The shrinking Royal Navy

[Ozexpatriate]

I think it now recognised that RN and USN cold war submarine operations, and those of the Soviet navy, were quite a bit warmer than the world would've been comfortable with at the time.

With all the submarine cat and mouse that was played it's quite unsurprising. And many worse things have happened - submarines lost with all hands on both sides.

 

There's a reason the US has really great deep water submersible equipment. Woods Hole was never really a purely scientific effort.

 

More scary are the broken arrows - undetonated nuclear weapons ejected from aircraft, crashed aircraft or missile silo explosions like the one highlighted in the documentary "Command and Control" (which is excellent if you can see it).

 

Here's a list of some of them along with other military nuclear accidents. (It's a really long list.)

Edited January 25, 2017 by Ozexpatriate

[pete_mcfarlane]

There have been reports over the last few years that Russian Subs have been waiting off the coast to intercept our Trident submarines. They used to be deterred by our Nimrod maritime patrol aircraft, but in a spectacular miscalculation, that really heads should roll for , we scrapped them in David Cameron's defence review, Thats certainly one of the reasons we are now having to invest in the US 737 derived Poseidon aircraft. Really what folly!

I'm not a big fan of Cameron, but I don't think he should take much of the blame for the Nimrod MRA4 fiasco. The seeds of the problem were sown about 15 years previously, when it was decided to save some money by reusing bits of the existing airframes rather than build totally new aircraft from scratch. All his Government did was stop pretending that the MRA4 was ever going to work. 

Edited January 25, 2017 by pete_mcfarlane

[Mike Storey]

If the report in the UK Defence Journal is even remotely accurate [which I am more likely to believe, than mainstream press?]....then the missile wasn't launched at the west African coast area, but at one of the US' ranges. [so, in accordance with press coverage, it wasn't 'off course']

 

It was destroyed [automatically?] because a fault was detected. [This would happen probably if fired in anger too?]

 

It appears, UK Trident submarines don't operate using 'launch codes' from the UK Government.....but will only launch on consensus with the crew. [Relying on {superior??] discipline]

 

It appears, the UK Tridents are entirely independent in operation, command & control, from the USA. [Only sharing repair & service facilities for the missiles, as a cost-saving measure]

 

This is a 'bash-the-Government' issue, over something which, would ordinarily not be for public consumption.  

 

Why do we still buy newspapers???

 

For once, I sympathise with Government ministers over their exasperation at the ongoing vitriol......[OK, we lost the referendum, let's now cause trouble over any issue we can get hold of?}

 

Interesting reactions based on a curious patriotism, that of incredulous wonder. I would be concerned with two things:

 

1. Full details (if they are true and full) were made public by the US Dept of Defence, but not our own MoD or govt, about our own missile test. Why? Which is the correct reaction? I would suggest that of the US, for otherwise the ill-informed speculation and ability to use such lack of info for other, possibly nefarious (as you conclude) purposes,

 

2. The test was of the boat and its crew, not the missile, is being claimed - fine - and the purpose of the test was passed. If that is true, then it begs two questions - a) why was it not revealed prior to the vote on Trident renewal? - the accusation of political opportunism can go both ways - and (b) if true, when are Trident missiles themselves tested? I would not expect the latter to be answered in any detail whatsoever, but I would expect some better assurance that such tests do take place, or if not, why not. As several have already said, I guess it does not really matter if they ever get used. But it was clear from the Russian use of their "new" cruise missiles in anger for the first time, over the Middle East, when at least one veered badly off course (thankfully non-nuclear), that practice is pretty critical.

 

Whatever spin you place on using the Brexit situation, which may or may not be true (and given Corbyn's history with CND, I think you are wrong - he would have given this reaction at any time, in order to cast doubt over the use of a nuclear deterrent, despite Labour's agreed official policy), this govt (or at least May and Fallon) has nonetheless, acted ineptly in dealing with this, given the cover had already been blown by the USA, and reinforced the suspicion that they are generally intent on secrecy, whatsoever the subject. They appear to be very slow to react to actual events, virtually wooden, which suggests further decisions on the future of defence policy may be behind the curve. Cameron represented the other end of the spectrum, being far too quick to react to events or opinions, without any thought through strategy. Trump and Putin, let alone China, are quickly redefining the world order, but each in their own vision. If our lot are not light on their feet .....

[Ohmisterporter]

I thought this article was of interest; showing what I think is mindless drivel from the British side and considered comment from the Russians.

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/afp/article-4156952/Russian-ship-shame-returning-Syria-UK.html

[The Stationmaster]

I thought this article was of interest; showing what I think is mindless drivel from the British side and considered comment from the Russians.

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/afp/article-4156952/Russian-ship-shame-returning-Syria-UK.html

 

I  think that if anything the Russian comment shows that a slightly raw nerve might have been touched.  It has been the practice since the year dot for the movement of Russian naval vessels through near UK waters to be shadowed by RN ships and/or RAF aircraft, and rather obviously the Russians do exactly the same - and have also done so since the year dot.

 

However if Fallon actually said what the DM attributes to him it was downright stupid for a Minster/Secretary of State to come out with such drivvel.  And quite what difference a Russian 'aircraft carrier' (with a handful of aircraft) made in Syria when there was already a very large Russian air force presence there doing exactly what it had been doing for several months past is rather beyond me.. It was simply a demonstration by Russia that it could actually launch aerial missions from its aircraft carrying heavy cruiser (when it was capable of moving itself) so really no more than a bit of propaganda and a few more bombs dropped on civilians who were already being illegally bombed to smithereens by other Russian aircraft and Russian made bombs.

[pete_mcfarlane]

I've still not seen any evidence of Russian carrier based aircraft taking off from the Kuznetsov carrying air to ground weapons. As far as I can tell the ship seems to have ferried some aircraft to and from Syria, so they could fly most of their sorties from shore bases. 

[jamie92208]

I've still not seen any evidence of Russian carrier based aircraft taking off from the Kuznetsov carrying air to ground weapons. As far as I can tell the ship seems to have ferried some aircraft to and from Syria, so they could fly most of their sorties from shore bases.

I believe that at least one jet ended up ditching and did see reports that the rest ended up flying missions from a land base. As others have commented, carrier borne operations are a difficult art that needs a lot of practice. the RN have got crews in the states to get up to speed before our new carriers are ready. I'm not sure that the Russians have had much chance to practice anywhere else. It seems to have been mainly a bit of a flag waving exercise.

 

Jamie

[pete_mcfarlane]

I think two jets ended up ditching in the end. 

 

The supposed Achilles heel of Russian built carriers (including the Indian/Chinese ones) is the low maximum takeoff weight for the aircraft, which launch entirely under their own power up a ski-jump ramp. This limits their fuel and weapons load - hence my suspicion that they needed to operate from shore bases to do anything useful in Syria.

[Mike Storey]

I think two jets ended up ditching in the end. 

 

The supposed Achilles heel of Russian built carriers (including the Indian/Chinese ones) is the low maximum takeoff weight for the aircraft, which launch entirely under their own power up a ski-jump ramp. This limits their fuel and weapons load - hence my suspicion that they needed to operate from shore bases to do anything useful in Syria.

 

Is this similar to the solution decided for the QE and its sister?

[pete_mcfarlane]

Is this similar to the solution decided for the QE and its sister?

Not quite - the key difference is that the QE class will operate aircraft specifically designed to have a very short takeoff run. 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STOBAR

[jjb1970]

The Russian carrier is configured as short take off, arrested landing (STOBAR), the QEC is short take off, vertical landing (STOVL). The F35B was designed to operate off STOVL carriers and while it loses out to the F35C in terms of payload/range it is still a pretty formidable fighter. The Su30 is a superb fighter but operating from carriers without catapult take off pretty much neuters its performance other than for limited air defence missions. STOBAR was considered for the QEC and consigned to the bin very quickly as it pretty much combines the flight performance hit of STOVL with the complexity and risks of arrested landing, or as you could put it, the worst of both worlds. STOVL (or indeed STOBAR) only makes sense if you have an aircraft that was designed to operate in that mode. If you don't have an aircraft like the Harrier or F35B then you really should go for catapults although it is true that you can operate conventional fighters with a ski jump.

[Bon Accord]

Of course the other problem with Harrier/F35-B is that without arrestor wires the landing weight is severely limited due to the need to land vertically.

What that means in practical terms is that although the aircraft takes off complete with a fuel/weapons fit, it cannot land with that same weight, so the weapons and/or fuel have to be dumped or used prior to returning to the carrier.

Ergo, every aircraft that takes off carrying some very expensive missiles and does not use them in action (that being the overwhelming majority of sorties) has to dump them into the sea before being able to return onboard.

When you consider the cost of effectively wasting these unused munitions - potentially up to £100K per missile - over the service life of every single aircraft you're talking about some quite staggering numbers. The kind of numbers which could have paid for catapults/arrestor wires and then some.

Still, they're long term rather than short term costs and the MOD/Govt doesn't care about them as in time they become a problem for someone else.

[jjb1970]

I don't know about hot weather boundary conditions but the F35B can land with unused payload. Although a STOVL aircraft, on STOVL carriers the aircraft can do a hybrid rolling landing which allows it to land without arrestor gear. That was considered during the carrier design and aircraft selection process. I'm guessing there will be conditions where they may have to ditch the payload but it is not the normal condition. The STOVL variant was not the cheapest option, the higher costs of the F35B were calculated as outweighing the savings of not having catapults and arrestor gear initially (although trying to alter a design midway through construction to take new EMCATs was too expensive).

[pete_mcfarlane]

I was under the impression that the need to jettison weapons before doing a vertical landing only applied to the Sea Harrier when operating in hot conditions with air-to-ground stores, and this was one of the reasons behind it's premature retirement. 

 

On the subject of very short takeoff runs......

[jjb1970]

The EF Typhoon was considered for the QEC, either as a catapult assisted take off naval variant or to operate with short take off, arrested landing. I don't think it was ever the preferred option and seemed to be more of a stalking horse/strawman than anything else. Given the cost and risks of developing a navalised Typhoon just for the QEC which would be unlikely to find any future orders then it is hard to see any sense in the idea when the F18E/F, Rafale M and F35C were available as alternatives.

[Ozexpatriate]

Given the cost and risks of developing a navalised Typhoon just for the QEC which would be unlikely to find any future orders then it is hard to see any sense in the idea when the F18E/F, Rafale M and F35C were available as alternatives.

Also considering the difficulties experienced in developing a 'mission-ready' F35C, a role it was designed for, it's hard to imagine that a CATOBAR Typhoon would necessarily even be feasible, unless it was designed for the launch and recovery stresses, particularly with nose wheel and arrestor hook stress points.

[jjb1970]

Also considering the difficulties experienced in developing a 'mission-ready' F35C, a role it was designed for, it's hard to imagine that a CATOBAR Typhoon would necessarily even be feasible, unless it was designed for the launch and recovery stresses, particularly with nose wheel and arrestor hook stress points.

 

The only possible argument in favour that I could see is the emotional appeal to those who like to wrap themselves in a flag. The Typhoon is a superb fighter, but so are the alternatives, the costs and risks just didn't seem sensible on any level to me unless there was a large global market for naval fighters which offered further sales opportunities, which there isn't.

[Ozexpatriate]

...  unless there was a large global market for naval fighters which offered further sales opportunities, which there isn't.

Unless you reversed 72 years of US policy, and I don't think the Congress will let the Donald sell any to Vlad. He's too busy lobbing tweets at F35 pricing and procurement anyway.

[Mike Storey]

Unless you reversed 72 years of US policy, and I don't think the Congress will let the Donald sell any to Vlad. He's too busy lobbing tweets at F35 pricing and procurement anyway.

 

Apparently, the F35 is now the best, greatest thing since sliced bagels, or similar, and I'm telling you, it will be the greatest thing ever and you'll see, and I think it will be a great thing for the American people. And NATO is great. And Mexico will pay for it anyway.

[Ohmisterporter]

A new addition to the fleet. http://www.naval-technology.com/news/newsseaquest-oversees-construction-of-rfa-tidespring-mars-vessel-for-uk-navy-5725184

[The Stationmaster]

A new addition to the fleet. http://www.naval-technology.com/news/newsseaquest-oversees-construction-of-rfa-tidespring-mars-vessel-for-uk-navy-5725184

 

Where's the 'fingers crossed' symbol to click on?

[jjb1970]

I wasn't aware that the RN were buying any tankers......

[Ohmisterporter]

Looking at the picture of Tidespring it looks like a hose has burst and sprayed fuel over the front of the superstructure.

[jamie92208]

They're having 4 of them built in Korea and IIRC they are being delivered rather late.

 

Jamie

[jjb1970]

They're having 4 of them built in Korea and IIRC they are being delivered rather late.

 

Jamie

Sorry, probably should have used a smilie. These aren't RN vessels, they're being built for the RFA. Admittedly these days the RFA is more militarised but legally they're still subject to merchant shipping laws and regulations.