"UK is worlds 4th largest military"
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WH904 wrote "We have only a token air defence capability now (maybe fifty operational Typhoons on a good day, if we really needed them?) and an offensive capability that isn't significantly greater."
Unfortunately unless the RAF has changed direction in the year since I left then those 50 Typhoons are probably counted as offensive capability as well as Air Defence since Tornado will go the same way as Harrier 6 months after it is withdrawn from Afghanistan.
Shocking isn't it.
Unfortunately unless the RAF has changed direction in the year since I left then those 50 Typhoons are probably counted as offensive capability as well as Air Defence since Tornado will go the same way as Harrier 6 months after it is withdrawn from Afghanistan.
Shocking isn't it.
Originally Posted by Once A Brat
WH904 wrote "We have only a token air defence capability now (maybe fifty operational Typhoons on a good day, if we really needed them?) and an offensive capability that isn't significantly greater."
Unfortunately unless the RAF has changed direction in the year since I left then those 50 Typhoons are probably counted as offensive capability as well as Air Defence since Tornado will go the same way as Harrier 6 months after it is withdrawn from Afghanistan.
Shocking isn't it.
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Agreed GeeRam,
When I joined, admittedly towards the end of the cold war, we had Lightning, Phantom, Buccaneer, Harrier, Jaguar, Canberra and Tornado sqns plus a multitude of other types (the basic trainer was the Chipmunk still) - Hunter was still flying as a trainer for Buccaneers, the RAF was about 100000 strong and was led by a 4*
The RAF I left had Typhoon and Tornado (no true jet CAS or BAI platform, just a strategic bomber and an air defender having a very good go) plus a few other types, with many of their roles having gone by the wayside - an island nation without its own orgainic MPA? It had just gone down to about 32000 personnel (which strictly is a Corps not a Force), but was still led by a 4* - admittedly a point for another thread, but surely at sometime during the multitude of reviews over the last 25-30 years we should have reviewed the cold war command structure?
Did I enjoy my time? Yes. Would I join again? in the 80s, Yes - now, doubtful.
When I joined, admittedly towards the end of the cold war, we had Lightning, Phantom, Buccaneer, Harrier, Jaguar, Canberra and Tornado sqns plus a multitude of other types (the basic trainer was the Chipmunk still) - Hunter was still flying as a trainer for Buccaneers, the RAF was about 100000 strong and was led by a 4*
The RAF I left had Typhoon and Tornado (no true jet CAS or BAI platform, just a strategic bomber and an air defender having a very good go) plus a few other types, with many of their roles having gone by the wayside - an island nation without its own orgainic MPA? It had just gone down to about 32000 personnel (which strictly is a Corps not a Force), but was still led by a 4* - admittedly a point for another thread, but surely at sometime during the multitude of reviews over the last 25-30 years we should have reviewed the cold war command structure?
Did I enjoy my time? Yes. Would I join again? in the 80s, Yes - now, doubtful.
Last edited by Once A Brat; 2nd Sep 2013 at 10:56. Reason: spelling!
It is almost getting to the point a Movie could be made about the RAF....."The Mouse That Roared".
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GeeRam - in the summer of '74 the Warsaw pact was 630 kms from Dover and armed to the teeth
Russia is now 2100km from Dover and not exactly a major military force
Russia is now 2100km from Dover and not exactly a major military force
Last edited by Heathrow Harry; 2nd Sep 2013 at 16:53.
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Heathrow Harry, I agree totally that Russian forces are far further from us than back in the Cold War. But to say Russia is hardly a military force!
I would suggest they are superpower number 2 or 3, its hard to say if China or Russia is stronger. Russia alone could likely take on Europe and win.
If you add Russian and Chinese forces together you end up with a force larger than the US military. From this point on the Chinese and Russian forces are likely to increase in size and most importantly both are likely to rapidly bring into service great ammounts of new equipment. While the strongest military power in the west is very likely to enter a period of significant decline, as are all the smaller players such as ourselves, the French and Germans also.
I would suggest they are superpower number 2 or 3, its hard to say if China or Russia is stronger. Russia alone could likely take on Europe and win.
If you add Russian and Chinese forces together you end up with a force larger than the US military. From this point on the Chinese and Russian forces are likely to increase in size and most importantly both are likely to rapidly bring into service great ammounts of new equipment. While the strongest military power in the west is very likely to enter a period of significant decline, as are all the smaller players such as ourselves, the French and Germans also.
Do recall we have reverted to a military posture of being able to fight a single war and not two at a time.
Reckon the JCS and SecDef reminded Odumbo of that before he went out with his bucket of red paint and brush and started painting himself into that Corner as he did?
Reckon the JCS and SecDef reminded Odumbo of that before he went out with his bucket of red paint and brush and started painting himself into that Corner as he did?
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It is all very well our having the 4th largest military in the world (in terms of GPD spend), but if we are not even going to bother using them to punish one of the most horrendous breaches of international law in recent history, then what is the point of having them? We might as well retreat within our own borders, keep a token defence force, ditch our nuclear deterrent and pocket the dividend.
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Originally Posted by Heathrow Harry
GeeRam - in the summer of '74 the Warsaw pact was 630 kms from Dover and armed to the teeth
Russia is now 2100km from Dover and not exactly a major military force
Russia is now 2100km from Dover and not exactly a major military force
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The world has moved on since the 1000 bomber raids of WW2 where aircraft were being churned out at a fantastic rate.
. If it ever happened again where there was a sustained none Nuclear War attack on the UK, we would be stuffed after the first couple of days, gone are the factories capability to ramp up aircraft production in a short period of time, gone are the facilities to design and build aircraft without significant time delays of years to see them to fruition, if indeed you could with the multi world sourcing of parts we have these days.
It just couldn't be done, so quantity over quality would come into play, as excellent as the Typhoon is, 50 odd fighters if you could generate that amount would be stuffed if they came up against 3 times the force, and as they say in the advert, once their gone, their gone.
. If it ever happened again where there was a sustained none Nuclear War attack on the UK, we would be stuffed after the first couple of days, gone are the factories capability to ramp up aircraft production in a short period of time, gone are the facilities to design and build aircraft without significant time delays of years to see them to fruition, if indeed you could with the multi world sourcing of parts we have these days.
It just couldn't be done, so quantity over quality would come into play, as excellent as the Typhoon is, 50 odd fighters if you could generate that amount would be stuffed if they came up against 3 times the force, and as they say in the advert, once their gone, their gone.
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Surely the point to be celebrated is that we no longer need such a force size. Otherwise what was the point of the era of the 1000 bomber raid. Neither lament the loss of the industrial capacity to ramp up production, we neither have need for that. We are what we are - the very fact that we continue to be compared and contrasted in the same breath as America, China, Russia with all their significant resources is telling enough.
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The other result of losing build capacity and buying the likes of the F-35 means that the factories that would have built homegrown fighters as in the past shut up shop and went, laying off and dispersing the knowledge base and skills we had, that one fact means we could probably never go down the route of a home grown product again and will continually be at the call of other countries to produce our military assets, fine until something goes wrong with those relationships we have.
Last edited by NutLoose; 2nd Sep 2013 at 20:57.
I don't own this space under my name. I should have leased it while I still could
TJ, whilst I take your point there is an irreducible minimum for any type and you could argue that we are pretty close to that.
The Type 45 destroyers are a case in point. Hugely capable and the equivalent of several earlier types of frigate but they can only be in one place at one time. Also lose one and its operational effect is the same as losing ALL the number of types that it replaced.
While the Malta Adex of yesteryear involved 10 or 12 Lightnings and 6 Typhoons might be the equivalent of 24 Lightnings the same attrition rule would apply.
Send just 6 to Cyprus with a single E3 certainly does not provide 24 hour AD.
The Type 45 destroyers are a case in point. Hugely capable and the equivalent of several earlier types of frigate but they can only be in one place at one time. Also lose one and its operational effect is the same as losing ALL the number of types that it replaced.
While the Malta Adex of yesteryear involved 10 or 12 Lightnings and 6 Typhoons might be the equivalent of 24 Lightnings the same attrition rule would apply.
Send just 6 to Cyprus with a single E3 certainly does not provide 24 hour AD.
Nutty ( if I may be so forward),
I agree with you 100% and would add that over the last 20 to 30 years we, as a nation, have chased the "cheapest" at the expense of the "nearest". The consequence is that many of our major industries have been defeated by the cause of lowering prices. The shoe industry in Leicestershire, pretty well gone now, home grown aircraft design and build likewise. Our government might promote our "wonderful vehicle manufacturing industry", then you have a think and most are here because of public subsidy in one form or another or as an easy way to sell cars in Europe. In the meantime we put our eggs in the basket of Stock Market trading and Foreign Holiday companies. I despair at the way that governments have given way and allowed our manufacturing industry to decline. The next thing we hear I suppose will be that their £70+ billion train set is to be built by an Australian company, owned by the Chinese and using an imported Latvian workforce. I'm thankful in a way, that at 60, I probably don't have to watch it all play out. Fourth largest Military ? Like the man who said it, a claim rather larger than capability.
Smudge
I agree with you 100% and would add that over the last 20 to 30 years we, as a nation, have chased the "cheapest" at the expense of the "nearest". The consequence is that many of our major industries have been defeated by the cause of lowering prices. The shoe industry in Leicestershire, pretty well gone now, home grown aircraft design and build likewise. Our government might promote our "wonderful vehicle manufacturing industry", then you have a think and most are here because of public subsidy in one form or another or as an easy way to sell cars in Europe. In the meantime we put our eggs in the basket of Stock Market trading and Foreign Holiday companies. I despair at the way that governments have given way and allowed our manufacturing industry to decline. The next thing we hear I suppose will be that their £70+ billion train set is to be built by an Australian company, owned by the Chinese and using an imported Latvian workforce. I'm thankful in a way, that at 60, I probably don't have to watch it all play out. Fourth largest Military ? Like the man who said it, a claim rather larger than capability.
Smudge
TJ, whilst I take your point there is an irreducible minimum for any type and you could argue that we are pretty close to that.
I do sometimes wonder whether we shouldn't just tone down our quest for all singing all dancing shiny 22nd century toys for something a bit more early 21st century and actually buy more than 4 of them. Isn't that the principle that the Navy's new Type 26 is supposed to be based around?
I understand why we do it - to maintain compatability with the US above all else - but maybe the rest of the world can't afford and doesn't need to keep up with the US' level of technological superiority. Rather than spending all that money on the F-35 and getting how many platforms exactly (not many), hypothetically what would you have got and how many could you afford if you bought Flankers and put western avionics and weapons systems in (probably a lot more)?
Yes I know it would never happen, but I'm just musing hypothetically as a distraction from the Syria and the RAF Club threads.
Last edited by Melchett01; 2nd Sep 2013 at 21:50.
If a country the size of Sweden can put together it's own jet fighters then presumably it's a bit too gloomy to think Britain couldn't. It might have to be single-role and limited in various ways.
Last edited by t43562; 2nd Sep 2013 at 21:53.
Melchett,
the argument is a good one - the purchace price for a single F-35B would buy around 120 Block IV TacTom TLAM's, or 3 SU-30MKI Flanker H's.
i hope, though only for the sake of UK carrier aviation, that F-35B works, and is affordable in sufficient numbers to be worth owning - but the truth is we'd have been far better off either going for F/A-18F and C&T in 2005, or deciding we were out of carrier aviation all-togetherand plumping for a much larger RN surface/sub-surface fleet and filling it with TLAM's for risk free uppity-wog-bashing - and using the money saved to look at increasing the 'LO-ness' of Tommahawk and Storm Shadow for future conflicts...
the argument is a good one - the purchace price for a single F-35B would buy around 120 Block IV TacTom TLAM's, or 3 SU-30MKI Flanker H's.
i hope, though only for the sake of UK carrier aviation, that F-35B works, and is affordable in sufficient numbers to be worth owning - but the truth is we'd have been far better off either going for F/A-18F and C&T in 2005, or deciding we were out of carrier aviation all-togetherand plumping for a much larger RN surface/sub-surface fleet and filling it with TLAM's for risk free uppity-wog-bashing - and using the money saved to look at increasing the 'LO-ness' of Tommahawk and Storm Shadow for future conflicts...