I think the 1990 orbat represented the final Cold Wat force structure - prior to cuts being imposed - rather than a deliberately scaled force structured to meet some considered Post Cold War blueprint.

You could argue that a sensible post Cold War restructuring would have scythed armour, and perhaps even the strategic 'Moscow-capable' deterrent, while leaving agile, deployable air power unscathed to meet the challenges of what would inevitably be a more unstable world. In my dreams, anyway!

But in the event the fast jet force was reduced, and it is the 2004 situation that seemed to represent a sensible post Cold War strength, nearly matching resources to sensible planning assumptions, and configured to meet that considered Post Cold War blueprint.

As you pointed out:

About 18 Fast Jet Squadrons would seem to me to be 'about right' to be able to do what the UK aspires to do - leaving a capability to do a Granby-sized op, or to sustain a 'Warden' and a Balkans simultaneously.

Personally I'd have kept an air launched deterrent - albeit with a 'nuke Storm Shadow' replacing a WE177-type weapon at some point around the Millennium. No. you might not be able to bring Armageddon to Moscow, and yes, you'd be vulnerable to a Russian first strike, but it would be enough to deter and enough to 'deserve' a seat at the top table. And Mr Corbyn and his ilk could have enjoyed the real reduction in nuclear capability, perhaps?

Doesn't that kind of assume that our German friends are just going to sit around eating sausage and drinking beer while we do all this?

What chance would our forces realistically have against a credible and determined adversary? Or to put it another way, what countries could we consider our equals in terms of fighting capability on neutral territory?

Look at the German Air force, only got 4 Typhoons it can offer to NATO, not much use.
What was the old reason for originally forming NATO, keep the Russians out and the Americans and the Germans in.
"sigh".

I suppose I will answer a question by asking a question. Never say never, but how feasible do you consider full-scale, single nation (no allies) state on state war these days?

I would say its pretty unlikely. Its worth pointing out the UK is exceptionally niche at what it does very well and those things are appreciated by our allies I suspect.

The OP was reminiscing about having 20,000 sopwith camels or something. Firstly, I dont see how those aircraft could be used in multiple roles. Secondly, the pensions bill for the maintainers and pilots at a 2 to one manning ratio alone would bankrupt the country. Finally, the glue and string wouldnt meet first contact post Haddon-Cave with the MAA. Far too flammable.

Close. To keep the Russians out, the Americans in and the Germans down. Or so the story goes...

Yes I did. We will see. At the end of it's sea trials (incidently some time ago) no aircraft were assigned to the ship. They still have not, nor do we have any. Not for a very long time. Read the news my friend. It was madness hastily giving away our Harriers (for twopence) before we had anything to replace them with. That was the Government wanted to make short term gains.

Sharpend

It (HMS QE) is STILL doing Sea Trials as and when, (its still effectively a prototype) and has yet to finish them. Which it will do once its been over the pond to conduct trials with the future aircraft that will fly off it later this year. By the way the first Sqn to operate off it has reformed and will be arriving in Norfolk sometime this summer.

Oh and Yes we do have them, 15 at the last count with 17 Sqn at Edwards which is the Test And Evaluation Sqn and the now reformed 617 Sqn do keep up with credible news items.

As for Harriers too late they have gone and ain't coming back. TTTFN

QEC completed initial sea trials till late laat year to make sure the basics worked. She then did more troals woth about 8 helos embarked to esrablish RW operating limits and make sure she can support helo ops and other things like rough weather trials etc. Now they know this critical informatipn, she is doing a short upkeep period like all ships, then embarking jets in the summer.

its almost like the RN has over 100 years experience in trials needed to ensure a carrier is safe to embark and operate airceaft isnt it?

I hope that the QE's computers are better than yours.

Don't forget I42 that there was an early post WWI SDSR which removed approx 90% of the newly formed RAF's aircraft from service.

Fortunately Trenchard and Churchill got together to keep the RAF as an independent fighting force...albeit with no money to spend....

Observing that adversaries may also be woefully unable to function reminds me of a Luftwaffe staff officer's diary entry in summer 1944 which, if memory serves, went along the lines of "Our only hope is that the chiefs of staff of the enemy air forces are as scatter-brained as ours"...didn't turn out well for the Germans...

This bit of the telegraph article was interesting....

All but 10 of the fighters are suffering from serious issues with their automated systems. Cooling fluid is leaking from sensors in the wings that are supposed to detect enemy aircraft, making the sensors unreliable.

The problem could be easily repaired, but engineers are unable to source the necessary parts because the manufacturer has gone out of business.

Really ?

OLD AND BOLD
 

Having a quick car wash this morning wondering why no Hawks in the sky, and then from the north came 'that unmistakeable sound' of a powerful machine at low level.
Seconds later a Tornado creamed overhead (full stores and tanks) going like a B O O H at about 300ft.
I immediately thought about this thread and what has been said. It was difficult to comprehend how long these machines have been in front line service and yet I got the feeling that here was a fighting machine with a capable crew that could still do the business, and looked the part. Much more impressive than a 100 year fly past.

I fully agree with you and I have been saying that for a long time. Some of the responses pointed out that Tornado operation could not be sustained due to the severe manning shortages etc. Yes it is getting old but that is not the real issue as it is still extremely capable. Money is the real issue.
Unfortunately the decision to withdraw it from March next year is irreversible and we must hope that the Project Centurion Typhoon jets will give the same level of service for many years to come

Lets face it, we are screwed, we no longer have the capability to fight a sustained or even short war against anyone with an equivalent capability, its ok bombing the crap put of third world sh*tholes, but going up against a country that can shoot back, we wouldn't stand a chance.

But....isn't that why we are spending all those billions on the F35???

Nutloose
 

BV, remember the various war options: wars of necessity and wars of choice. The Falklands was arguably the former though, as a n overseas territory we could have left them to their fate.

Kuwait, like Poland, was a war of moral choice.

Now which first world power might involve us in a war of necessity? Spain is a possibility as are Turkey or Greece over the SBAs. Of choice? A country with whom we have a mutual assistance treat, say one of the former colonies? We can discount Africa as they are not first world class opponents. We can also discount the Middle East which really leaves the Far East. Our commitment is probably the traditional Malaysian one with a threat from the North rather than the south.

In essence, apart from maintaining a policing role against Russia, the balance of our forces is probably adequate for the more likely different role in our areas of interest. What we have to hope is that our bluff isn't called.

But we are not buying enough to equip two carriers and one well placed torpedo or sea skimming missile and those billions are forming the next reef for the local fish population. I take it you have seen what damage was inflicted upon the USS Cole by a bunch of Suicide bombers with intent to inflict damage on their target..hi tech no and pretty powerless to react to in a rush.

Bob I was just being realistic, how long would you give the UK forces in a modern war where the opposition had a roughly equal capability in assets? we have sold our souls to the devil and destroyed our capability to produce squat to replace losses, we just do not have the facility to ramp up production to replace losses anymore, look at the current RAF and how much is actually home produced.

and who will be maintaining the F-35 engines for us??? Ohhh Turkey of course.

I think we'll probably manage to equip two carriers when the full 138 have been bought. Unless someone does something daft on the variant choice.

I'd love to know where the idea that one well-placed torpedo or sea-skimmer being fatal comes from. Yes, the stationary and unfortunately unaware Cole got a hole blown in her, by a substantially larger blast warhead than you'd find in most missiles. Strangely that event (nearly 20 years ago now btw) triggered a sea-change in FP measures, which substantially reduces that threat.

You may be interested to know that the USN did a sinkex on one of their decommissioned carriers (ex-America) about a decade ago. The ship had been in reserve for several years, had no DC parties aboard and was therefore significantly less well-prepared to absorb damage than an operational ship would have been. They fired all sorts at her (and in her) and after some weeks of this, ended up having to scuttle her....

Your point being?

From my perspective, our politicians are either deluded or see the electorate as half wits; probably a mixture of both. I was watching the BBC news this morning and a Conservative politician was saying (nothing at all to do with the local elections by the way) that under the Conservative Party Great Britain has now the best defence capabilitiy in the world......
I am not sure what he was on but it cannot be legal.

It's a bit annoying when people like Bromund, who wear their academic credentials like medals, bewail the inadequacy of the money coming into defense and utterly ignore the inefficiency with which it has been spent.

A few weeks back I heard a political hack from a shipyard state outgassing about the desperate need for a 355-ship Navy and whingeing that sequestration had cost the Navy $4 billion in investment. How does that compare with the cost of the Little Crappy Ship? The whole Zumwalt misadventure? The overruns on one CVN?

As for UK air power, where would its strength stand today if the F-35 had arrived on schedule and on cost? The force would be six years past IOC, <80 aircraft in service and arriving at a rate of 12 per year. What if MRA4 had not been gooned up?

I strongly suspect someone has written a staff paper saying 'drones' will do it all within 15 years, and this has hit the desk of a beancounter who already has guidelines saying aircraft must exhibit a 40 year useful life - and he's submitted a GEMS suggestion.

You're a witty chap, BV. But no-one is looking to return to a 1957-sized air force, and nor does anyone think that tossing eight dumb 1,000-lb bombs around is really going to cut it nowadays. But PGMs have been part of the scenery for most of this century, and their use has been routine (unless you're Russian). And a PGM-delivering air force in 2007 had five dedicated AD squadrons to sustainably do QRA and the Falklands, and about a dozen Tornado/Harrier/Jaguar units to do the deployed stuff, whether that was a Telic, or a simultaneous Herrick and Grapple.

​​​​​​​That doesn't seem unreasonable, does it?

Arguing for a 12-18 Squadron FJ force is arguing for an air force that is comparable with nations like Turkey, France and Italy - all of whom spend less on defence than we do. For an air force big enough to support a Granby-sized op. For an air force that can sustain more modest commitments without people becoming so disillusioned by the quality of life that they leave in droves.

My apologies I42. I guess that's 'Agile, Adaptable and Capable' for you. The RAF has some very state of the art kit. just not very much of it. Budgets eh?

This is quite an old argument now, does anyone actually sit down and calculate just how many GR4s are needed as compared with the number GR1s? Are the possible and probable scenarios where HM Forces could be deployed fed into a computer somewhere which then spits out an answer saying something like you'll manage with just x number of GR4s, just don't be careless and allow any to be shot down! Military assets and personnel are given the boot for one multi-facet reason.. Primarily to save money, the driver is the next facet; to secure expected votes by spending savings on other government departments. And of course, the government will always fend off criticism of some unsatisfactory state of affairs in the nation's defence arrangements by saying in a 'lets have no more of this nonsense' tone; We have the fourth/fifth largest blah blah blah budget in the whole wide world! So there!!

FB

Great posts, BV and PN. Good points well made.

But surely the point is that in today's World you don't get sufficient warning to reconfigure or grow your armed forces to meet a developing threat. Nor can you necessarily rely on being able to make only a small tokenistic contribution to a multinational coalition, or to rely overly on a particular ally. In the 1930s we had enough warning to train lots of people, build lots of kit, and to be ready (more or less) when war broke out - though arguably we had to let the Czechs and the Poles down while we completed our preparations.

How much warning would we get of a growth of isolationism in the US that would compel us to take on more of the burden of our own defence?

And remember that these threats emerge quickly and unpredictably.

In 1977, who could have predicted an Argentinian invasion of the Falklands?

In 1986, who was predicting that Saddam Hussein would march into Kuwait?

In 1998 who would have predicted 9/11 and the subsequent war in Afghanistan?

In 2008 who would have predicted the rise of Daesh?

You necessarily have to size and scale your armed forces not to meet predictable threats, but to be able to deal with the unpredictable-yet-conceivable. The old planning assumptions that sought to size the forces to 'do a Granby' or to undertake two smaller commitments simultaneously were not, in my view, unreasonable or unrealistic.

We all know the RAF is not as good as it was " in my day ". I know it has gone downhill since 29 July 2012, because that was the day I retired!

Puts on kevlar helmet, takes tongue out of cheek and ducks!

How do you get the Smilies to work in this new site?

Tengah Type,

Wow! Did you really retire when you were 68?

You have to go to 'Post Reply' instead of 'Quick Reply'.

That exemplifies the Front Line overstretch ;)

Fareastdriver.
Thanks for the steer on the smilies.https://www.pprune.org/images/infopop/icons/icon14.gif

Brian 48nav
Aged 68 yrs 6 months and two days to be exact. After 37 yrs Regular Service, I was lucky enough to be offered a post under the old Retired Officer scheme, and served just shy of 14yrs with a Reserve Commission. I was able to continue later, but thought it was time to go for " a proper job " rather than continue with my hobby. Enjoyed about 98% of it. https://www.pprune.org/images/infopop/icons/icon7.gif

On the software test system today, I 'flew' a trail from Souda to Abu Dhabi, with 4 x receivers who joined at a down route RV point. During the first bracket one of the pods failed, so the trail continued single hose. Then during the second bracket, one of the receivers couldn't fill his external tanks. The software solved both snags very quickly indeed (a few seconds in each case) - but I thought at the time that in VC10K days, probably the only tanker nav who could have solved the problem as quickly was you, Tengah Type!