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[justboatonic]

OK, it's behind the paywall and it's only a paragraph to go on but, is it possible the number of Type 26 and 31s could be cut already? This sounds like the 'source' could be from the ship building side. If correct, it makes the decision to build the 2 QE carriers an utter farce. Obviously with a government taking of trillions of pounds of debt due to the ridiculous panic over covid19, something has to give on public spending?

  Exclusive: anti-submarine warships could be cut down to single figures   ‘You might as well start claiming that you're going to defend Great Britain with a bunch of dugout canoes,’ said a defence industry source.
Anti-submarine warships could be cut down to single figures following the Integrated Defence and Security Review, naval sources have warned, in an act that has been deemed a “national embarrassment” for a maritime nation.

 
 

[warspite]

I'd scrap HS2 as well if they want to save a bit of dosh 

[SailorGreg]

Well, I can't say I'm surprised.  Remember when there were going to be 12 Type 45s? And that was down from the original estimate of the actual number needed to meet all the RN's commitments. Cut, cut and cut again! 

Greg

[dodes]

Forget the dug out canoes, there are plenty of inflatables available at Dover Harbour. Twin Johnson outboards and a grenade thrower and we will be able to be listed with the Iranian navy!!!!

[Stan]

Sorry guys but this may be only the tip of the iceberg. I am sure there is more pain to follow for us all


Stan.

[Colin Bishop]

This is in addition to reports that the Army may lose all its tanks and Warrior AFVs and the RAF/RN will never see most of the 136 F35 jets as planned, maybe no more than 48. And of course there is the proposed abolition of the Royal Marines. One of our new carriers, PoW is being repurposed as a helicopter carrier and general purpose platform - possibly no bad thing as it could actually be qute economical in that sort of role although if the Royal Marines are abolished then there would be a reduction in capability.

All in all it looks like anything up to 50% reduction in the armed forces over today's already critically low levels. No immediate reports on the Trident subs at the moment but as reported in my paper today we risk having nothing between relatively token conventional forces and the nuclear deterrent which is a pretty dangerous place to be.

Whilst it is true that methods of warfare will change with the use of drones, unmanned aircraft and even unmanned ships plus cyber warfare, it is difficult to get away from the truism that for successful warfare you need to be able to hold or take ground.

NATO is weak. The USA is no longer committed to it, Greece and Turkey are almost in a state of open warfare whilst the core European countries have allowed their armed forces to degrade. Germany in particular is almost toothless by all accounts with most naval vessels out of service and other branches of her armed forces at low operational levels.

Only France has a credible military at the moment and despite all the Brexit and other squabbles they are desperate for the UK to maintain operational capability.

The politicians are focussed on financial savings and will use any fig leaves to try and justify reductions. They have no real understanding of the risks they are running.

Colin

[kinmel]

The greatest mistake was ordering the 2 aircraft carriers after it became clear that we would not build the fleet necessary to protect it.   They were make work for Scotland.

Without a powerful fleet we have no force projection and become a defence force. So we have no need for tanks, marines, bombers or much else.

With our staves we can fight them on the beaches..............
Actually after 30 years of useless politicians the country is safer from attack than we have ever been.  There is nothing worth invading us for.

[Colin Bishop]

I think the RN took a punt on if they built the carriers then the Government would be forced to build the necessary escorts. Bad call!

However, now that we have got them they could prove quite useful as general purpose naval platforms. People say thay are too big but it is more economical to build and run a big hull then a smaller one with similar capabilities and the big hull is far more versatile in the uses in which it might be put. So the best bet might be that having built and paid for them then make the most of them as their crew requirements (without the air arm) are far more economical than their USA counterparts and their projected 50 year service life will accommodate a variety of roles. Taking a long term view they coud turn out to be very good investments.

The RN hung on to HMS Ocean in favour of keeping HMS Illustrious as Ocean, despite its drawbacks as a fully fledged warship, was a more versatile  naval asset.

Asking politicians to take a long term view is of course rather problematical.

Colin

[dreadnought72]

the ridiculous panic over covid19

My Mum died in a Care Home in late March.


Would you care to rephrase that?


Andy

[justboatonic]

I think the RN took a punt on if they built the carriers then the Government would be forced to build the necessary escorts. Bad call!

However, now that we have got them they could prove quite useful as general purpose naval platforms. People say thay are too big but it is more economical to build and run a big hull then a smaller one with similar capabilities and the big hull is far more versatile in the uses in which it might be put. So the best bet might be that having built and paid for them then make the most of them as their crew requirements (without the air arm) are far more economical than their USA counterparts and their projected 50 year service life will accommodate a variety of roles. Taking a long term view they coud turn out to be very good investments.

The RN hung on to HMS Ocean in favour of keeping HMS Illustrious as Ocean, despite its drawbacks as a fully fledged warship, was a more versatile  naval asset.

Asking politicians to take a long term view is of course rather problematical.

Colin

Both carriers are sitting ducks with bloody big bullseyes all over them without adequate escorts. They were built as willy waving vanity projects and to reward Scotland to reject independence. Im really not convinced the RN wanted 2 carriers at the expense of other surface combatants and it's bloody naive of the RN to think any Government would build more escorts for them if they did.

As I said in my OP, I dont have access to the full article but I was very suspicious at the onset with all the talk of 12 T26s and another 12 or so T31s to replace the current T23s.
The RN will get a maximum 12 T26s and no T31s or a reduced number of T26s plus an equally reduced number of T31s Given the current production costs alleged to be upto 4 T31s for the same price as 1 T26, Id say it's odds on the RN will get a reduced number of T26s and some T31s.

[unbuiltnautilus]

Both carriers are sitting ducks with bloody big bullseyes all over them without adequate escorts. They were built as willy waving vanity projects and to reward Scotland to reject independence. Im really not convinced the RN wanted 2 carriers at the expense of other surface combatants and it's bloody naive of the RN to think any Government would build more escorts for them if they did.

As I said in my OP, I dont have access to the full article but I was very suspicious at the onset with all the talk of 12 T26s and another 12 or so T31s to replace the current T23s.
The RN will get a maximum 12 T26s and no T31s or a reduced number of T26s plus an equally reduced number of T31s Given the current production costs alleged to be upto 4 T31s for the same price as 1 T26, Id say it's odds on the RN will get a reduced number of T26s and some T31s.

The current build schedule is for eight Type 26 and five Type 31 frigates. Maybe the article you are looking at is already very out of date. The original plan was to replace type 23 on a ship for ship basis. When five of the Type 23s were reduced in capability ( no VDS etc ) this gave the government an angle to repeat the high/low mix represented by the current Type 23 fleet. Eight high end ASW ships and five general purpose ships. This is the current state of affairs. What happens going forward is anybodies guess, but we are already at single digit figures on both classes of vessel.

[Colin Bishop]

Given the current production costs alleged to be upto 4 T31s for the same price as 1 T26, Id say it's odds on the RN will get a reduced number of T26s and some T31s.

Probably correct but my comments re the carriers came from an authentic inside source, not speculation.

The carriers may be targets (if unprotected) but only to antagonists with sufficiently sophisticated weaponry which probably boils down to just China and Russia. In other situations they would be able to project power very effectively.

With hindsight maybe they would not have been built but I think we might be surprised just how useful a big fast deck with extensive hangar capacity could be used for a variety of both military and humanitarian roles.Traditionally the RN has always suffered from having to build ships that are too small to be updated and thus have had truncated and costly service lives. The Type 45s were intended to overcome this problem but although big enough suffered from inaequate equipment provision which is currently being remedied at gret additional cost.

Yes, the carriers cost a lot to build, but a lot of that cost was due to Government policy in extending the building time to support employment. The Governments of the day deliberately made them more expensive than they needed to be.

We have been here before many time historically.

Colin

[dreadnought72]

Ok. I've just had a PM.


Andy

[dodes]

As my late brother in the RN used to say (well known Naval saying), last man out switch the light off. 

[Rob47]

Funny all this talk about the Army scrapping its tanks, yet at the defence council meeting the one word not used was scrapping, all these "genuine insider hints" annoy as they usually prove wrong.  The Royal marines being binned has cropped up more than enough times, yet they are not being scrapped, they were saved in the last batch of rumours.


Lets wait and see, the media cant be trusted, a headline a few weeks back was RN prepared to build two new large carriers,, really, fertile minds these hacks.

[dodes]

I see in the paper yesterday that common sense is prevailing in that they are raiding the much questioned over seas development fund for defence procurement.

[ballastanksian]

Getting rid of tanks is daft when the major sword rattler today has our army sending armoured battlegroups training in the Baltic states! I appreciate that Russia's new tank development program has hit some issues regarding cost and the reliability of associated support vehicles, but they are a nation that thinks armoured. If the US does no want to have an involvement (and their Marines are reportedly moving away from heavy armour in favour of equipment suitable for fast reaction) in the Baltic, then it is up to the European states to make up the numbers. A commentator on Youtube states that the MOD are investigating a new 130mm Rheinmetal gun system in new turret to fit onto the Chally 2 hull. It doesn't mean this will happen of course!

[raflaunches]

Every five years I always get apprehensive about the SDR, the last one wasn’t too bad but the 2010 messed not only the RAF up for 10 years but directly affected the Navy too by the lack of Harrier and Nimrod to support them.
I can only hope that nothing drastic is done this time but the results of COVID 19 will tell I’m sure.

[dodes]

A lot of people keep on going on about the Russians, but Nato winds them up by playing close along their border, I can understand the Russian angst, because the last war was won on their land with the blood of their people and they swore never again, the old communist states were a protective bubble for the motherland, now they are gone and Nato has basis in that area.

[old_gunner]

I think the RN took a punt on if they built the carriers then the Government would be forced to build the necessary escorts. Bad call!

However, now that we have got them they could prove quite useful as general purpose naval platforms. People say thay are too big but it is more economical to build and run a big hull then a smaller one with similar capabilities and the big hull is far more versatile in the uses in which it might be put. So the best bet might be that having built and paid for them then make the most of them as their crew requirements (without the air arm) are far more economical than their USA counterparts and their projected 50 year service life will accommodate a variety of roles. Taking a long term view they coud turn out to be very good investments.

The RN hung on to HMS Ocean in favour of keeping HMS Illustrious as Ocean, despite its drawbacks as a fully fledged warship, was a more versatile  naval asset.

Asking politicians to take a long term view is of course rather problematical.

The problem with the two carriers is they have done nothing to address the lessons of the Falklands campaign without cats and traps they cannot operate an AEW asset thus we have two very large targets and no method of identifying any attack until it comes over the horizon of the ship based radar, and they have insufficient CIWS assets to deal with a volley of missiles.

[dodes]

Their ships weapons radar actually bends over the horizon and has a very long range. When Paris airport had trouble with its air traffic control radar system, the unit on top of Portsdown hill was used to assist Paris air traffic control.

[KitS]

The problem with the two carriers is they have done nothing to address the lessons of the Falklands campaign without cats and traps they cannot operate an AEW asset thus we have two very large targets and no method of identifying any attack until it comes over the horizon of the ship based radar, and they have insufficient CIWS assets to deal with a volley of missiles.

The Merlin HM2s aboard the carriers will be fitted with the Crowsnest AEW radar system when the carriers make their operational cruises, as I read anyway.

[old_gunner]

Their ships weapons radar actually bends over the horizon and has a very long range. When Paris airport had trouble with its air traffic control radar system, the unit on top of Portsdown hill was used to assist Paris air traffic control.

Being an ex soldier my understanding is that unless you use a Skywave system from a radar array using skip propagation there are limitations on useable detection so next time the RN take Portsdown Hill to sea they will find the elevation of 131 meters most helpful
The resolution of any radar depends on the width of the beam and the range to the target. For example; a radar with 1 degree beam width and a target at 120 km (75 mi) range will show the target as 2 km (1.2 mi) wide. To produce a 1-degree beam at the most common frequencies, an antenna 1.5 kilometres (0.93 mi) wide is required. Due to the physics of the refraction process, actual accuracy is even lower, with range resolution on the order of 20 to 40 kilometres (12–25 mi) and bearing accuracy of 2 to 4 kilometres (1.2–2.5 mi) being suggested. Even a 2 km accuracy is useful only for early warning, not for weapons fire

[SailorGreg]

Do we want to get into a discussion of radar technology, modern processing techniques and so on?  Old Gunner is a little off beam with some of his figures, but I suspect we would be descending down a long rabbit hole if we start discussing how modern radars produce accuracies considerably better than he suggests.  Suffice to say that surveillance radars (at the lower end of the radar frequency band) have very long range and modest accuracy, while weapon control radars (much higher frequency transmissions) have shorter range (more commensurate with the range of the associated weapon) but very much greater accuracy.  And together they can detect and shoot down small targets at ranges adequate to keep the ship safe.  CIWS has only ever been a last resort weapon.  If everything else works as advertised it should never come into play.  Fingers crossed!

Greg

[Colin Bishop]

And of course the carriers may never be used against a first class naval power. They can still be very effective power projection platforms in other situations.

Colin