Si vis pacem, para bellum

[caddyman]

At  11.00am GMT the Royal Navy ceases to be a credible force with the decommissioning of HMS Ark Royal, robbing the service of its capability to launch fixed wing aircraft for the remainder of the decade at least.

This leaves the senior service with a few destroyers and frigates and precious little else other than the Trident force, which frankly, we will never need.

Cameron's coalition government has cut further, deeper and more definitively than any previous administration, seriously compromising the Navy's ability to fulfill its function.


Royal Navy c.900AD - 2011AD

Comments

[delvy.livejournal.com]

Errr.... the protection of Aid and Sea-lanes are exactly multi-national efforts currently, but we've just cut our navy substantially below that that is required to meet the commitments expected of a G8 country. Add to that that the most expensive part of our naval force is the bit you *cannot* use in such activities namely trident submarines.

[littleonionz.livejournal.com]

I read this really interesting bio of Nelson, he complains about lack of frigates when he's chasing the french, nothing changes:)

We're just going to have to let other people carry the three lions' share for a little bit. I hardly think the scrapping of the Ark Royal is going to turn loads of land lubbers into budding Jack Sparrows. Neither am I being glib or naive, I just think we need to be realistic about our place in the modern world.

[delvy.livejournal.com]

Okay, put it this way. We have had conflicts which we have been involved in during which we have used an aircraft carrier in each of the last 3 decades. I think it immensely foolhardy to remove the capabilities that mobile air platform provides from the current defence strategy, especially if one examines the relative costs of this conventional defence system to nuclear defence systems.

[littleonionz.livejournal.com]

We have had conflicts which we have been involved in during which we have used an aircraft carrier in each of the last 3 decades.
True, but we probably shouldn't have been involved in a few of them.
I'm in favour of a conventional defence system over nuclear, sure, but one more fitting to our needs and perhaps not the needs of the whole world. I might not have decommed the AR as suddenly as it has been, same with the wingy things, but then I haven't done the maths. One has to hope someone has. I really think (hope) it's a smarter strategy than it appears.