So what? The carrier escorts weren’t carrying any Exocets then? or just a handful?

Following ships had 4 apiece
Type 22s (2 units)
Type 21s (7 units)
County class (2 units)
Some Leanders (4 went down south I don’t know which if any had Exocet)

With no OTH targeting RN would have been using them almost LoS and so charging toward 25May and her escorts would have put themselves up against their SSMs (coz the Argentinian T42s had 4 Exocet apiece)

I’d add my vote to the theory that RN would have used their SSNs to destroy 25May

Yeah I hear Paraguay wants to see NK and SK duke it out so they can buy the Pay For View rights and market it all over the world in order to boost their sagging economy.:rolleyes:

Hey that’s funny AND ridiculous. Suggesting that nuclear war and multiple deaths is the best or only MANLY response to the sinking of a ship is only the latter. Its not particularly manly to offer up other people’s lives either.

By the way magnetic detonating keel breaking torpedoes have been around since World War 2. Pretty easy for NK to have a supply of them.

Or for there to be some unexplodeds hanging around near a former or current war zone. There are possibilities other than a deliberate act of piracy. Which is not to say that your analysis is wrong. But it ain’t the only one.

Now this is just a thought, no evidence to back it up but……….

The Great Leader and Supreme Leader have shown themselves to be calculating chaps with no regard for human life not even/especially the lives of their subjects.

N Korea is going through a continued and prolonged economic crisis.

Nothing promotes internal dissent and revolution like an economic crisis.

Nothing takes people’s eyes off of an internal crisis like a nice big external threat or even better a war.

So is it beyond the realms of possibility that IF N Korea deliberately sank the ship it did so to provoke a war?

Maybe a mature, measured response by the S Korean government isn’t a sign of weakness?

Al

The difference in living standards probably does make up a lot of the er difference.

Buddies of mine who served on current RN flat tops tell me that the gulch has bunks 4 high. So if CVF has 2 high ………..

Likewise Astutes provide a bunk each rather than S and Ts having hot bunks (not so great if you are sharing with anyone whose nickname is “swampy”)

Most of my dreams are like that. Aren’t yours? 😀

Stanflex 3000 (Thetis class) anyone?

Abso ‘kin lutely

Canada would probably need hulls strengthened for ice cube bashing.

I’d have thought that this would be a sensible addition to “Combatant Warfighting Floaty things” or whatever UK Treasury wants to call them now for all of the putative customer nations both for the areas they might well be required to patrol and as protection against assymetric threats.

Typhoon fails in the LO

VLO for sure.
LO more debatable

and supercruise department.

Depends on which definition of supercruise one is using surely?

I’ve not seen any figures on maintenance costs so it might fail on that one.

Had the US not produced any 5th generation aircraft before, I think your argument might have held up. Given that LM manufactures the F-22, I don’t think it does.

Not sure that I’d glorify my post with sobriquet ‘argument’. ‘Thinking aloud’ or ‘naive optimism’ might be closer to the truth.

However ………….. if the some or all of the net rumours about the following are true:
handbuilt airframes
maintenance issues
outdated computer hardware
inadequate passive sensors
datalink problems

then F35 is a necessary stepping stone for the US

(Don’t get me wrong I’d love USAF to have a full fleet of Raptors with all the wrinkles ironed out and the extra capabilities – not STOVL clearly* – of F35 but I don’t think that that’s ever going to come to the table)

* and yes I know the difference in ordnance bay sizes