Half of UK Royal Navy "to be mothballed"

Kirruth

Active member
This had me spitting tacks on the train yesterday:

"HALF of the Royal Navy is to be “mothballed” as it bears the brunt of cuts imposed after a series of expensive procurement projects and the hidden costs of the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq. Six destroyers and frigates and two other vessels are expected to be put into reduced readiness, known as mothballing, to achieve urgent savings of more than £250m. It can take up to 18 months to bring mothballed ships back into service.

The armed forces have been told to save more than £250m this year, and £1 billion by April 2008, amid a “rebalancing” of the Ministry of Defence’s (MoD’s) spending plans, defence sources disclosed.
The MoD will also cancel the last two of the eight Type-45 destroyers the navy was supposed to get. The navy was promised the government would provide these in exchange for cutting 15 major ships in 2004, sources said."

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-2524444,00.html
 
Don't they have to keep so many Surface Ships ready for the NATO commitment?
 
Don't they have to keep so many Surface Ships ready for the NATO commitment?

Well, standing Nato commitments probably require half a dozen ships including a minesweeper in the Baltic, a frigate/destroyer and nuclear submarine in the North Atlantic (and a similar number of ships in port).

I must admit, I'd have much more respect for these types of announcements if they put in which commitments would be scaled back, "...and this means that if you're in the Middle East, Falkland Islands or Indian Ocean, you're on your own, dude".

In recent war with Hizb'allah, those guys missiled an Israeli gunboats. The Taliban repaired and flew Soviet fighters when they took Afghanistan for the first time. Let's not forget the USS Cole. The idea that we are dealing with a global movement whose only capability is getting kids to blow themselves up in Tel Aviv supermarkets (and that therefore we dont need much of a Navy) is way off the mark.

Um....sorry for frothing at the mouth, but this announcement has had me bouncing off the walls.
 
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I was more than a little dismayed when I found out that England was cutting back to only SLBM's for her Nuclear Deterrent. In todays World there may come a time when England may wish she had a few Tac Nukes laying around.
We sure as hell do not lend or lease such things, as a matter of fact the US supplies England her Trident II Missile Systems, but we make England build the Warheads, because they are not allowed to see ours, let alone buy them.
 
Well Major, last I heard China was having her own troubles trying to get her SSBN to work right, and England does not seem to have the same problem.

Plus the Chinese take an entire Aircraft Carrier and turn the damn thing into an amusement park.
 
so they could lease the ships from England... their troubles would be over.


oh, and I am not really serious about that comment. I would rather watch them stumble over producing their own navy.
 
Why is it that our allies are reducing their militaries when our enemies our building theirs up.

Iran
Red China
North Korea
Russia (Still can't trust them)
Venezuela (Cuba Part II)

Are all buidling up their military forces. Red China wants a blue water navy. Iran wants everything, North Korea wants South Korea, Russia wants to be a Superpower again, and Venezuela wants to be a major power in South America.

Yes, Terrorist themselves are a major danger too.


Well, standing Nato commitments probably require half a dozen ships including a minesweeper in the Baltic, a frigate/destroyer and nuclear submarine in the North Atlantic (and a similar number of ships in port).

I must admit, I'd have much more respect for these types of announcements if they put in which commitments would be scaled back, "...and this means that if you're in the Middle East, Falkland Islands or Indian Ocean, you're on your own, dude".

In recent war with Hizb'allah, those guys missiled an Israeli gunboats. The Taliban repaired and flew Soviet fighters when they took Afghanistan for the first time. Let's not forget the USS Cole. The idea that we are dealing with a global movement whose only capability is getting kids to blow themselves up in Tel Aviv supermarkets (and that therefore we dont need much of a Navy) is way off the mark.

Um....sorry for frothing at the mouth, but this announcement has had me bouncing off the walls.

Hit the nail straight on it's head. Our Islamic Terrorist enemies themselves also have some military power of themselves that they want to build and increase.

Teddy said it best. "Speak softly and carry a big stick."

That is what England, America, and the rest of NATO and NATO's Allies need.
 
That aircraft carrier is not an amusement park, its being refitted for jump jets and will be ready for sea in less than 18 months. GoogleEarth the Dalian dry dock in NE China and also a little to the SW and see what you notice. They are also building a few floating deep sea "research" platforms that have more sat dishes and comm towers than NORAD on them.
 
The Varyag is the one in Dalian. You can google it and the Chinese are also developing their own fighter based aircraft based on SU-33 designs with the assistance of newer Russian technology.

The Minsk is up for "sale". If you are familiar with the story of the Varyag you can connect the dots. The Varyag was purchased from the Russians by a mysterious Macau based front company that later turned out to be owned by a group owned by a group owned by a group with PLA ties. It sits for a couple years till people forget about it and then they turn it over for an undisclosed sum to the PLA Navy for refitting and upgrading.

Now we have the Minsk, purchased and turned into an amusement park in Shenzhen to rust and be another showy POS for the CCP. Now that the media is looking elsewhere they have put it up for sale. First attempt was in March of 06 and now its being geared up again for sale. If no one is looking it will be purchased by another front company, moved and set to rot for about 18 months. By that time people will have written the story off and lost interest and the Varyag will be completed and the Minsk will then be refitted using what they have learned from their work on the Varyag. Also they will have completed development of the carrier borne fighters by this time as well.

All of this coincidentally ties in with the timeframe for the holding of the Beijing Olympic games. A perfect built in distraction for the media. An old magicians trick that has correlating ties to Chinese military thought. By the time anyone gets wind of it and people pay attention it will be a done deal. Once again I fear China will catch the west with their pants around their ankles like they did in Korea on Xmas night or more recently when they surfaced behind the Kitty Hawk(?).

How convenient it is for the Chinese that now the British are mothballing half their naval assets while they are building an arm by which they can extend their power beyond defensive capabilities.
 
The o/p story hit the front pages this week as the First Sea Lord, Admiral Sir Alan West went public with his concerns. There's another front page report today talking about how naval promotions to Lt Cmdr and above have been frozen.

Here's another view:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/01/05/navy105.xml

which makes the point that many of the ships being mothballed are 20+ years old and not up to much. The article says the real loss is the opportunity to command a ship, rather than military capability, and there is actually some truth in that.

Setting aside the nuclear deterrent, the big ship vision for the UK navy is probably a couple of modern aircraft carriers, 6 Type 45 air-defence destroyers, 3 amphibious assault ships (Marine squadrons) and 6 nuclear attack submarines (torpedoes plus Tomahawks). There might be a few frigates floating around for where we need to "show the flag" (sadly, the day of the frigate as a serious military vessel ended when the Soviet sub fleet rusted into the Baltic).

It's probably better to have 15 high capability ships than 40 useless ones, but the number of destroyers is a limiting factor. For example, it was pretty clear that HMS Bulwark (the amphibious assault ship) couldn't pull anyone out of Lebanon last year until the air defence came on station.

I was very interested to read Bulldogg's analysis: the Chinese are certainly developing their naval capability. When the Taiwan thing kicks off, as kick off it will, the truth is the Americans will be on their own. We might need you guys to get our people out...hope that's OK :pray:
 
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If and when the Taiwan thing kicks off it very well could be that the Taiwanese will be the ones that are on their own.

The United States of America is neither Treaty nor Defense Pact bound to fight in open conflict for Taiwan Independence, add to that the Official United States Government stance that there is but one China, with Taiwan as part of it, as in Taiwan being part of Mainland China, and not Mainland China being part of Taiwan.

Taiwan, or rather radicals in Taiwan, in my own opinion, will grow tired of being counted as China one day, and declare her Independence, China will put the smackdown on Taiwan, and the United States of America will not lift a finger, as we have told China, and told Taiwan that we are in the game for the Defense of Taiwan and not for the Offense of Taiwan.
 
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