Naval Technology on San Antonio:

Global Security on San Antonio

Last of the WASP class, Makin Island LHD-8 is the first (and only) US amphibious ship to employ GTUs. Schedule to be commissioned in spring 2009.

BPE Juan Carlos is the first and only Spanish amphibious ship to employ a GTU. Will commission only in 2011 (and Aussie version 2013+)

So, in short, at this point, the only GTU amphibs in service LPD is the venerable Ivan Rogov class. The Makin – an LHD – will be the first non-russian amphib ship that will employ GTUs. Unlike Ivan Rogovs, Makin will have Electric Drive. BPE (LHDs) are not coming online for another 2 years. These LHDs are however much closer to e.g. Principe d’Asturias, Garibaldi and Cavour, Invincible class carriers (all COGAG).

So, in effect, this type of propulsion (GTU/Electric) is rather innovative in this field. Let’s not pretend it is the most common form of propulsion for LPDs.

No but diesel is and steam is an ancient technology that is rapidly being abandoned. That these ships use that propulsion form will seriously work against any possible sale.

I’m not sure if that is the official line or not but the reality is that the V-bomber force would have been flying the TSR2 mission profile with less chance of success. In operational terms TSR2 would’ve taken over the V-bomber mission as well as that of the Canberra – the way I see it.

The V-Bombers were intended to deliver strategic nuclear weapons to the heart of the Soviet Union, first free fall then skybolt. The use of the TSR-2 in this role only comes after the failure of skybolt and delays in Polaris. However by this time the TSR2 design was settled and all the proposals were associated with additional weapons and were primarily seen as pre-polaris stopgaps. In a nuclear war with the Soviet Union, as with the canberra, the TSR2 would have been used to kick down the door for the V-Force. That is to deliver nuclear weapons along the inner German border and the warsaw pact to take out the frontline air defences. In reality they would have gone where ever they were sent as circumstance dictates but the TSR2 as a V-Bomber replacement is largely myth. The RAF genuinely saw it as a carrier replacing global power projection asset and had plans to deploy them globally to bomb irritating communist militia in the commonwealth. It is no secret that there were those in the RAF who genuinely believed that they could provide global power projection capability in place of the Navy. Fortunately by the 90s that argument had long since been destroyed and the Navy was the rightful beneficiary of Tony Blairs liberal Interventionism. The 1998 SDR was Tony Blairs ego inspired plans entwined with limited experience from GW1 and Kosovo and a grandiose but ultimately never to be fulfilled desire never to repeat the Rwandan genocide.

No. To complete the reorientation of our still Cold-War entrenched forces into a responsive rapid deployment instrument capable of servicing our foreign policy goals. IF we are going to go ashore and cause other peoples things to expand rapidly we need to be properly equipped for task. We aren’t there yet. CVF will help as the enabler for the employment of a greater percentage of UK airpower – RAF, RN and Army. The alternative is that we lose the ability to act in this fashion independently and choose foreign policy positions that keep us nice and out of harms way!.

Except all these foreign policy goals are an unrequired luxury that rarely if ever get followed through to any beneficial conclusion. Iraq has proved this and Afghanistan will in time too. If you want to spend your tax pounds on operations that will provide little if any real world benefit then do so, but understand that such operations are not imperative. I am not saying cut the defence budget, just be aware that currently defence (its actually offence but that is too offensive to be pc) is an option for the UK. There would be no impact (beyond the job losses associated with the programme) to the UK economic or security (Falklands aside but Argentina is decades from having the military capability to mount any sort of assault) status if CVF was cancelled at this time. I agree that with you what the purpose of the UK armed forces is but my point is that that purpose is optional.

The rapid response bit has already been re-thought. It seemed like a great idea to roll Piranha’s out of the back of transport planes to solve all the ills of the third world. Unfortunately someone invented a rocket with an explosive charge on the end that has a remarkable ability to defeat armour designed only to repel 50 cal machine gun fire, and that is before we even start on the IED. In the meantime the reality has struck that a genuine logistics train and diplomatic approval takes a very long time to come about thus making rapid deployment of the wheeled coffins rather un-rapid. And therefore good riddens FRES-UV.

as for funding I know my %’s are OTT but really the defence budge needs serious increase. RN short of boats, RAF short of aircraft, army short of them big steel coffins, sorry tanks etc

Short for what? What great enemy is just across the waves and poised to strike?

Most numberes are rigth because they are taken from START- MOU. That’s rigth. Nevertheless, his forecasts last were consistently wrong. You just should read the threads. My opinion is simple: he has an agenda. Anyway, you are free to believe on his forecasts if you want. I prefer to believe in Solovtsov’s words. They are more in line with the lasts events.

I never said his forecastes are correct, hence my entire previous post, his reporting of open source information however is exceptional.

I think you’ll find the great majority of us in light blue know we primarily exist, and do their very best, to provide the best service possible to those who need it from any of the services, UK or coalition, and have no “desires of grandeur” as you so ridiculously talk about.:(

We’re there to do a job and provide a service. We do it to the best ability.

No you know why the RAF thinks it should exist and that is very different from sound doctrinal analysis. The roles undertaken by the RAF would be done much more effectively if granted to those who actually use the services, the Army and the Navy. After all it was the Royal Navy that pioneered strategic bombing and the Army that developed true CAS capabilities. With the loss of the doctrinal anchorage provided by the parent services the RAF as wandered around like a blind man in the dark flirting with various ideas that have usually proven flawed. Again I make the point, one of the primary roles of the RAF is CAS yet it has not had a dedicated aircraft of this type since 1918 despite fighting one world war and a multitude of smaller ones. The development paths being taken by the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Naval Air Service up to 1918 were entirely appropriate and had they been allowed to continue I have no doubt that the outcome would have been a far more effective development of airpower in the UK.

I have the upmost respect for those who serve in the RAF and am in know way undermining their individual contributions my is simply that the RAF was a poor structural decision.

Oh, I don’t know I would agree with disbanding the RAF. It clearly has a supporting role as any Air Force. Yet, many Air Forces from around the world seem to want to dominate there other services. (i.e. Army, Navy, etc) Which, is funny as the Air Force should always provide a supporting role. Which, is its place with such types a Transports, Tankers, and in some cases Strategic Bombers.

So why should those service not provide their own support? Surely they would be much better tailoring their own requirements than allowing a third party with its own desires of grandeur to do it?

The RAF exists to project AIR POWER across the majority of spectrum, something that the Navy and Army have never ever done and never will be able to do efficiently and effectively. (The reason that the RAF was formed in the first place, and its still valid today as it was in 1918).

No it was not. The RAF was formed to provide air defence to the UK. A role that the RN was perfectly capable of doing with its own air component. By the time the RAF came into being the Germans had effectively abandoned air attacks against the UK due to the very heavy losses they were taking.

As for the RAF projecting air power better than the Army or Navy………rubbish. Carrier based aviation is far superior to land based for power projection and the RAF has no strategic capability anyway. That vanished with V-Bombers that were by then sitting ducks anyway. The RN possesses all of the UK’s strategic power projection capability through its triad of carrier aviation, the amphibious fleet, and Tomahawk armed SSN’s.