Extending astute would save no cash at all, might as well simply re-use the vanguard design. As fro cruise missiles being the cheaper option, we don’t have a cruise missile to do the job or a warhead to put in it, and as for land based ICBMs, they would never be allowed on the british mainland, and even if they were the cost of building the Silo’s would likely be more than building the subs.

how would continuing to build an existing design with a silo plug inserted in it not save money? It would save a ton of cash compared to preparing a whole new design.

You can’t keep using the current vanguards they will be knackered, you can’t build new vanguards as they are an old design and haven’t been built for over a decade, you could buy a new design off the yanks but it will probably be too big for the UKs needs, have too high manning levels (as most yank ships do) and would cost a lot to transfer production to the UK for just three-four boats. So why not take a design being built now, build some more but with a plug or extended sail. should be a lot cheaper and is probably the only remotely affordable option.

Having moved to RAF Uxbridge recently, it became apparent that the approaches to RAF Northolt were almost directly overhead.

I am familiar with the Islander aircraft from my time in NI. I was just wondering what role they perform here on the mainland UK. (I have heard ELINT/SIGINT?) They have been flying some rather unusual hours lately, late nights and weekends, certainly not your usual 9-5

Thanks;)

Thats not unusual for them, that is very much their normal, being a wet lunden inhabitant its very normal to see a little grey islander slowly climbing overhead on a sunday afternoon or early early on a sunny day. Offcially they are used for transport. The joke round here is that senior officers must have a huge number of pressing meetings at 10,000 feet over the capital.

But unlike the Defence Select Committee, this group would actually hold the purse strings and decide what was needed and what would be the support costs. Therefore the Government has to consider its asperations and is unable to say one thing in public but only fund a part or delay equipment to reduce costs in year.

Thought you said it would have no power as such? Holding the purse strings is enormous power, the elected governement could do nothing without the military and industrialists say so.

I know there are some pretty big holes in my position but there is a need for a redical shake up as to how defence is managed as the current system is leading us toward to bad old days of Empire where we would send a small force, it get badly beaten up so we send a better equipped force to try to solve the problem, come home and the same happens the next time.

Why ruin a perfectly good system that has served this country since the days of sword and horse? You can’t mess with tradition. Its what we do best, doing exactly what we did last time is the last thing they would expect! bah! carry on blackadder….

War is said to be an extention of Politics by other means and the primary role of any Governemnt is the defence of its people. You cannot conduct wars or run a military on a just in time or just enough basis as this Government has done since 1997. You need capacity as well as broad capabilities with the tail able to properly support both peacetime and wartime needs.

You’re right this governments being doing it since 1997 and the last did it from 1979 and the one before that did it from……

Sorry I am standing in my pulpit again

its what we’re all here to do, vent our collective know-all spleens! 😀

You think a subsonic weapon would penetrate 6 inches of armour. Honestly?. Do you know how thin hull plating is for a modern warship?. If it would penetrate 6″ of ordinary hull plate, let alone hardened armour, it would have been right through the Stark and the Sheff before the warhead detonated!.

Yes I do think it would. 5.5″-6 is the armour at its thickest. Yes Sheff and Stark are thin but the spaced plates act like “spaced armour” -as you hit a container the air pressure inside increases offering more resistance in the container itself then as it is punctured the increased air pressure attempts to equalise through that hole with the air travelling in the opposite direction to projectile (i.e slowing it by increasing air resistance). Do this a couple of times (i.e multiple compartments) and it is not as easy as saying that modern warships would be sliced in two.

Exocet hitting at 315 m/s (lets understand what we mean by subsonic here…) and detonating would almost certainly go through the amount of armour Belgrano carried.

Precisely how much trouble do you think?. IF it took 6 repeated impacts on precisely the same plate and penetrated what damage do you think an Exocet would do to a ship with that kind of mass?.

Its not repeated impacts on a single spot i’m talking about, the flexing, vibration, heat causing an overall failure in the armour resistance.

Think about that. ‘Sunk her’ is the hint.

She doesn’t need to be sunk though, just hurt enough.

You think that their WW2 vintage Oerlikons would be less effective than the WW2 Oerlikons we were using on their Skyhawks do you?.

And they were ever so effective…..

Destroyed it if they got into guns range. Exocet could not have dealt with the threat on its own – we’d seen how vulnerable it was to softkill seduction already ourselves. Plus we were facing an Exocet threat against us from their DD’s although mitigated by the same softkill factor. Taking Exocet out of the equation you are looking at 4.5″ Mk6’s and Mk8’s (and the Mk8 was no great shakes in ’82 believe me!) taking on a cruiser while the carriers try to run. Its not a pretty scenario.

Behave! destroyed? One old cruiser and a couple of 40 year old destroyers would destroy the task force….sounds awfully like the sort of spin put out by Thatcher’s team after the war when they were having a hard time justifying it to the left wing press. I think it was right to sink her, she was a threat no doubt, but i think its being well over stated. Could HMS Belfast and a couple of old Castle class frigates have destroyed the 82 Task force? shakes head, not a chance. There would be a scrap yes, but it would have ended in Belgrano’s demise or need to flounder home.

Well we are 30 years on now and we need to find the scapegoat for the dire mess we are in, resulting in inevitable MOD cuts. Ultimately our elected representatives have to decide how to spend our money, not unelected, unaccountable quangos. In fact with any luck we will be rid of a good 50% of these organisations by the end of year. We don’t want any more.

Ok ok, Herbert Asquith for dragging us into WW1 and therefore blowing all the riches we had acquired over the previous two centuries and effectively making us bankrupt. But thats my final offer.