If it's Airbus (ie Germany) leading, it's a lost cause. Hopefully these mistakes are never to be repeated

I heard the shock that went though the place when they realised MOD weren't bluffing on T31 was massive. It was Phil Hammond who cracked the whip, he saw right through the BS first as Def Sec then he took that knowledge to Treasury. There was a crisis meeting on Astute in Downing Street in the earl...

I love it Ron. I guess we should also have never built the Flower Class Corvette, the Hawker Hurricane or the Sten Gun and we'd be holding this debate in German. I was at BAE at the time (not Govan). It was the most painfully bureaucratic place I'd ever seen - basically an industrial version of the ...

I do agree the T31 has learnt some of those lessons, however it started in the wrong place (financially rather than requirement driven) and is delivering the wrong thing. Also, what cannot be overlooked was that it made other programmes that were delivering things that were needed much harder, long...

There are only two yards that can integrate a complex warship - Scotstoun and Rosyth. And part of Rosyth is needed anyway to refit the carriers. H&W are building a diverse marine engineering business including refit, offshore wind, ferries etc. - not dependent on the MOD. Similarly Cammell/ A&am...

BAE are already planning on significantly compressing build time once they move into the new shed. Incorrect. Lister is on record as saying the increased efficiency is to get the ships back on the original schedule. He intimated that the one off delays Covid etc would be recovered by boat 5 and aft...

We've already lost Westminster of the T23ASW, and Monmouth, Montrose and v likely Argyll of the T23GPs. All before delivery of any T26 or T31. True. But would they be crewed if they hadn't been lost? The 3 x GPs will be covered by T31, all of which are scheduled to be delivered by 2030. If we've al...

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2024/04/15/bae-pushes-to-delay-royal-navy-frigate-to-prioritise-norway/ BAE pushes to delay Royal Navy frigate to prioritise Norway deal Bid to sell submarine-hunting warships to Norway hinges on Royal Navy accepting delays This is completely impossible the T23 ...

Does it really matter? Those two type 26s will still be operating, in the same area, hunting the same enemy. The RNs CAPEX gets pushed to the right and the UK wins its largest naval export orderin decades. Also - do the Norwegians need a barely used tanker by any chance? Difficult one, but based on...

Poiuytrewq wrote: ↑15 Apr 2024, 10:56

Effectively Norway would be funding the 5x T26 that HMG refused to fund.

Never thought of it that way. True! We've gone all around the houses to get back to where we should have been from day 1 with a modernised frigate factory pumping out 13 x T26s.

Jeez we make life hard for ourselves

Bloody hell, what a choice to make. Nice to see the UK government ham fisted approach to the Type 26 coming back to kick us in the ass again. That positive note I had yesterday lasted less than 24 hours. A British bid to sell submarine-hunting warships to Norway cannot go ahead unless the Royal Nav...

Does it really matter? Those two type 26s will still be operating, in the same area, hunting the same enemy.

The RNs CAPEX gets pushed to the right and the UK wins its largest naval export orderin decades.

Also - do the Norwegians need a barely used tanker by any chance?

https://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/glasgow-frigate-shipyard-keen-for-international-orders/ Sir Simon stating,(in respect of Govan) “We’ve got eight to nine years of steelwork ahead of us. If there’s no prospect of another class of ship, we’ll need to slow down a bit to bridge the gap. However, we are a...

https://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/bae-target-dramatic-reduction-in-frigate-build-time/ We aim to reduce the build duration from the first of class being 96 months to the eighth being 60 months. More than that, we intend to compress the interval between ships from 18 months to 12 Now that’s an opportu...

Report in the Torygraph that Bae at Govan have now deployed the radical unheard of innovation called Robotic Welding to “recover lost time on batch 1 of T26 and make up for a shortage of welders” Personally, were I a welder with a choice between working outside under a tarp in the Scottish winter, o...

Maybe something got lost in translation, this makes little sense. Since when are we planning to do single ship amphib deployments - that’s the opposite of the LRG concept.

Sounds like the RN program has been pushed to the right, cue 5 years of concepts and studies…

Another member? https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/04/08/canada-justin-trudeau/. Canada could join Aukus defence pact as Trudeau considers nuclear sub patrols in Arctic waters…….The Canadian prime minister says he has already held ‘excellent conversations’ with the US, UK and Australia ove...

They have a reservation backlog of £1 billion - interestingly many seem to be from operators based in the Med. Which kind of makes sense - good weather, twice as fast as a boat, major airport infrastructure not needed. Could carve out a niche in Island hopping

Not sure where to put this https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2024/01/norway-seeks-international-partners-for-future-frigate/ Norway looking to buy 5 new frigates “from a close ally”with build to start asap. Looking for a top end ASW ship and the responsible Officer specifically name checks the va...

Scimitar54 wrote: ↑05 Apr 2024, 16:14 SD67

Of Guyanese descent maybe, but NOT Guyanese as he was born in the UK.

Not quite he was born in Tottenham...

But they are still in the ground they aren't preventing access to any one. The shocks to the economy due to Ukraine have been due to a lack of Russian Gas and Oil not Ukrainian. I suggest you read up on the subject a bit more. Putin and the oligarchs are obsessed with acquiring wealth. The oil, gas...

But they are still in the ground they aren't preventing access to any one. The shocks to the economy due to Ukraine have been due to a lack of Russian Gas and Oil not Ukrainian. I suggest you read up on the subject a bit more. Putin and the oligarchs are obsessed with acquiring wealth. The oil, gas...

Ah the what ifs. Joined up government thinking and no service silos. I fear we may be repeating the same mistakes with drones but time will tell

Right now some new build AV8Bs would be useful to lob LGBs at Houthis

The global meltdown that will ensue if we give the CCP control of 80% of the microchips on which our economy is dependent would be far worse. Frankly it would be the end of the western world as we know it. From that point on Japan would be effectively Finlandised and Australia would be next - with h...

IMHO we're in the grey zone already. China is a massive customer for Iranian Oil, I struggle to think those attacks are happening spontaneously. If China continue to ratchet up the pressure on Taiwan then some sort of confrontation with the USN is inevitable. In that case we can assume the USN will ...