Head of Royal Navy threatens resignation over push to scrap Harriers
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Soddim,
Prior to the landings what were the SHARs doing if they weren't providing the outer layer of defence??? From my position in a T42 down there the SHARs were doing just that.
Jacko,
Re the CVF/HAR/JSF debate I am unclear who provides a/d and or strike missions prior to a point where the GR4s/Typhoon find an airfield to operate from? And why can't the EU provide A/D for the UK, esp as they seem reliuctant to go anywhere else?
The SHARS did not provide the outer layer of defence - the picket ships did.
Jacko,
Re the CVF/HAR/JSF debate I am unclear who provides a/d and or strike missions prior to a point where the GR4s/Typhoon find an airfield to operate from? And why can't the EU provide A/D for the UK, esp as they seem reliuctant to go anywhere else?
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I think you'll find, Bismark, that a large number of the kills achieved by the SHARs were post attack and the AD provided was necessarily limited by the distance from deck to CAP. To provide a reasonable outer defence the SHARs would have needed to CAP to the West of West Falkland. Having said that, everyone acknowledges how much better the AD would have been a few years earlier whilst the old Ark with F4s was in service.
Although you aimed your AD comment at Jacko, you cannot be serious about relying on the EU for air defence of UK. If that situation ever comes about I am emigrating!
Although you aimed your AD comment at Jacko, you cannot be serious about relying on the EU for air defence of UK. If that situation ever comes about I am emigrating!
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Damn these proposed carriers must be fast to deploy anywhere in the world and provide AD/CAS with their embarked aviation quicker than land-based aircraft can deploy.
Oh that HNS thing, what if the countries surrounding the target country also deny overflight permission? Suntans and cocktails all-round for the guys and girls on the slowboat?
Oh that HNS thing, what if the countries surrounding the target country also deny overflight permission? Suntans and cocktails all-round for the guys and girls on the slowboat?
Time we concerned ourselves with our country and our people, if we can't afford to do anything more.
But. If the UK hadn't been so conspicuously committed over the past few years, what would be left of the armed forces by now, with no political ammunition to defend them?
My personal position for the record: I would love to see a future where we don't have to maintain hugely expensive strike capability, where weapons and war are relics of the past. Surely that, regardless of its achievability, has to be the goal of whatever world order we can create. While I don't live on that planet, however...
P
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Re the CVF/HAR/JSF debate I am unclear who provides a/d and or strike missions prior to a point where the GR4s/Typhoon find an airfield to operate from? And why can't the EU provide A/D for the UK, esp as they seem reliuctant to go anywhere else?
Land based and maritime based air power each have their benefits and disadvantages Bismark. But please do not try and distort history by suggesting that carrier air is an essential pre-cursor for most ops.
Regards,
MM
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The problem is that with a cat and trap carrier RN squadrons would not be made available for lengthy land based rotational commitments in the way that RN Harrier squadrons have been.
You have two carriers one is active while the other is in refit or maintenance. What do you think you do with the air wing of the carrier that is pulling shore duty?
The fact is carriers are used to project power and protect overseas possessions in a way that shore based land power cannot. If you need that capability then you need carriers. If you want to be relegated to performing air police missions and the occasional overseas deployment under Uncle Sam's security umbrella well then you do not need the carriers. Your obsolete (they certainly will be around 2015) Eurofighters should deter Russia as long as Uncle provides back up.
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Wingingit.
I see you put your location as being somewhere in cyberspace. To make the following statement you must be way out there in deep space.
Unlike Jacko, I agree we need the carriers but if you think that a) the light blue mob are only capable of air police missions or that b) Typhoon is going to be obsolete in seven years, you are well and truly out of it on something. I'll have some of whatever you're taking but I think I'd better take a month's leave first, it will be a long way back down!
I see you put your location as being somewhere in cyberspace. To make the following statement you must be way out there in deep space.
If you want to be relegated to performing air police missions and the occasional overseas deployment under Uncle Sam's security umbrella well then you do not need the carriers. Your obsolete (they certainly will be around 2015) Eurofighters should deter Russia as long as Uncle provides back up.
I don't own this space under my name. I should have leased it while I still could
If we get 2 CVF why would we need 2 NSW if one CVF was always in refit?
Just a thought. Right or wrong?
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Even Squadrons need recovery time after deployments, both for recovery of aircraft serviceabilityand recovery of personnel. If you have one NSW bouncing permanently from ship to ship without any "harmony time" you will wear out your aircraft and your people, resulting in less efficiency and a hefty retention problem.
Even Squadrons need recovery time after deployments, both for recovery of aircraft serviceabilityand recovery of personnel. If you have one NSW bouncing permanently from ship to ship without any "harmony time" you will wear out your aircraft and your people, resulting in less efficiency and a hefty retention problem.
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Even Squadrons need recovery time after deployments, both for recovery of aircraft serviceabilityand recovery of personnel. If you have one NSW bouncing permanently from ship to ship without any "harmony time" you will wear out your aircraft and your people, resulting in less efficiency and a hefty retention problem
From the BBC:
Decision due on aircraft carriers
Defence Secretary John Hutton is due to issue a written ministerial statement on the future of two new Royal Navy aircraft carriers.
Reports suggest he could delay their entry into service - scheduled for 2014 and 2016 - by two years as the Ministry of Defence tries to cut costs.
Work on the £4bn project had been due to begin next spring.
The announcement affects shipyards in Appledore, in north Devon, Portsmouth, Barrow-in-Furness, Glasgow and Rosyth.
Former defence secretary Des Browne had given the green light for the creation of HMS Queen Elizabeth and HMS Prince of Wales in May.
Contracts worth about £3.2bn were signed in July and the work was expected to create or underpin a total of 10,000 jobs at the yards.
But Mr Hutton told MPs this week there would be a new announcement on defence spending.
He said: "We will be setting out some ways in which we intend to improve value for money in relation to defence procurement.
"But we have got to make sure that the armed forces have a balanced range of kit available to them."
'Financial chaos'
BBC defence correspondent Caroline Wyatt said the government did not view cancelling major defence projects as an option. Instead, it was considering delays as a way of controlling the Ministry of Defence's (MoD) spiralling budget.
She said: "At least one of Britain's two new aircraft carriers could be put back by a year, or even two.
"There's already a delay to the joint strike fighter that will fly from the warships, so the MoD could argue it makes sense to put off the completion of the carriers."
But Liberal Democrat MP Mike Hancock, a member of the Commons Defence Committee, said the MoD was in financial "chaos".
"Without the carrier contracts, many of those yards are going to find it difficult to keep going," he said.
"MoD contracts have been fundamental in keeping the skills together, keeping the technology alive and moving it on... delays will undoubtedly mean a lot of that good work and a lot of money will have been wasted."
Defence Secretary John Hutton is due to issue a written ministerial statement on the future of two new Royal Navy aircraft carriers.
Reports suggest he could delay their entry into service - scheduled for 2014 and 2016 - by two years as the Ministry of Defence tries to cut costs.
Work on the £4bn project had been due to begin next spring.
The announcement affects shipyards in Appledore, in north Devon, Portsmouth, Barrow-in-Furness, Glasgow and Rosyth.
Former defence secretary Des Browne had given the green light for the creation of HMS Queen Elizabeth and HMS Prince of Wales in May.
Contracts worth about £3.2bn were signed in July and the work was expected to create or underpin a total of 10,000 jobs at the yards.
But Mr Hutton told MPs this week there would be a new announcement on defence spending.
He said: "We will be setting out some ways in which we intend to improve value for money in relation to defence procurement.
"But we have got to make sure that the armed forces have a balanced range of kit available to them."
'Financial chaos'
BBC defence correspondent Caroline Wyatt said the government did not view cancelling major defence projects as an option. Instead, it was considering delays as a way of controlling the Ministry of Defence's (MoD) spiralling budget.
She said: "At least one of Britain's two new aircraft carriers could be put back by a year, or even two.
"There's already a delay to the joint strike fighter that will fly from the warships, so the MoD could argue it makes sense to put off the completion of the carriers."
But Liberal Democrat MP Mike Hancock, a member of the Commons Defence Committee, said the MoD was in financial "chaos".
"Without the carrier contracts, many of those yards are going to find it difficult to keep going," he said.
"MoD contracts have been fundamental in keeping the skills together, keeping the technology alive and moving it on... delays will undoubtedly mean a lot of that good work and a lot of money will have been wasted."
For a lesson in what happens when you continually delay ships, see Charles de Gaulle cost escalation, or more recently, the impact when MoD deferred MG for CVF back in 2003/4.
Fact of the matter is, the only thing you can do (without wholesale redundancies and consequent impact on ability to build in the first place) is slow the build down, which means throw less bods at it. Run-on costs for CVS are likely to eat up any savings in CVF build (which I thought was the whole point of combining EP and STP!) as Lusty & Ark (particularly the latter judging by her material state) will need another trip to Babcocks North.....
Fact of the matter is, the only thing you can do (without wholesale redundancies and consequent impact on ability to build in the first place) is slow the build down, which means throw less bods at it. Run-on costs for CVS are likely to eat up any savings in CVF build (which I thought was the whole point of combining EP and STP!) as Lusty & Ark (particularly the latter judging by her material state) will need another trip to Babcocks North.....
Whingeing git now,
You'd be surprised. Not only a journo, but a busy one for the last 20+ years, and reasonably well informed, if not respected.
And I'm entirely happy to be compared with Bill Sweetman, thanks, who's better informed than you are or will ever be, with your kneejerk prejudice and facile and fatuous opinions.
1) "The fact is carriers are used to project power and protect overseas possessions in a way that shore based land power cannot." Much more slowly, at many times the cost, and all to deploy a small force incapable of sustaining a high sortie rate for an extended period, you mean?
2) "If you need that capability then you need carriers." Well no, you evidently don't. The UK has been successfully projecting power (in the Balkans, the Middle East, and other places) since 1982 - and in EVERY instance (even when the decision was taken to send a CVS) land-based air power COULD have done the job - and could always have done it quicker, better and cheaper.
Carriers are a useful niche capability, but a niche capability should not be so expensive (at a time of tight budgetary limits) as to distort the entire defence budget.
Scrapping Harrier early: Saves £1 Bn +
Scrapping CVS early: Saves ???
Scrapping CVF: Saves £4 Bn +
Scrapping JSF: Saves at least £5.4 Bn/$8.052 Bn (66 x $122 m) in flyaway costs ALONE.
By contrast, you could buy 48 Gripen NGs for £2.3 Bn, all-in.
or 58 Gripen NGs (including Fuel, Spares, and Upgrades for a 30 year service life, an MLU, and ”Uncertainties” ) for £5.29 Bn.
It's not that carriers aren't useful - it's that they are not cost effective, and are unaffordable.
And the RN didn't have a great record of making even the STOVL SHar available for non-carrier ops in the past, and a 66 aircraft force of JSF would certainly be tied to CVF.
You'd be surprised. Not only a journo, but a busy one for the last 20+ years, and reasonably well informed, if not respected.
And I'm entirely happy to be compared with Bill Sweetman, thanks, who's better informed than you are or will ever be, with your kneejerk prejudice and facile and fatuous opinions.
1) "The fact is carriers are used to project power and protect overseas possessions in a way that shore based land power cannot." Much more slowly, at many times the cost, and all to deploy a small force incapable of sustaining a high sortie rate for an extended period, you mean?
2) "If you need that capability then you need carriers." Well no, you evidently don't. The UK has been successfully projecting power (in the Balkans, the Middle East, and other places) since 1982 - and in EVERY instance (even when the decision was taken to send a CVS) land-based air power COULD have done the job - and could always have done it quicker, better and cheaper.
Carriers are a useful niche capability, but a niche capability should not be so expensive (at a time of tight budgetary limits) as to distort the entire defence budget.
Scrapping Harrier early: Saves £1 Bn +
Scrapping CVS early: Saves ???
Scrapping CVF: Saves £4 Bn +
Scrapping JSF: Saves at least £5.4 Bn/$8.052 Bn (66 x $122 m) in flyaway costs ALONE.
By contrast, you could buy 48 Gripen NGs for £2.3 Bn, all-in.
or 58 Gripen NGs (including Fuel, Spares, and Upgrades for a 30 year service life, an MLU, and ”Uncertainties” ) for £5.29 Bn.
It's not that carriers aren't useful - it's that they are not cost effective, and are unaffordable.
And the RN didn't have a great record of making even the STOVL SHar available for non-carrier ops in the past, and a 66 aircraft force of JSF would certainly be tied to CVF.
"Rebalancing" the Equipment Programme or more p1ssing about?
Well, now we know SoS's hit-list.
Ministry of Defence | Defence News | Equipment and Logistics | More helicopter capacity for Afghanistan in rebalanced equipment programme
Quite how re-engining 12 AH9 is going to dramatically change matters is beyond me. Nor is essentially starting FRES again or even more fruit-loop, the idea that we can push our Fleet tankers back three years - having already issues ITT and got responses.....
Fiddling while Rome burns.
Ministry of Defence | Defence News | Equipment and Logistics | More helicopter capacity for Afghanistan in rebalanced equipment programme
Quite how re-engining 12 AH9 is going to dramatically change matters is beyond me. Nor is essentially starting FRES again or even more fruit-loop, the idea that we can push our Fleet tankers back three years - having already issues ITT and got responses.....
Fiddling while Rome burns.
Ho ho. Keep going Jacko. Some one will even believe the "distorting the entire defence budget" claim sooner or later! £4bn over eight years is hardly a distortion (not compared to Tiffy at £70M a pop according to the NAO) at what, 20 airframes pa for 6 yrs?
Apparently the FA18E has a unit price of $55M at the minute (albeit according to the DoDs own figures!). 120 for $7bn or so, knock out the F3, true MR jet that's carrier capable. Bin the GR4 for Typhoo and Bob's yer uncle a two jet FJ fleet (and 350 or so of them at that if we get Tranche 3!)
Apparently the FA18E has a unit price of $55M at the minute (albeit according to the DoDs own figures!). 120 for $7bn or so, knock out the F3, true MR jet that's carrier capable. Bin the GR4 for Typhoo and Bob's yer uncle a two jet FJ fleet (and 350 or so of them at that if we get Tranche 3!)