British armed forces. The gentlemen (and ladies) of David Cameron’s Tory government responsible for the Strategic Defense & Security Review (SDSR) are resting merry. They hold an unexpected absolute majority in Parliament. The far-Left-led opposition, barring catastrophe, will be outside the door calling for figgy pudding for many years. Cameron’s team can afford to plan for the long term.
Scrooge’s change to his Christmas plans was influenced by ghosts, as was the U.K.’s decision to rebuild its fixed-wing antisubmarine warfare (ASW) force with nine Boeing P-8A Poseidons. The ghosts were the Nimrod AEW3 and MRA4 (based on a Ghost-powered airplane named Comet), two disastrous attempts by U.K. industry to build large reconnaissance and surveillance aircraft. They appear, rattling their chains, whenever a British defense planner contemplates doing that again.
British ASW technology is world-class. European companies have delivered complex maritime and other sensor systems (such as Airbus’s P-3 upgrade for Brazil). But the known-quantity P-8A has been on the surviving ASW community’s letter to Santa every year since the 2010 SDSR chopped the MRA4. Officials say that they thoroughly analyzed alternatives to the P-8A, but at least one executive explains how his company was involved in the process: “By realizing early on that the RAF wasn’t interested in any answer other than the P-8.”
The P-8A seems to work, but the U.S. Navy has loaded it with lots of toys and goodies—provision for a large ground-surveillance radar and a beefed-up wing to carry heavy weapons—making it heavy and expensive, with a smaller range and persistence advantage over older or smaller platforms than you might expect.
Speaking of yonder Istar (intelligence, surveillance, targeting and reconnaissance, to use the British term), the SDSR makes an offhand reference to keeping the E-3D Sentry airborne early-warning aircraft in service to 2035. That’s not a new plan, but it gets pricier by the year: The RAF aircraft still have their original, 1970s-technology control and display suites and have fallen behind the rest of the worldwide fleet. Given the E-3’s high cost per flight hour, a smaller replacement could make economic sense.
The British made a big deal about speeding up Lockheed Martin F-35B Joint Strike Fighter deliveries and committing to their long-planned 138-aircraft buy, but Fort Worth might be singing “Blue Christmas” when the implications of the SDSR hit home. The acceleration of the first 48 jets is relative to a very slow schedule that was never published; the remaining 90 aircraft, once set for delivery in the 2020s, are now, a senior U.K. official says in Washington, “a long way away” (beyond field and fountain, moor and mountain, in all likelihood). “We have not made any decision about future tranches and we don’t need to make them yet.”
As for the Eurofighter Typhoon: In the Mummer’s plays that my ancestors would perform for pennies and beer, and the hell with figgy pudding, the M.C.—Father Christmas—was a morally ambiguous character. (The joint global brand with St. Nicholas came later.) Once St. George had killed the dragon or the Turkish Knight, Father Christmas would summon the Doctor, who would produce a vial and say to the victim:
Here, Jack, take a little of my flip-flop
Pour it down thy tip-top
Rise and fight again!
Which is what SDSR has done for the Typhoon. Rivals have made hay for years with the U.K.’s squishy commitment to the Typhoon. The decision to retrofit the active, electronically scanned array radar, keep the type in service to 2040 and add two more squadrons will invigorate a rearguard action in Denmark (where one major party wants fighters that are good at air defense) and points to interesting times in Belgium and Canada. It makes the unfunded commitment to 138 JSFs look like window-dressing, complete with elves and plastic snow.
The Royal Navy, meanwhile, can at least see more than three ships come sailing in, although there will be eight Type 26 ASW frigates rather than the previously planned 13. The money for the other five will pay for a larger number of smaller, less costly, export-friendly frigates.
You may think that you remember that the Type 26 used to be the export-friendly Global Combat Ship. From hints about the threat environment, it sounds as if the Type 26 is now regarded as a very quiet high-end ASW ship. The risk is that the Type 26 could end up as a costly bespoke product like the Daring-class destroyer, and that the export market will be even harder to crack a decade hence.
Six days after Christmas is the season for resolving not to keep repeating one’s mistakes. British planners will have done well to avoid the need to do that, this time around.