Of Carriers, Obsolescence and Vulnerability

An aircraft carrier is a sovereign, mobile air base that ensures you can apply airpower at a point of your choosing. It ensures the fleet can have its own intimate air support, and its own timely air cover. It allows the surface fleet to launch its own quick reaction alert fighter jets and have its own CAPs to protect itself from enemy air attack.

Incidentally, allow me to say that one of the biggest mistakes the Royal Navy has made in the past was to refer to the carriers as “strike” carriers. That actually downplays the immense importance the carrier air wing plays in the survivability of a surface task group.

“Strike” is just one of the many missions of the Air Wing and is actually in some ways the least important one. Much (not all of it, but certainly much of it)  of the “strike” role could be carried out with Tomahawks or other ship and submarine-launched missiles, if you just funded enough VLS cells and missiles.

Air defence, reconnaissance, flexible close air support, anti-submarine warfare through the use of groups of helicopters, etcetera. These are the really defining roles of the carrier air wing. There are many alternative ways of putting 500 to 1000 lbs of explosive into a target, especially in the age of air to air refueling, drones and cruise missiles.

Put putting air defence patrols up above the fleet deployed far away from friendly shores? That definitely requires the carrier. You can’t sustain any sizeable air umbrella for any meaningful amount of time by trailing fighter jets thousands of miles via air to air refueling.

The aircraft carrier enables you to do that, because it is a fighter jets base that you can position as needed. As such, it can only ever become truly obsolete if A) jets themselves are obsolete and no longer needed. Already in the 50s the UK imagined a world where aircraft would become almost pointless because of missiles. It was wildly wrong at the time, and still is in many ways, but maybe a combination of drones and missiles will indeed take the place of jets one day. Not today, nor tomorrow, though.

Option B is that jets somehow grown such combat endurance and range that you can launch them from home and have them reliably and persistently overhead out at sea, or anyway at a great distance from a friendly air base. This is still technically unfeasible and it will be so for many, many more years.

Is the carrier vulnerable? Yes, it is relatively fragile. It is a ship. It has very little available estate, no matter how large it is, and that makes it difficult to work around battle damage. If the flight deck is damaged, you can’t simply fill up the crater with dirt and plate it up with AM-2 mat like you’d do on land. And if enough holes are opened in the hull, it will inexorably sunk. That’s the reality of being a ship. But that’s nothing new, and shouldn't be blown out of proportion either, because finding an aircraft carrier at sea and then assaulting it successfully, going through the various layers of its defences, remains actually a very challenging task. 

Whenever you say the aircraft carrier is “too vulnerable”, what you are actually implying is not the obsolescence of the carrier, but the fact you don't trust your AAW and ASW capabilities.

From a purely british point of view, the aircraft carrier is surrounded by Phalanx CIWS, Aster missiles from the Type 45 and Sea Ceptor from Type 23, 26 and 31.

Add the embarked jets supplying air defence, and the carrier is literally the best defended place in the whole of the UK and its armed forces.

In comparison, Land forces and land airbases have access to just a few STARSTREAK and Land Ceptor missiles (replacement from Rapier, coming into service beginning in the new year).  

If you feel you can’t protect the aircraft carrier from “drones”, it is not a carrier problem. It is a forces-wide problem, because it means other ships, the army and the RAF jets when on the ground are all even more vulnerable.

Clearly, your problem is not the carrier being “obsolete”, but your air defences.

Naturally, the carrier is exposed to submarine threats which are particularly scary. An air base on land, no. Then again, the land base is subject to a whole lot of other threats, including lack of host country authorizations and cooperation, protests, disruptions of the supply routes and potentially indirect fire at all levels (from ballistic missiles down to mortars and rockets). Airbases on land can also be assaulted by suicidal attackers with various tactics. 

There is a reason why the RAF continues to integrate the equivalent of 2 infantry battalions in the form of 6 RAF Regiment Squadrons for Force Protection. Without expanding beyond the last decade alone, we have witnessed the Taliban attack on Camp Bastion, repeated disasters in Pakistani airbases stormed by terrorists and various attacks in Syria which are all good examples of additional threats to land bases. 

A base on land cannot sink, but it remains very vulnerable to disruption and, moreover, any aircraft when parked on the ground is very fragile. 

A swarm of UAVs cannot sink an air base ashore, but it can put it out of commission all the same, and destroy the aircraft on the ground with relative ease. 

Yet nobody would argue that the airfield is "obsolete". You'd argue, correctly, that better defences are required. 

The submarine threat is perhaps the most terrifying of all, but if you don’t think you can keep the aircraft carrier safe, the implication is that surface operations as a whole are doomed to failure, because nothing else will be as well defended.

Again, it implies you don’t trust your ASW technology, tactics and resources as a whole to be up to the task. If this is the case, the problem is not the carrier, or at least definitely not limited to it. 

Ultimately, if the carrier was not there with its jets and helicopters, both your AAW and ASW instantaneously gets even weaker. Maybe the fleet will still have access to Airborne Early Warning (the one saving grace of having helicopter-borne AEW is that it can work from pretty much any ship at all), but it will no longer enjoy intimate air support. It’ll have to restrict its movements to where land-based airpower can provide sufficient cover.

Remove the ASW helicopters embarked on the carrier, and your ASW defences are also immediately weakened.

Threats are getting more difficult to counter, that’s undeniable, but the war between the “sword” and the “shield” is as old as war itself.

It is not the carrier that you are calling into question if you believe you can’t defend against the enemy “swords”. It is your “shields”.

Of ships and shipyards; Type 31 and Fleet Solid Support

Babcock has now unveiled its offer for the Type 31e programme, and in so doing has revealed the full extent and effect of its alliance with the danish group Odense Maritime Technology (OMT). The Arrowhead 140 is effectively a Iver Huitfeldt frigate hull with modified top decks, pushed by an impressive alliance called Team 31 and comprising two Babcock yards, Ferguson Marine and Harland & Wolff. 

The Iver Huitfeldt class, in service in the Royal Danish Navy, is an impressive family of ships which have cost surprisingly little for the huge capability they pack. The unitary cost per frigate was 325 million in FY 2010 US dollars, which is extremely competitive for a high end, 6600 tons warship equipped with good sensors and a big silos of 32 Strike Length MK41 cells flanked by MK56 launchers for 24 ESSM. Up to 16 Harpoon are also carried. Of course, that is in no small measure possible because OMT includes the commercial shipping colossus Maersk, but Denmark is confident that it can offer good deals for customers abroad as well, and OMT and Babcock apparently believe that they can build the Arrowhead 140 in british yards, staying within the infamous 250 million all-in price.

Arrowhead 140 Brochure by Liger30 on Scribd

The Iver Huitfeldt design makes limited but important use of the StanFlex concept in which modular “wells” are provided in the design for the easy slotting in of capability modules, for example the guns. The ships have been delivered with re-used Oto Melara 76mm guns in StanFlex modules, with the option of installing a 127mm later on. The total budget for three ships was 940 million USD plus 209 million USD in reused equipment. Spread on three hulls, it gives a total pricetag of 383 USD million per ship.

Shock Testing with explosive charges was carried out in late 2010 

The ship is fit to receive a variable depth sonar but was delivered fitted only with an hull mounted one. The propulsion arrangement is CODAD with 4 MTU8000 diesels delivering 32800 KW of power to two shafts. The ship’s max speed is given as 28 knots, although it has demonstrated 29.3 knots, reaching them in under 120 seconds during trials. Range at 18 knots is a flattering 9300 nautical miles.

Babcock’s Team 31 proposal would keep the hull unchanged and focus on relatively minor modifications to the top decks. Obviously, sensors and weapons fit would also change. This would cut down design costs to the very minimum, and still give the UK a proven hull which was put even through explosive shock testing. The Iver Huitfeldt achieved their cost-effectiveness by making large reuse of design features from the Absalon class, and the Arrowhead 140 seeks to pull through even more content from the Huitfeldt themselves.

Compared to the Danish ships, the Arrowhead 140 is expected to be lighter, at 5700 tons, with a reduced draft and, one assumes, benefits to range and speed while maintaining very significant margins for working weight back in with design variations for export and/or capability insertions through life.

The design trades out the MK56 launchers in favor of two extra boat bays / mission spaces. The Arrowhead 140 is being marketed with the Thales TACTICOS open architecture combat system and with Thales NS100 AESA radar enclosed within a conical mast topped by IFF array, although some images of the “Royal Navy variant” seem to carry an Artisan 3D on a different mast.

24 CAMM missiles in a “mushroom farm” silos are seen in place of 32 MK41 cells amidships, although the design maintains the capability to fit the strike length cells. The gun seems to be an Oto Melara 76mm.

The Danish ships, which operate as the principal AAW platform of the navy and which may one day soon serve in the anti-ballistic role as well, operate with a crew of around 117. At one point they hoped to make do with as few as 99, but that proved a step too far. Still, it is a very impressive achievement and the Type 31e, given its simpler mission and weapons fit, should be perfectly able to make do with fewer, while retaining plenty of space for the at least 40 EMF spaces the RN hopes to have on the vessel.

The impressive firepower of the Iver Huitfeldt class: 32 Strike lenght MK41 cells flanked by MK56 launchers for a total of 24 ESSM missiles. 

The proposal seems solid. There probably isn’t another hull which is proven, cheap and capable as that of the OMT design. BAE System’s Leander is based on the Khareef class corvette, stretched longer, and does not compare all that well. It is also arguably riskier, because while the Arrowhead 140 would literally take the hull and propulsion “as is”, the Leander would require changes, albeit relatively minor.

Babcock’s offer is now truly interesting, and there is even a possibility that the Arrowhead 140 might make a surprise foray into the FFG(X) competition for the US Navy. Huntington Ingalls Industries (HII)’s sudden silence about its proposal for what could become an immensely important shipbuilding contract has got some people thinking. Craig Hooper has recently raised the prospect of a Danish incursion into the competition, and he correctly notes that the Iver Huitfeldt design is not without its fans in the US. The Royal Danish Navy has been promoting its ships for years and organized a successful tour in the US as far back as 2014. He might or might not be on the right path with his analysis, but it is certainly a fascinating prospect and one which is not without merits.

Danish Frigate Program brief_May 2014 by Liger30 on Scribd

Leander or Arrowhead 140?

At the moment, the Team Arrowhead and the Team Leander seem to be the leading contenders. Moreover, if the Arrowhead 140 truly can fit the Type 31 budget, the Cammell Laird/BAE Systems ‘Team Leander’ design is now in an uncomfortable spot. Babcock’s proposal now looks more convincing: much larger and more adaptable, both through life and for export; considerably greater speed (28+ knots against 25) and endurance (9000+ nautical miles at 18 knots compared to 8100 at 12); much greater space for weapons (easily configurable for 32 MK41 Strike Length versus 12 small SAM cells up front and a single 8-cell Strike Length amidship for Leander). Both ships claim the possibility of fitting guns up to 127mm, but Arrowhead’s claim is more immediately belieavable. The tightness of the Type 31e budget might mean that this is not relevant for the Royal Navy as funding a 127mm gun might be out of the question, but adaptability for the future, as well as for potential (albeit unlikely) export orders is still key.

Navy Recognition obtained these BAE images at DIMDEX 2018 

The Team Leander now claim that the flight deck of their ships will be rated for 16 tons helicopters, which would accommodate Merlin operations, while for the hangar they are reporting “up to Sea Hawk plus UAV”, but conspicuously not mentioning Merlin. The Arrowhead 140 would be fully Merlin compatible from day one, and this for me is a major factor, even though the Royal Navy will struggle to have many Merlin for frigates since their main focus will be the aircraft carrier group. With the merger of 829 NAS into 814 NAS there are now only 3 flights permanently focused on Small Ship Deployments (Tungsten, Kingfisher and Mohawk Flights) and their priority will be the Type 26, but this is still not a reason to be unable to operate with the most important machine in the Fleet Air Arm’s arsenal.

BAE Systems Type 31e Candidate Design by Liger30 on Scribd

A spacious hangar should always figure high up on the list of requirements: even with Wildcat being the most likely visitor, space is always precious, especially since the expectation is that UAVs will become a common feature in the next decade. The last thing the Royal Navy needs is a ship with handicapped aviation facilities causing headaches already a few years after entry in service.

The Arrowhead 140’s problems, in turn, are its use of a new main radar and of a new Combat Management System at a time when the Royal Navy has heavily invested in commonality and fleet-wide fits. Artisan 3D, Common CMS and Sharpeye navigation and air direction radars are now fleet-wide standards and departing from them would imply unnecessary costs and complexities.

The CGI of the "british variant", the Arrowhead in Type 31 guise, clearly uses a different mast from the one seen in the video. The radar on top looks a bit small to be Artisan, but it probably represents it nonetheless. MK41 cells are replaced by (surprisingly few) Sea Ceptor "mushrooms". 

The Arrowhead 140 team includes Ferguson Marine on the Clyde, Harland & Wolff in Belfast and the Babcock Appledore facilities in Devon and in Roysth. Judging from the brochure, each shipyard would build a “superblock” that would then be shipped out to Rosyth for final assembly.

Note that the various partners seem to have already decided which superblock they will build. Rosyth is proposed as final assembly facility. 

This spreads the financial and technical benefits of the programme across the wider shipbuilding industry, but would cut out Cammell Laird at a time in which it is arguably the most successful shipbuilder out there, picking up new orders for ferries; while building the impressive new Polar Research Vessel, the RRS Sir David Attenborough.

Pick a design and enlarge the consortium?

I’m not in a position to make choices, obviously, but I come back to my original points about theShipbuilding Strategy to at least make my recommendations.

A Financial Times report recently said that Babcock is very active on the Fleet Solid Support requirement as well, and is talking to BAE and others to craft a joint, british bid for this 1-billion pound programme which will involve building two or three ships in the 40k tons range. In other words, a lot of precious work.

Building the FSS in blocks around the country and assembly in Rosyth’s big dock, on the lines of what has been done for the carriers, remains an attractive option.

The best possible outcome, in my mind, would be to have the Fleet Solid Support work staying in the UK, with assembly in Rosyth.

For the Type 31 the best possible outcome would be selection of the Arrowhead 140 design, followed by enlargement of the consortium to include the other team. The main reasons are that the Type 31 should be fitted with the BAE-developed Common CMS on shared infrastructure as the rest of the fleet, in the interest of commonality. It should also be fitted with the Artisan radar, again in the interest of fleet standardization, especially considering that there will be up to 8 spare systems available as an effect of 5 coming off the Type 23 GPs as they are withdrawn plus the 3 new sets purchased to avoid shortage of components during the delicate transition.

For those who might have missed this development, the Royal Navy has actually purchased 3 new sets of main equipment pieces for the first three Type 26 ships, in order to avoid having to pull Type 23s out of service early to strip pieces off them, refurbish them and deliver them to the shipyards.

Since then, however, it has become clear that the Type 26 assembly will be a very slow affair: parliamentary under-secretary for defence Guto Bebb is on record saying that the first ship in the class, HMS Glasgow, is due to be accepted by the Royal Navy in summer 2025 and then, after trials and preparations, enter service in 2027. In theory, this is acceptable because the first Type 23 in ASW configuration, with 2087 towed sonar, would leave service in 2028 under the last known plans. 

Type 23 OUT OF SERVICE DATE  (February 2016 assumption)

HMS Argyll 2023

HMS Lancaster 2024

HMS Iron Duke 2025  

HMS Monmouth 2026

HMS Montrose 2027

HMS Westminster 2028             [ASW]

HMS Northumberland 2029      [ASW]

HMS Richmond 2030                [ASW]

HMS Somerset 2031                  [ASW]

HMS Sutherland 2032               [ASW]

HMS Kent 2033                         [ASW]

HMS Portland 2034                   [ASW]
HMS St Albans 2035                 [ASW]

Despite the Royal Navy's careful approach with the ordering of three extra sets of equipment to avoid having to remove equipment from the Type 23s early on, it is also painfully evident that Type 23s might effectively go out of service early anyway. It must be remembered that at least one ship from the class in the last few years has been tied up in mothball, serving as harbor training vessel because of the enduring shortage in manpower. Even more ominously, the Fishery Protection Squadron is currently down to a single ship as OPVs leave service early to allow the crews to transition to the new ships, and even this has had to be aided by using some of the MCM crews, given "on loan" to the Squadron (Project JICARA). I'm sure the Navy hopes to solve the worst of the manpower crisis at some point, and the last few reports show that it is the only service with an inflow matching or exceeding outflow, but technical roles are difficult to form, and the percentage of fully trained manpower is the lowest in the three services, shy of 90%. At the moment it is hard to be optimistic, and even harder to imagine that the frigates transition can be any easier than the OPVs. If anything, it'll be much more complex.


Note: the OPV transition and project JICARA

The Royal Navy has up to 16 MCM crews, 8 in Scotland (MCM 1 Sqn, Faslane) and 8 in Portsmouth (MCM 2 Sqn). They rotate on and off the Sandown and Hunt class ships respectively.

Under JICARA:

Beginning from 1 April 2017, MCM2 Crew 6 moves from the minesweeper HMS Middleton onto HMS Tyne, allowing the crew of the latter OPV to transition to the new HMS Forth.
They were later relieved by the crew of the Hunt class minesweeper HMS Atherstone after this ship was suddenly decommissioned as part of emergency budget cuts in December 2017 while she was already in the shed for her refit and life extension.

HMS Forth commissioned on 13 April 2018, but remains alongside for defects rectification and final preparations. She is not yet ready for patrols, and anyway seems to be earmarked for replacing HMS Clyde down in the Falklands. HMS Clyde's out of service date is currently unclear.
HMS Tyne has decommissioned days ago, on 24 May 2018.

MCM2 Crew 7 moved from the MCM vessel HMS Ledbury onto HMS Mersey and will stay on the OPV until she decommissions (expected to happen this November). Mersey is currently the facto the only Fishery Protection Vessel actually patrolling UK waters.
Thanks to the MCM crew stepping in, personnel from Mersey can move on to the new HMS Trent.

The Royal Navy should this month accept the new HMS Medway, which is crewed by personnel from HMS Severn, the first River Batch 1 to be decommissioned, on 27 october 2017.
HMS Medway will then make ready to begin operational patrols early in 2019.

It seems likely that, with the number of MCM ships dropping, some of the crews will permanently become part of the OPV squadron to take in the additional River Batch 2s. The possible re-activation of the River Batch 1s parked in reserve waiting for a government decision is another factor.

- Ends

With the Type 31e supposedly entering service one per year from 2023, replacing the Type 23 GPs one by one, it seems like the spare Artisan radars, Sea Ceptor launchers, etcetera will be more useful on this class rather than on the 26s. For the 26s there should be time to employ equipment taken off from the 5 GP Type 23s as they decommission, at this point. 

It is not entirely clear yet, but the Royal Navy appears to also have ordered 3 new 2087 towed sonars, that added to the 8 installed on Type 23s ASW give a total of 11.

Once the equipment from all Type 23s is removed and refurbished, the UK will have reusable equipment for 16 ships, including 11 Type 2087 sonar arrays.
One has to hope that, whichever design is chosen for Type 31e, this treasure is not squandered. Fitting the “extra” 2087s (if there truly are three full such sets: Thales has received a contract but has not specified exactly what is included) to three of the Type 31e would be immensely beneficial, even though Type 31e will never match the expensive acoustic stealth of the super-specialized Type 26. It would be a low cost expansion to ASW capabilities that would come as a logic consequence of the recognized increased threat coming from submarines lurking in the North Atlantic as Russia probes british waters. It would also make the Type 31 far more belieavable as Fleet Ready Escort, a role she is supposed to cover but that, without a proper sonar fit, would still require a Type 26 to be kept at readiness as on-call Towed Array Patrol Ship to respond to submarine incursions in home waters. Having at least 3 Type 31 with wider ASW usefulness would then truly begin to take some tasks off the Type 26s' shoulders, allowing the latter to focus on high end training, NATO groups and carrier task group.  

So, of course, it probably won’t happen.This is the british government and MOD we are talking about, after all. Rhetoric is never matched by facts. 

The availability of radars, decoys, missiles, light guns, even sonars and other sensors and components should be seen as a blessing and incorporated into Type 31e whenever and wherever possible.

Purchasing new radars while having spare Artisans is something I certainly wouldn’t recommend.

Finally, I’d ideally want to see the Type 31 assembled south of the Scottish border. Cammell Laird is my ideal candidate for that. Aiding the revitalization of Birkenhead would be an insurance policy against the SNP and a strong political message.

One of the (undoubtedly numerous) difficulties with such an approach is the fact that the Type 31e and FSS timelines do not align. The contract award procedures for the FSS are expected in 2020, while Type 31e should clear that stage already next year. Without FSS work for Rosyth and for the other shipyards it will hardly be possible to negotiate such a change in plans.

This is the kind of conundrum that I hoped the Shipbuilding Strategy would finally end, but the document did not go far enough and did not commit the government to any specific path forwards for shipbuilding capability. It is still down to the individual programmes to determine the future of british yards, and without real multi-programme coordination there will continue to be gaps.

Together, FSS and Type 31e could truly be transformational for the british shipbuilding sector, but only if they are considered as part of a truly joined-up strategy.

Speaking of Fleet Solid Support…

The MOD has published the call for bids for the programme, and the three ships requirement has translated into two firm and one option, a development that, given previous history, does not inspire confidence.

Among the cuts and reductions caused by Strategic Defence and Security Review (SDSR) in 2010 was the removal of the requirement for concurrent, geographically displaced Carrier Strike and Littoral Manoeuvre task groups. With Carrier Enabled Power Projection and the final acceptance of a future without HMS Ocean came the necessary unification of all the remaining resources in the single Response Force Task Group.

Among the other implications, the once separated Fleet Solid Support Ship and Combat Support Ship Auxiliary requirements were finally merged into a single FSS class of 3 hulls.

The Naval Design Partnership Team was then asked to produce a series of designs to assess the technical feasibility and cost implications of this requirement merge. The main result was the famous image of a modern, large joint supply ship including provisions for the carrying of a couple of LCVPs as well as a well deck in the stern. Both additions obviously came from the Combat Support Ship Auxiliary requirement, earlier still known as the Joint Sea Based Logistics requirement, which was to provide afloat supply and support to forces ashore.

The design initially put forwards by the NDP. Fascinating, but probably never to become reality. Note the two Heavy Rigs on the port side, for QE class replenishment. 

That design has probably been deemed too expensive, however, and the latest images coming out of the NDP through DE&S suggest that the Fleet Solid Support vessel is losing all of the more “amphibious” features in favor of a design very much in line with the American T-AKE “Lewis and Clark” class.

A US Navy CVN aircraft carrier receiving stores through one of the aircraft lift openings. The same method is used by the QE class. 

In turn, the uncertain fate of the amphibious capability as a whole might be part of the reason why the third ship is now only an option. If the Modernising Defence Programme ends up destroying the amphibious capability, the third vessel might simply not be needed anymore.

The T-AKE class is not incapable to support an amphibious force ashore, but obviously is not optimized for the role as the earlier NDP design would have been thanks to the well deck. The USNS still keeps two T-AKE ships within the USMC Prepositioned groups, using the vessels to carry the vast range of stores needed for an amphibious operation. The new NDP design, which very closely follows the general ships arrangement, would be similarly able to crane stores into landing crafts and sustain a force ashore.

As a solid stores vessel, the T-AKE is very rationally arranged, with all accommodations grouped in the single citadel on the stern rather than split at the two ends like in the earlier NDP design which was closer to the current Fort class in general shapes.

A single, full-width cargo preparation deck runs from the bow to the flight deck on the stern, and multiple heavy RAS rigs are provided. The british design has three rigs on the port side and, apparently, a single rig on starboard. This is because the first and third rig on the port side are specifically spaced out to “meet” the aircraft lifts opening of the Queen Elizabeth class carriers, which are fitted to receive the heavy stores. The two rigs remaining, one per side, would be used to support the other ships. 
The american T-AKE also carries and transfers fuel, while the british ship will not. The Royal Navy has chosen to keep the two roles well separated: Tide class for fuel, FSS for stores and ordnance. 

The latest FSS CGI, as published on the latest DE&S annual department plan. 

A USNS Lewis and Clark T-AKE supply ship. 

Until the new FSS enter service, in the second half of the 2020s, the QE class will be supported by RFA Fort Victoria, which is currently in refit to prepare for the “new” role. In order to comply with today’s regulations she is being double-hulled since she carries not only solid stores but also fuel and oils. 

The Heavy RAS receiver on HMS Queen Elizabeth, deployed for use and folded away. The Queen Elizabeth class can receive fuel from two stations on the starboard side and simultaneously take on stores from the port side. Refueling station is available also on port side.  

She will not be refitted with the new heavy RAS equipment, so she’ll only be able to transfer loads of 2 tonnes rather than the 5+ enabled by the new Rolls Royce kit already demonstrated on land at HMS Raleigh.

Drop one FSS, convert two Points?

What if FSS followed the path of the Type 26, which came out of the merge of what had originally been planned as two separate frigate classes, and eventually was cut back with the appearance of Type 31e?

Instead of building a third expensive and not truly fit-for-role FSS to support the amphibious force, I would suggest that, for a much smaller investment, the UK could re-acquire the two Point class RoRos it dismissed in 2011 and convert them in a way similar to what the US have done with the virtually identical MV Cragside, now MV Ocean Trader.

The US conversion had the Special Forces in mind and focused on adding a lot of spaces for planning, training, accommodation for up to 207 embarked forces with endurance of 45 days. Multiple davits for a variety of boats and assault craft are provided at the sides and a jet skis launch and recovery system was also required. The requirements as published included carrying 12 20 foot containerized equipment stowage module and 22 11-feet lockers for weaponry. The flight deck can accommodate any helicopter including the large Chinook, the MV-22 Osprey and the even larger CH-53. The hangar has two bays, each large enough for a MH-60 class helicopter, and spaces for aviation support and maintenance are provided. For aviation and craft fuel, the requirements specified the possibility of using containerized tanks but specified armor protection for them in that case. A single RAS station is specified, to enable the reception at least of fuel. A vast boats storage and maintenance area, conference and planning rooms, communications, dedicated space for UAV detachment and lots of different storage solutions were also required. The capability the ship can express is impressive, but in the American case also very Special Forces specific.

The MV Cragside before and during conversion. The photo during the conversion makes it easy to identify the boat bays being opened in the sides, and the new blocks of superstructure: the double hangar and the big, white, windowless extension of the citadel towards the stern. 

But the space available is such that organizing afloat workshops; transporting stores and vehicles and supporting aviation through the construction of a flight deck and hangar like on the Ocean Trader are real possibilities.

The Point class continues not to have a well deck, but on the other hand has already demonstrated the feasibility of opening the stern cargo ramp out at sea, weather permitting, to enable the roll in and out of vehicles over mexeflote rafts.

These photos by David Kozdron, published by Tyler Rogoway on TheDrive.com. show the "MV Ocean Trader" as she is today. Note the hangar, the abundance of antennas, the stealth boats on the davits and the two hangar bays, plus what looks like Insitu catapult and recovery hook-wire system for UAVs like Scan Eagle and Integrator. 

Converted container ships of this kind could provide the afloat support the amphibious forces needs. A ship could also be relatively easily transformed into a RFA Argus replacement, embarking hospital facilities.

Moreover, these ships could replace the Bay class vessels tied down in the Caribbean and in the Gulf respectively on Humanitarian Assistance & Disaster Relief (HADR) and MCM support. That would make them twice as useful to the amphibious force.

Canada's Irving Shipbuilding put out its own proposal for a Point-like containership conversion, . 

Point Ro-Ro and Mexeflote operations. 

Point class Ro-Ro ships by GabrieleMolinelli on Scribd

Personally, I’d gladly trade out the third FSS for a number of converted civilian vessels like these, especially because the alternative is losing RFA Argus possibly as soon as 2024 almost certainly without replacement as well as continuing to struggle to put together an amphibious task group because the necessary ships are stuck in other long-term roles abroad.  

Type 26: where does the money go?

The MOD has announced the signature of the Type 26 Manufacture Phase 1 contract, covering the first 3 of 8 planned Type 26 frigates. First steel will be cut in the next few weeks, and perhaps we'll hear about names too. 

The latest, and presumably final CGIs released show "fat cheeks" on the superstructure that give long passageways around the bridge, good for situational awareness and for the placement of small weapons for anti-swarm, anti-FIAC defence. The mast design has been further refined, and the Sea Ceptor cells arrangement has been finalized, with the launchers being the same "mushrooms" tubes used on the Type 23s refitted with the missile. The number of cells has not changed, while the export design targeted at Canada (and, with further modifications, at Australia) has been shown replacing the CAMM cells with an additional MK41 module (from 24 to 32 cells).

The latest images show what Type 26 will look like

This model of a Type 26 proposal for Canada shows an extra MK41 module instead of CAMM cells. 

The contract is described as a 3.7 billion pounds deal, but this figure urgently needs to be clarified. Government seems to be playing games by using it: on one side, it is giving the impression that it is committing more money than it actually is; on the other it makes it impossible to figure out how much each of the three vessels is costing. Unfortunately, whatever the exact amount, the answer is: a bloody lot.

The confusion is due to the MOD having already signed contracts worth more than 1.9 billion pounds to get to this point.

The first big Type 26 contract dates back to 2010 and was a 127 million, 4-years contract for designing the new vessel.

In February 2015 this was followed by an 859 million Demonstration Phase deal, which included selection of suppliers and long lead items orders, plus the construction of three shore-based test facilities to de-risk key parts of the vessel. David Brown built a test facility to demonstrate the new cross-connect gearbox developed for the Type 26; General Electric Power Conversion built the Electric Power Generation and Propulsion facility to de-risk the power segment of the ship; and the Combat System Land Based Integration and Test laboratory demonstrated the entire Combat System. This investment should pay dividends later on by ensuring that all works as intended, preventing many of the teething issues associated with new systems in new ships.

In march 2016, contracts for 472 million in long-lead items including side doors, helicopter handling system, bow sonar domes and other parts was announced.

In July, 183 million pounds were added to procure the MK45 gun systems (including automated ammunition handling, gun fire control system and ammunition) for the first three ships; plus another system to be installed ashore as integrated training facility.

In December 2016 another large contract followed, for 380 millions, covering chilled water plants, hangar cranes, hatches and watertight doors, membrane sewage treatment plants, steering gear and stabilizers.

The long list of suppliers and systems already under contract and at work due to earlier Demonstration Phase contracts 

Most, but not all, of these almost 2 billion pounds, which have been converted in a long list of parts already on order / delivered / being delivered for the first three vessels, have effectively been announced a second time, because they are included in the 3.7 billion deal.

A part of what was already expended is counted separately: probably the non-recurring cost of setting up the shore test facilities, the gun training system, and other voices of expenditure.

Whatever the exact division of costs, the pricetag of the Type 26s remains disconcerting, because most of its known systems and capabilities are non-developmental, funded by different budget lines, or straight out recycled.

The ship will have a newly designed gearbox but will use well known MT30 gas turbines already used all around the world; and it will have a CODLOG (Combined Diesel or Gas) which is arguably the simplest configuration involving a gas turbine. A well understood, definitely non innovative propulsion system and, arguably, in some ways a step back from the Type 23’s CODLAG (Combined Diesel and Gas) which allows the ship to exploit all of its installed power for obtaining max speed.

The ship’s main defensive weapon is the CAMM / Sea Ceptor missile, which is developed and acquired under the Complex Weapons budget line and which is already being procured for the Type 23 life extension and capability sustainment project, with three vessels already refitted.

Type 26 will have more Sea Ceptor cells (48 in two well separated silos, fore and aft, of 24 cells each; versus 32 all on the bow for Type 23), but will essentially inherit most of the arsenal from the retiring Type 23s.

The ship’s gun is new to the Royal Navy, but is the latest iteration of a system which is decades old and used in hundreds and hundreds of exemplars on US Navy and other nations’ vessels all around the world. The only developmental addition is the automated ammunition handling system and depot, but similar systems are already operational around the world and hardly break the bank.

The main radar is planned to be the Artisan 3D, already operational on Type 23, from which it will migrate to the new hulls.

The Type 26’s main offensive power will entirely depend from three 8-cell MK41 vertical missile launchers. Again, a new system in Royal Navy use, but well over a thousand such VLS modules are operational in the US Navy and elsewhere. Their cost is far from prohibitive, and they are non developmental and well understood.

What is not well understood is what, if anything, the Royal Navy will put into these VLS. It currently has no weapon, in service or planned, which is ready for MK41. The Tomahawk is an obvious candidate, but the small Royal Navy stock of the missile is all in the encapsulated variant for submerged launch from submarine’s torpedo tubes.

Harpoon is going out of service next year, leaving the Royal Navy bare of any heavy anti-surface missile, and the Type 26’s offensive power is entirely dependent on “Maritime Future Offensive Surface Warfare capability”, a programme which is funded under the Complex Weapons budget (so entirely additional to other Type 26 costs) and which only appeared in the Equipment Plan in the 2016 edition. We know absolutely nothing of its exact aims and of the timeframe associated with it.

Light guns for ship’s self defence will come from retiring Type 23s, as will a good part of the decoy outfit, including the S2170 anti-torpedo system.

The towed array sonar Type 2087 also comes straight from the Type 23s. We don’t yet know about the hull-mounted sonar on the bow. Maybe this, at least, will be new. Or maybe no.

The exact details of how equipment will migrate between Type 23s and Type 26 is not known. The MOD was asked about it in a few occasions, but offered very little in terms of answers. It is obvious that a Type 23 will have to leave service early to be dismantled and robbed of parts to enable the fitting out of a new Type 26 unless a few new sets of equipment are purchased.

According to admiral sir PhilipJones, three such “extra” sets have been procured, for the first three vessels, to ensure that there is no need to shrink the fleet early to fit out the first new Type 26s. After that, the equipment for the following vessels will come from the withdrawn 23s.

Admiral Sir Philip Jones: Yes, that is absolutely true. One of the things that we think will de-risk the Type 26’s entry into service is the fact that much of its equipment will have been tested and proved by operating on the Type 23 frigates, in particular the Sea Ceptor missile system, the Artisan Type 997 air surveillance radar and a number of other things.The Type 23 that we bring in to pay off has to be the donor platform to the next Type 26. We’ve bought new equipment for each of the three first Type 26s, to sort of get the class going, if you like; that is part of the long-lead items we have procured. So we will then have, as it were, a residue of decommissioned Type 23s’ equipment, which we can return and recycle, and deliver to the builder to fit into the Type 26. We won’t have to bring one in and stop it operating before we send it north; we’ve deliberately factored that in. I think that means that we will have much more resilience and already-tested equipment in that ship, which will bring it into service much faster than we’ve seen before.

Exactly what these “extra” sets include is not clear. It seems highly unlikely that there will be extra Type 2087 sonars, for example. Probably we are only looking at the essential pieces.

In theory, the extra sets could afterwards ease the fitting out of the Type 31e frigate if it will ever actually come together and if there will ever be more than 5 of them. In theory, purchasing three extra sets of parts gives the Royal Navy enough kit for 16 frigates instead of 13. Whether this benefit is ever realized is anyone’s guess.

The Type 26 introduces very little in the way or truly new systems to the fleet. There is a hope that the Royal Navy will be able to improve the crucially important self-defence decoy fit by replacing current fixed-tube launchers with something like the CENTURION trainable decoy launcher, which can adjust to fire the decoy in the best possible direction for maximum effect, without the entire ship needing to change course first. This is extremely important in light of the development abroad of faster and faster anti-ship missiles which will not wait for the ship to manoeuvre into a new position. But even this very, very modest development is currently a mere hope: data about Type 26 so far makes no mention of this and earlier attempts by the RN to invest in this area were frustrated by lack of funding.

CENTURION trainable decoy launcher 

It even seems that the Type 26 will not carry ship-launched anti-submarine torpedoes. For years now there has been no mention of migrating the Type 23’s magazine torpedo launchers. In absence of a vertical launch anti-submarine weapon such as the American ASROC, the Type 26 will be entirely dependent on the embarked helicopter for prosecuting the submarines it picks up on the sonar.

While the limitations of the ship-launched light torpedo are well understood (being close enough to a submarine to employ it probably means the submarine has already fired its own much larger torpedoes), it seems rather disconcerting to do away with them entirely. And if they aren't fitted, this is another capability the Type 26’s budget is not funding.

How the ship can be quite so expensive despite all of the above is mysterious. We are light years away from the affordable pricetag that had been the target of the programme, yet many of the big-ticket items are not even contributing to the cost. 

We are left to wonder whether spreading the build on two shipyards (Scotstoun and Govan) is at least partially responsible. Earlier plans included spending serious money on finally building a single, capable “frigate factory” plant, but this would have meant closing one of the current two yards, and this was unpalatable. One look at the two-site Type 26 construction strategy, however, is enough to see how much more complication, risk and waste of time (and, inexorably, cost) it adds.

Above, the single-site shipyard proposal. 

BAE Systems two-shipyards Type 26 assembly strategy. 


The Type 26 is also now described as a 157 men ship. Earlier, the “Core Crew” had been given as 118. To be fair, however, 118 probably excluded elements such as the embarked helicopter flight, which are very much an integral part of what makes a warship work. Probably, 157 is not sign of a step away from automation, but merely a more complete and realistic indication of what it takes to make the warship operate. In 2012, the Royal Navy described the 118 core crew as needed for mere “Float, Move and Self Protect” activities, with ASW specialist “packets” coming separately, along with all other teams needed for the mission.  There is space for a further 51 souls (208 bunks in total) to be embarked to operate systems carried in the Mission Bay or as reinforced boarding teams or for other necessities.

The MOD is being very vague about timeframes for entry in service. What once was 2021 had already become 2023 and might now be closer to 2025, with the MOD talking of “around the middle 2020s”. It won’t be earlier than 2023, might be 2025. This is bad news as it means shrinking the fleet or delaying further the exit from service of the aging Type 23s. HMS Argyll was meant to bow out in 2023, followed by the others roughly with a yearly drumbeat. This will have to change unless the fleet is to dramatically shrink.

While we wait for the Shipbuilding Strategy and for a plan for the Type 31e frigate that is supposed to complement Type 26, it is hard to rejoice for Sunday’s announcement. It was a key, much delayed and long expected development, definitely overdue, but it brings forth unpleasant questions. How can this ship cost so much? How can british shipbuilding go on if this is the best price it can offer?