pjhydrochatting with a friend “who knows” (how much depends on quantity of beer consumed), apparantly the barmy are facing quite drastic cuts and may have to go to a “super brigade” concept with fewer brigades of a size more akin to 3cdo bde and 16th air asslt, each with 4-6 inf battalions but less of the really expensive stuff such as armour, sigs, engineers etc. Apparantly RAF is looking at similar with fewer but bigger squadrons (24 FJs) and the RN is looking at fewer hulls with rotational crews as standard.
He had 5 pints so claimed to be under the defence ministers desk….
pjhydroRegardless of the expense of the Nimrod MR4 programme if Britain can make do without Nimrods and Labour win the election there will be no Nimrod force – they will be put up for sale, no one will buy them and they will quietly become a piece of history.
Using politicians logic they will pick up on the fact that the Dutch once had a decent sized MR fleet and now have none and will use that as there benchmark regardless that the US, India, Australia etc. are in the process or will be shortly be ordering new state of the art MR aircraft.
Unfortunately the withdraw date of the MR2 is before the election so it would be difficult for the tories to reverse this decision and keep them in service until the MR4 is ready.
The world is constantly changing and with the Russians flexing their military might and under taking more naval activities which need to be monitored and with the increase in pirates the need for MR a/c is probably greater now than any time since the collapse of the Warsaw Pact.
You are so correct its painful…
pjhydroThe Tories are not going to throw their lot in with an EU army, and any Tory leader who proposed such a thing would be booted by the rank and file in short order
I didn’t mean an EU army (though the attractions long term as we plow through the 21st century are manifold) I meant co-op with EU, I see the UK by need pulling closer to our neighbours. At present we are a little out in the cold, the spanks have fobbed us off, the EU has moved on while we were building sandcastles in Basra and much of the world has turned to India and China (the recent execution demonstrating how much diplomatic clout we have as an individual nation….) War toys are ever more expensive, world order is reforming and the damage from our Iraq legacy has all added up to us needing new friends and a new direction (and a new army…)
pjhydroGoing as part of a major coalition in a UN sanctioned mission is a little different from say the Falklands or the more recent Iraq war. Those are the decisions that require a strong leader.
or mad ones…:D Only difference between maggie and tony was he thought he was close to god, she thought she was…
pjhydroI think a temporary respite is closer to the mark, the Tory’s will be quite happy to play peacekeeper/global police when they want to.
I don’t know….(well genuninely I don’t) but would say that UN blue helmet stuff is out after the Bosnia fiasco (no more white painted 105mm LGs) and after iraq I can’t see us throwing our lot in with the septics too readily, I think Tony et al expected special treatment from Bush afterwards and it wasn’t forthcoming. I forsee us going a bit French, doing a bit here and there but throwing more of our lot in with the EU and falling back on a more self-defence stance- Fortress Europe.
pjhydroThe Times is a traditionally Conservative paper (currently opposition party),
Well its a murdoch paper so it does what ever he says, traditionally The Times was the paper that reported against the establishment, what ever its colour or hue.
The Guardian is a very left wing newspaper, I would expect much of their readership would be quite happy for the UK Government to be spending much less on the armed forces.
They can be very ‘right wing’ when they want to be or conservative with a small c (like most socialists tend to be.)
The British press is very, very poor at reporting on Defence matters so the moron factor is very relevant, the Times and Guardian are otherwise quality newspapers but for defence matters; next to useless.
The torygraph can be pretty good for defence matters but tends to be lots of historians and old generals getting knickers in a twist but agreed all pants really.
pjhydroThe major problem with discussion like this is that nobody actually knows, not even the men with the purse strings. It is true to say that iraq and Afghan have wrecked the UK armed forces, skewing procurement, overal strategy and tactics too far in a particular direction at the expense of so much that the UKAF were previously good at. Who knows what the next ten years will bring…
I would guess smaller armed forces that will be used a lot less because post iraq inquiry I would hazard we will see an end to the New Labour (old liberal) imperial intervention gunboat diplomacy of the last decade. But as I said all pure speculation.
pjhydroA reduction of six MRA4s would leave us with a front line force of… 3 aircraft!
I think the rumour was a reduction to 6 not of six, though an active fleet of 3 from 6 airframes is not a bad guess anyway. My biggest concern is that MR2 is going early…so what does the UK do at the next maritime disaster (piper alpha et al) and we need an MPA to find, fix, co-ordinate, drop rafts etc???? “Mayday Mayday Ferry capsizing, 500 people….” “Erm sorry UK coast guard here can you just wait 18 months until the RAFs new Nimrods are in service…..”
Harrier to go before F-35B arrival. OK lets get serious here. Any decision this government takes that isn’t implemented before the next election is just hot air anyway. Unless Cameron and his cronies seriously screw things up between now and next may, Labour will be history. They certainly won’t have any influence on decisions about matters five or more years from now. For example, in 1997 shortly before the election, the tory defence minister announced there would be a new Royal Yacht to replace Britannia, costing £60million. Anybody seen it sailing around recently?
Fat chance with this deficit. lets not forget the tories have done the biggest hatchet job on the strength of UK Forces, Options for Change and Frontline First anyone?
The longer term items in this announcement don’t worry me as they will probably not happen anyway. Labour won’t be around to see them through anyway. The Chinooks will be welcome, but won’t arrive until we are beginning our withdrawal from the Stan so it’s a hollow gesture.
Will all the Chinooks even arrive?….
The Green Merlins will have to be extensively modified for Naval use, folding rotors, folding tails being the main items, and to replace the SK4s one for one we’ll have to order another batch anyway.
Same goes for ASaC7 replacement, currently we have 13 airframes flying with three sqns (849, 854 and 857). The rumours are that only eight HMA1 Merlins will be alocated as their replacements. Obviously this isn’t enough, another five new builds are required to maintain the minimum fleet necessary. Ordering more Merlins would be a better solution for the Stan than Chinooks in the short term, as they would be in service much sooner. Common sense and governments don’t usually go together sadly…
No indeed. Unfortunately there is no rule book that says the RN will get 1 for 1 Asac or Sk4 replacements. Your not wrong it obviously isn’t enough, but then neither is 25 escort ships, 5 Astutes, 37 Infantry Battalions or 9 (6?) Nimrods for that matter but that hasn’t stopped the last dozen defence ministers
pjhydroFrom the MOD web site.
“In addition, the Nimrod MR2 will be taken out of service in March 2010, 12 months earlier than planned and the introduction of the Nimrod MRA4 will be delayed until 2012.
One survey ship and one minehunter will be withdrawn from service early. The Navy’s older Lynx and Merlin Mk1 helicopters will be retired sooner than planned prior to the transition to the more capable Wildcat and Merlin Mk2 as part of the new helicopter strategy. “
That last bit about navy helicopters is a bit vague. I’m sensing very many “capability holidays” are coming.
pjhydroSome slightly better news: Only one fast jet squadron is actually being cut now (a Harrier squadron), whilst another squadron (Harrier or Tornado) won’t be decided until after the defence review. I hope it’s a Tornado squadron that goes to be honest, it’s the difference between losing a squadron of planes (that can in turn extend the life of the overall fleet as spares) and losing the entire capability of Carrier strike if we lose all the Harriers.
And from the sounds of it, only the Nimrod MR2’s are being retired, with the MRA4s simply being delayed by 12 months.
Agreed. Still c**p though. Would be nice to not loose anymore FJ squadrons at all.
As a thought, if we are going down to a smaller harrier fleet why not just hand them over to the RN?
pjhydroSo I gues I was wrong, one Harrier sq is going, my guess is we’ll next see an extended OSD for the Harrier as a type as their are now more frames to spread the hours over, leading to a delay in type introduction of the F-35. I knew the MR2s were going to get binned fairly suddenly (along with the already announced retirement of 1 R-1) but the big surprise is that another minehunter and a survey ship are going, the Echo class are too new to get binned (unless labour have gone completely insane), and even Roebuck had a life extension in ’05, so where exactly is the saving?
I did not want to be right, sorry.
Trouble is none of those details matter to this government. Labour is achieving what it always wanted to, the run down of the armed forces…micheal foot would be terribly pleased.
We also seem to be having a temperance movement foisted on us by these same presbyterian scots, but thats a whole different debate for another forum. Can not wait to be shot of them.
pjhydroThere is also a nasty little rumour txted my way from an RN source that the CHF is to go, replaced by the RAF chinooks, but that might be just senior service paranoia.
pjhydroThe Conservative spokesman made some good counter-points to the announcement though – in the past, expenditure for operations has not had to come out of the MoD budget – it comes from the reserve.
He also spoke out against making cuts to core capabilities to fund current operations. I really wish that the opposition would make a stink about this, but it seems nobody wants to pay to defend this country.
The problem is this is a beautiful peace of doublespeak- Headline “Increase in Helis to support our boys” But then a reduction in other capabilities and bases is tacked onto it. Todays news is actually “massive defence cuts”, the message people will take away is “this government has finally listened to us and bought more chinooks”. Never forget the ignorance of the proles is total.
Interesting that the Chinook annoucement was made seperate from the cuts anouncement. SO Chinook makes lunchtime news, desk top online reports and 6o’clock news while the detail of cuts might make the ten o’clock…..
pjhydroTheir will be no further reduction in MRA4 airframes, that money has already been spent, I just hope we get the prototypes converted for use as R-1 replacements, MR2s however will start going sooner.
When has that ever stopped them. Rumour is they will mothball them and only 6 will be active.
Harrier will not go Before F-35, the Gr9 upgrade spend makes that impossible, the only time Harrier squadrons will fold early now is after they timeout their airframes.
The rumour is a Harrier unit will go now and the number of airframes will be whittled down quickly over the next five years.
Dear lord I can’t wait to get rid of this shower, FRES should just be binned for a decade or 2, we’re already buying tons of new vehicles which are far more capable than what we were using before anyway.
Agreed ++++++ etc
pjhydroOne other thing, when it says a cut back in the Tornado fleet, does it mean a cut into the 142 strong interdictor force, or simply retiring what is left of the F.3 fleet before it’s replacement Typhoons are ready?
The buzz is a GR4 unit to go
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