Good points, in many ways the equipment issues balanced out, the Argentine ground forces were much better equipped in several key areas (not least boots and winter jackets) and many of the limitations of Argentine air power were due to command decisions rather than any real problems with the actual equipment. Since the war many have given the AIM9L and Sea Harrier credit for winning the war, ignoring the fact that the RN had to carry a landing force 8000 miles from home, put it ashore and supply it then the ground forces had to win a ground war against a well entrenched, well equipped enemy.
One of the things I find odd about the war is that it was the Argentine Navy who were one of the prime movers in starting the war, yet their fleet played very little part after the loss of the Belgrano as they were scared to lose their ships. There has been a lot of comment on British ship losses, but for all the British lost their ships they also achieved their aims and it was this British acceptance of losing assets in pursuit of victory that was one of the biggest differences. If the Argentine fleet had mounted a serious attack on the task force they’d probably have taken crippling losses but could also have potentially crippled the British task forces ability to retake the islands, and in so doing secured Argentine control of the islands. A fleet that is not willing to take risks is a worthless fleet. Argentine pilots and soldiers paid the price of a war that was in no small part the brain child of their Navy, which showed no fight after losing their old cruiser.

Re-engine projects are seriously expensive, it’s not just new turbines and boilers (there were plenty of options for new high power/ higher efficiency boilers and turbines) but all the auxilliary equipment, wiring, pipes etc. The hull is still an old and limited hull, it’s still very crew intensive and would be very limited in aircraft suitable for deployment without placing major restrictions on payload. Ships can be re-engineered very successfully, but it isn’t cheap and there are still limitations from the hull and size capacity.

Sea Cat was something of a joke really, it’s main purpose was to arm the RN vessels with a missile, whether it was of any use was a secondary consideration 🙂 Now Sea Dart on the other hand was a very powerful missile, and even I as a hater of the Type 42 will say this, it was the Argentine awarness of the capabilities of Sea Dart that was a major factor in keeping their air attacks at very low level with all the implications that has for fuel burn and payload, so it must be admitted that for all their faults the Sea Dart equipped Type 42’s did play a major role in the British victory.

To Wanshan, the Type 42’s did not have any way of integrating Sea Wolf, apart from swapping out the Sea Dart (or possibly the 4.5″ gun), it was hard enough finding deck space for Phalanx. The ships were terrible for stability in both it’s true sense and sea keeping sense, they were terrible sea boats with virtually nil reserve stability, they had no free space in the hull and virtually no free deck space, so adding Sea Wolf was a no no. My point is that when the Type 42 was being designed the RN was aware of the threat and in the 70’s specifically included anti-missile capability in it’s new Sea Wolf design and was aware of US work on high speed radar controlled cannon for CIWS. Even if the weapons were not ready for the Type 42 on initial service entry why were they built so small that there was no way to integrate such weapons in the future (apart from losing existing equipment like boats)? These ships were built for 20-30 years life, the RN knew full well they were very limited and that they had no upgrade potential beyond capability upgrades to existing equipment on the ships, why were British politicians so short sighted and greedy to build ships like that? The ships were deployed as radar pickets (as our great politicians had decided fleet AEW capability wasn’t needed) and to put a ship with no close in self defence against the weapons they knew they would face was criminal IMO. Feydakin is right, most of this stemmed from the decision to reduce the RN to a NATO North Atlantic ASW task force and to ignore any threats outside the Cold war Soviet air and submarine threat. In 1982 a lot of equipment was funded and fitted almost literally over night, given that the USN was interested in finding out how good Phalanx was in the real world you can bet that CIWS could have been sourced and fitted in a hurry.

The absolute weight of additional equipment isn’t so important compared to the stability reserves of the vessel. Obviously stability reserve varies according to consumables carried (fuel, water, stores, munitions, ballast condition etc.) but if the stability is already close to acceptable limits then whether the extra equipment is light or heavy is not important, the reserves aren’t there.
In 1982 the Type 42’s were sent South to face a threat of Exocet sea skimming missiles, the Exocet threat was fully recognised, and the RN were well aware of the qualities of Exocet by virtue of having selected the missile themselves for use. The counter measures were already in service, and the UK themselves had developed a SAM with anti-missile capability against the weapon in the 70’s (Sea Wolf), the Phalanx was available. Bearing in mind that the UK suddenly found funds and sources of certain other systems very quickly, for these ships to be sent into combat against air and sea launched Exocet with nothing more than chaff and jamming to protect them was criminal. Most of the developed navies were working on counter measures against this threat in the 70’s, and the development of Sea Wolf is enough evidence that the UK RN was fully aware of the risks and need for a defence. By building these ships to a minimum possible spec, and then settling for a hull design that made even future upgrades dificult, was pathetic.
At least in the Type 45 the RN has avoided this mistake as that design has a large amount of reserve capacity for future upgrades. I’d like to have seen them fitted with Harpoon when new, and the ASW torpedo tubes, in this case though the RN have done it pretty well, concentrated on the core mission (air defence) with adequate in built upgrade potential to imprve the ships capabilities later.

What’s this meant to say? Why not publish the accident statistics of every major air force and see how the JASDF compares to others.

I was directing my comments at those whinging, that’s what you do on a Internet message board, debate with the others on the forum. And my point stands, if Pakistan has billions to blow on weapons then they have billions to invest in the welfare of their own people. And I’d have more time for the argument that Pakistan was a real big ally of the USA if their government had a genuine popular mandate to support the USA, if they hadn’t sold nuclear weapons technology to anybody interested in paying for it and if elements of the Pakistan intelligence service weren’t universally suspected of supporting the Taliban and Kashmiri terrorist groups. Pakistan strikes me as another Shah’s Iran or Saudi, a government supposed to be allies sitting on a country with an entirely opposite view.

Even by UK standards, the Type 42’s were real cheapskate ships, as the old saying goes the ships were ruined for a half penny of tar. They were a cheap way of getting Sea Dart in service, but they had no room for expansion or upgrades, no surface-surface capability beyond their 4.5″ gun and using Sea Dart against ships, no CIWS, stability was extremely tight and even the Sea Dart handling was done on the cheap. In the Falklands the types short comings were exposed in a spectacular fashion. For all that, I’ve always had a soft spot for the design simply because I think that in terms of appearance they were elegant and attractive looking ships.