Is Going The Royal Navy To Be Scrapped ?

[EthanXH58]

Lafayette frigates ordered by the Taiwanese Navy are fully capable of anti-submarine warfare and the ones ordered by the Saudi Navy are Anti-air warfare capable. The frigate can be equipped with the type of avionics required by the customer so please have your facts straight.

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[Padfoot]

i have read in the last editorial of richard beedall www.beedall.com that after so many cuts and cuts in the royal navy some people is thinking that in the medium future this force will be reduced to just a coastal force leaving only a few frigates, after seeing what is happening reducing submarines, escorts, retirement of sea harriers, delays in new projects etc for me it is not impossible if things follow this way but the problem is that the conservative opposition has the same ideas as the labour government.

Hi overlander,

...in the medium future this force will be reduced to just a coastal force leaving only a few frigates...

Au contraire. Britain is increasing its defense spending by £3.7 billionover the next three years to a total of £35.2 billion, the longest period of sustained real growth in planned defence spending for over 20 years. The UK Defence budget in 2005/06 is some £30.1Bn. In terms of monetary expenditure, this puts the UK second in the world on defence spending.

I think the RN of 2015 will be far and away the second best Navy in the world, and French efforts to compete will fall well short. But, it is all very, very, expensive. The RN has five priorities; the two planned large Queen Elizebeth aircraft carriers; the new Astute nuclear powered submarines; Type 45 destroyers; amphibious assault ships; and new Royal Fleet Auxiliary vessels. You could hardly call this a coastal fleet. Could you? In fact I would go so far as to say that the RN is becoming a true global navy, with capabilities it has not possessed for decades. Sure there will less numbers, but the tonnage of the RN will rise substantially.


I guess you could accuse the UK government of attempting to make very expensive changes without a huge rise in defence spending. It would seem that all UK defence forces are upgrade crazy at the moment - RAF's Typhoon is coming into service. And the cost of new equipment is awesome. But governments will be governments and the line has to be drawn somewhere.

Just my thoughts.

Cheers.