The Cold War

 

 

Picture: Unknown photographer,Admiralty Official Collection photograph,© IWM A 32072

 

The Royal Navy has been operating in cold climates for hundreds of years and most vessels in An Independent Navy For An Independent Nation shall operate throughout the United Kingdom,the British Overseas Territories and the Crown Dependencies (except the British Antarctic Territory) and shall be built to Lloyds Register notation Winterisation H,M,C to withstand extremes of temperature which they are likely to encounter in areas ranging from the Shetland Islands down to South Georgia,vessels expected to operate in the low Arctic seas from Canada to Finland shall be built to Lloyds Register notation Winterisation H,M,B and the Assistance class icebreaking tugs which shall operate in the high Arctic ice pack and around Antarctica shall be built to Lloyds Register notation Winterisation H,M,A.

 

AR-15 Rifles For The British Armed Forces

 

 

Picture: L. (Phot.) Joe Cater,Crown Copyright

 

The Deputy Chief of Defence Staff (Transformation) at the United Kingdom's Ministry of Defence,General Stephen Laughter who is soon to retire and take up a post with a small arms manufacturer in the United States of America,has chosen game-changing AR-15 rifles to replace the SA80 family of weapons currently in service with the Royal Navy,British Army and Royal Air Force going forward,a decision he described as a no-brainer,he added that procurement of this sixty year old design demonstrated a commitment to modernisation in the face of an increasingly dangerous security environment and that in an era of ever closer military integration using the same weapon as key allies shall be transformational.

 

Joint Leader's Statement On AUKUS

 

 

Picture: L. (Phot.) Mark Johnson,Crown Copyright

 

"In September 2021, Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States announced AUKUS – a new security partnership that will promote a free and open Indo-Pacific that is secure and stable.

  

The first major initiative of AUKUS was our historic trilateral decision to support Australia acquiring conventionally-armed, nuclear-powered submarines (SSNs). Today, we announce our pathway to achieve this critical capability.

 

Together we will deliver SSN-AUKUS – a trilaterally-developed submarine based on the United Kingdom’s next-generation design that incorporates technology from all three nations, including cutting edge U.S. submarine technologies. Australia and the United Kingdom will operate SSN-AUKUS as their submarine of the future. Australia and the United Kingdom will begin work to build SSN-AUKUS in their domestic shipyards within this decade. 

 

In order to deliver conventionally-armed, nuclear-powered submarines to Australia at the earliest possible date, we intend to pursue the following phased approach, moving through each phase based on mutual commitments from each nation:

 

  

Beginning in 2023, Australian military and civilian personnel will embed with the U.S. Navy, the Royal Navy, and in the United States and United Kingdom submarine industrial bases to accelerate the training of Australian personnel. The United States plans to increase SSN port visits to Australia beginning in 2023, with Australian sailors joining U.S. crews for training and development; the United Kingdom will increase visits to Australia beginning in 2026.

 

As early as 2027, the United States and United Kingdom plan to begin forward rotations of SSNs to Australia to accelerate the development of the Australian naval personnel, workforce, infrastructure and regulatory system necessary to establish a sovereign SSN capability.

 

Starting in the early 2030s, pending Congressional approval, the United States intends to sell Australia three Virginia class submarines, with the potential to sell up to two more if needed. This step will systematically grow Australia’s sovereign SSN capability and support capacity.

  

In the late 2030s, the United Kingdom will deliver its first SSN-AUKUS to the Royal Navy. Australia will deliver the first SSN-AUKUS built in Australia to the Royal Australian Navy in the early 2040s.

 

  

This plan is designed to support Australia’s development of the infrastructure, technical capabilities, industry and human capital necessary to produce, maintain, operate, and steward a sovereign fleet of conventionally-armed, nuclear-powered submarines. Australia is fully committed to responsible stewardship of naval nuclear propulsion technology.

  

When we announced the AUKUS partnership in September 2021, we committed to set the highest nuclear non-proliferation standard. The plan we announce today delivers on this commitment and reflects our longstanding leadership in, and respect for, the global nuclear non-proliferation regime. We continue to consult with the International Atomic Energy Agency to develop a non-proliferation approach that sets the strongest precedent for the acquisition of a nuclear-powered submarine capability.

  

Our plan elevates all three nations’ industrial capacity to produce and sustain interoperable nuclear-powered submarines for decades to come, expands our individual and collective undersea presence in the Indo-Pacific, and contributes to global security and stability. In these outcomes, AUKUS reflects the principle that shared action, taken in partnership, can benefit all.

 

Implementing AUKUS will also require robust, novel information sharing and technology cooperation. Our nations are committed to further trilateral collaboration that will strengthen our joint capabilities, enhance our information and technology sharing, and integrate our industrial bases and supply chains while strengthening the security regimes of each nation.

  

For more than a century, our three nations have stood shoulder to shoulder, along with other allies and partners, to help sustain peace, stability, and prosperity around the world, including in the Indo-Pacific. We believe in a world that protects freedom and respects human rights, the rule of law, the independence of sovereign states, and the rules-based international order. The steps we are announcing today will help us to advance these mutually beneficial objectives in the decades to come."

  

Quality British Defence Journalism From Sky News

 

 

Picture: Sky News

 

The uninformed may believe that Her Majesty's Ship Blake,which was decommissioned forty-three years ago,was the last cruiser to serve in the Royal Navy,however,a recent Sky News report from Jack Taylor,their Open Source Intelligence (O.S.Int) producer,which by some strange coincidence contains similar information to that which was earlier published in an article on the ukdefencejournal website,has revealed the existence of a hitherto unknown British cruiser,rumours that this vessel is part of a secret fleet which also includes mysterious battleships which can be seen only by journalists have not yet been confirmed.

 

Carrier Strike Group 21: The Captain's Dilemma

 

 

Picture: Unknown photographer,musician Ferre Grignard,unknown copyright

 

Shocking reports that Royal Navy sailors consume alcohol have recently become international news headlines,herein we consider the dilemma facing commanding officers who have to curb such behavior.

 

Carrier Strike Group 21: Happy Thanksgiving!

 

 

Picture: Unknown photographer,unknown copyright

 

Thanksgiving (should that be two words?),the colonial holiday the Royal Navy can celebrate without committing treason!

 

Carrier Strike Group 21: One Of Our Aircraft Is Missing

 

 

Picture: L. (Phot.) Kyle Heller,Crown Copyright

 

A pilot has been rescued and an aircraft salvage operation is underway after a Lightning II aircraft from Her Majesty's Ship Queen Elizabeth crashed in the Mediterranean Sea on the Seventeenth of November,TwentyTwenty-one,the Royal Navy has not yet confirmed rumours that a rainbow flag become entangled in the aircraft's lift fan when an attempt to create a hostile work environment for Muslim sailors went horribly wrong.

 

 

Picture: L. (Phot.) Unaisi Luke,Crown Copyright

 

Due to it's complex vertical lift system,the F-35B variant of the Lightning II aircraft used by the United Kingdom is likely to have higher accident rates than the conventional variants and be more expensive to buy,more expensive to operate,generate lower sortie rates,carry lower payloads,have less range,have less endurance,be less maneuverable and require more aircraft and more aerial refuelling to do the same work.

 

Picture: Chris McAndrew

 

There is a name for people who think such aircraft are a good idea,they are called Philip Hammonds.

 

Save The British Army!

  

  

Picture: Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Janiel Adames,United States' Navy photograph

  

The identity of the United Kingdom's next Chief of the Defence Staff has been revealed but General Strike Brigade shall not be succeeded by General Tribute Regiment as the post has instead gone to one of four outstanding candidates,Admiral Tony Radakin,and a Royal Navy officer shall now oversee the implementation of the nation's new navalist strategy,herein we shall discuss one of the most important challenges he shall face.

 

  

Picture: Mister Puttnam and Mister Malindine,War Office official photographers,© IWM H 1668

  

Aden,Boston,British Somaliland,Corunna,Crete,Dunkirk,Gallipoli,Greece,Norway,the Royal Navy has a long history of saving the British Army,in recent years much of the army has been rendered unfit for combat not by the enemy,nor by a lack of funding,but by the waste of around ten thousand million pounds on a series of ill conceived and poorly executed procurement projects,this was more than enough money to have designed and built an entire division's worth of our proposed Charger Cavalry Heavy ARmoured vehicles,one vehicle family with one design team,one manufacturing facility and one support infrastructure,but instead army officers embarked on a multiplicity of vehicle projects of dubious military and economic viability,destroying the United Kingdom's armoured vehicle industry in the process and leaving the impression that they know little about warfare and even less about the design and manufacture of military equipment,army officers have not fixed this problem because they are the problem,now the army needs the navy to save it,again.

  

  

Picture: Richard Watt,Crown Copyright

  

Supposedly in order to avoid the expense of a new design,at a time when the United Kingdom had agreed to eliminate sectors of it's defence industry in the name of European integration,and when senior officials appeared more interested in waging war on BAE Systems than the nation's enemies,the British Army chose an elderly,underweight and mediocre European Infantry Fighting Vehicle as the basis for it's Future Rapid Effects System Specialist Vehicle family (a third rate copy of what was then the latest in military fashion,the American Future Combat Systems),which was not needed in any case,then spent many years and thousands of millions of pounds turning it in to a reconnaissance vehicle,with a redesign so extensive that designing an all new vehicle would have taken less time and money,subsequently deciding,just after signing the production contract,to use it instead to perform the same combat role as hundreds of nearly new,combat proven,Challenger 2 tanks,costing over a thousand million pounds,which the fashionistas had recently retired because they were not transformational,the end result being the Ajax vehicle which does not work,fortunately,as it would have neither the protection nor the fire power needed to survive on the modern battlefield if it did.

  

 

Picture: Sergeant (Photographer) Dan Bardsley,Royal Logistics Corps,Crown Copyright

  

Although the Warrior vehicle was only procured because Infantry Fighting Vehicles were fashionable at the time,and army officers are nothing if not fashion victims,it was a perfectly adequate example of it's breed,though extensive combat use had demonstrated a need for greater protection which could easily have been added by removing the turret to free up weight for more armour,instead the British Army embarked on an extensive redesign costing one thousand million pounds which was eventually cancelled after running years late and hundreds of millions of pounds over budget.

  

 

Picture: Jack Eckersley,Crown Copyright

 

Despite having been twice rejected by the British Army,the second time after losing to the Piranha in the "Trials of Truth",the Boxer vehicle was absurdly procured on the grounds that the Australians were buying it (eight wheeled armoured vehicles are highly fashionable),due in part to it's unneccessary modularity,it is big,heavy and expensive for it's type but still a perfectly adequate armoured truck for the lorried infantry role,unfortunately this is not how army officers intend to use it,despite it lacking the mobility,protection and firepower needed to keep up with Main Battle Tanks in combat,they appear intent on using it as an Infantry Fighting Vehicle,a role for which it is entirely inadequate.

  

  

Picture: Sergeant Gustavo Olgiati,United States' Army photograph

  

In order to improve effectiveness against Main Battle Tanks (which are rarely engaged as they make up only a very small percentage of battlefield targets,more common targets such as Kornet missile teams being best engaged by a large calibre rifled gun),and despite limited remaining service life,uneconomic production quantities and peripheral benefits,in yet another extensive redesign of an existing vehicle known as Challenger 3 the remaining hulls of Challenger 2 tanks are to be fitted with a new turret and a more fashionable German smoothbore gun which is already considered inadequate,by the Germans,and may be obsolete before full operating capability is reached a decade from now,the potential combination of the Challenger 3 and Boxer vehicles suggests that the British Army has learnt nothing from the Battle of Arras eight decades ago.

  

 

Picture: Private First Class Rhonda J. Roth-Cameron,United States' Army photograph

  

Steadfastly ignoring the outstanding example of procurement practice which gave it the successful AS90 Self Propelled Gun in the first place,the British Army has recently embarked upon the Mobile Fires Platform project to find it's replacement,in time honoured fashion,initial requirements set for rate of fire and range exceeded the state of the art and production quantities are likely to be uneconomic (often procurement projects also have unrealistically low budgets and frequent changes to specifications,quantities and production schedules which suggests that officers would not know how to procure a good time in a house of ill repute),potential candidates all appear to be foreign and,like the army's new air defence systems,are too heavy to support airborne and air mobile light formations whilst also lacking the protection and mobility needed to keep up with an armoured force advancing hundreds of miles through hostile territory each day,which is after all the raison d'etre of an armoured force,none of which is likely to be seen as important by senior officers because wheeled artillery guns are highly fashionable at the moment.

 

  

Picture: Unknown United States Army Signal Corps photographer,unknown copyright

 

Winston Churchill saved the country by adopting a policy of sacking generals until he found a good one,we suggest Admiral Radakin saves the British Army by doing the same,while some senior army officers sound like teenage management trainees there are generals who are capable of communicating without buzzwords or acronyms and also talking sense,rare qualities in today's army,but ending the lack of accountability is only half of the army's problem,the other half is an organisation which allows senior decision makers to interfere in areas where they lack sufficient expertise,the army needs an independent Ordnance Office with a Secretary of State for Ordnance,advised by a Board of Ordnance led by a Master-General of the Ordnance and made up of professional Ordnance Corps officers,to act as an institutional repository of knowledge relating to design,manufacture,construction,maintenance and storage,infantry officers are not allowed to dabble in brain surgery,nor should they be allowed to meddle in the infinitely more complex business of defence procurement.

  

Where Were The Grown Ups?

 

 

Picture: Unknown photographer,unknown copyright

 

The National Socialist Swastika.

 

 

Picture: Unknown Ministry of Information official photographer,© IWM TR 711

 

The Communist Red Flag.

 

 

Picture: Dying Regime

 

The Islamist Black Banner.

 

 

Picture: Unknown photographer,unknown copyright

 

Where were the grown ups when officers set a precedent which legitimised flying the flags of every political movement on Royal Navy warships?

 

Carrier Strike Group 21: The Republic Of Cyprus

 

 

Picture: Corporal Phil Dye,Royal Air Force,Crown Copyright

 

Her Majesty's Ship Queen Elizabeth arrived in the Republic of Cyprus during what it's President Nicos Anastasiades described as "The largest fire since 1974".

 

 

Picture: L. (Phot.) Luke,Crown Copyright

 

Despite the Royal Navy's long history of providing assistance to foreign countries in their hour of need,"First on the scene of disaster and promptly at work,defiant of danger",her helicopters do not appear to have helped to fight this fire.

 

 

Picture: Corporal Phil Dye,Royal Air Force,Crown Copyright

 

However,Royal Air Force helicopters did.

 

 

Picture: Unknown photographer,Crown Copyright

 

This was an excellent opportunity to generate goodwill missed for want of fire fighting equipment and training.

 

The Six Aeroplanes: Prefect,Pegasus,Perseus,Centaurus,Falcon And Furious

 

 

Picture: Paul Crouch,Crown Copyright

 

Further to an earlier piece on rationalising the United Kingdom's naval and military helicopter fleet and another on Hector,Hercules and Hermes,herein we shall list the only aeroplane types which the United Kingdom's armed forces actually need (rather than have or want).

 

 

Picture: L. (Phot.) Sam Seeley,Crown Copyright

 

The Prefect is an aeroplane of approximately one and a half long tons maximum take off weight used for both naval and military initial aeroplane pilot training.

 

 

Picture: L. (Phot.) Sam Seeley,Crown Copyright

 

The Prefect shall eventually be replaced by an aircraft designed and built in the United Kingdom to stimulate the United Kingdom's economy and secure the future of the United Kingdom's aeroplane industry.

 

 

Picture: Grand Logistics

 

The Pegasus shall be an aeroplane of approximately ten long tons maximum take off weight used for both naval and military multi engine aeroplane pilot training,low intensity combat operations and for other,noncombat,tasks for which a larger aeroplane is unneccessary or impractical such as the Waterguard Service (surveillance and search and rescue) and Scottish Ambulance Service (air ambulance) charters.

 

Picture: Unknown Royal Air Force official photographer,© IWM CH 2364

 

The Pegasus shall be an all new aircraft designed and built in the United Kingdom to stimulate the United Kingdom's economy and secure the future of the United Kingdom's aeroplane industry.

 

 

Picture: Grand Logistics

 

The Perseus shall be an aeroplane of approximately fifty long tons maximum take off weight used for both naval and military multi engine aeroplane pilot training,combat patrol and for other,noncombat,tasks such as Foreign Office (secure transport) charter.

 

 

Picture: Unknown photographer,SAAB photograph

 

The Perseus shall be an all new aircraft designed and built in the United Kingdom to stimulate the United Kingdom's economy and secure the future of the United Kingdom's aeroplane industry.

 

 

Picture: Corporal Andy Reddy R.L.C.,Crown Copyright

 

The Centaurus shall be an aeroplane of approximately three hundred long tons maximum take off weight used for military four engine aeroplane pilot training,strategic transport,tactical transport,naval mine laying,aerial refuelling and for other noncombat tasks for which a large aeroplane is necessary such as the Foreign Office (foreign aid) charter.

 

 

Picture: Corporal Daniel Wiepen,Crown Copyright

 

The Centaurus shall be an all new aircraft designed and built in the United Kingdom to stimulate the United Kingdom's economy and secure the future of the United Kingdom's aeroplane industry.

 

 

Picture: Corporal Paul Oldfield,Royal Air Force,Crown Copyright

 

The Falcon shall be an aeroplane of approximately ten long tons maximum take off weight used for both naval and military combat aeroplane pilot training,and for other noncombat tasks such as weapons trials and the Aviation Medicine Flight.

 

 

 Picture: Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Nathan Parde,United States' Navy photograph 

 

The Falcon shall be an all new aircraft designed and built in the United Kingdom to stimulate the United Kingdom's economy and secure the future of the United Kingdom's aeroplane industry.

 

 

Picture: Alert5

 

The Furious shall be an aeroplane of approximately fifty long tons maximum take off weight used for both naval and military combat aeroplane pilot training,air defence,air attack and aerial reconnaissance.

 

 

Picture: David Chao

 

The Furious shall be an all new aircraft designed and built in the United Kingdom to stimulate the United Kingdom's economy and secure the future of the United Kingdom's aeroplane industry.