HMS Ocean
I'd certainly agree that the RN needs more escorts. Current plan is for a carrier in a high risk area to be escorted by 2X T45 and 2X T26/23. Based on how things are currently done, in most scenarios you can probably add a US and a French asset to that. With 19 UK escorts (albeit as Hula says we have a couple currently alongside doing harbour training) that should be readily possible, leaving a few available to be in other places. Getting the balance right requires easing escort numbers upwards, not binning the carriers (which are paid for and bring a lot to the table, however much some on here would disagree) so that we can deploy escorts around the world with little to escort.
I don’t disagree with you that the RN needs to grow - even from my RAF side of the fence it strikes me as rather odd for an island nation with global aspirations to have such a small blue water fleet. But to say we need to increase the number of escorts to support the carrier rather than we need an effective fleet to carry out missions x,y & z does rather make it seem as though the carriers are now the RN’s mission. Either that or someone in Fleet Plans had incredibly big balls and worked on the theory that the loss of or inability to use a carrier would be so politically embarrassing and strategically damaging that HMG would have to provide funding for more ships thereby dragging the size of the fleet up. It’s an interesting question as I’m just reading Gen Richard Shirreff’s book War with Russia and the lack of effective escort screen is the primary cause for losing the carrier whilst it waited for the rest of the NATO TG to arrive.
Also part of the rationale for the Type 31 frigate is to free up the 14 top tier escorts for the likes of carrier escort, while using the T31s for such things as maritime security, choke points and simply turning up - the stated aim being to increase numbers eventually beyond the current planned 5. The 5 new 90m OPVs can also do a job, within limits. The hope must be that the current review recognises some earlier increase in escort numbers as a priority and stumps up the cash to deliver that a bit sooner. Like them or not, binning the carriers now would make no sense at all, the priority should surely be to rebalance around them.
Yes, in all likelihood. If the Russians can fit LACMs to smaller vessels (Buyan-M) than our River Class OPVs armed with 20-30mm cannon, I have no doubt there are unconventional naval capabilities out there that can do significant damage to the unaware and unprepared. Don’t base your thinking of enemy capability purely on our own way of doing things.
Originally Posted by Frostchamber
Which will be a large part of the reason the QEs will be fitted with 4X 30mm and 3X Phalanx Block 2B, the latter with anti-surface capability specifically for speedboat-type attack. Not to mention an escort screen.
Did a fair bit of work on this for the Royal Navy, when we brought in the latest -1B version of Phalanx and its “anti-surface capability” was being proposed as a reason to get rid of some other weapons that, supposedly, would now be redundant.
For those interested, Phalanx was originally purely an automatic air defence gun – it decided what it would shoot at and when, and other than putting it into “Air Mode Auto” that was the extent of operator interaction. One of the many updates it’s had to keep it capable, is a thermal camera: radar is very accurate in range and excellent for finding and locking onto “fast, small thing coming at you at nearly Mach 1”, infrared is then outstanding for giving a very precise angle of sight onto that object so the gun can be aimed even more accurately and kill incoming threats further out with fewer rounds fired. While it’s mostly used fully automated, the nice engineers at Raytheon thought “since we’ve got the camera, why don’t we put the image in front of the operator so they can see what they’re shooting at?” followed by “if we can see where the gun’s pointing, why don’t we give the operator a controller so he can drive it manually?” Hence why the -1B version of Phalanx gained its ability to manually engage small boats and slow air targets – it was a “why not do this?” rather than a “there is a pressing need to…”
The reason not to be worried that the Phalanx doesn’t seem to be hitting and sinking the boats are twofold. Against small boats, you’re not in any sort of automatic mode; the operator is tracking and firing manually. The gun is stabilised, but that’s all the help you get: there’s a fair bit of spray-and-pray and Kentucky windage involved. (The really clever – and genuinely impressive – open-loop tracking and fire control only works well on fast airborne targets, which is the job Phalanx was always designed for). It’s not the mount’s priority, so the operators don’t get huge amounts of practice in peacetime.
The other problem is that Phalanx is firing a 20mm APDS round, which is very lethal fired head-on into incoming missiles but just drills a 9mm hole through a boat when it hits: if you don’t hit the engine or the coxswain, it won’t do much. Small boats can be *tough*; we had an incident a few years ago when a destroyer seized a drug-smuggler’s go-fast and, having secured relevant evidence, used it as a gunnery target precisely because it would stay afloat despite being shot full of holes and set on fire: it gave all the weapon-aimers needing to stay qualified, the chance to get their practice shoots in. (It never did sink, even after one of the boarding team blew it into smallish pieces with some PE7)
Phalanx is a very good system for defending against missiles and aircraft close-in, and the manual mode is better to have than not have, but it’s a backup not a priority. For surface threats close-in, we use 30mm cannon firing high explosive/incendiary shells; the USN’s got assorted 25mm and 30mm weapons for the job. And of course when it’s really close, there are assorted machine-guns, small arms and (in our case) Mk 44 Miniguns coming into play.
The 30mmm cannon is the DS30M Mk2 which was designed specifically to deal with the small boat threat, and incorporates things such as an Electro-Optical tracker.
I agree - but they do have to obey the laws of Physics. 4Greens mentioned a 'speedboat', which implies something like a RIB or a skiff. He also suggested a man portable weapon, such as an RPG or an ATGW. Modern ATGW might be accurate fired from a stable position, but a small craft moving a speed is not very stable.
Phalanx block 2B does indeed have a manual surface to surface mode, but it is primarily an anti aircraft.missile weapon. However, as this page suggests...
Did a fair bit of work on this for the Royal Navy, when we brought in the latest -1B version of Phalanx and its “anti-surface capability” was being proposed as a reason to get rid of some other weapons that, supposedly, would now be redundant.
For those interested, Phalanx was originally purely an automatic air defence gun – it decided what it would shoot at and when, and other than putting it into “Air Mode Auto” that was the extent of operator interaction. One of the many updates it’s had to keep it capable, is a thermal camera: radar is very accurate in range and excellent for finding and locking onto “fast, small thing coming at you at nearly Mach 1”, infrared is then outstanding for giving a very precise angle of sight onto that object so the gun can be aimed even more accurately and kill incoming threats further out with fewer rounds fired. While it’s mostly used fully automated, the nice engineers at Raytheon thought “since we’ve got the camera, why don’t we put the image in front of the operator so they can see what they’re shooting at?” followed by “if we can see where the gun’s pointing, why don’t we give the operator a controller so he can drive it manually?” Hence why the -1B version of Phalanx gained its ability to manually engage small boats and slow air targets – it was a “why not do this?” rather than a “there is a pressing need to…”
The reason not to be worried that the Phalanx doesn’t seem to be hitting and sinking the boats are twofold. Against small boats, you’re not in any sort of automatic mode; the operator is tracking and firing manually. The gun is stabilised, but that’s all the help you get: there’s a fair bit of spray-and-pray and Kentucky windage involved. (The really clever – and genuinely impressive – open-loop tracking and fire control only works well on fast airborne targets, which is the job Phalanx was always designed for). It’s not the mount’s priority, so the operators don’t get huge amounts of practice in peacetime.
The other problem is that Phalanx is firing a 20mm APDS round, which is very lethal fired head-on into incoming missiles but just drills a 9mm hole through a boat when it hits: if you don’t hit the engine or the coxswain, it won’t do much. Small boats can be *tough*; we had an incident a few years ago when a destroyer seized a drug-smuggler’s go-fast and, having secured relevant evidence, used it as a gunnery target precisely because it would stay afloat despite being shot full of holes and set on fire: it gave all the weapon-aimers needing to stay qualified, the chance to get their practice shoots in. (It never did sink, even after one of the boarding team blew it into smallish pieces with some PE7)
Phalanx is a very good system for defending against missiles and aircraft close-in, and the manual mode is better to have than not have, but it’s a backup not a priority. For surface threats close-in, we use 30mm cannon firing high explosive/incendiary shells; the USN’s got assorted 25mm and 30mm weapons for the job. And of course when it’s really close, there are assorted machine-guns, small arms and (in our case) Mk 44 Miniguns coming into play.
The 30mmm cannon is the DS30M Mk2 which was designed specifically to deal with the small boat threat, and incorporates things such as an Electro-Optical tracker.
Phalanx block 2B does indeed have a manual surface to surface mode, but it is primarily an anti aircraft.missile weapon. However, as this page suggests...
Did a fair bit of work on this for the Royal Navy, when we brought in the latest -1B version of Phalanx and its “anti-surface capability” was being proposed as a reason to get rid of some other weapons that, supposedly, would now be redundant.
For those interested, Phalanx was originally purely an automatic air defence gun – it decided what it would shoot at and when, and other than putting it into “Air Mode Auto” that was the extent of operator interaction. One of the many updates it’s had to keep it capable, is a thermal camera: radar is very accurate in range and excellent for finding and locking onto “fast, small thing coming at you at nearly Mach 1”, infrared is then outstanding for giving a very precise angle of sight onto that object so the gun can be aimed even more accurately and kill incoming threats further out with fewer rounds fired. While it’s mostly used fully automated, the nice engineers at Raytheon thought “since we’ve got the camera, why don’t we put the image in front of the operator so they can see what they’re shooting at?” followed by “if we can see where the gun’s pointing, why don’t we give the operator a controller so he can drive it manually?” Hence why the -1B version of Phalanx gained its ability to manually engage small boats and slow air targets – it was a “why not do this?” rather than a “there is a pressing need to…”
The reason not to be worried that the Phalanx doesn’t seem to be hitting and sinking the boats are twofold. Against small boats, you’re not in any sort of automatic mode; the operator is tracking and firing manually. The gun is stabilised, but that’s all the help you get: there’s a fair bit of spray-and-pray and Kentucky windage involved. (The really clever – and genuinely impressive – open-loop tracking and fire control only works well on fast airborne targets, which is the job Phalanx was always designed for). It’s not the mount’s priority, so the operators don’t get huge amounts of practice in peacetime.
The other problem is that Phalanx is firing a 20mm APDS round, which is very lethal fired head-on into incoming missiles but just drills a 9mm hole through a boat when it hits: if you don’t hit the engine or the coxswain, it won’t do much. Small boats can be *tough*; we had an incident a few years ago when a destroyer seized a drug-smuggler’s go-fast and, having secured relevant evidence, used it as a gunnery target precisely because it would stay afloat despite being shot full of holes and set on fire: it gave all the weapon-aimers needing to stay qualified, the chance to get their practice shoots in. (It never did sink, even after one of the boarding team blew it into smallish pieces with some PE7)
Phalanx is a very good system for defending against missiles and aircraft close-in, and the manual mode is better to have than not have, but it’s a backup not a priority. For surface threats close-in, we use 30mm cannon firing high explosive/incendiary shells; the USN’s got assorted 25mm and 30mm weapons for the job. And of course when it’s really close, there are assorted machine-guns, small arms and (in our case) Mk 44 Miniguns coming into play.
The 30mmm cannon is the DS30M Mk2 which was designed specifically to deal with the small boat threat, and incorporates things such as an Electro-Optical tracker.
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I don’t disagree with you that the RN needs to grow - even from my RAF side of the fence it strikes me as rather odd for an island nation with global aspirations to have such a small blue water fleet. But to say we need to increase the number of escorts to support the carrier rather than we need an effective fleet to carry out missions x,y & z does rather make it seem as though the carriers are now the RN’s mission. Either that or someone in Fleet Plans had incredibly big balls and worked on the theory that the loss of or inability to use a carrier would be so politically embarrassing and strategically damaging that HMG would have to provide funding for more ships thereby dragging the size of the fleet up. It’s an interesting question as I’m just reading Gen Richard Shirreff’s book War with Russia and the lack of effective escort screen is the primary cause for losing the carrier whilst it waited for the rest of the NATO TG to arrive.
Imagine winning the battle with short term tactical thinking, clever as it may be and then having to gamble on the long term strategic goal - many war leaders have achieved it but do we have the calibre of people to achieve it in office today or have we all been taken for a ride? Carrier/Brexit...? Same thinking
Melchett01/thunderbird7
This thread is about HMS Ocean. You do realise there is a Future Carrier thread?
Post Falklands, throughout the tail end of the Cold War the Royal Navy's activities, both in and outside the NATO area, were frequently based on carrier centred task groups. Not only did the CVS provide the capability for long range ASW, but also air defence and long range attack. Then in 1990/1991 US carriers played a huge role in fighting Saddam Hussein.
In the 90s, RN carriers were very busy, mostly in the Adriatic but also the Gulf. The origins of the QEC lie in the need to replace the aging and sized limited CVS, with a recognition that the next generation of jet (which the UK was also going to participate in), would be considerably larger than Sea Harrier or Harrier GR7/9.
The studies started in the early/mid nineties..... The CVS continued to be busy throughout that decade and into the next.
Frostchamber
I am not an expert on Phalanx, so no worries. You might be interested in this 2005 paper regarding research and development work into what would be DS30M Mk2:
Royal Navy Small Calibre Gun Research to Defeat the Small Boat Threat
You can also Google it and download the PDF. Additionally remember the role of helicopters - all naval helicopters can be armed with GPMG/.50 cal, and Wildcat will have Martlet specifically for small craft threats.
Back to HMS Ocean. Ocean has had a busy life. From Forces TV:
1995
HMS Ocean was launched on 11 October, and was subsequently named at Barrow by Her Majesty the Queen in 1998.
1999
She was sent to the Mediterranean in readiness for possible involvement in the Kosovo conflict.
2000
Supporting Operation Palliser in Sierra Leone, HMS Ocean aided the suppression of rebel activity.
2003 - Iraq
Ocean was deployed for Operation Telic, the UK contribution to the 2003 Iraq War, for which she was awarded the battle honour "Al Faw 2003".She set sail from Plymouth on January 16, carrying 300 Royal Marines and 400 air crew (sic). Ocean was a platform for 22 helicopters and her 200 Royal Navy medical staff treated casualties from both sides of the conflict.
2010
British citizens stranded in continental Europe by the eruption of an Icelandic volcano were ferried across the Channel by HMS Ocean.
2011 - Libya
HMS Ocean is sent to aid NATO operations concerning the Libyan conflict.
This was the first time that Apache helicopters had been sent into action from a Royal Navy ship.
Apache crews from 656 Squadron Army Air Corps carried out effective missions inside Libya, hitting military vehicles, installations and communications equipment.
Ocean spent four months operating off Libya, spending 87 days at sea.
2012
Mooring at Greenwich, she provided logistics support, accommodation and a helicopter landing site during the London Olympic Games.
2015
Ocean became the Royal Navy Fleet Flagship, taking over from HMS Bulwark.
2016
HMS Ocean assumed command of the maritime counter-Daesh effort.
In 2011 and 2016/17 she was doing roles that might normally be given to a carrier. They seem to have missed a few - the 2001 exercise in Oman, her 2002 deployment to the Middle East in support of fighting the Taliban/Al Qeada, various amphibious exercises such as the Vela deployment to West Africa in 2006, the 2009 Taurus deployment to the Far East, and lots of NATO amphibious deployments in recent years, and a few ASW ones.
In the last few years, following her last refit, she has been worked extremely hard, as shown by her news stories on the RN website.
This thread is about HMS Ocean. You do realise there is a Future Carrier thread?
Post Falklands, throughout the tail end of the Cold War the Royal Navy's activities, both in and outside the NATO area, were frequently based on carrier centred task groups. Not only did the CVS provide the capability for long range ASW, but also air defence and long range attack. Then in 1990/1991 US carriers played a huge role in fighting Saddam Hussein.
In the 90s, RN carriers were very busy, mostly in the Adriatic but also the Gulf. The origins of the QEC lie in the need to replace the aging and sized limited CVS, with a recognition that the next generation of jet (which the UK was also going to participate in), would be considerably larger than Sea Harrier or Harrier GR7/9.
The studies started in the early/mid nineties..... The CVS continued to be busy throughout that decade and into the next.
Frostchamber
I am not an expert on Phalanx, so no worries. You might be interested in this 2005 paper regarding research and development work into what would be DS30M Mk2:
Royal Navy Small Calibre Gun Research to Defeat the Small Boat Threat
You can also Google it and download the PDF. Additionally remember the role of helicopters - all naval helicopters can be armed with GPMG/.50 cal, and Wildcat will have Martlet specifically for small craft threats.
Back to HMS Ocean. Ocean has had a busy life. From Forces TV:
1995
HMS Ocean was launched on 11 October, and was subsequently named at Barrow by Her Majesty the Queen in 1998.
1999
She was sent to the Mediterranean in readiness for possible involvement in the Kosovo conflict.
2000
Supporting Operation Palliser in Sierra Leone, HMS Ocean aided the suppression of rebel activity.
2003 - Iraq
Ocean was deployed for Operation Telic, the UK contribution to the 2003 Iraq War, for which she was awarded the battle honour "Al Faw 2003".She set sail from Plymouth on January 16, carrying 300 Royal Marines and 400 air crew (sic). Ocean was a platform for 22 helicopters and her 200 Royal Navy medical staff treated casualties from both sides of the conflict.
2010
British citizens stranded in continental Europe by the eruption of an Icelandic volcano were ferried across the Channel by HMS Ocean.
2011 - Libya
HMS Ocean is sent to aid NATO operations concerning the Libyan conflict.
This was the first time that Apache helicopters had been sent into action from a Royal Navy ship.
Apache crews from 656 Squadron Army Air Corps carried out effective missions inside Libya, hitting military vehicles, installations and communications equipment.
Ocean spent four months operating off Libya, spending 87 days at sea.
2012
Mooring at Greenwich, she provided logistics support, accommodation and a helicopter landing site during the London Olympic Games.
2015
Ocean became the Royal Navy Fleet Flagship, taking over from HMS Bulwark.
2016
HMS Ocean assumed command of the maritime counter-Daesh effort.
In 2011 and 2016/17 she was doing roles that might normally be given to a carrier. They seem to have missed a few - the 2001 exercise in Oman, her 2002 deployment to the Middle East in support of fighting the Taliban/Al Qeada, various amphibious exercises such as the Vela deployment to West Africa in 2006, the 2009 Taurus deployment to the Far East, and lots of NATO amphibious deployments in recent years, and a few ASW ones.
In the last few years, following her last refit, she has been worked extremely hard, as shown by her news stories on the RN website.
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Well we did once have a solution to putting all our eggs on one boat..
