Lets look at this in two parts.

First could Isreal detroy Irans nuclear programme. Very slim chance. A surgical strike is not going to do it given the dispersed nature of Irans facilities (Those we know about). So a massive air campaign repeatedly hitting multiple targets over a period of time to prevent Iran restarting its programme. IF Israel attacked it would come under attack from Lebanon in a major way forcing the IDF to split its resources. Any attacks would alos put pressure on those nations in the region currently on reasonable terms with Isreal to change their stance, notably Egypt and Jordan again forcing Isreal to split its resources. Imagine if Egypt began overtly supplying Hamas with weaponry, how would Isreal stop them without going to war?

Would Iran use the bomb. No. It and everybody elsr in the Middle East knows Isreal has over two dozen accurate IRBM in the Negev desert each of which can turn a city to a glass bowl. No middle Eastern country has or will have the capability to neutralize these and given Israels ABM capabilities a single missile may not even get through. Add to this it would be made vey clear that a nuke exploding in Isreal would be take as the responsibility of Iran even if delivered through a third party and Iran would gain no tactical or strategic advantage.

Having the bomb would mean Iran joins the elite club and gains prestige and influence in the Middle East. It could however backfire in that other nations in the region would wish to come under the protection of the US allowing US forces to be based in their countries or at least equipment pre-positioned. This would probably destabalise the region even more and could lead to a conventional confrontation which Iran would come out second best, but again would not use any nukes for obvious reasons.

It is a case of what the RN wants and what we can afford that will do the job even if only 90%. As for Exocat, the MM40 Block 3 is a totally different weapon to the old MM38 the RN used to use. It has greater range, far superior guidance and is designed to be very effective in littorial zones. It is equal if not better in some areas than the current version of Harpoon which the RN doesn’t actually have.

As for the 76mm, well I did mention a larger calibre if that was required but the 76 is a very good weapon and used in far more countries than the UK 4.5 and so is cheaper to operate etc. We are not talking shore bombardment here by the way but it can do the job at a greater range than the 4.5 with special ammunition and is on the whole a far more versatile system. Plus with 16-20 platfroms the 4.5 becomes the orphan when it comes to logistics and given the 76 would make a good gun for a C3/Corvette platform more so.

Regarding ASYER on land. I was syaing that a purchase of this system as used by the French would fill a gap in out AD capability and given its range and altitute envelope would cover much of what the Rapier currentlyu does allowing a much lighter VSHORAD system to be purchased to replace rapier, possibly based on an exisiting MANPADS.

It is all well and good to support the industrial base but it must produce equipment that provides the capability required at an affordable price. The MoD is going to be made to change its mindset regarding aquisition and bespoke solutions are going to become the exception not the norm unless industry and ther MoD develope programmes with a wider appeal than solely a bespoke UK one.

The Horizon would have met UK requirements but it was how the programme was run that scuppered things. In fact the Horizons in service are as capable as if not more so than the T-45 as they are fully fitted out unlike the Uks fitted for not with solution. FInally if we had stuck with Horizon we would probably have ended up with additional platforms and thewse would have been built in the UK just the same as the T-45.

As stated most defence companies are or are part of Multinationals. Yes money has been spent on CAMM, but other proven systems are available off the shelf. BAe Systems is a major employer in the UK but it employs far more overseas where it is noe concentrating its business after years or few if any firm orders from the MoD and especially now it looks like the MoD is going to either bang out of or renegociate its support contracts. We should not tie ourselves to UK manufactured equipment just for the sake of national ego.

The DIS is going to become a joke after the SDR as the number of new programmes and theri size is going to shift downwards quite drastically. For too long the UKs defence industry has taken its eye off the global market. It does produce some very saleable equipment but this has been through the aquisition on other companies and even nor it is losing out to competetors even in the UK market, the ASCOD win in the recent CVR(T) replacement programme.

What is important is that the UK’s Armed Forces has the best kit affordable in sufficient quantities. If we are woried about support then negociate licenced production though this can reduce the benefits by increasing overheads. WHere there is no alternative then fine a UK produced bespoke solution may be appropriate, but first the capability requirement should be re-examined to see if it is too tightly defind.

Whilst in this topic I am advocating closer co-operation with Europe the US should also be involved. There will not be a problem with tech especially regarding stealth as BAe has a substantial knowedge base on the subject up a BAe Warton.

Returning to the FREMM. With its ASTER 15 AAW it will have commonality with the T-45 and if Co-operative engagement sytems are installed along with the longer lauch system could act as an additional magazine as well being able to fire the SCALP. The Exocet MM40 block three is a state of the art system and an advance on the RNs current Harpoon. Whilst the Italian and French vessels are fitted with a 76mm main gun their is no reason a larger system could be fitted if really required. In fact I would recomment purchasing two variant for the RN, an ASW variant and a GP variant fulfilling both C1 and C2 roles. The capability requirement would have to be amended but a fleet of 8-10 of each type would bring the RN back up to strength with an affordable, capable solution with commonality with other NATO navies.

As I clearly said the Tranche 1 airframes with the exception of a number of twin sticks are going to go early. It has already been agreed that the sale to Saudi counted towards our committment and any sale to Oman would do the same. The RAF wants to ensure it get the F-35 and is willing to give up almost anything to achieve this. Having 4 frontline Typhoon squadrons is sufficient to meet the UK’s defence needs and deploy a force of 8-10 airframes on operations. Add to that an F-35 fleet of the same size and that will be the UK’s FJ strength.

I think people really have to get their heads around that the cuts comming are greater than anyhting in recent memory. To maintian top flight capabilities the armed forces are going to be reduced heavily. All previous assumption about what size operations we can conduct and for how long are going out the window. It is going to be a whole new ball game.

The possible maximum task force deployed will now be a brigade battle group with 16 to 20 FJ support, 8-12 attack helicopters, 20-30 transport helicopters togeter with ISTAR, logistics and tanker support. At sea we will probably be able to muster 1 CVF (providing half the FJ support), 2 T-45, 4 FFGs, 1 LSD, 2 LPD(A), 1 SSN, plus auxilaries. With the size of the CVF I cannot see HMS Ocean being replaced

What commonality does the RM have regarding propulsion at the moment though. If we went down this route surely we could adopt the same weaponry as France and Italy, cancelling programmes bespoke to the UK. I know this would mess up the T-23 upgrade but if theat was also cancelled to save money and the SCALP fitted to the T-45s along with the latest Exocet we would end up iwth a 2 platform fleet of escorts with economies of scale. Yes we wouldn’t have bespoke Radars etc but then neither would France or Italy. With other NATO navies needing new escorts the FREMM could become a common standard, at least it is in production unlike C1 or C2 so we could get units faster allowing the earlier retirement of the T-22B3 and early T-23. The first units could even br built overseas until capacity is available in UK yards.

How close is the FREMM to the UKs C1 or C2 requirements? Also are there any current European maritime programmes that could be used to fill the RNs needs with little alteration and excepting that they would not be 100% fits?

But Afghanistan is slowly destroying our Armed Forces, wrecking long term procurement planning and shifting its bias towards similar conflicts. Its cost given existing resourses has been too much especially with the previous Government being very tight with the purse strings meaning the core budget had to be used to pay instead of from the reserve as was publicised. I severly doubt we will ever launch an operation of the size of Afghanistan again.

Again the arguement is put that we must plan for fighting state of the art opponenets by ourselves. But I cannot think of one opponent with this capability or who is likely to have in the near future (2020). Even then a combination ot Typhoon, F-18E/Rafale with state of the art ECM and stand off weapons would still do the job unless the arguement is to achieve all future conflicts with Zero casualties. If so then an awful lot of new equipment will also have to be bought for the Army and RM so that they are also 100% protected.

With the above air assets we will be able to complement the US or other allies in any operation and have the numbers to sustain committments without wearing out out assets.

But that is the point. Of the western powers only he US is capable of medium or large scale independant operations. We can still conduct small scale operation like Sierra Leon but for anything else we need to be part of a coalition be it UN or NATO. We simply no longer have either the budget of public will to conduct anything else.

However we already have very capable ECM/ECCM capabilities and the ALARM is rated as top of the class in SEAD missions. We have never gone done the road of dedicated ECM and SEAD platforms but what we have now is good ans more than capable of defeating soviat era single digit SAMs and their western equivilents.