Its a witchhunt driven by people who dont fully understand the challenges of missile testing. The Russians average a 50% fail rate on their Bulava Missile (SLBM) which is at 12 tests failed from 24. The Americans historically design their missiles for a 90% success rate (stats elsewhere) but every single American programme has had as a percentage a far larger failure rate.

Missiles should work, but sometimes they don't. On this occasion it seems like it didnt but thats one of those things. Saying people will think the UK is a laughing stock or doesnt have a credible deterrent only makes sense sense if you apply exactly the same logic to the US, French, Russians who have all had identical problems.

Indeed!

This whole thing is being sensationalised by "should-know-better" politicians using it for their own anti-Trident agenda. The SNP and CND luvvie, Jeremy Corbyn. They are trying to undermine last year's vote on renewal, simple as.

And there was me thinking that 'test' firings of the delivery system had to be 100% perfect, 100% of the time....!

Wouldn't a real headline be

Weapon system works 100% of the time

...and, of course, nothing happened while the Lord Admiral was on watch did it. Or perhaps it was because he chose very sensibly, not to comment on the status of our defence capability.

Pot = Kettle :=

Imagegear

Presumably this is T S NUC UK EYES ONLY

- so I don't expect to know.

To address an earlier q on who these are targetted at?

- Well whomsoever fired one at us - that's why it's called a detterent.

Thank you all for your comments in the light of which here's Flight Lieutenant Basil's opinion (Yes, even the lower orders have an opinion even if it may not have the validity of that of a VSO).

With hindsight, the PM should have responded that we do not discuss that sort of thing publicly and that includes Parliament which is a public forum. OTOH, she DID take the opportunity of a good sideswipe at The Leader of the Opposition.

Re the comments by Admiral Lord West:
The Admiral should be ashamed of himself.
The Lord? Well, just another point-scoring pollie.

For sure we want to know that the issue which sent this missile off course is being fixed, but no system works 100%; some well below 50% The political head of steam being worked up by Labour is naked opportunism. Their own leader has publicly stated he would not press the button even if we were attacked. So if by some calamity they come to power, we don't even have a deterrent at all!

From The Times........

Steve Aitken, a former nuclear submarine commander and member of the Ulster Unionist Party, defended Theresa May, saying that she is under no obligation to speak about sensitive national security matters.

“There is a convention that we don’t talk about the deterrent,” he said on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme this morning. “It’s the nature of the security of this nation and I would fully support the prime minister in avoiding these questions.”

He added that the row had turned into “politicking”.

It should be noted that it has not been 5 years since a Trident UGM-133 test firing. It has been 5 years since the U.K. performed a test firing as part of the recommissioning of one of our boats after a refit - but the USN also do test firings on a regular basis.

The UK does not own its own missiles, but shares a common pool with the USN held at King's Bay, Georgia and which are rotated on a regular basis. Hence the test firings are valid as a data source whichever boat or service fires them.

The last firing was by the USS Maryland on 31st August 2016 - and it was successful, the 161st successful firing since 1989.

All in all, quite an interesting worked example of what is wrong with our politicians and media. If the pun can be forgiven, "ready, fire, aim".
If a system could be guaranteed to be 100% reliable, there would be no need to test it. For such a critical system, nobody could possibly guarantee 100% reliability, so testing is necessary. Arguably the most valuable tests are the ones where something goes wrong (as long as nobody is injured obviously), as a point of failure can be identified and eliminated.
There was no risk to life or limb here, other than to any passing fish, and there would be no danger posed by a live firing going astray.
For me the biggest disappointment was the Prime Minister's inability to state the bleeding obvious: Love Trident or hate it, the debate doesn't hinge on a single test failure. The failure in question was and is absolutely irrelevant to the debate regarding nuclear deterrence.
Finally, and the point has been made already, it is dumb to trumpet successful tests on you tube etc. This sort of activity should be conducted discretely, which would have created a more accommodating backdrop for occasional failures.

It isn't the first time a retired VSO has cast a light on that which should be kept secret. Sadly I guess Parliamentary privilege applies to the upper house too.

I though the story was published first in the Sunday Times -

West just jumped in as rent-a-quote

As I said in post #3, West should keep his trap shut. He knows the situation. His actions must call into question the merit of his (considerable) retired VSO pay.

Basil, yes the PM is weak on this sort thing, like most pollies!:rolleyes:

OAP

ORAC, just a minor point; you are spot on about the King's Bay pooled servicing arrangement but our 2D5s are fully bought and paid for, as per the Trident Amendment to the Polaris Sales Agreement. The missiles in the post Upkeep Outload just don't necessarily have the same Serial Nos as those landed pre Upkeep.

My, how we miss Adml Alan as 1SL. I wonder if his documentary security skills have improved since '86?

Quote for the day: "A unilateralist complaining about Trident is like a eunuch complaining about Viagra."(M Gove Esq).

(...and, yes the UK Labour Party under present leadership is de facto unilateralist since Mr Corbyn (contrary to party policy) has publicly stated he would not use the deterrent even in the face of a nuclear attack.)

On a lighter note.

QUOTE: However, the tactic of not answering any question seems to be totally ingrained with all politicians,

Not only politicians, my wife, for example.

Being deaf [I have deafaids] I always always craft questions to SWMBO very carefully so as to elicit either "yes", "no" or "dunno" or "mind your own business".

The answer is never less than the length of The Lords Prayer, and therefore incomprehensible in whole or in part.

This does not make for domestic bliss.

So who are our enemies ? I still don't know

No use saying its a sort of general deterrent because it doesn't deter terrorism . Of the people on my list none of them are enemies at the moment and saying well it can be targeted at some future foe doesnt make much of a case. At the moment the two most likely foes would be the Eu- silly because its on our own doorstep or the USA because they have a megalomaniac president but I suspect we cannot fire them without his say so and he likes the Russians.

As to the anyone who fires a missile at us scenario , no good because its already to late.

So who are the tridents targeted at today - or are they all aimed at Ascension Island like the alleged mis fire. They must be targeted at someone otherwise they could hardly be called operational on one hand and if it isnt targeted at something how do they know it went off course.

As for the national security issue please ....,in todays post truth world everyone knows no comment means yes .

Its a lot of money that we havent got; to defend ourselves from enemies when we do not know who they are or what form they take and the biggest threats to UK security are:-
1 Serious terrorism incident
2 Cyber attack on Infrastructure or financial system
3 Another Wall St inspired financial crisis.

The response to none of these is 'launch nuclear missiles'

Dump the whole shooting match and with the money saved pump £350M a week into the NHS...have I heard that somewhere else tho'?

PB, how much space do you have in your room with that elephant in the corner.

Seriously I guess the only valid target is another State. That it is already too late if someone has fired a missile at us is true, but that is what deterrence is about; retaliation is a secondary aim.

.

Another popular myth Mr PB. Again part of the Polaris Sales Agreement, as amended, the deterrent is independent. The US has no more say over how we deploy and use our missiles than they do over our TLAMs or Harpoons.

Collating two reports, the Times and CNN, this would seem to indicate the missile itself was performing nominally, it was a failure in the range safety abort system which triggered the self-destruct mechanism.

Times: "The £17 million unarmed D5 missile is believed to have been obliterated in an automatic self-destruct sequence when it went off course after being launched from HMS Vengeance off the coast of Florida. A failure in the data communications system of the US-made weapon system has been blamed."......

CNN: "Britain's Sunday Times newspaper reported that the missile veered towards the US coast, but the US official told CNN that this trajectory was part of an automatic self-destruct sequence. The official said the missile diverted into the ocean -- an automatic procedure when missile electronics detect an anomaly."

Not the first time that a missile test has failed due to range safety equipment failure / operator error by a long shot.

Has anyone checked to see if the son of Dr No is back up and running from Crab Key again!! ;)

Didn't harm his subsequent career ;)
I've no wish to badmouth a brave and gallant officer but I do wish he'd remained silent on this matter.

Will some people now want test results for all Trident missile training launches reported to the house of commons?
As I see it the report says HMS Vengeance has successfully completed her post refit work up..

Phillip all previous launches have been reported in the form of press releases. LM and MoD have even in the past invited dignitaries and the press to view launches.

CC my point was the USN has tested a fair number of Tridents, there have been some failed launches, as both navies use the same system, why not report the USN launches as well. I did hear yesterday that there was a group of VIPs watching the launch, so that the press release could be put out.

You mean like this? They brag about the 161 successful launches - no mention about the failures. But given the limited number of launches per year the failure rate must be below 1%.


Successful Trident II D5 Missile Flight Test Supports Navy Submarine Certification for Strategic Patrol · Lockheed Martin

"...... The missile was converted into a test configuration using a test missile kit produced by Lockheed Martin that contains range safety devices, tracking systems and flight telemetry instrumentation."........

There's a rather smug radio talk show host on LBC 9.73 FM, his name is James O'Brien, he normally succeeds in getting quite far up my nose and I expected his take on this particular incident/saga to be predictable. But instead, yesterday lunch time he produced a brilliant argument in defence of Theresa May's position on Trident. His criticism was purely reserved for how she floundered like a... well a Flounder on the end of a line. His own suggestion was simple and one I couldn't help but agree with; that is, instead of making yourself look utterly incapable of affording Mr Marr and his wider audience the credibility to spot frantic waffle when its present in overdrive but simply own up. Say, yes I did know, these tests are carried out for this very purpose, to determine whether anything will go wrong and when it does, to resolve the issue.

I would add, that by way of further explanation, to have mentioned this at the time of the Trident Submarine renewal debate may well have unduly prejudiced the debate alarming toward the anti-nuclear sentiments of the Labour front bench.

There, simple:}

FB:)

Around 358 Trident C-4 and D-5 missiles have be fired in both R&D work and operational tests up to the end of 2015. Total number of failures was 12 (7 of which were C-4's). The 5 D-5 failures were all in the R&D and early operational testing phases (like the first SSBN launch in the video below) and up to the end of 2015, 184 D-5 missiles had been fired, including all of the R&D firings at the start of the program, plus missiles used for ABM target use.




The 161 launches quoted are operational systems tests from SSBN's and this is most likely the first confirmed failure. This gives a failure rate of 0.6% which isn't bad for any guided weapon system

All listed here Trident

I'm not sure if I was a potential aggressor that news of a failed missile test would make me anymore likely to 'take a chance' it might happen if the missiles were used in anger.....


There's an awful lot of sunshine that would be potentially be incoming....I guess that deterrence for you?

The British American Security Information Council (BASIC) has an interesting take on this. It's worth a read.
The Implications Of The Trident Test Failure | British American Security Information Council

Amongst other things, the author, Paul Ingram, talks aboutairsound

Ahh BASIC - "
WORKING FOR A SECURE WORLD FREE FROM THE THREAT OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS

Well, if you don't like BASIC, HH, (and I confess I don't always agree with their strictures) - here's what the editor of defense-aerospace.com says in response to the UK MoD statement on the subject.I believe that what some PPRuNers may be missing is that this a political spat, and not really a military or technical one.

If you're a real sucker for punishment, here's the record of the 'urgent question' to the Sec Def in the House of Commons (and the many answers).
https://hansard.parliament.uk/common...dentTestFiring

airsound

I think you are correct airsound, it is a political spat. However, your quoted editorial is drivel, worthy of any rubbish source!:yuk:

OAP

From the BBC News Website....
"According to the Sunday Times, an unarmed Trident II D5 missile veered off in the wrong direction towards the US - instead of towards Africa - when it was launched from a British submarine off the coast of Florida."

Perhaps they fed the wrong coordinates into it's navigation hoofer-doofer..... Or maybe they didn't :E

The primary objective of a DASO is to examine the competency of the Boat's Company to safely, successfully and competently launch a missile under simulated operational conditions. It also tests the Boat's Weapon System post Upkeep. A failure in the firing range's telemetry calls for a safety destruction of the missile. It does not invalidate the Boat's DASO and operational fitness. It's an opportunistic exercise in political point scoring and sod all to do with the Andrew's day job nor the effectiveness of the weapon.

Gather round while I sing you of Wernher von Braun,
A man whose allegiance
Is ruled by expedience.
Call him a Nazi, he won't even frown.
"ha, Nazi sch-mazi," says Wernher von Braun.

Don't say that he's hypocritical,
Say rather that he's apolitical.

"once the rockets are up, who cares where they come down?
That's not my department," says Wernher von Braun.

Tom lehrer

HH,


OK, though von Braun perhaps did not care, it was his boss - Walter Dornberger who cared. And whose role in applied rocket science/industry is, IMHO, underestimated (only von Braun's name is in the air). In fact, Dornberger was, using modern terminology, the project manager. He hired young and talented Werner in 1932 who then became his tech. lead for V-2/A4.

aah, the late great Tom Lehrer

he's not "late" - still lives near Santa Cruz I beleive aged 88......

"If, after hearing my songs, just one human being is inspired to say something nasty to a friend, or perhaps to strike a loved one, it will all have been worth the while."