Well then. I just hope you are right. It is all scaremongering. I don’t really manage to believe it, but i certainly hope it is so.

As to having nukes on cruise missiles, yes, a similar scenario may be a boost to the Astutes, as i’m pretty sure that the current build Astutes couldn’t be easily cleared out for carrying nukes without modifications to the weapon storage compartment. People is very touchy about nukes, obviously.

It may be a chance to get a few more Astutes, possibly fitted with an additional module with a dozen or so VLS tubes for Tomahawk-class cruise missiles. (BAe already proposed that long ago)

Again, as i stated more than once, a nuke cruise missile though could NOT be designed by the UK simply fitting a nuke on a TacTom. The US wouldn’t permit such a move.
The UK would need to design a whole new sub-launched cruise missile, since no one in the world is mad enough to allow its conventional cruise missile to serve in another nation armed with a nuke.

The new missile will have to be clearly recognizable, so that a (example) Tomahawk being launched can’t be mistaken for a nuke launch.
And ideally, anyway, the target should be to develop a little more ambitious missile, with far greater reach and at the very least supersonic speed. Or better hypersonic, like the latest model of BramHos being developed in Russia/India.

Yeah, but can we assume the SDSR doesn’t accept reducing even more the number of frontline Typhoons squadrons and possibly their numeric consistence to cut on total numbers of airframes?
I’d like to say it is impossible. But i fear we can’t assume so with that much confidence. I don’t think Typhoon cuts are probable (save for the certain cancellation of T3B) in the amounts suggested by the press, but if Oman was to be happy with buying RAF standard T1 planes, we could see 24 Typhoons leaving the RAF for Oman, for example.

An hope against this scenario is offered by the fact that apparently there’s a gentlemen agreement with the Eurofighter consortium on trying to assure that the T3B planes that the UK does not buy are compensated by export orders.
Thus, selling T1s would not fullfil that commitment, unless the UK buys part of the T3B to replace the planes it sells.
This last case should allow short term savings more immediate than simply cancelling an order that, at the end, is merely an intention: there’s no effective contract in place for T3B planes, thus no money really committed to them.

If it was possible to sell abroad some of the T1, there would instead be a consistent immediate saving, ideally with new buy in future years of newer, more modern airframes of the T3B. Which wouldn’t be that bad at all for the RAF.

Ultimately, though, we’ll probably know only in October.

Don’t live in a happy world of light and colors where nothing bad ever happens either.

October’s announcements are likely to shock us all. Deeply.

Navy News gives its own analysis of the Press reports about Navy and Marines related possible cuts in an article on page 31.
http://content.yudu.com/A1owcf/navynewssept10/resources/index.htm?referrerUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.navynews.co.uk%2F
The points made are all good and i think we can all agree to them. Still, my fear is that the people shaping the SDSR may not be just as wise.

Anyway, a bit of a good news i read into another article is that near the end of this month HMS Dauntless should fire the Sea Viper missile as last part of the PAAMS testing.
As to Daring, unfortunate tug accident allowing it, in the autumn it is expected to show off itself in joint training in the US.

I hope the Navy makes a great ruckus about the firing of Sea Viper: i’m quite sick to read dumb people laughing of the Type 45 as the “destroyer without working missiles”.
Sure, if Phalanx guns could be finally installed too, and fast, the fame of the Type 45 would improve largely. It would be about damn time, sincerely.

Take it as an exaggeration about the overthrowing of the government… but it is a realistic scenario still, that reminds me of Sierra Leone in some ways.

Don’t we look too much at the finger and not to the Moon behind it. The article gives a suggestion, maybe exaggerated in some parts, but a good one.

I particularly liked the Uganda scenario – it seems to be right out of the colonial power hand book – prop up a African government, buy all their food and minerals cheap, when they wobble, send in a show of power followed by a nice military coup and everyone goes home for tea (apart from the previous government who all end up shot or in exile in Cuba). As far I can tell the author is stuck in the 1960’s 😀 – still it is interesting in terms of the range of operations and how ready the UK is for them.

Not really. It is very realistic, actually.
Such rare minerals, like it or not, are becoming strategical relevant resources that are indispensable to build mostly any kind of electronic device from mobile phones to supercomputers.

If people wants to continue having fancy phones and satellite pay TV, and if they want to have a job in the future producting electronics, the nation will have to make sure it can get a share of the natural resources.

Want another possible scenario of war that may become serious enough NATO has to intervene? Egypt, Sudan and Eritrea are stepping up their military and doing exercise because they are at loggerheads over the Nile’s waters.
Regardless of a years old agreement, Eritrea and other nations are planning to build tens of damns on the Nile, and Egypt is getting worried and angry like Hell. If diplomacy fails (and currently it seems the talks are going the wrong way), in a few years time they may begin firing at each other. It is a real scenario, more realistic and more urgent than those of the Telegraph.
Also, the coup in Pakistan is very serious a possibility: i linked the article i found this morning from the pakistani press stating that the risk of a coup is very high, and it is so RIGHT NOW, not 5 years in the future.
And there could be many more scenarios, all pretty likely despite the easy laugh of people, that could be listed out.

Surely from over 5000 meters. Altitude grants longer reach for the bomb. I don’t know the top ceiling though. I’d say that yes, they can be launched definitely from high altitude though.

Just to be controversial – but as far as I am concerned having nuclear weapons is good but it does not matter if you need to launch 10 nuclear missiles to score one guaranteed hit or 2, the value is in possessing them. Therefore I much rather have less capable nuclear deterrent and have the money pumped into conventional forces, quite frankly the RN is too small and personally I feel a lot happier if they used the $5 billion of the $20 billion for Trident replacement, moved away from a continuous deterrent, to ensure the two CVF’s are built and they can field two whole air wings

Me too, to a degree. But just because the government once more betrayed the armed forces and forced an “Or this or that” situation upon the services.

Trident SHOULD NOT and WAS NOT expected to be paid by the defence budget, as it is a POLITICAL instrument for the nation more than it is a weapon.

That’s why normally the nuke budget is SEPARATED from the defence budget (USA docet) and why it was expected to be separated in the UK as well.
The truth is that the government does not want to give in the privileges and advantages that come with Trident, but don’t wants to pay for them either.
A shameful trick that puts defence in a disasterous situation.