Just a very quick answer to a polite question (before draconian mods swinging axe descends :)). Flexible airgroup obviously dependent on tasking and what the RN can afford!. I would look at one of three capability mixes though:

Convoy/HVU Escort – 1 Lynx & 1 Boeing A-160
Force Protection (1) – 1 Lynx & 2 RQ-8 Firescout
Force Protection (2) – 1 Lynx & 6 Scheibel S-100

The Boeing A-160 would be Seaspray7500 equipped and a capability shared with the Type26 fleet. It would be a fleet-level organic, persistent, AEW/ISTAR resource supporting independent deployment and LACM/indirect fire ashore. RQ-8/S-100 would be tactical MIOPS-class mission force multipliers.

I guess if we wish to further examine the composition and options available for small combattants ships flights going forward a new thread on Naval Aviation may be called for? 🙂

6 Scheibel Camcopters??

The sensor fit for the Holland class is excessive – because of Dutch industrial strategy reasons – but there is now a family of Thales integrated masts, so a less sophisticated version could be fitted – the 400 is the model fitted to the Hollands – and some of the savings used to pay for the addition of a CIWS. Otherwise not a lot wrong with the design. Would two smaller helicopters – Lynxes, or Panthers – be better than one bigger one?

Thing is though, as Kev rightly states, the useful parts of the warfighting frigates in counter-narcotics missions and MIOPS have been expensive bits. Radars, comms, medium calibre guns and ships flights.

I’ve long been an advocate of a dual-tier escort fleet along the same Fleet/Patrol split model we used to use in the Submarine force. The French have used this model well for years.The key, as it ever has been, is the accurate definition of the required Oceanic-capable Patrol Vessel – the so-called ‘C3’ capability.

Oceanic-capable defines a size of hull longer than 90m for pitch performance. The Dutch OCPV Holland class are 107m long – a similar length to the old Leander class frigates boats known for their excellent seakeeping qualities. Our OCPV will need to be in the same ballpark to get the performance and incorporate the kinds of mission deck/garaging spaces identified as desireable in the design.

Once you have a high-endurance 105m+ hull displacing 2500+ tonnes or so you have the foundation to build off and you can do a lot with that to turn a basic OCPV into a comprehensively equipped patrol frigate…which is essentially what the requirement for C2 is.

Batch 1 of a 100m+ hull setup as the OCPV variant with Batch 2 the patrol frigate with common machinery and ancilliary equipment fits and you get the hulls to do the routine taskings and provide stabilising presence just like the old ‘gunboat diplomacy’ days.

The trick here is numbers – just like we were getting T23’s for £130mn by the time we’d built more than a dozen – if you build enough you get the economies of scale. Build 30 hulls between the two ‘batches’ and it becomes viable to bolt an Artisan radar onto the OCPV because BAE will give you a price that makes it little different to the cost of changing the design and supporting a ‘cheaper’ less capable commercial set for the more basic hull. Net effect is that, for little additional cost, you end up with a far more capable ‘cheap’ OCPV. Such pull-throughs are a natural byproduct of a joined up programme. Hopefully this is starting to be realised now.

You would probably get a reasonable 100m+ OCPV for about £100 million. A warfighting frigate of similar size will cost 3, 4 maybe 5 times that amount?

Look at the work that’s done by some RN frigates at the moment: chasing drug smugglers in the Carribbean and pirates off Somalia. All that’s needed in situations like those is an OPV carrying helicopters and boats: full-spectrum high-intensity warfare ships are gross overkill.

Professor Gwyn Prins (one of the authors) was on the Today programme this morning with Lewis Page. While he agreed with Page that a vast amount of money is wasted in procurement, he disagreed with Page’s contention that frigates are pointless. I noticed that Page didn’t suggest an alternative.

They’re arguing for a two-tier escort fleet, with a sizable number of cheap frigates to supplement the high-end T45 & T26.

I think I recall Lewis Page arguing somewhere else that you could replace frigates in many cases by a simple vessel – possibly based on a merchant ship design – that primarily provided a base/platform with sensors and comms from which RHIBS and helicopters and various UAVs, USVs etc. could operate, a ‘mother-ship’ I suppose, rather than a combatant in its own right.

….. Cancelling QE and PoW will send the wrong signals in this regard, and, the contract is for 2 ships and renegotiating will add in so much extra cost we may as well just buy 2 ships …..

Does anyone know the precise details of the CVF contract, and in particular, what exactly these famous penalty clauses contain?

The link mentions the pilots are training with the USMC – they only use the legacy A-D fleet.

If it was a planned F/A-18E/F purchase, wouldn’t they be flying with the USN?

Might it be lack of Harriers, flight decks to train naval aviators?

This is the story from Jane’s

“RN sends cadre of pilots to train on US carriers

Reuben F Johnson JDW Correspondent
Kiev

Robert Hewson Jane’s Air-Launched Weapons Editor
London

Additional reporting by

Peter Felstead Editor
London
Key Points

*

A larger than usual number of UK pilots are taking part in carrier training in the US
*

The move may indicate that the UK favours a commitment to conventional aircraft launched by catapult rather than a STOVL platform

An uprecedented number of UK Royal Navy (RN) Harrier pilots have begun training for catapult-assisted take-off but arrested recovery (CATOBAR) carrier operations in the United States, information obtained by Jane’s has revealed.

The news further fuels rumours that the UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) may be re-assessing its previous commitment to fulfilling the UK’s Joint Combat Aircraft (JCA) requirement with the F-35B short take-off and vertical landing (STOVL) variant of the Lockheed Martin Joint Strike Fighter (JSF), instead opting for a conventional aircraft launched by catapult.

The latter could be the F-35C carrier variant of the JSF, which has a greater range and payload capability than the JSF STOVL variant and also costs slightly less per unit, or even the Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet on which the UK pilots are likely to be certified. The RN’s two future Queen Elizabeth-class carriers that would operate the JCA are designed for, but not yet intended to be fitted with CATOBAR equipment.

The programme for this exchange of aviators is much larger than normal and was apparently initiated in April when a senior US Navy (USN) officer announced training and squadron integration for 12 UK pilots. This officer then briefed the US Commander Naval Air Forces (CNAF) in mid-April.

Sources who spoke to Jane’s on condition of anonymity state that the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations (OpNav) is “driving the requirement and the CNAF is implementing [it]”. Given the high level of support, the training and timing for the programme will be high priority for the local F/A-18 fleet replacement training squadrons (FRSs).

USN sources anticipate that this training programme will be scheduled so that the RN will have 12 fully qualified carrier pilots by 2012. They did not mention whether or not any of these 12 would be trained for the rear-cockpit weapon systems officer (WSO) position in two-seat carrier aircraft or as landing signals officers (LSOs).

According to the programme plan, eight of the 12 pilots will complete a full syllabus on the Boeing/BAE Systems T-45 jet trainer (a carrier-capable version of the BAE Systems Hawk Mk 60) and a full CAT I syllabus on the F/A-18 Hornet. The CAT I syllabus has recently been designated as the pilot certification training for the F/A-18. Three pilots will complete a partial T-45 syllabus and a full CAT II F/A-18 syllabus, which is the training for qualified pilot transition to the F/A-18. The training regime for the 12th and last pilot has not been specified, but it is anticipated that he will conduct some T-45 Goshawk training and a full CAT I or II syllabus that includes day/night landing carrier qualification. Eleven of the UK pilots will join USN fleet squadrons and will be flying both C/D legacy Hornet and E/F Super Hornet models of the F/A-18. The 12th pilot will remain at one of the FRS locations as an exchange pilot.

The RN pilots will also fly US Marine Corps (USMC) McDonnell Douglas/BAE Systems AV-8B Harrier IIs.

It is the much larger number of pilots included (typical exchange programmes with the USN involve only two or three pilots) along with the additional training involved that suggest this pilot training programme is not part of a standard exchange tour.

“It’s typical to take the RAF [Royal Air Force]/RN guy to the carrier for some ‘good deal’ [carrier] traps,” said the USN source, “but they go in daytime only and are scheduled on a ‘not to interfere with [regular USN] student traps’ basis. In other words they do not have a quota. All 12 of the RN pilots addressed by this training will have a quota.”

Asked about the reasoning behind the programme, one source told Jane’s that it is designed to “give additional STOVL and cat-and-trap experience and provide invaluable ‘big deck’ familiarisation prior to introduction of Queen Elizabeth . It will also further strengthen the bonds between the USN, USMC and RN”.

In conjunction with Jane’s reports in July that the UK MoD is continuing to contract Converteam UK for the design, development and demonstration of an electro-magnetic catapult system, news of a cadre of UK pilots being carrier trained would seem to confirm the ministry is reassessing its carrier options. The contractual decision on what variant of F-35 to buy does not have to be made until early in 2011, although RN sources indicated to Jane’s in July that the B/C decision would be made as part of the UK’s Strategic Defence and Security Review process, so a decision could come this year even if no contract is signed.

Meanwhile, unsubstantiated reports have emerged that the RN might even be offered an ex-USN carrier as the size of the USN carrier force is reduced from 12 down to 10 ships. This would provide the RN with a conventional ‘cat-and-trap’ aircraft carrier in advance of the UK’s two Queen Elizabeth-class carriers entering service. Although the RN does have experience of operating nuclear-powered submarines, its aircraft carriers have always been conventionally driven. While all USN carriers in service are nuclear powered carrier, the last conventionally powered carrier in USN service, USS Kitty Hawk (CV 63), was decommissioned on 12 May 2009 and is currently maintained as a Ready Reserve Fleet asset.”

Surely a fixed-wing type such as the Hawkeye is far more efficient and rangey than a helio based type?

And it can fly higher, so the radar can see further.