I don't think anyone is arguing that two carriers aren't a useful asset. Or that carrier air can operate where land-based can't.

However, we have to recognize that there are reasons why the land-based branch might be looking askance at the wonders of CV.

The carrier plan has, for the time being, been severely cut back in terms of the number of sustained, embarked airplanes.

However, it continues to dominate the TacAir budget, to the point where the Tornado capability is being "replaced" by eked-out Typhoon AD squadrons and 48 F-35s which will mostly support naval operations. If MSOCS is to be believed, too, FJ people are going to be told that they can go to sea or take a walk.

So you do start to ask "Carriers are cool, but what else could we have bought for the money?"

Old RN - there was never a real plan to invade Rhodesia - the Tories were dead set against it and most of the country didn't support the idea. Harold Wilson was far too downy a bird to get involved in a pointless war far far away that wasn't going to benifit the UK - remember his views on helping the Yanks in Vietnam.

Plus, IIRC, papers such as the Torygraph and the Excess were running stories "that British servicement would refuse to fight" Smith's mob.

The Admirals, as ever, were trying to hang on to as many assets as possible especially in warm waters - Wilson used the whole RAF/RN operation as a low cost, low risk cover so he could face the UN and the Commonwealth and show he was "doing something"

The way I heard it....the Brits stayed out of it because you thought the North Vietnamese were doing well enough without your help.:=

SASless,

My sincere apologies for not expressing myself more clearly. What I was trying (badly) to put over was the need for the RAF, RN and the Army to work together now to develop the detailed operational plans to make best use of the carriers over the next 30 to 40 years. There will also need to be a series of tests and trials to work out things like optimum sortie rates, recovery intervals, launch patterns, mission preparation timings, weapon loading organisation and loading programmes, how to operate mixed fixed and rotary wing air groups, how to operate USMC F-35Bs, and so on. In fact, all the normal things one does when a new weapons system (or combination of weapons systems) is brought into service.

There may be new ideas. If the USMC embarks MV-22s, or SOCOM embarks CV-22s on a QEC, they may be able to use rolling takeoffs and recoveries from the large deck to increase payload and bringback. Just shooting the breeze, here, but new kit often offers new possibilities.

I do struggle with your position that two fully loaded QE class carriers would be equivalent to one land based squadron. If the full buy were 138 Bs, I'd expect the UK, in extremis, to be able to put 24 aircraft on each carrier - failing that, at least 40 on one. I don't quite see how that would be equivalent to one RAF FJ squadron, assuming normal strength of around 12 jets.

Once again, my apologies for not being clearer the first time around - my bad.

As a small correction, Atlantic Conveyor was certainly lost down south in '82, and there were a lot of aircraft on it. However, there were more aircraft on the two carriers, which were (very sensibly) positioned a fair away from Conveyor. Of course, if you had all your aircraft on one air base somewhere down there (assuming you could have found one within usable range), I suppose that might have been regarded as a bit of a 'basket' as well.

Best regards as ever to all those who will work these issues going forward,

Engines

In what sense was Atlantic Conveyor a carrier ? She had no close in weapons, no defensive radar, no chaff, she was just a wartime adapted civilian freighter that unwisely was sent out of the collective defence shield to unload her Chinooks and Wessex without any close RN support. She ended up in the wrong place at the wrong time and sadly paid the price. In what way would one of the new carriers end up in the same situation ? Would they be in a fighting situation without any F-35s whatsoever ? Any close in Type 45 ?
Atlantic Conveyor was carrying Harriers and helicopters from the UK to the Falklands, in no way was she a 'Carrier'.

What a plan!
 

[QUOTE=Old RN;9880823]The best (?) example of the use of land based a/c vs. carriers was after UDI in Rhodesia in late 1965. As any good navy the RN proposed a plan (which it started to implement) to move the East of Suez based carrier towards Beira while offloading all aircrew with Rhodesia or South African conections. The plan was to get a carrier and comando force off Beira, to estsblish air superiority over eastern Rhodesia, land the comando by helo on a small airfield, start flying in troops. With a firm base in Rhodesia then take control of Salisbury and end UDI in weeks. Given the very limited state of the Rhodesian military at this point it was very credible.

So it's true; rum rots the brain! If that plan had been tried the resulting debacle would have been so bad that the Brit Govt would have offered a deal to Rhodesia that might have saved us all from Mugabe. Two million Zimbabweans might still be alive as a result.
That silver lining does not make it a viable Plan though. First problem, what would the Portuguese Goverment's reaction have been?

OH well - back to the future - aircraft carriers at sea - soon to be TWO!

Suspect the only time we'll see two is for a photo op once the PoW is ready - then whenever one is swapping out of the long term boat park for the other

As detailed ad nausem here ONE CG is a big ask for the RN - TWO is dreamland - and both carriers together really is all your eggs in one basket..............

If there actually were enough eggs, that is.....

Two carrier related things this morning:

!. Prince Of Wales is being named today. Here is an article from Janes about her importance to regenerating Carrier Strike in the shortest possible timeframe.

2. HMS Ocean is reported to be off to the Caribbean in the wake of Hurricane Irma. Even for disaster relief, a large ship with a large flight deck (and multiple helicopters), organic logistics, C3, and so on gives you options. Earlier in the year she was acting as Flagship for TF50 in the Middle East

'WEBF' that Tarzan me JANEs article first noted here: http://www.pprune.org/military-aviat...ml#post9879505 with question about 'landing light systems'.

WW2 is over. A done deal. The Brit carriers almost saved Malaya and Singapore from falling ... but not quite.

If anyone is crazy enough to relight Korea, we'll have land bases in South Korea, but do we really want to go there? I hope not.

Suez: do we really want to start another war in the Middle East? Would the Murricanes let us attack the canal, this time?

Does anyone really think that Argentina is going to revert to a military dictatorship supported by the US?

Sierra Leone: what role would you suggest for F-35s in that bloody place?

The Beira patrol was half a century ago. It successfully contributed to the downfall of a hateful racist regime. Now look at that bloody place!

Indonesia: been a long time since Britain got involved in wars over there. Thankfully we avoided getting sucked into The American War.

Let's face it. The Blaircraft carriers are an absurd anachronism for a country which lost its empire in the 1940s.

If we want to provide aid to the Caribbean islands in the aftermath of hurricanes such as Irna and Jose, heavylift assets such as C-17s, A-400M and even the venerable Herc can shift vastly more tonnage than anything the carriers can carry. A ship which is purpose-built to support F-35s is not much use and can do little more, if anything, than an RFA in such an operation and its very existence in the area would effectively subtract at least one RFA from the equation.

With PoW now entering the home straight, would now not be the time to order a 3rd ship to permit 2 ships to be available most of the time or to be ready for an export order if QEC proves to be the "second best" carrier class in the world? Keep playing the emotion card and call it Ark Royal. After all, as Lord West once opined "steel is cheap" (seemingly with no idea of hydrodynamics and propulsive efficiency)........Having removed the pin from that particular grenade I shall now roll it towards the masses and retire to MSD.....where's that popcorn?

Caz,

Thanks for replying. I thought I should respond.

My point was that carriers have been very useful in the past, and will provide capability to get access to a large part of the planet. Whether those 'parts of the planet' are going to be an area we want to get involved in is one for the future (indeterminate but often unexpected) and the politicians. My view is that the carriers will be useful. Yours isn't. That's fine.

You pose a number of reasons why we wouldn't use a carrier, or where you think they haven't helped. I could (but won't) list areas where I think we wouldn't use air power, or where we have used air power to doubtful eventual effect. I don't think that would be especially useful.

Finally, if you believe that long range airlift from the UK can provide the tonnage that a large ship can move, I honestly cannot help you. Airlift is a hugely important tool in disaster relief operations for getting 'first response' stuff to where it's needed, and the RAF are doing their customary excellent job right now. As is RFA Mounts Bay that was positioned out in the Caribbean for the hurricane season. In this case, they were first on the scene at Anguilla, moving kit ashore via helicopter and Mexeflotes. In any logistics operation, the big tonnages go by sea, and take longer. It's physics, not a competition.

Best regards as ever to all those of all three services actually doing the hard yards to help people in need,

Engines

Yup. That is a bygone era for a country which lost its empire in the 1940s. Carriers are primarily a weapon of war for an imperial power. Britain has no empire, consequently has no need for such an imperial weapon. Britain is an aircraft carrier. Sardonically referred to as Airstrip One as long ago as 1948.

As I pointed out, an RFA can do a little bit of useful work in such an area, but only if it doesn't have to support an F-35 airbase at the same time.

Yes, and they go by cargo ship or by airbridge, not by warship.

The really desperately needed stuff that is most urgently needed goes best by heavy lift cargo aircraft. They operate best from airfields outside the immediate vicinity of the airlift destination.

A warship optimised for F-35s isn't as well suited as a proper airfield and can never hope to handle meaningful quantities of air-hauled cargo as the massively more appropriate fleets of C-17s and A-400Ms and C-130s can from appropriate intermediate points.

Left Pompie last Wed on Brittany Ferries' Cap Finistere - which enabled some fairly close-up views of the new behemoth. Have been travelling since then, with no connections , so apologies if similar views have already been posted.
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4393/...2a17cb9d_o.jpg

https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4435/...fc551850_o.jpg

https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4399/...b2dca34d_o.jpg

Caz

1. Am I right in thinking you were busy and forgot the contributions carriers made to a few recent operations? Just since 1980, amongst others:

Falklands
NATO Cold War activities
Gulf 90/91
Adriatic operations - Bosnia
90s tensions in the Gulf
Kosovo
Sierra Leone
Iraq
Afghanistan
Ongoing Middle East operations
Facing a renewed belligerence from Russia

2. You are aware that ships carrying big tonnage are often escorted by warships? Sometimes they even have carrier aircraft protecting them.

3. Transport aircraft are excellent, but what if you need helicopters and need to have a minimal footprint on the ground, and the ability to move them a couple of hundred miles per day?

4. You are aware there are different types of RFA - right? The one currently in the Caribbean is not going to support a carrier group.

Wot USN thinks of their SUPER Carriers at TAILhook17 VIDEO: https://livestream.com/wab/tailhook2...deos/162442258

Gotta be said,....with every passing day, the dichotomy between the (imagined) purpose of the UK carriers and UK reality just grows and grows... :sad:
I doubt that they will ever operationally embark their full compliment of F35. What a waste of Mil budget. I wonder what the PM imagines she is getting from this? Just an easy target for imaginary "cost cutting" in the near term? I suspect that is the plan, most money has now been spent in UK before long term costs build up . F35 transferred to useful multi-role capability by RAF.
Sounds like an easy plan, after all, they have hardly wasted anything,...yet!:eek:

OAP