A throwaway comment was made on the CVF construction thread

This followed on from the comments on the pre-Falkland cuts

Which I thought was an interesting debate. When QEC comes in, we will effectively have applied all the major lessons of the Falklands War in terms of ship construction and naval air power and naval air defence. In particular the T23s were amended whilst on the drawing board (lengthened, gun added etc). The T45s were built to incorporate the lessons of air defence in the missile age and the QECs were built to re-develop naval air power (for air defence and power projection).

So are we now weaker? less numerous undoubtedly. But weaker?

Obviously each ship now is more capable than its equivalent back then, but have we improved our capability compared to other nations? Personally I think:
– we will have massively in terms of power projection (Tomahawks and JSF)
– we will have massively in terms of anti-missile defence (radars, weapons, C4I)

Where we might be weaker is amphibious capability. We also cannot deploy as many frigate workhorses around the world, but that reflects that we don’t have as much world to protect.

I think the RN has really learned the lessons of that conflict and others to advance much further, some are lessons that most other navies have not yet fully learned, so overall the RN’s capability has improved relative to others.

As an example, in 1982 we were damned lucky to get the troops ashore. With (say 12 T23s; 4 T45s and a QEC protected by SSNs) do we think we could get the troops ashore more easily against current Argentinian forces?

Thoughts?

The Falklands War was almost 30 years ago; I hope the RN isn’t making the basic military mistake of planning for the next war on the basis of how they fought the last one!

The new carriers are warmed over CVA-01s, indicating that the admirals never accepted the loss of large conventional flat-tops, and saw an opportunity to restore them when (a) Tony Blair was in Downing St and following his ‘ liberal interventionist’ policy, together with (b) Gordon Brown as Chancellor who wanted lots of jobs for his constituents in Rosyth.

The fundamental problem with the Royal Navy is numbers: the carriers, escorts, and submarines are so expensive that only small numbers of each are being bought – in IMHO, Britain would be far better served in the modern world with larger numbers of smaller, simpler ships. Forget about trying to keep up with the Joneses, sorry, the Americans; they’re defence expenditure is in a different league than any other country on the globe.

We also have to consider they airframes available to the Russians for conversion to STOBAR operations. The Mig29 and Su27 were both designed for partial rough field operations, adapting their very traditional airframes for sea operations is far more realistic then Typhoon’s.

What’s so big a deal about beefing up Typhoon’s undercarriage and structure, folding the wings and adding an arrestor hook? It was done in the case of the Hawk-to-Goshawk. Indeed many British aircraft have been converted to carrier versions over the years. This is not the cutting-edge technology area of design.

With the benefit of hindsight, it would have been better to develop a number of different aircraft to meet the very different requirements of the USAF, USN and USMC. One of the fundamental problems with the F-35 is the fact that it has to be ‘Joint’, whereas the USMC requirement was essentially a STOVL Harrier replacement (yes they want a supersonic aircraft, but is that really necessary for the CAS mission?); the US Navy seem to be happy enough sticking with the Super Hornet until UCAVs come along; and the USAF wants a replacement for the F-16 and A-10, two very different aircraft.

A better approach might have been to merge the Marines’ Harrier replacement with the A-10 replacement, since they both do the same job, although the ‘STOVL or not’ question would have to be resolved; and to develop a new light fighter to replace the F-16, without the complications of having to factor in STOVL or carrier operations.

In essence newbury, the USN conducted a study of our stovl carriers performance during the Falklands war, (widely available on the web) and concluded that their carriers would not have been able to launch aircraft due to the weather conditions in the south atlantic. If you cant launch due to the weather then u certainly cannot recover!

I am well aware that had we the old Ark with her systems and aircraft then the argies would not have even attempted an invasion (deterrent), however the point I am making is this…

Given that the USN has stated that their carriers would have struggled to lauch aircraft in bad sea states with steam cats, will an electomagnetical lauching system enable our CVf’s a bad weather launch advantage over exisisting conventional steam catapults or not due to its controlability?

Also I am trying to establish if the USN study is true or is it some form of justification (at that time) for our Invincible class carriers.

Or alternatively, would the money due to be spent on electromagnetic catapults be better spent developing a Sea Typhoon – maybe re-using the Tranche 1 aircraft that the RAF wants to dump – which should have sufficient thrust to be able to launch using a ski-jump, without catapults, just like the Su-33s launching off Admiral Kuznetsov? That would restore the launch advantage of the Invincibles.

Would the EC120B with a more powerful engine be a suitable replacement for the Gazelle?

Two more ‘A’ models joined the Training Wing at Eglin AFB yesterday, bringing the number of jets to four.

Flying? Or still grounded?

…..

Bills done an article now going into the details of the USN possibility of cancelling one of the F-35 variants as a cost cutting exercise. However whilst that would probably fall under the F-35 thread the quote from a UK source on possible F-35C cancelation by the USN was rather interesting !:-

Interesting, i would have assumed the F-18E/F would have been the first choice as back-up !!!!!!! – Naval Typhoon again as a full CATOBAR aircraft or would the RN end up with Rafale B to keep our neighbours happy ?

Acquiring the Rafale for the RN would tie in with the proposed carrier-sharing – RN aircraft able to be based on CdeG and MN planes basing on QEII or PoW? Maybe the French are prepared to offer some sort of workshare deal on the Rafale?