The evolving equipment budget situation: land forces

 1: Of aircraft carriers and OPVs 
 2: Land Forces
 3: Helicopters 

FRES SV

FRES SV hit trouble in the last few months, and the prototypes are struggling with weight management and other issues, including an internal spat between General Dynamics and Lockheed Martin. The FRES SV Scout variant, the most complex and heavy of the platforms under development in the program, must deliver a vehicle which is 27 tons in weight for air transport, around 32 tons in combat ready configuration and with a growth margin stretching well beyond the 40 tons, up to 42 or even 45. The superior promise in terms of weight growth margin was a decisive factor in GD’s victory over the rival proposal of BAE Systems with the CV90, so weight issues are not promising.

It is to be hoped that the very generous planned length of the demonstration phases for the programme will contain any slip and reduce its effect on the wider defence programme. In fact, already months ago it became evident that FRES SV would not substantially appear in the Army before the 2020s, and IOC might be as far away as 2023, with the last of the CVR(T) family of vehicles not expected to bow out before 2026. The time it is taking to deliver this capability is seriously depressing, and not for the first time I’m left to wonder why the “paper project” of GD was preferred over the more mature CV90 solution. We have no certainty that the second would deliver without issues either, of course, but it sure looked promising back then.

Warthog into core; what about TALISMAN?

One good news comes from the UOR to Core front, with Warthog securing itself a future in the Army beyond Afghanistan. Around half of the one hundred Warthogs available will be refitted and reconfigured for use in the 1st Intelligence and Surveillance brigade. They will have two main roles: they will give mobility to the Desert Hawk III detachments and to the five MAMBA artillery-locating radars, currently installed on older, unprotected BV206 platforms. 

The fifth MAMBA was only delivered this year, and the OSD for the system is now given as 2026: it seems that the ambition to replace both COBRA (already gone out of service) and MAMBA with a dozen new surveillance and artillery locating radars under the Future Weapon Locating Radar program is dead, leaving the Army far away from the level of capability it hoped to have and from the capability it had before the COBRA went out of the window. COBRA was going to be hardly sustainable as, despite impressive performances, had a huge obsolescence bill mounting up and would have needed several serious measures taken, but now it is gone and the promised replacement is nowhere in sight. Unfortunately, this kind of situation ceased to be surprising quite a while ago.     

The 21 Watchkeeper TacGroup vehicles (on Viking hulls) recently purchased will be kept as they are, denying a full commonality in terms of armor platforms used by the Royal Artillery UAV regiments, with Viking and Warthog forced to coexist.

The hand-launched Desert Hawk III UAV, in itself a UOR, will be brought into core budget, and so will the dozen of Tarantula Hawk UAVs used as part of the TALISMAN route-clearance convoys. The fate of the TALISMAN convoys themselves is not yet clear: the Buffalo rummaging-arm vehicle, the remotely controlled PANAMA (Land Rover Snatch converted as unmanned vehicles fitted with ground-penetrating sensors) and the High Mobility Engineer Excavator HMEE are all UORs, and their fate is not year clear. Hard to say if the composite route-clearance convoys will be maintained in their current general arrangement. The HMEE was a stop-gap solution between the retirement of the old Combat Engineer Tractor (CET) and the entry into service of the new Terrier, so it might be very low on the list of priorities, as Terrier by now is in service. Buffalo and PANAMA; on the other hand, are much harder to replace in the respective roles and there are no alternatives immediately available, unless the army replaces them with the impressive Pearson Engineering PEROCC, but this appears very unlikely. The fear is, of course, that not unlike what has already happened with other route clearance solutions of the past, the Army will divest the precious TALISMAN system and the knowledge connected to it, only to have to come up with a new solution during the next deployment.

The Mastiff Protected Eyes vehicle, regardless of the fate of the rest of TALISMAN, would instead most likely be kept and used as a combat ISTAR platform or converted for another role within the planned Mastiff-mounted mechanized infantry battalions.   

A Desert Hawk detachment with a Husky vehicle. 12 DHIII detachments are routinely active in Afghanistan

 

Some 115 Warthog vehicles were procured as UOR, to replace the Viking in Afghanistan

Warrior CSP and ABSV

Jane’s reported on November 5 that the Warrior Capability Sustainment Programme has hit issues with the CTA 40mm gun which have caused a slip in the schedule, with unmanned firings from a static platform now not planned before next year. However, the news piece has been taken down and can no longer be read: it is rather surprising, and makes me wonder if the report wasn’t wrong somehow. After all, the CTA gun cleared in July a long and comprehensive campaign of test firings, during which the problem should, at least in theory, have surfaced. We will have to wait for further reports to understand what is actually happening on this front. 

Promising news have filtered out of the Army about the conversion of Warriors surplus to the CSP numbers into new support variants. Considerable confusion was caused by early press reports about what DE&S head of Armoured Vehicles Programmes, Brigadier Robert Talbot Rice, said in his conference at the DVD show held in the summer of 2013.

In particular, a report by Shephard News suggested that the Warrior Capability Sustainment programme only plans to fit the renewed turret with 40mm gun to a mere 65 vehicles, with aspirations to modify another 300. However, a report by Army Recognition puts things straight and explains that while most Warrior vehicles interested by the CSP are in the IFV variant and will get the new turret, 65 are in the Repair and Recovery variants (FV512 and FV513) and are also getting enhancements. The CSP should also deliver protection, mechanical and electronic upgrades to the FV514 variant, the Artillery Observation vehicle for the Royal Artillery. According to the NAO Major Projects Report 2012, some 445 vehicles will be interested by the CSP. I believe 65 of these are the mentioned repair and recovery platforms (a reduction from over 130, proportionate to the reduction in the number of armoured infantry and tank formations) while a further 40 to 50 might be in the FV514 variant (which only has a dummy gun, so is not getting it replaced with the CTA 40mm). This would leave some 330 vehicles in the Section and Infantry Command variants (FV510 and FV511), which is a value consistent with the planned six armoured infantry battalions.

There are, however, more than 700 Warrior vehicles in the Army’s inventory, and while as of NAO report 2012 the affordable fleet has been already cut back to just 565 as the army closes down whole battalions, the Army is (thankfully) aware that the 300 (more or less) fine vehicles left out of the CSP could and should be put to better use than being just cannibalized and scrapped.

"Why would you not make use of these pretty good armoured vehicles? If you could sort these out, you could save money on Bulldogs and have better command and control elements based on Warrior."

This is where the Armoured Battlefield Support Vehicle (ABSV) steps in. This programme has been around, notionally, for years, but it now seems that the Army is determined to breathe new life into it. ABSV is currently still in the Concept Phase, but it is reassuring to know that it has the Army’s attention as a possible solution for the replacement of, mainly, the old Bulldog.

Each armoured infantry battalion is not only made up by Warrior vehicles, but by a substantial number of Bulldog vehicles (the latest incarnation of the ancient FV432) as well. This is a consequence of the management of the Warrior procurement back at the time. The Army was never able to purchase as many Warrior as it had initially planned, and any ambition to completely replace the FV432 was abandoned, with many Warrior variants never seeing the light of day.

Basically, ABSV is a bit of a time machine to go back in time and fix that problem, but much will depend on what variants eventually emerge during the concept phase. As said, ABSV is a programme which has born and died many times. Once known as M1P1 (in opposition to M2P2, the 8x8 wheeled platform which initially had to be the MRAV Boxer and then became FRES UV), it then became ABSV, it was first planned to encompass some 125 vehicles, and there was a contract signed with Alvis Vickers for it, with some prototyping work completed. ABSV was then supposed to deliver Command Post, Ambulance and General Purpose variants. 

ALVIS produced a prototype of the "turretless Warrior" ABSV Ambulance

An armoured infantry battalion can have as many as 20 between FV432 and FV434 (the recovery variant), in Mortar Carrier, General Purpose APC, Ambulance and Command variants. All these need to be replaced at some point, either through FRES SV or, where possible, via ABSV. There is also a new requirement for up to 35 engineering and bridgelaying vehicles to support the FRES Scout equipped formations. This was once part of FRES but has been descoped in a money saving review of the program, while a Warrior bridgelayer variant has been showcased.

It will be very important to see where ABSV goes, and how it integrates with FRES SV.

The US Army is facing much the same situation with its need to replace the M113 and its countless variants, and unsurprisingly one of the solutions offered (in my opinion, the most realistic) is the “turretless Bradley” family put forwards by BAE Systems. 

The Turretless Bradley proposal gives a good idea of what ABSV should be about. A turretless Warrior family would be very precious for the british army

 

The ABSV vehicle is closely connected to FRES UV and Mastiff, as well. The Bulldog that ABSV would replace has also been, in these years, the APC for the mechanized infantry battalions of the Army. Three such battalions, as for Army 2020 plan, are now going to transit on Mastiff and Ridgback wheeled vehicles, with the aim of receiving, finally a 6x6 or 8x8 armoured vehicle under FRES UV, around the middle of the next decade.

The FRES UV (Utility Vehicle) was also meant to replace various variants of FV432 vehicles, mainly in the mechanized infantry battalions, but not only in them. The Army seems to now be more aware of the need to keep tactical wheeled platforms and tracked platforms separated: an 8x8 command post in a Warrior-mounted battalion would not make much sense, and one of the recommendations of the Agile Warrior experimentations has been to ensure that all main platforms in a formation have, as much as possible, the same mobility characteristics. As a consequence, the focus on ABSV has returned, and Rice has gone on record suggesting that ABSV, FRES SV and even wheeled platforms such as Foxhound all have a part to play in covering the various requirements in the various formations. The 8x8 or 6x6 vehicle to come will be ordered to cover a specific requirement which can be assumed to be almost wholly confined in the mechanized infantry area.  

The opening to a 6x6 vehicle is very significant as it can be read as an opening for possible collaboration with France, which plans such a platform as solution for its VBMR requirement. VBMR is supposed to replace the countless 4x4 VAB vehicles of the French army, coming in many variants and with as many as 1000 to be procured, so it could become very attractive for the british army to follow this path. 

One of 124 specially up-armoured Bulldog APCs used in Iraq. Command, Ambulance, General Purpose and Mortar Carrier variants of the FV432 are still serving in the army, but growing more and more ancient

Returning to the Warrior Section Vehicle, RUSI wrote an analysis reporting that the upgrade, which replaces the seats for the soldiers with new, blast-resistant seating, reduces the number of dismounts carried by 1, from 7 to 6. In a platoon this means a reduction of at least 3 men, and while the 40mm gun with its new ammunition boosts the battalion's firepower massively, losing a significant number of dismounts is not such a good thing.
RUSI observes, with some merit, that the Army might want to reduce the number of Warrior IFVs fitted with the turret and 40mm guns, delivering instead a greater number of Warrior "APC" via the ABSV conversion programme, to restore somewhat the number of dismounts. If a platoon of four Warriors included one Infantry Command, two Section vehicles and one such Warrior APC (which would realistically carry 8 men if not 9 or 10), the number of dismounts would remain unchanged. It might be something worth considering, even though the reduction in manpower of the Army and in the establishment figures for every kind of battalion are there to remind us all that it is personnel that has the greatest impact on costs.
The Army might not be concerned with the reduction in the number of dismounts, at this point...

Viking

Under the 38 million contract for the refurbishment of 99 Viking vehicles for the Royal Marines, the Vikings are sent to the Örnsköldsvik plant in Sweden, where they were conceived and built, to be re-lifed after the heavy usage in Afghanistan and to be upgraded with greater protection, bringing them all to MK2 standard.

The Royal Marines have gone through three different Marks of Viking, the original MK 1, the improved MK 1A with modifications due to Afghanistan needs and the MK2.

The vehicles of all variants (Command, APC, Recovery & Repair) are being given V-shaped hull and improved protection on both front and rear cars (the exception is the rear car of the Repair and Recovery variant as it carries no personnel). All variants have also been by now fitted with a ring for a protected weapon station.

An underbelly mine-protection kit has also been purchased and has already been delivered, back in April. These will not be a normal fit, but will be kept ready for installation when greater protection is needed (and amphibious capability is not, as the weight is likely to become excessive for floating).  

Greater work is required on a total of 28 vehicles as they are being turned into two new variants: Crew Served Weapon carrier (19) and Mortar Carrier (9). BAE showcased both of these new variants in defence shows, before the UK made an order for them. However, it is far from certain whether the Royal Marines are going to get the “full optional” platforms seen in the shows. The Crew Served Weapon carrier, in particular, was showcased not only with a protected, manned weapon station on the rear car (which gives the name to the variant), but with a Selex Enforcer RWS with .50 machine gun on the front car, plus Boomerang III acoustic fire detector system and mast-mounted ROTAS EO/IR unit with laser designator. Boomerang, RWS and ROTAS might or might not figure on the Royal Marines vehicles: at the moment, it is not known.

The mortar carrier allows the firing of the L16A2 mortar from within the protection of the rear car, and carries 140 rounds. The mortar is mounted on a turntable. 

Warrior Crew Served Weapon carrier as offered by BAE: will the Royal Marines variant be this "full optional"...?

The Crew Served Weapon carrier as showcased would be a major addition to the firepower and ISTAR equipment of the Royal Marines, while the mortar carriers provide a steep improvement over the old, un-armoured BV206 equivalents. Unfortunately, there will be enough to equip just the high readiness RM battalion, part of the Lead Commando Battlegroup. With the Warthog taken up by the Royal Artillery, the Royal Marines remain faced by the problem of funding a replacement for the venerable BV206s.  

Viking mortar carrier as proposed by BAE

 

The entire fleet is being certified for a 14 tonne gross weight, will be fully amphibious and will have improvements to suspensions, brakes and other modifications where necessary. Unfortunately, it wasn’t possible to fund the replacement of the engine on the old MK 1 vehicles: the MK 2s sport a bigger, more powerful and more modern 6.7-litre Cummins engine instead of the original 5.9 unit. Unfortunately, this couldn’t be adopted at this stage on the whole fleet, but the Vikings are being given wiring and adaptations which will make the replacement of the engine easier and cheaper afterwards, when there will be a budget for it.

The programme is going well and meeting its targets. By the end of next year the whole fleet should be back with the Royal Marines. It would be fantastic to replace the old engines on the upgraded MK 1 and 1A vehicles (which would also bring all the fleet to a single mechanical standard, importantly) and it would be even better to be able to purchase more vehicles, to replace the BV206. Other variants, ordered by other countries such as France and Sweden, include load carrying / logistic platform and ambulance variant, and both are likely to have the interest of the Royal Marines. Let’s hope they can get them soon enough. 

Viking variants. The Royal Marines could use at least some ambulances...

  

Mortars and Artillery

Jane’s reports brings both good and bad news about the future plans of the british army for mortars. Once more, the British Army is preparing to remove the light, hand-held mortar from the infantry platoon. The 60 mm mortars procured for this role as UOR for the Afghanistan operations will be put in storage, with only a few of them remaining in routine use, only with the Marines and PARA formations. Removing the handheld platoon mortar has been done and proven wrong already several times since the end of world war two, but evidently it is still not enough of a lesson learned.

The long-barrel, bipod-equipped 60mm light mortars that have complemented the venerable L16A2 81mm mortar on operations in Afghanistan will also all be put into storage, as there is no money to bring them into core.

And of course there is no plan to follow the lead of many NATO allies and procure 120 mm mortars.

The British Army will instead revert fully to the L16 itself. The L16A2 will be life-extended with new barrels, which might receive a Blast Attenuation Device, like the American variant did already in 1984. The BAD is meant to reduce the peak pressure to comply to health and safety normative in terms of hearing protection. The British Army, having no money for a longer range 120mm mortar, wishes to achieve an extension in the useful range of the L16A2, but this will be challenging because it will require either a more powerful launch charge, which would also be, again, noisier, or a longer barrel which would make the mortar heavier, another big no-no. In any case, the current L41 HE bomb is to be replaced with a new bomb, compliant to the Insensitive Munition (IM) regulation.

Improvements are planned for the training and equipment of Mortar Fires Controllers, which will receive a wider training to be better able to direct support fire other than mortars. Mortar Troop Commanders should also receive greater battlespace management training to enhance their contribution to tactical decision making.

During next year, the Mortar Fire Controllers will replace the current Fire Control Application computer with a much lighter solution which will add a meteorological data handling capability while cutting weight to 0.9 kg including battery from 2.4 without battery. This at least looks like a major improvement.   

A programme was also started last year for the selection and acquisition of a lightweight targeting system, which should be delivered by 2018. A laser-designation capability is among the ambitions for MFCs, as well, as it would allow them to designate targets for the EXACTOR missile (SPIKE NLOS) which is being brought into core budget.

An EXACTOR troop should be added to each of the three GMLRS batteries in the “reaction force” artillery regiments, which will so gain a truly formidable and complete spectrum of firepower, from the AS90 to GMLRS to EXACTOR, which will give a precision strike capability even against moving targets.

The EXACTOR should be installed on a new vehicle platform as it is brought into core, but it is not yet clear on which one: as a UOR, it has been sourced urgently from Israel, installed on non-standard M113 vehicles which, in the british army, would be a logistic oddity.    

VIRTUS

A budget of 5 million pounds is allocated to Project VIRTUS in the financial year 2014 – 15, so we should finally see some elements of this new integrated personal load carrying equipment. A contract notice appeared in February this year, specifying the planned programme of trials and the evolutionary plan for the acquisition of the VIRTUS capability with three successive ‘Pulses’. 

The evolving equipment budget situation: of aircraft carriers and OPVs

1: Of aircraft carriers and OPVs 
2: Land forces
3: Helicopters


Replacing the Rivers?

The biggest news of the last while is the announcement that military shipbuilding in Portsmouth is closing down and 1775 jobs in the shipbuilding sector are to go, with 940 coming from Portsmouth itself and the balance from Filton, Rosyth and the Clyde's yards. The announcement did not come as a surprise, as it had been in the air for a long while. The surprise came from the fact that, althout the battle to obtain funding for the construction of two new OPVs to be produced in Portsmouth, to both reinforce the navy and keep the shipyard alive, has failed, the MOD intends to actually buy three OPVs.
This could be excellent news, wasn't for the fact that it won't actually do anything to save Portsmouth and for the fact that, at the moment at least, these three new, larger and more capable OPVs, are not presented as reinforcements but as a replacement for the current three River-class OPVs of the fishery protection squadron.

The three new OPVs are going to be larger, coming with a flight deck sized for medium helicopters up to Merlin size, and with "additional operational flexibility through extra storage capacity and accommodation". This seems to suggest that the new OPVs will have more to share with the Amazonas taken up by Brazil than with the current Royal Navy's Rivers. Depending on what exactly is meant with extra storage capacity, the new ships could also act as "prototype of sorts" for the future MHPC ships, but from the little we know the project should essentially be based on the 90m OPV design by BAE. According to BAE, the 90m OPV can embark 6 standard TEU containers 20' without occupying the flight deck.

The expected marginal cost of these three ships is expected to be in the range of 100 million pounds in addition to unavoidable TOBA fees which the MOD would have had to pay to BAE systems anyway in absence of work for the shipyards.

Under the terms of the TOBA, without a shipbuilding order to fill that gap, the MOD would be required to pay BAE Systems for shipyards and workers to stand idle, producing nothing while their skill levels faded. Such a course would add significant risk to the effective delivery of the T26 programme, which assumes a skilled work force and a working shipyard to deliver it.

Ordering ships, therefore, does make plenty of sense and it is exactly what myself and others have been shouting for a long while, asking for just two such vessels as a way to keep Portsmouth going, knowing that in a few years time the shipyards are supposed to experience another phase of major activity, enough to assume that it would be possible to keep all three major yards busy. In particular, observing the MOD plans (even bearing in mind that changes and cuts are a constant...) we have:

- Main Gate for Type 26 frigate at the end of next year with building of the first vessel expected to start in 2016. 13 vessels to be built, with the first entering service in 2021 and the last not before 2036;

- MARS Solid Support Ship: while the MARS Fleet Tanker requirement has been met ordering hulls in South Korea on the ground that tanker hulls are simple and are best built by yards which build commercial tankers all the time, the assumption is (was?) that MARS Solid Support Ship, being more complex and technologically sensitive, would be built in british yards. The Fort class supply vessels are due out of service in 2023 (Fort Austin) and 2024 (Fort Rosalie) and undoubtedly Fort Victoria is also planned to bow out roughly in the same timeframe (2025, possibly?), so the replacement vessels have to enter service in the early 2020s. If they are to be built in Britain, and now doubting of it is licit, they will overlap with the work for the Type 26 frigates.

- MHPC: in late 2012 a DSTL document said that the MCM, Hydrographic and Patrol Capability programme should deliver the first new vessel in 2028. MHPC will replace the Hunt and Sandown minesweepers and, possibly, the hydrographic ships HMS Enterprise and HMS Echo. HMS Scott and her oversized equipment are unlikely to be replaceable by the relatively small multipurpose vessel (some 3000 tons, according to most sources) envisaged for MHPC. Delivery of the first vessel in 2028 implies an overlap with the activities on the late Type 26 ships, which will continue to be built into the 2030s.

These three programs, in theory, could have kept all three the major shipyards going, if only the short gap in workload between the aircraft carriers and the Type 26 was bridged. But the decision taken indicates that either the remaining yards can do it all; or someone is anticipating being far less busy than planned; or work on MARS SSS hulls is, like that on MARS FT, heading for foreign shipyards.

The boat building activity in will survive the closure of the major surface warship activity. Of interest in this field we have the Royal Marines requirements for a Fast Landing Craft, which has however been put on hold and won't resurface before 2020, when the slow LCU Mk10 is supposed to finally retire; and the requirement for a Force Protection Craft. The fate of this second Royal Marines requirement is not clear at the moment. During DSEI this year, CTrunk, while unveiling its THOR catamaran solution for riverine, force protection and inshore mission, said that they are in contact with the MOD, which hopes to reveal its final requirements for the boat during next year.
The Force Protection Craft programme, at least until 2011 or early 2012, hoped to deliver 12 crafts, which would partially replace the current fleet of 21 LCVP MK5, from 2016.
Hopefully, the programme is still going ahead.

Waiting for clarity on how the closure of Portsmouth affects the above shipbuilding plan and hoping that closing the yard doesn't turn out to be only the first one of a series of bad news, i want to focus on the building of the three OPVs.
Subject to approval in the coming months, these new vessels will begin being built already next year, with the first due for delivery in 2017. Their biggest merits are that they do good use of money that the MOD couldn't avoid spending (in absence of the order for these ships, BAE would be entitled to around, i believe, a couple hundred millions of payments under the TOBA agreement) and that they keep the workforce going and preserves the shipbuilding skills ahead of the critically important Type 26 project.

The unpleasant bit of news about them is that they are expected, at least for now, to replace the River OPVs. These cheap and effective vessels have only been purchased outright from BAE last year, for 39 million pounds. Initially, in fact, the three ships were not owned by the Royal Navy, but they had instead been built under an arrangement with the shipbuilder, Vosper Thornycroft (VT), under which the Royal Navy leased the vessels from the shipbuilder for a period of ten years. VT were responsible for all maintenance and support for the ships during the charter period. At the end of this, the Navy could then either return the ships, renew the lease or purchase them outright. The first lease period was renewed in 2007, out to 2013. In September 2012 the outright purchase was announced.

The oldest one was only launched in 2002, so in 2017, if replaced, would bow out after a mere 15 years of life and just 14 years of service, having been commissioned in 2003. In my opinion, this is shameful and can't be allowed to happen, especially not in a Royal Navy already struggling to cover its basic, daily committments.
There is no real operational reason why the Rivers need to be urgently replaced by larger OPVs with aviation landing facilities. While additional capability is always welcome, it should not come at the cost of the Rivers. The Rivers are not combat vessels: they patrol the economic zone of the UK and control that fishery respects the rules. They are very busy ships and they are very precious in forming the officers that will then transfer to the large warships. But they have little to no combat use, they are tied to home waters and they do not really need aviation facilities that would be seldom used at best. A flight deck could be handy to operate small rotary wing UAVs, perhaps, but a Camcopter does not take a Merlin flight deck, and i'm pretty sure that enough space could be arranged in the stern of the current Rivers, if that was the idea.

The new OPVs announcement, in other words, as it has been made, smells of back-door capability slashing. The Merlin-capable flight deck immediately made me imagine an horrible scenario in which know-nothing MPs with little understanding of the military are made to think that the ability to refuel a land-based Merlin helicopter away from the shore using the OPVs is a replacement for the missing Maritime Patrol Aircraft capability, for example. Most obviously, for a tons of very good reasons, this wouldn't even rank as mitigation of the gap, and never could it be "a replacement".

The Rivers are very busy in their intended role, besides, and the replacement vessels would be just as busy, meaning that they would actually have very little chance to even try and use their greater capabilities, which in home waters are useful, at best, but not essential.
And having a Merlin-flight deck is of little use when the availability of Merlin helicopters is going to be next to none, with just 30 of them being retained and all of them already overtasked, especially with the AEW role falling on them as well, under CROWSNEST. 

One thing for which the large flight decks could be useful is for landing the S-92 helicopters of the civilian SAR service coming up, to refuel them and enable them to expand their reach out at sea, but even this might be an illusion as it is unclear if the PFI-supplied crews will even have any deck-landing certification.


MP Bob Stewart has, admiradly, thought of the same thing, but still we have no precise answer on whether that would be possible. The helicopter could surely use the deck, but would the crews be qualified for it? That's the real question.

Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con): Most people suggest that our biggest defence capability is not in maritime patrol aircraft. I am no expert—although I can see that there are many naval experts in the Chamber—but could this new River class OPV, with its enhanced length and helicopter deck, also be used to cover the gap between 240 nautical miles, the distance a land-based helicopter can go out from our shores into the Atlantic, and the 1,200 nautical miles for which we are treaty responsible? Could it perhaps play some sort of MPA role in that area?

Mr Hammond: I have not looked at the specification in detail, but I do not envisage that the thing will be able to take off and fly. I understand the point that my hon. Friend is making, however, and we are conscious of the gap in maritime patrol aircraft capability. It is one issue that will be addressed in SDSR 2015 and we will manage the gap in the meantime through close collaboration with our allies. We are considering all the options, including, potentially, the use of unmanned aerial vehicles in a maritime patrol role in the future.

Also note how, as i feared, irrealistic mentions of MPA capability are made. Back-door capability cutting, camouflaged as new capability being delivered. Disasterous, and tipically suited to politicians. Better to keep one hunded eyes open on this matter. 

In other words, there is no real need to replace the Rivers with these new vessels. Losing the current River vessels would be a waste, and the greater capabilities of the replacements could also end up largely wasted.
In fact, these new vessels would be perfectly suited for interdiction of smuggling, for protection of oversea territories (And the Caribbean standing task springs to mind) and counter-piracy work as well, as noted by Hammond himself in answer to a question by Peter Luff: 

 
Peter Luff (Mid Worcestershire) (Con): I commend the Secretary of State, the Minister for defence equipment—the Under-Secretary of State for Defence, my hon. Friend the Member for Ludlow (Mr Dunne)—the Chief of Defence Matériel and all those involved for making the best of a very difficult situation. Will my right hon. Friend clarify the purpose and capabilities of the three new very welcome offshore patrol vessels?

Mr Hammond: They will be more capable than the existing River class, as they will be able to take a larger helicopter and will be 10 metres longer. They will be able to undertake a full range of duties, including not only fishery protection but the interdiction of smuggling, counter-piracy operations and the protection of our overseas territories.

To do all that, though, the new vessels would have to sail far away from home and, most likely for it to have any sense, they would have to be forward based, like HMS Clyde in the Falklands. While the OPV is suited for ocean navigation, it has a very short logistic endurance in terms of stores and, in part, in terms of fuel, so that sailing it back and forth from the UK would be unworkable.
The new OPV would be a perfect solution for the West Indies committment, if it was forward based there. If the ships end up home-based, and tied to the River's current role, they won't be able to do anything of what they could and should do. 

In my opinion, the Royal Navy can obtain an excellent boost in capability if it manages to retain the Rivers for fishery protection and home waters, using the new vessels in addition, forward-basing them overseas. I can think of three locations:

Caribbean, removing a committment that has been a source of problems and embarrassment for the Royal Navy which has long struggled to find a way to send a warship, having to resort extensively to RFA vessels which would also be very much needed elsewhere, for their actual role.

Gibraltar, because from the base the OPV would be able to engage with allies, with North and West African countries while also providing much needed reassurance to the Gibraltarians, which are loudly calling for a more tangible sign of UK support

Bahrain, because the OPV would be able to provide additional anti-FAC protection to the minesweeper squadron there and/or deploy to piracy-infested waters, restoring more enduring british presence in the wider area and relieving the warships from another role which has been hard to cover with a sheet which is, at the moment, just too short.

The challenge is, of course, in budget and manpower. The Royal Navy is exceptionally lean-manned, following the latest cuts. The insufficient manpower is possibly the biggest problem that must be overcome to bring the second aircraft carrier into service alongside the first, and trying to man three new patrol vessels as well, even with the crews being pretty small, is not going to be straightforward at all.
In terms of cost, the River class costs annually just about 20 millions per year. More correctly, it did in 2010: the current value is probably different. The outright purchase of the vessels has been made in the assumption (hopefully supported by facts) that removing the lease costs would reduce the annual expenditure, while further differences are likely because of inflation and other factors. Anyway, we are talking of a very small amount for three very useful vessels with plenty of life left in them. The new OPVs will also be hopefully quite cost-effective, so the Royal Navy should make every effort to secure all six in the longer term.

The door for such a decision, at least in the words, is left open:

Mr Julian Brazier (Canterbury) (Con): I, too, pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth North (Penny Mordaunt) for her doughty struggle to get a good city deal for her constituents and for the vision for the OPVs that to my knowledge she has been outlining for at least two years. Will the Secretary of State confirm that the OPVs will to some extent provide a force multiplier for our frigate fleet? Some of the roles carried out by frigates do not require full frigate capability, so the OPVs could be a way of partially expanding that capability.

Mr Hammond: At the risk of causing her to blush, I am happy once again to praise my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth North. I should say to my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Mr Brazier) that no decision has yet been taken about whether the old River class vessels will be retired after the new OPVs are brought into service. That decision will have to be made in SDSR 2015 based on the ongoing budget challenges of maintaining additional vessels at sea. That will be a decision for the Royal Navy.

This is somewhat reassuring, as well as the admission that there has not been a decision on where to base the new OPVs. If they were already certainly meant as a replacement for the Rivers, the basing answer would be pretty simple.
Of course, the door is not locked, but this does not make it easy to push it wide open and squeeze the new ships and the old ships through. I can only hope that the Royal Navy realizes how decisive the next SDSR is going to be for its future, and i hope people is hard at work, already now, to make sure to fight the incoming battle with the utmost determination.

Any possible solution should be actively considered. To overcome the manpower issues, it might be attractive to use RFA manpower, but we must not forget that the SDSR took away 400 men from it as well, leaving it far from being overmanned.

Another chance, which has the favor of government, is the use of reserve personnel. This is the only area that is seeing a manpower increase, and it is also low-cost manpower compared to regulars, so it might be very helpful to find ways to fill as many posts as possible on board of the OPVs with reservists, even though it is challenging: normally, a crew member on a River stays onboard for four weeks and then rotates ashore for two weeks, while the ship is at sea for most of the year. Finding a way to make good use of reserves in this cycle could be challenging. 



A note on the aircraft carriers as well: as part of the announcement, Hammond confirmed that the cost of the enterprise has grown further, to 6.2 billion, an increase of 800 million from the last announced figure. If we believe to the secretary, however, this has had no impact on projects other than the carriers themselves, as the increase has been absorbed using the programme's own built-in financial margins. This, we are told, has avoided the use of any of the 4 billion pounds contingency reserve built into the 10-year budget:

In 2012, I instructed my Department to begin negotiations to restructure the contract better to protect the interests of the taxpayer and to ensure the delivery of the carriers to a clear time schedule and at a realistic and deliverable cost. Following 18 months of complex negotiations with industry, I am pleased to inform the House that we have now reached heads of terms with the alliance that will address directly the concerns articulated by the PAC and others. Under the revised agreement, the total capital cost to Defence of procuring the carriers will be £6.2 billion, a figure arrived at after detailed analysis of costs already incurred and future costs and risks over the remaining seven years to the end of the project. Crucially, under the new agreement, any variation above or below that price will be shared on a 50:50 basis between Government and industry, until all the contractor’s profit is lost, meaning that interests are now properly aligned, driving the behaviour change needed to see this contract effectively delivered.The increase in the cost of this project does not come as a surprise. When I announced in May last year that I had balanced the defence budget, I did so having already made prudent provision in the equipment plan for a cost increase in the carrier programme above the £5.46 billion cost reported in the major projects review 2012 and I did that in recognition of the inevitability of cost-drift in a contract that was so lop-sided and poorly constructed.
I also made provision for the cost of nugatory design work on the “cats and traps” system for the carrier variant operation and for reinstating the ski-jump needed for short take-off and vertical landing operations. At the time of the reversion announcement, I said that these costs could be as much as £100 million; I am pleased to tell the House today that they currently stand at £62 million, with the expectation that the final figure will be lower still.
Given the commercially sensitive nature of the negotiations with the Aircraft Carrier Alliance, I was not able publicly to reveal these additional provisions in our budget, since to do so would have undermined our negotiating position with industry. However, the MOD did inform the National Audit Office of these provisions, and it is on that basis that it reviewed and reported on our 10-year equipment plan in January this year.

I am therefore able to confirm to the House that the revised cost of the carriers remains within the additional provision made in May 2012 in the equipment plan; that as a result of this prudent approach, the defence budget remains in balance, with the full cost of the carriers provided for; and that the centrally held contingency of more than £4 billion in the equipment plan that I announced remains unused and intact, 18 months after it was announced.
In addition to renegotiating the target price and the terms of the contract, we have agreed with the Aircraft Carrier Alliance to make changes to the governance of the project better to reflect the collaborative approach to project management that the new cost-sharing arrangements will induce and to improve the delivery of the programme. The project remains on schedule for sea trials of HMS Queen Elizabeth in 2017 and flying trials with the F35B commencing in 2018.

Hoping that this is true, because any penny matters, these days, and the two major army programmes, the FRES SV and Warrior CSP, are both dealing with some trouble and delays which might cause cost increases, and i'll talk of armour in the coming days in a new post.