This, frankly, seems like political bollocks - making promises the government after next can’t keep.

The government says it wants to build a force of 12 SSN-A by the “late 2030s” to replace Astute.

SSN-A hasn’t been fully designed yet, though RR has been contracted to start building reactors for the UK and Australia and any increased production will be difficult. But let’s take it at face value and assume production will start in 2027 and, at best, construction (let alone trials and commissioning`) will take 5 years (the time the US aim to take to build a Virginia class).

The current hall is sized to build one Vanguard and 2 Astute at a time.

Assume a roll out of the first SSN-A in 2032. With another SSN-A sub rolling off the line each 18 months they have to start another every 18 months. That means by the time the first nears completion, they will need to have 4 to 5 SSN plus a Dreadnaught under construction by 2032.

Where are they supposed to build them? Does anyone think they can recruit and train the type of experienced welders and engineers in that timescale?

Note also the present Astute/Dreadnaught production facilities and rate are designed to allow the current design and production force to remain stable for decades as replacements are build to prevent a recurrence of the problems between the design and construction of Trafalgar/Vangaurd and Astute/Dreadnaught.

Is this in any way feasible?

https://www.deeside.com/uk-outlines-...asing-threats/

UK outlines plans to build 12 new nuclear submarines in response to ”rapidly increasing threats”

…”The government says the industrial base will be expanded to deliver one new submarine every 18 months.”……

https://archive.ph/t8OWp

Britain to build a dozen nuclear submarines as forces arm for war

“A submarine will be built every 18 months, replacing all seven Astute class submarines by the late-2030s, the Ministry of Defence said.

The announcement will also trigger a major expansion of industrial capability at Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria, and Ranesway in Derby. The MoD said it was working with the defence industry to ensure there was a rapid expansion in training and development opportunities.

The government’s target is to double the intake for its nuclear programmes, civil and defence, to 30,000 apprenticeships and 14,000 graduate roles over the next ten years.”……

A glimpse of where this insanity came from this morning when a junior MOD minister, Luke Pollard, was interviewed on the radio and stated that the hope was to reduce SSN production time from 3 years to 18 months…… :ugh:

Ignoring the problems of designing a new type and ramping up production (the US is spending tens of billions to try and get Virginia production up from 1.3 to a planned 2 a year), the figures just don’t reflect reality.

Of the 6 Astute class produced so far the times from the first section being laid down till being launched were 6, 8, 9, 6, 10 and 11 years. Sea trials and commissioning added on average another 18 months. The last in the class was laid down in 2018 and has yet to be launched.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astute...s_in_the_class

Build submarines in 18 months.

Build 1.5 million new homes by 2030

Achieve 95% clean energy by 2030

Labour politicians (and probably ALL politicians) never let practical realities get in the way of their promises/pledges/commitments, which are often timed far enough for delivery in the future that they know they'll have moved on and not be held responsible for failure.

That's what you get with placemen pollies. they don't understand their briefing notes.

I suspect what he meant was interval between deliveries, as opposed to total production time. It is clearly madness to suggest that - particularly the way BAES operates - one could build a boat in 18 months. On the other hand, it is also madness to continue building boats such that it takes twelve years between cutting steel and going on sea trials.

It won't be easy, but it has to be done. Ir also means the arguments about build capacity vs number of boats will need revisiting.

As explained here previously the production rate is designed not to build subs quickly or most economically but, (post the debacle caused by the hiatus between Trafagar/Valiant when most design and experienced construction staff retired or were laid off), to ensure a low production rate in order to keep the teams together until the next class was required.

Now, especially at RR who now have to increase their production rate to accommodate the Australian SSN-A reactor modules as well as RN orders, that production rate has to be revisited - as does the size of the production facilities and engineering manning levels.

That introduces several problems. The time and cost of building new/larger production facilities; ensuring subcontractors are able to do the same to ensure no bottlenecks - and assurances they'll get future orders at the same rate to justify/calculate their costs and prices; recruiting, security clearing and training the new staff such as exotic welders (which means pulling the experienced current workers off the line to become instructors) plus the RN recruiting and training the officers and men to crew them.

​​​​​​​That's assuming the Treasury is actually able/willing to foot the bills when the full costs become apparent.....

You really don't have to "explain" any of that to me. It may just relate to my day job......

The debacle of the post T/V boat skills shortage hit the design element first, then the production. Which is why Barrow ended up building some surface ships and a couple of commercial tankers in the late nineties / early noughties just to pay the bills. Now they have a continuous stream of production work, that side will take care of itself to a degree. What is less obvious is the design cycle, particularly for the initial stages, which for AUKUS has been going on for quite a while now. One of the reasons to decrease the build time will be to potentially decrease the interval between design times as well.

I did say it won't be easy - but that's also why the overall arguments on numbers vs capacity need looking at. One of the other consequences of long build durations is that much of the kit is legacy by the time the boat gets into service. That makes the support function even harder.

However - given the squirming over the actual budget trajectory I doubt Starmer has any answers. This is a kick the can down the road budget.

So assuminglate 30s Agammemnon and Achilles will be decommissioned less than 15 years after commissioning. For the Trafalgars all lasted 25-30+ years, apart from Swiftsure herself (for specific reasons) the class all made it to 20+ years in commission before falling prey to defence cuts.

I am not au fait with modern SSN capabilities but with a 'littoral' focus for much of HM Naval Service shouldn't we be looking at SSKs as well? Yes, I know we would need to recruit and retrain to crew them.

Assuming delivery of the first successor SSN will be late 30s - even if they do get 18 months between deliveries, and all 12 boats, then you are looking at an 18 year build program, so the later Astutes may be in service into the 2050s

I'm far from convinced that the "Littoral" is the focus anymore. We appear to be pivoting back to state on state open ocean, as opposed to visiting the peace-loving natives of Umbhoto Gorge. Trouble with SSK is that they're essentially immobile. Great for homeland defence / sea denial, not so good for worldwide ops (compared to SSN).

"...pivoting back to state on state open ocean...."

Against who, apart from China - and we're supposedly going to be NATO focused going forward.

A quick look at the current Russian surface fleet indicates that a lot of their ships, from cruisers down to corvettes, are 35 years old or older. They also have 4 geographically quite separate fleets to resource.

I don't know what Russian intentions are with regard to budget and building plans for their navy, but it appears to be withering on the vine from a search of publicly available sources.

Standing by to be corrected/educated!

But they have a sizeable nuclear submarine fleet which they are in the process of upgrading and/or replacing.

​​​​​​​https://www.nti.org/analysis/article...-capabilities/

I don't want to get into a p*#@ing contest over this but their nuclear submarine fleet would appear to include:

5 Delta IVs - 41 to 35 years old
7 Oscars IIs - 37 to 29 years old
2 Victors IIIs - 35 to 33 years old
2 Sierra IIs - 35 to 32 years old
9 Akulas - 35 to 25 years old (8 out of 9 over 30)

That's an awful lot of hulls nearing the end of their life and in need of replacement.

Older submarines are also noisier submarines, which makes them easier to locate and kill.

There are also increased safety issues, but perhaps the Russian Navy is willing to accept more risk in that area than western counterparts.

Silly me, the version of the story implied (later corrected) delivery would be through the 30s - it did seem wildly optismistic. So we actually actually have the opposite problem, the 25 year life of the reactors that implies given launching in 2007 and commissioning in 2010 Astute needs replacing in commission sometime in the early 2030s ( and Ambush in the years before before 2036) or the fleet will be shrinking. Unless of course the unrefueled life of the PWR2 can be extended:hmm:

I am trying to digest the following, does it mean FCF is being ditched as gash and the Royals are going to be heavily integrated into The Army, littoral strike gets a passing mention on page 105 but LRG(N) looks to me like it is a much diminished version of COMAW's units including 3 Cdo Bde declared to reinforce the Northern Flank when I joined. I suspect LRG(S) will cease to exist in fact if not on paper.

I suspect that FCF will survive in some form, largely because 3 Cdo ceased to exist as a formed unit some time ago - which was why people were relatively relaxed about the LPDs going.

As long as it doesn't cost any money. Interestingly, not a mention of MRSS in that steaming pile of ordure......

The Astute PWR Core H reactor has a design life of 30 years, so it will reach the planned out of service date around 2037.

But reactor life isn’t a finite hard cut off - it just means power starts to degrade - HMS Trenchant had a planned reactor life of 25 years and was finally decommissioned after 36 years (1986-1922).

So, assuming the first SSN-A is laid down in 2030, and is launched around 2040, Astute should reasonably be expected to last until she is commissioned.

Also worth remembering that the average time between the delivery of each Astute has been a lot more than 18 months. So if Astute herself can survive until the first AUKUS boat commissions, the remaining Astutes will be relatively youthful and an 18 month interval between delivery of subsequent boats shouldn't be a problem at all - in fact beyond a certain point it should allow overall numbers to creep up...

.....apart from the fact that boats WON'T be delivered at 18 month intervals.

Probably true. In which case they just need to be delivered more regularly than the Astutes have been. If we can't manage that, we might as well pack up and go home.