Significantly more than one action.
Inexpensive compared to others - anyone who understands where the money goes is pretty clear the carriers are a long way from the biggest pot.
Once again, complete lack of understanding of "escorts" vs task group. What pray, are we deploying these escorts around the globe to escort? They do "stuff". Is that "stuff" more or less effective than a task group?

Boffin - as we all know and the RN are happy to keep telling us all RN and RFA vessels not in overhaul or training are deployed on a wide variety of missions in an enormous variety of locations.

https://www.royalnavy.mod.uk/news-an...ity/operations currently lists the areas and https://www.royalnavy.mod.uk/news-an...-activity/news lists latest news which covers vessels in Arctic, S Georgia, the West Indies, the Gulf, the Med , E Scotland.......................

These are almost all single ship deployments and presumably are considered important to the national security no?

The RN has no spare ships sitting around - therefore if you form a Carrier Task Force with 2 x T45's, 2 x T23's and 2 RFA's those vessels are no longer available to cover the areas were they are currently deployed - you have a great deal of force , but you only have it in one location. Those escorts are protecting a carrier in the N Atlantic - they can't be in the Gulf at the same time, nor in the Med... the argument about the RN carriers is not that they're not nice to have but that in a Navy which was stretched to breaking point before their arrival something which we currently feel is necessary has to give to protect them.

I am sure that if things kick off in the Far East, the Europeans and the UK will need all hands to the pumps to maintain security while the big cat is away away, else the rats will want to play.

Just sayin'

IG

Arctic - HMS Lancaster
S Georgia - HMS Forth (long-term deployment)
Med - HMS Trent
Gulf - HMS Montrose (long-term deployment)
Caribbean - RFA Argus

Of those, only two might be considered TG ships. There are also another T23 and a T45 in the Med off to support Albion & Lyme Bay on LRG. All done while 2 T45 and 5 T23 are in long refits / conversions (something that is a one off due to convergence of two programmes and will get a bit better). Just after a month long CSG exercise, which was just after another couple of Arctic deployments. It's definitely not easy, but it demonstrably possible.

The other thing about single ship deployments is that you can choose whether or not to do them permanently or periodically. It's called flexibility.

I was going to reply to A56, and point out that those 75 years have included carrier operations as part of the Cold War from 1945 until 1992(?), Korea, Malaya, Suez, the Borneo Confrontation, Middle East and African entanglements, deterring an invasion of Belize in 1972, Gulf War related activities, Bosnia, Kosovo, keeping Saddam in his box, Sierra Leone, and renewed NATO naval activities.

I was going to point out that naval forces, like all forces, do not just cease to have a useful role when not on live operations. They deter, reassure, and influence. A carrier group will often do that in the same way that amphibious forces exercised in the Baltic and near Arctic waters earlier this year, and now they are in the Mediterranean. Likewise carriers will be a part of NATO operations and exercises.

I was going to point out that a task group can cover a large area, and the ships in it will often be detached for other things - just as ships being detached from the main task group in the Falklands to conduct naval gunfire support, support Special Forces, or do localised ASW with a couple of frigates and ASW Sea Kings from the carriers.

Instead, I will just post something you might find informative:

British Uses of Aircraft Carriers and Amphibious Ships: 1945 - 2010

Boffin - I agree they will have to change their priorities - otherwise they can't support the carriers. My point is that the roles which will be downgraded are also critical to the national defence. So you protect the carriers and can exercise a great deal of power over a small area or you can disperse the escorts and cover more areas of concern........ The argument between us is which is more important .

WEBF - A carrier force operating in the N Atlantic cannot "deter, reassure, and influence" actions in the Gulf today, tomorrow or even next month - sure they look good but if Iran snaffles anther UK tanker in the Straits of Hormuz tomorrow what is an RN carrier group several thousand miles away going to do? Yes you can send the Carrier Group to the Gulf - but a bit like the Russian Navy on its way to Tsushima it takes along time and they have a lot of time to be ready for you.

This argument has raged over 14 years 300 pages and TBH we''re nowhere near agreeing

The naysayers argument is summed up in post #5 by Occasional Aviator-

"Not meaning to troll, but what capability will CVF/JSF Really give us? As I understand it, we are only ordering 2. Now, the Yanks can afford to have a carrier battle group on station permanently covering pretty much every likely trouble spot, but with only one to position we will either have to be prescient or we will be projecting our air power at fast walking pace"

Is there a part of the list of the tasks you highlighted, not involving task group ships that you didn't understand?

Is that a double negative? I understand that we (or rather HMG) have to choose - that means changing the current list of priorities

Protecting the Carriers will be considered more important than some of the tasks currently carried out by the RN - we gain a concentrated battle force at the cost of a presence (s) somewhere else - agreed?

The single ship deployment examples you quoted as national security priorities were all filled by ships that would not normally be on the TG deployment. You're now trying to give that a stiff ignoring and invent a list of non-specified tasks that would hypothetically be backheeled to allow a CSG deployment.

Boffin

I didn't post a full list of deployments but you know we have at least one escort, a tanker and an RFA support vessel in the Gulf normally for example.......

I can't understand why you won't admit the point that a Carrier Group means we're doing less elsewhere. I agree that a CG is a strong force which we haven't had for a decade - but it comes at an operational cost.

The question is is it worth it - and on that we clearly differ - no doubt time will tell.

That'll be HMS Montrose - noted as long-term deployment out there. Plus one Bay class and 3-4MCMV, none of which are task group ships. Tanker less critical now we have HMS Jufair. Wave Ruler was out there for six months earlier in the year, one of six and a half tankers. Plus we currently have a Littoral Response Group (two amphibs and two escorts joining) in the Med.

Because the "evidence" appears to be solely based on your opinion.

I repeat - if only those who claim to have "flagged" this understood what they were talking about.

The Future Navy concept is based around five areas of operational output

Continuous At Sea Deterrence
Forward Presence
North Atlantic
Carrier Strike
Future Commando/Amphibious Force

These overlap of course - in particular the last three. The carriers will routinely carry Royal Marines and can be used as an LPH, and the carriers are suited to Atlantic operations and providing ASW and air defence for a task group or crisis response shipping. On that note:

ORAC posted this on the Strategic Review thread this morning:-

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/n...pree-7p9knnpvm

Navy is big winner in Johnson’s £16bn defence spending spree

......The biggest winner will be the Royal Navy after the prime minister set out plans for the service to take on a bigger role. He confirmed that Britain will get eight Type-26 frigates, sophisticated anti-submarine ships, as well as five Type-31 frigates, which are cheaper all-purpose warships. New fleet support ships to carry food and ammunition in the Royal Fleet Auxiliary will also be built, along with multi-role research vessels. The various projects confirmed will be a boon to shipbuilders and are expected to support up to 10,000 jobs.

The blueprint will be a boost to the Union too as Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales have a significant proportion of the UK’s shipyards and linked industries. The government said that the blueprint would secure “jobs, prosperity, security and the Union”.

Mr Johnson said that the aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth would be launched on its first carrier strike force operation next year, and will sail to the Mediterranean, the Indian Ocean and east Asia. HMS Prince of Wales is up to 18 months behind in its timetable. In a sign that Britain will seek to boost international co-operation, Australian and Canadian personnel and assets are expected to be invited to operate from one of the carriers. Proposals are being considered for one of the carriers to be permanently stationed either in the Middle East or further east in the southern hemisphere, it is understood. A military source said that the focus on the Royal Navy was “a paradigm shift”, adding: “Boris Johnson has refocused defence to its historic maritime axis.”.....

NavalNews has been doing some digging on the Type 32.

Is this what happened to the illusory T31s in the 'at least' five?

https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news...aritime-force/

One asumes if there are to be extra escort vessels this means extra helicopters or RPVs to extend their sensor and weapons range. Also will need to magic up find crews and aircrews from somewhere,

Regarding a base port for a CV, HMG has invested a modest £23.8 million to "triple the size of its base" at Duqm, Oman - the port even has a drydock which could take QNLZ or POW. Granted, it is rather close to Iran.

Still, I am old fashioned and consider the RN to have only 2/3s of a carrier capability. So permanently basing one East of Suez seems a tad over ambitious. They then also have to address airgroup numbers as well if the other is to be operable from the UK when one is not in refit or on workup. There was a reason for planning to keep two old carriers in service as well if CVA-01 and 02 had actually been built.

If Singapore will HMS Simbang (RNAS Sembawang) be resurrected for shore support of aircraft? If Oman where, RAFO Masirah is close to Duqm but RAFO Adam might make more sense

We are not going to permanently base a carrier in Oman or Singapore. There is talk of forward basing an asset in Singapore, probably an OPV, and some media types have jumped to wild conclusions. Neither Canada or Australia currently operate V/STOL aircraft, however there is an agreement within NATO and some non NATO partners to allow for naval helicopter interoperability.

Do you think there there is any significance in the map in the Twitter update above?

Will the build up of the RN/RAF F-35B force be speeded up?

Will there be an increase in Merlin HM2 numbers?

Following on from that, you may be interested in this transcript of a NATO conference in 1956. Vice Admiral Clifford RN notes that the key development in ASW aircraft was the helicopter with dipping sonar and homing torpedoes, which were carrier based, and a few years later frigate/destroyer based aircraft such as the Wasp.

I remember seeing a promotional film from the seventies that stated that a frigate and her Wasp could work in conjunction with a Sea King (from a carrier or larger RFA). Today the same could be said for frigates and destroyers operating Wildcat - they could work in conjunction with dipping Merlins. The carrier controls all task group aircraft, and contributes to the effectiveness of other units, like the potential use of data from F-35B to cue ships' weapons.

The limitations of the carriers the RN back then were understood, which is why the new carriers were intended to be larger. However, instead of building a strong case built around convoy defence in the Atlantic, fending off mass submarine attacks and long range aircraft in the GIUK gap, and amphibious operations as part of NATO, the case for new carriers was vague and based on a possible Far East crisis. As such it could be dismantled. Forgetting that whilst the nature of future crises is hard to predict, our national interests, such as securing the Atlantic Sea Lines of Communication will not.

We can expect carrier based task groups to perform these exercises as part of NATO, naval operations that are the peacetime conjugate of war. We can also expect them to contribute to humanitarian aid and disaster relief, for which a large deck and multiple helicopters can get aid where it is needed, like the current role being played by RFA Argus, operating three Merlin HC4 and a Wildcat HM2 as well as lilypadding American helicopters.

I was expecting there to be a NATO exercise this year that involved simulating a transatlantic convoy, but I must have missed it when it took place in February. Mea culpa!

USS Eisenhower Leads Exercise To Clear Atlantic Shipping Lanes

PENTAGON: Since its surprise deployment last week, the USS Eisenhower has been clearing a path for cargo ships full of Army equipment bound for major ground exercise in Europe, the first drill simulating a contested crossing of the Atlantic since 1986, Navy officials say.

The Ike, along with an unidentified submarine sweeping the depths of the ocean for unexpected Russian guests, is participating in an exercise that will throw simulated attacks at the convoy to stress test how prepared the Navy is to punch its way across the Atlantic. The path is being cleared for the roll-on/roll-off USNS Benavidez, along with US-flagged merchant vessels MV Resolve and MV Patriot, which departed Beaumont, Texas Feb. 24 to deliver equipment to the US Army DEFENDER 20 exercise in Europe. The ships are carrying gear for the 1st Armored Division, including Abrams tanks, Bradley Fighting Vehicles, and other heavy armor.

“The Atlantic has changed dramatically over the last 20 years,” 2nd Fleet’s director of operations, Cmdr. Troy Denison told reporters Friday. “It’s not what it used to be. We treat it as contested waters now.”

I look forward to seeing our carriers taking part in this sort of exercise, or a NATO amphibious exercise.

MoD Minister of State Jeremy Quin replied to a written question from Julian Lewis on Tuesday (24NOV2020)

Source: questions-statements.parliament.uk

We will see if the same is true after the delayed review. Is the MoD being 'economical with the actualités' in responding to the chair of the Intelligence and Security committee?

The important part will be the capability beyond those two - in other words are replacements in the long-term shipbuilding programme? I suspect not.

And is dependent on agreeing there will be a need to deliver an actually amphibious force. (i.e. not just by helicopter / tiltrotor) of reasonable size. If they are replaced will the lesson that Al Faw "demonstrated the utility of hovercraft in amphibious landings." be implemented with an LCAC-100 size ACV for them to carry? Playing fantasy fleets, the real need would be for two and preferably three Bougainville type LHAs but as the cost would be close to that for another two of our medium size aircraft carriers it's not going to happen. The running costs of the Albion class is its Achilles Heel and will have to be addressed if there is a replacement. Call me a fool but two landing spots and no hangar doesn't make sense to me - a San Antonio style ship would have made much more sense but @6 times the cost of an Albion not in the UK's reach. Did they not think much beyond a Fearless-alike?