[Typhoon]

Saw this story in The Times yesterday but im not paying a pound to read it so heres the Scotsmans version, worryingly the Navys leadership is planning on selling off the majority of the surface fleet to preserve the plans to build two carriers. You do wonder the logic of trying to hold onto these big ticket items that dont even have a firm committment on the aircraft they are supposed to operate at the expense of all else...

THE two enormous aircraft carriers being built on the Clyde and Rosyth are likely to escape the government's defence cuts but their survival will be at the expense of the rest of the Royal Navy fleet which will be cut to its smallest size in history, it emerged yesterday.
The decimation of the fleet will see the number of UK warships cut by almost half to just 25 with frigates, destroyers, submarines, minesweepers and all amphibious craft facing the axe.

Yesterday, it emerged that admirals offered to scrap such a large proportion of the navy in exchange for keeping the carriers, upon which 4,600 jobs on the Clyde and at Rosyth depend.

While the suggestion that the work in Scottish shipyards will continue will be welcomed north of the Border, defence experts warned that the cuts would be felt more deeply elsewhere in the country.

There have been suggestions that at least one and possibly two out of Scotland's three RAF airbases at Leuchars, Kinloss and Lossiemouth will be axed in the coalition government's Strategic Defence and Security Review, which will see cuts in the UK's £37 billion annual defence budget.

The government's defence cuts are expected to be lower than 10 per cent but there are fears that they will be sufficiently draconian to see the UK ending up with aircraft carriers, but no aircraft to fly from them.

The option of savaging the fleet in return for saving the carriers was offered by navy top brass to the National Security Council as the days count down towards the publication of the review later this month.

Although negotiations over the cuts are going right down to the wire, the signs are that the future of the first carrier the Queen Elizabeth is secure. But there are still some doubts about whether the second ship the Prince of Wales will actually end up being an aircraft carrier.

Some people have suggested that the ship may be built then mothballed and put on a state of "extended readiness". Another option would be for the second carrier to be redesigned as a helicopter or troop carrier.

Although the future of Faslane looks reasonably secure thanks to the fact that the nuclear deterrent is based there, defence experts acknowledged that the minesweepers moored at the naval base are not safe. "This is the typical fudge that we were expecting. If we had no carriers we would be admitting that we were no longer a world power.

"The Tories are reluctant to say that, even though the truth is that we are not," said Clive Fairweather, the defence analyst and former SAS commander.

"In Scotland, we are talking about a lot of jobs, but there is a danger that we could have the aircraft carriers but they don't carry aircraft.

"The implications of getting rid of so much of the fleet also begs the question what are you going to do with the Royal Marines? You may have the ability to project power from the carriers, but you don't have the amphibious vehicles to get ashore.

Full Article
http://news.scotsman.com/news/Defence-c ... 6572795.jp

[Igor Antunov]

Stupid, they should take all the resources going into these carriers and build 10-20 more frigates. If you need to defend faraway places such as the falklands then just station more troops and aircraft on that island. Plus the carriers britain has now are modest but fine.

[Cartertonian]

Certainly, as a maritime nation made so by geography rather than choice, we need the ability to keep our SLOC open and the only way to ensure that is by the maintenance of a purposeful surface fleet.

These bloody carriers risk our ruin as a military nation.

[Typhoon]

I cannot help but feel that a large part of the blame for this slow motion crash lies with the leadership of the respective services themselves. They dont seem to have shown an ounce of good leadership on the issue, content to fight among themselves or willingly slash round figures from their charges without any sense for the consequences.

They all seem to have completely failed to recognise the politicians as the greatest threat to the UK, though either misadventure (Iraq or Afghanistan) or bean counting and failed come up with a unified strategy to enable the armed forces to come though intact. Politicians can be relied upon to act in this manner, it is no suprise that they act this way so why do the armed forces get caught with their trousers down each time it happens?

More importantly beyond a purge of the current leadership how can it be avoided in the future...

[Thunderhawk]

Are the carriers supposed to function independantly, or function with a support fleet of French/Euro ships?

[MB.]

One carrier is about all any nation that isn't the US can afford.

[Rilzik]

Why don't you build one and buy a old US carrier, we could put that money into speeding up construction of the first Ford-Class to maintain our carrier fleet numbers.

So this would effectively remove most of the fleet for what 20 years at least? I don't think people realize how long it takes to build or in this case rebuild a navy.

I just finished reading you old thread "Building Britain's ultimate warship" and it seems you answered your own question. http://www.politicsforum.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=62&t=119483

P.S. form a EU navy and remain relevant.

[Typhoon]

Purchasing an old US carrier would be possible (Enterprise for example), the problem with this idea is that the US has held onto them so long they dont have many more miles on the clock, run the risk of being in poor condition, expensive to continue running and not being relevant to what is required. As such it would be difficult to imagine the UK going for an ex-US carrier and the idea of subsidising the US fleet is a definate no no ;.)

I think few politicians up top realise the time it takes to build a Navy or what it takes to maintain one. Quite right though, joining up with the French seems a lot more desirable than the solutions presented by the Navy in this article!

[Igor Antunov]

Join the fleets of France, Germany, Spain, Italy and Britain and nobody has to build anything.

They could spend the money everybody saves in this scenario to build something extra.

[Lensky1917]

Wow, they're really going to regret this when the world is submerged in water from global warming.

[Zerogouki]

This is bad. too many capital ships, not enough support craft.

[Rilzik]

This is funny

!

[Typhoon]

^ Very good I had forgotten they did one on the issue, procurement really has become one big and very expensive comedy sketch.