Okay, now that we’ve got the P-8 fitted with a decent recce radar how about the next step?
The Cast Glance high resolution electro-optical camera as fitted in the N-P3D with its 170mm lens would make an excellent addition. It works, no further development is needed, if it can spot tiles pealing off a space shuttle at launch from a distance it would seem to be good enough for most maritime situations.
Imagine wide area maritime surveillance done properly, not just a list of ‘possible’ targets from a radar sensor but targets ‘confirmed’ by high resolution optical images.

Just the testing location

The article said

…the LaWS will be installed as a self-defense weapon and integrated with the Ponce’s combat system, including the sensors and operator station for the Phalanx close-in weapon system…

Okay Fed: First let me apologise if I have upset you, and you have every right to call what I say ‘utter rot’ if you want to.
Let me try to explain better what I thought I’d said where I can.
As with any Int collection asset some things must remain in the dark, I have signed the Official Secrets Act and I like my pension. I am not hiding behind that act and will say what I can, you will have to find out the rest the best way you can.

The ‘outdated concept’ comment refers to the fact that the radar is a ‘Possible Target Detection Sensor’. It relies on other recce assets to do the positive identification of these ‘possible’ targets. Just like it was designed to do in the late 70’s when it was called Castor (hence the outdated bit). The Atlantique 2’s are there using their radar and optical sensors – not the most up-to-date example of wide area reconnaissance, but it does ID what may or may not be a target.
Did I say it wasn’t wanted? Commanders will always want whatever they can get, what they need is always more than what they have available.

The weight issue is sensitive and is in part related to Raytheon owned equipment in the aircraft.

I like the aircraft and I like the people who work it, I just wish it wasn’t just limited to radar recce as I know how limited that can be. I would love to see the Sentinel re-equipped as a recce jet with a range of sensors – but I doubt that there’s money for that. Just as I doubt it would make an MPA..

As to who is spinning who – I will only ever say what I know; when I give an opinion I say so.

Now I will say sorry for the Crab and Pongo bit, (I was following Jonesy’s cue – I’m new here and still finding my way a bit). It used to be called banter but I accept that those days of name calling are probably over (I will not use these terms again). I agree with you wholeheartedly that inter-service co-operation is vital. I am proud to have worked closely with all branches of our armed services in the past and have learned greatly from the experiences. I don’t care what colour of uniform a man (or woman) wears in service of their country any more than I care what colour their skin is or eyes are. We all have aces and dullards in our various services – that’s life.

The Seedcorn guys are known to me, I am only too aware that they are too few – but they will make a difference.
Your suggestion that the RN Helicopter ASW personnel will need to work alongside the Seedcorn returnees, to form a basis for restarting the capability is one I totally agree with. I hope that those with their hands on the purse strings also agree.

We will all have to wait until all the ‘studies’ have been done, the good thing is that it is an opportunity to balance our collection assets for whatever we think will be needed after Afghanistan. I’m sure an MPA will be near the top of the priority list.

Forums like this give us the opportunity to speculate what this platform might be, but we’re not policy makers for that we need to lobby our MP’s.

More Questions than Answers

Jonesy, is right of course “Crabs don’t do inter-service co-operation” with his old mob. Or rather they didn’t always do it that well in the past, there were exceptions.
The Crabs seem to be doing quite a good job of inter-service co-operation with a variety of Pongo’s on 5 (AC) Squadron (on the face of it at least – it isn’t all going smoothly). One ‘platoon’ in the squadron is the Int Corps (lovingly referred to as Green Slime – the colour of their berets). One thing they do extremely well is propaganda as part of operational psyops. They do this so well that we don’t always realise it when they do it to us,

We have all heard how well Sentinel is alleged to have performed in Ellamy but as to any evidence of this? Remember a recent inadvertent release to the Danish media of a classified report on NATO Ops over Libya was highly critical of Int operations by all partners once the US pulled the Int plug.

The well made jet as currently configured is severely weight restricted, the crews all have to be below a certain weight and last time I looked even the doors to the mission equipment racks had been removed to save weight. The Raytheon sensor is the problem (and to some extent Raytheon keeping their system all to themselves). Nice jet, outdated concept of ops and a very well spun story I think.

Jonesy comes up with some good ideas for a new sensor suite in these airframes – an idea I wholly support. A Sentinel PR Mk 2 with ‘proper’ multi-spectral sensors, an on-board analysis capability and tri-service co-operation would indeed be worth having. It would indeed be a valuable reconnaissance asset, for us to loan out to any other European country having difficulties in their old colonies etc.

Whether this would be a “UK replacement MPA” however is open to question.

Nic ‘o lasio, I like submarines very much, our submarines that is and I’m sure in time the Astute will prove to be excellent in dark blue waters. But here we have another unanswered question.

What happens if the politicians decide not to replace the Vanguard hulls when their lives come to an end? A not entirely unthinkable scenario however bonkers.There will still be the carriers to protect and the covert stuff etc but no SSBN to keep safe, what then?
Will we need more Astute’s or less? What do you imagine a politician will think then?

It’s a little sad to see someone metaphorically grabbing money from the kitty just for their own team without looking at the whole capability spectrum. (Yes I know you were only joking – but you know what I mean). I would love to see eight or even ten Astute hulls in the water.

So we are back to the (helpfully edited) question:

“What do we need the next ‘UK Replacement MPA’ to do, when, and at what level of capability?”

Which prompts a further question:

“Who in government or senior levels of service has any idea how to answer that question?”

And the question is? …

The real question is what do we need the next ‘UK Replacement MPA’ to do? Until the role has been defined it’s all pure speculation (but its fun bouncing ideas around to see people’s reactions):diablo:

We need to forget Nimrod and Kinloss they are history, we need to learn from the mistakes and move on. Please let us not “do what we’ve always done”, just because “that’s what we’ve always done in the past.” 🙁
What we need now is ‘clean sheet’ thinking and inter-service co-operation, all options should be open. Come on there must be good ideas out there…

Why are we to assume that the MPA capability will be run by the RAF for (in part) the RN?

Will the ‘UK Replacement MPA’ automatically be based at an RAF Airfield (in Lincolnshire)?

Is this an opportunity to run a Joint-Service asset ensuring it avoids inter-service rivalry for funding?

And please let us not tweak an overweight radar only ‘plane and call it an MPA just because it’s cheap and we were dumb enough to buy it in the first place.

The UK is a maritime nation like many others; let us take a careful look at what others do on a limited budget.

There are many solutions out there – it all comes back to the first question.

What do we need the next ‘UK Replacement MPA’ to do?

“Ping”
😉

The Aircraft is the easy bit

Finding enough experienced people to operate the aircraft will be the real challenge. The Seedcorn returnees would logically be used to start up an OCU but how long will it take to train ab initio MPA crews?

A sensible ‘first step back’ into this vital capability would be the C-295 MPA (OFF THE SHELF). We could use this as an ASW training asset while providing limited ASuW and SAR operations.

Much later, when we have built up a core of experience again we could look at a ‘Higher end’ platform, perhaps from a shared NATO pool of P-8B’s

Just my two ‘penn’th …

When?

Does anyone know when we will see a Merlin with ASAC/ASW capability on the deck of a carrier?