Royal Navy Aircraft carrier breaks down again.

[G-CPTN]

One would expect that the MOD would keep a full set of parts so to be able to effect an instant repair on either 'ship'.

[Boac]

One would be badly disappointed

[FD2]

Maybe China could knock up some bits and pieces on the cheap?

[FD2]

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/0 ... s-british/


Comment
Chinese aircraft carriers are already as powerful as Britain’s

In a future battle between Royal Navy and Chinese carriers, the British jets would be badly outnumbered
Lewis Page
27 April 2023 • 1:57pm
Lewis Page


China is starting to flex its naval muscles seriously. Earlier this month the aircraft carrier Shandong, with a powerful escort group, left the South China Sea via the Bashi Channel and positioned herself on the Pacific side of Taiwan – such that the carrier and her aircraft could effectively cut the small democratic island off from outside support, had there been an active conflict underway.

The Shandong Carrier Strike Group (CSG) then spent 19 days steaming around in the neighbourhood of Taiwan, carrying out hundreds of flights by her embarked aircraft. Japan felt it necessary to scramble its fighters on several occasions – just as British and German jets have lately done to meet Russian probes above the Baltic – and both Japanese and Taiwanese warships carefully shadowed the dragon prowling in the Philippine Sea.

The Shandong CSG steamed back through the Bashi Channel on Monday and Taiwan was able to relax somewhat. But Xi Jinping had made his point. As and when China may decide to move against Taiwan, the increasingly powerful People’s Liberation Army (Navy), the PLAN, will stand between Taiwan and its allies out in the blue waters offshore.

But there’s no need to worry, surely? Taiwan’s friends include many powerful Western nations, Britain among them. The Royal Navy may no longer be its mighty former self, but it has two new aircraft carriers, HMSs Queen Elizabeth and Prince of Wales. The Shandong is, after all, only a Chinese copy of an old Russian ship: outmoded technology. Surely she could never be a match for the best of British?

In some ways this viewpoint is correct. The Shandong, a little smaller than our Queen Elizabeth class ships, is propelled by old-fashioned steam turbines rather than our modern gas-turbine electric transmission technology. Shandong can apparently steam at better than 30 knots, though, so our vessels have little if any advantage in speed. And at least the Shandong’s propulsion system actually works, unlike that of the unfortunate Prince of Wales, which broke down catastrophically last August. The crippled British carrier is not expected to return to sea until this autumn.

Still, though. The Shandong doesn’t have catapults like a proper carrier, which means she has to launch her jets under their own power off a “ski jump” ramp. This means she can only use specially-designed J-15 warplanes with somewhat limited capabilities. She does have arrester wires, though, and the J-15s have tail hooks, so they can get back on deck without dumping weapons into the sea. This is a vital capability for fighters launched on routine air-dominance patrols. But the Shandong and her J-15s are clearly no match for a catapult carrier able to launch fully capable warplanes.

Unfortunately, the Queen Elizabeth class doesn’t have catapults either, thanks to a foolish, secretive campaign by a cabal of 13 Whitehall mandarins a decade ago. This means that the British carriers have to launch their aircraft under their own power off a ski-jump ramp – just as the Shandong does. The only Western plane which can do this is the jump-jet B version of the F-35 strike fighter, which has severely limited capabilities due to its heavy, bulky vertical thrust equipment.

Unlike the Shandong the QE class doesn’t have arrester wires either – again, we can thank those 13 mandarins for this. F-35Bs can’t make a vertical landing without dumping weapons beforehand, so ours have to come in using the “shipborne rolling vertical landing” method, unique to the British forces. This means that the plane touches down still going fast so as to get lift from its wings as well as its vertical thrust machinery. The F-35B then has to screech to a halt using only its brakes before falling off the ship.

There are those – for instance ex-Royal Navy fighter pilot “Sharkey” Ward, well known as a combat aviator above the Falklands and experienced in both tailhook and vertical operations – who doubt the viability of this technique on a pitching, rolling, soaking-wet deck crowded with other aircraft.

That said, the Ministry of Defence has largely solved the problem of the deck being crowded: by the simple expedient of only having a very small number of F-35Bs. The QE class were designed to operate as routine with 36 jets aboard, and could pack in as many as 70 in some circumstances. But on HMS Queen Elizabeth’s first operational deployment in 2021, during which she patrolled off the Chinese coast, Britain could find just 8 jets to put aboard her. Extra planes and pilots were borrowed from the US Marines, but even so the big ship was half empty.

Things will gradually improve but there will not be more than a dozen British F-35Bs available for carrier operations in the near future. There may never be more than 24: and that’s for both carriers, not just one, assuming the Prince can indeed be got working again.

Just how the F-35B stacks up in the air against China’s J-15 carrier jet is a matter for debate. The F-35B is much more modern and is deemed to be a fifth-generation warplane, whereas the J-15 and the Russian Sukhoi on which it is based are only fourth-gen. The F-35B has Stealth: its Chinese opponent doesn’t.

That said, China's J-15 appears to be significantly faster. It’s also longer ranging, a significant advantage as it allows the mother ship to stay further away from the air battle. The J-15 can carry a formidable array of weaponry, much more than the F-35B can fit inside its Stealthy internal weapons bays – limited in capacity as they are, due to that pesky vertical-thrust machinery.

All in all, it’s probably fair to say that the J-15 would not be a pushover for the F-35B and might be quite a handful if it were flown by competent pilots. And the fact is that quantity has a quality all of its own. China has more than 60 J-15s and is still building, while the UK has barely 30 F-35s and has only ordered a total of 48.

The fifth-generation advantage will not last, either: Beijing sees the J-15 as an interim solution only. China claims that its new Chengdu J-20 land-based fighter is already fifth generation, and it plans to produce a naval version.

It’s likely, then, that in any battle between Royal Navy and PLAN carriers in the near future, the British jets would be badly outnumbered: and soon enough they may be outclassed too.

Fortunately the US Navy maintains a forward-deployed carrier group based at Yokosuka in Japan, with a proper nuclear-powered catapult carrier much bigger than British or Chinese ones and fully equipped with 90+ aircraft as routine. At the moment this is CVN-76, USS Ronald Reagan. As this is written, CVN-68 Nimitz and her group are not far away in Thailand, too: there are usually at least two US carrier groups in the western Pacific area.

So things are under control for now. But Chinese naval power is growing all the time, even as that of the US is set to shrink for the next several years at least.

Everyone in the West needs to get serious about China: and it would help if we Brits didn’t keep shooting ourselves in the foot.

Lewis Page is a former Royal Navy officer and author of the book Lions, Donkeys and Dinosaurs: Waste and Bungling in the Military

[FD2]

How 13 Whitehall mandarins crippled Britain’s aircraft carriers

Disastrous chain of events weakened the UK’s most critical defence system – but there is a remedy
By Lewis Page 17 July 2022 • 6:00am


Two weeks ago, at a Nato summit, Ben Wallace, the Defence Secretary, pledged a strong commitment by the UK to defend Eastern Europe against Putin’s Russia.

“I think we’ll dedicate one of the carrier groups to it,” Wallace commented.

The suggestion that Britain has more than one carrier group is, bluntly, absurd. It’s faintly absurd to suggest that we have even one.

Consider Operation Fortis last year. This was a massive effort by the Royal Navy, in which our new aircraft carrier Queen Elizabeth was sent to the Far East. The idea was to demonstrate the reach of Global Britain and make China think twice about invading Taiwan.

HMS Queen Elizabeth was designed to operate with an air group including 36 combat jets and four radar aircraft. She can carry up to 60 aircraft in total.

For Op Fortis, sailing right into China’s backyard, she carried just 18 jets and a motley assortment of 14 helicopters. Three helicopters had been equipped as “Crowsnest” radar aircraft, but the project had suffered delays and Crowsnest was not fully ready for service. It is not expected to be properly ready until next year.

Radar aircraft cover is essential, as the Royal Navy learned at terrible cost in the Falklands. The French and the Americans use radar planes, not helicopters: planes can fly higher and further than a helicopter, delivering hugely better capability.

Xi Jinping probably wasn’t impressed by Operation Fortis. And indeed, the picture gets worse. Just eight of the Queen Elizabeth’s shrunken jet force last year were British service aircraft: the other 10 were from the US Marines. Britain has only a tiny handful of carrier planes.

Under current plans this situation will improve only very slowly and will never be fully sorted out. According to numbers given to Parliament by my old RAF comrade Air Marshal Dicky Knighton in April, one day in the 2030s it might be possible to send a single British carrier to sea with say 24 British jets – still nothing like what she was built to carry.

The idea of two viable carrier groups is fantasy. The notion that we have even one today is so far from reality as to be untrue.

How can this be? Britain has the fourth largest defence budget in the world. We comfortably outspend both France and Russia. Both those nations have deployed aircraft carriers with more than 30 warplanes aboard.
nd of interactive chart.

Our problems are self-inflicted. They stem from a stupid decision made in 2011 by three very senior bureaucrats in the Ministry of Defence, and a campaign by these three and 10 of their subordinates to push that decision through. These 13 Whitehall mandarins crippled our carriers.

The problem is that the Queen Elizabeth and her sister ship Prince of Wales, unlike US and French carriers, have no catapults to launch planes and no arrester wires to catch them on landing. This means that the only aeroplanes our ships can operate are “jump jets”, ones equipped with vertical thrust. The famous Harrier was of this type, but it has long been out of production. Britain sold off its Harriers in 2010.

The only jump jet available to buy today is the B version of the F-35 Lightning. This F-35B is the only warplane our carriers, as now configured, can use. It is the first aircraft ever to combine stealth, supersonic speed and vertical thrust all in one. It is one of the most complicated aircraft in the world and it will never be bought in large numbers.

This lack of production scale means that the F-35B is, and will remain, extremely expensive to buy and to fly. Its heavy, bulky vertical thrust machinery also means that it cannot carry much fuel or weaponry: it is not a particularly good warplane, despite its horrific cost.

The eye-watering price of the F-35B is one reason our carriers don’t – and won’t – have anything like a proper complement of jets. Ships which should each be more powerful than many national air forces, delivering enormous clout for Britain, will instead serve mainly as feeble helicopter platforms.

It doesn't have to be this way

It wasn’t going to be like this. From 2010 until 2012, it was planned that the Royal Navy would get carriers with catapults. In time, those carriers could have operated the F-35C, the catapult F-35, which the US Navy is slowly introducing.

Unburdened by vertical-thrust equipment, the F-35C is not only a much better warplane than the F-35B: it is also significantly cheaper to buy and fly.

But that wasn’t the best part of the Royal Navy catapult plan. The great thing about a catapult carrier is that it doesn’t have to use expensive F-35 stealth planes at all. Instead, we would have started out with a normal catapult jet.

This could have been the Rafale M from France: but in fact by 2012 our pilots were learning to fly the F-18 Hornet aboard US carriers. This is the same jet which takes centre stage in the new blockbuster film Top Gun: Maverick.

The Hornet was, and is, excellent value for money. It is the mainstay jet of the mighty US Navy and many allied nations, and will be through the 2020s and beyond. Because hundreds have already been made and it remains in production, it is very affordable.

Once the Royal Navy had a catapult carrier it was inevitable that we would get some F-18s at some point, rather than leaving our new ships empty except for helicopters and a handful of expensive F-35s – as we now are.

This would have had implications beyond the Navy. The F-18 doesn’t have to fly from a carrier: it’s quite happy working from a land airbase, as indeed it is used by most nations that have it.

The F-18 is in the same performance class as the RAF’s main combat plane, the Eurofighter Typhoon. The Typhoon was conceived as a pure air-to-air fighter and the process of adding air-to-ground bombing capability has been ridiculously expensive and prolonged. Even now that some RAF Typhoons are finally upgraded for ground attack (many others have been permanently mothballed) they remain extremely expensive to fly.

If we had some F-18s we would tend to use them for most tasks, even if the carriers were not required at all. It would be much cheaper than using Typhoons.


Indeed, if we had a force of F-18s, we might justifiably wonder whether we really need the RAF’s beloved Typhoon at all – especially as Typhoons would be rendered completely obsolete by fully capable (that is, non-jumpjet) F-35C stealth planes arriving at some point, as they would if we had a catapult carrier.


Lewis Page is editor-in-chief at capital.com. He is a former Royal Navy officer and author of the book ‘Lions, Donkeys and Dinosaurs: Waste and Blundering in the Military’.

[FD2]

Would we worry about air-to-air without Typhoons?

Well, the F-18 is the air-to-air fighter which protects the US Navy’s nuclear supercarrier groups and various top-20 economies such as Canada, Australia and Switzerland. Fully capable, non-jumpjet F-35s will protect those carriers and nations in future.

It would seem clear that the same aircraft are good enough for us, especially when we recall that for many years our primary air-to-air fighter was the laughing-stock Tornado F3.

So the catapult carrier plan, with its more-or-less-inevitable force of F-18s soon and proper, non-jumpjet F-35C stealth jets in future, was a terrible threat to the Typhoon.

The stakes were – are – very high. The British Government will spend tens of billions operating combat jets out to 2040. In the absence of a catapult carrier, the great bulk will go on Typhoons.

The jumpjet F-35B, crippled by its vertical lift machinery, cannot be Britain’s primary strike plane and will never become affordable like other, proper F-35s. Provided we never get a catapult carrier, Typhoons continue to have a future well beyond 2030.

If on the other hand we get a catapult carrier, F-18s and proper non-jumpjet F-35Cs will inevitably take an increasing slice of all those billions. In that scenario it would be hard to see the expensive Typhoon remaining for long.

We might also wonder, given the bloodsucking histories of the Typhoon and Tornado F3 before it, if we really want their successor, the Tempest, either.
Leaks and misinformation

Going back to 2010 it was clear that the catapult plan would be simple and affordable. The design of the Queen Elizabeth class is actually titled “Adaptable CVF”, with the word “Adaptable” specifically meaning that the option is there to install catapults and arrester gear: not only during construction, but at any time afterwards.

The builders stated this in a fact sheet, since suppressed: “Great care has been taken to ensure that CVF could be adapted for conventional carrier aircraft … each ship can be altered later in its service life to accommodate catapults and arrester gear.”

The Royal Navy website, indeed, said then that the CVF class had an “adaptable design that, while configured to operate [jumpjet] aircraft, can be altered later in its projected 40-50-year service life to accommodate catapults and arrester gear”.

One should also note that the two carriers cost us £6.2bn. It is undisputed that £1.6bn of this results from the government purposely slowing down their construction: the normal cost would have been £4.6bn.

In other words, if another entire new carrier were ordered the cost could not be more than £2bn: new, special shipyard facilities and other one-off costs were included with the first two.

Despite all this, soon after the catapult carrier plan was announced, mysterious sources began telling the media that adding catapults to the ships would be – literally unbelievably – expensive. The unattributable suggestion was that it would cost £2bn to fit the first carrier with catapults and £3bn for the second.

In other words, someone was suggesting that adapting Adaptable CVFs – as they had been specifically designed to be adapted – would cost more than just building entirely new ships from scratch.

That was not believable. Nonetheless the leaks appeared in the media unquestioned, attributed to “defence insiders”.

At first the whispering campaign achieved little, as then defence secretary Liam Fox was resolute in defending the catapult carrier plan. But then, late in 2011, Fox was forced out after MoD permanent undersecretary Ursula Brennan decided that his conduct in office was “not appropriate”.

As soon as the new defence secretary Philip Hammond arrived, some defence insiders sat him down and told him about the huge supposed expense of the catapult plan. It was agreed that prime minister David Cameron and the National Security Council should be briefed on the supposed £2bn costs early in 2012, with a view to cancelling the catapults and reverting to the F-35B jump jet.

At this point it was necessary to show how it could possibly cost the same as building an entire new ship to adapt an Adaptable carrier. It was also necessary to show that the greater cost and weaker capability of jumpjet F-35Bs, as compared to catapult F-35Cs, would not simply wipe out the saving from cancelling the catapults.

Most impossibly of all, it was necessary to somehow get around the existence of the cheap, excellent, ready-to-go F-18 Hornet: no possible catapult saving, however inflated, could bridge the difference in cost between a fleet of feeble futuristic jumpjets and one of Hornets.

Enter the 13 mandarins


The 13 chosen mandarins achieved these impossible accounting miracles by making sure that nobody else, even inside the MoD, knew what they were doing.

The triumvirate controlling the group of 13 were Ursula Brennan; General Sir David Richards, chief of the defence staff; and Bernard Gray, chief of defence materiel. They made sure that only they and their 10 picked subordinates were allowed sight of the briefing they prepared for the National Security Council.

In theory, one MoD minister other than Philip Hammond was also allowed to see the figures – Sir Peter Luff, minister for defence procurement – but I have interviewed him since and he says nobody told him anything.

This secrecy was fortunate for Richards, Gray and Brennan as the figures they produced to support the £2bn-for-catapults leaks were not credible at all.

Firstly, the mandarins inflated the cost of the US-made catapult equipment by more than £300m, despite written US cost guarantees. It was also asserted that purchase of this US equipment would mean paying substantial sales tax – but this was British VAT!

Not only would British VAT not cost the Treasury anything, it didn’t have to be paid anyway: under the VAT Act, a simple international agreement, one which the US would have gladly signed, would have removed the liability.

Apart from these fictitious “costs”, the quote from the shipbuilders for adapting one of their “adaptable” ships suddenly jumped by 60pc from the 2010 figure.

Even all this was not enough to reach £2bn, however: the total then stood at £1.766bn.

At this point the 13 mandarins decided that they needed to add a substantial figure for inflation that might occur before the catapult deals would be inked, inking which they simultaneously insisted was imminent. The mandarins settled on a figure of 13.25pc inflation. This, in 2012.

This meant that the new estimated cost of adapting an Adaptable carrier came out at – good lord – exactly £2bn. Not £1.999bn, not £2.001bn: £2.000bn precisely.

The exact figure that had already been leaked by “defence insiders” many months before the 13 mandarins even started their work on this estimate, in fact.
A remarkable coincidence

The 13 mandarins didn’t limit themselves to this. With an unexplained stroke of the pen they significantly narrowed the difference in cost between F-35B and C versions. By setting these wildly lowballed costs against the wildly inflated, fictitious £2bn catapult bill, it was just possible to claim that cancelling the catapult scheme would save money.

An inconvenient report by the MoD’s research bureau just then, marked SECRET – UK EYES ONLY, was simply ignored.

The report stated that a much larger number of jumpjets would be required to achieve the same combat power as a given number of F-35C catapult planes.

I’ve been able to have a look at that report since, and it also says that the whole-life cost of an F-35C catapult fleet would be more than £2.4bn cheaper than the F-35B jumpjet – more than wiping out even the comical £2bn estimate for catapults.

Richards, Brennan and Gray forgot to include any of that report’s findings in their briefing to the prime minister.

Even all this creative accounting couldn’t possibly make a no-catapult carrier with jumpjets seem cheaper than a catapult carrier with F-18 Hornets, so the 13 mandarins seemingly discounted the existence of the F-18 (and the French Rafale).

These planes were not even mentioned in the briefing to the prime minister and National Security Council.

When the 13 mandarins were later asked why these facts had not been included they replied tellingly that they had “ruled out these alternative jets because they would require catapults and arrester gear”.

Open and shut. Richards, Gray, Brennan and the rest of the 13 mandarins were not, in fact, trying to save money, except perhaps in the very short term. They were trying to kill the catapult carrier project: and in this they succeeded – at least, so far. In May 2012 the catapult cancellation decision was announced.

As a result, last year the Queen Elizabeth, several escorting ships and 3,700 sailors, airmen and marines went into harm’s way almost unarmed.

Lord Richards, Sir Bernard Gray and Dame Ursula Brennan did not respond to requests for comment.

[FD2]

Unpicking the detail

There are some other points that should guide those now addled with this mess.

First, the Typhoon is assembled by BAE Systems. Thirty years ago under its former acronym BAE, this company had 127,000 UK employees. Today, despite colossal revenues from the UK taxpayer ever since, it has barely 30,000.

Buying things from BAE does not preserve British jobs, let alone create them.

Second, the “Eurofighter” Typhoon is not British, nor is it even European. Like almost all advanced Western military equipment it contains controlled US technology and is dependent on US tech support. It cannot even be sold to anyone without US government approval.

Eurofighter Typhoon does not deliver any independence or sovereignty for the UK. Why not just buy US directly? Why not buy the F-18 Hornet?

Third, BAE Systems plc is the prime shipbuilder for the Adaptable CVF carriers. The suddenly increased 2012 shipyard cost estimates for adapting the Adaptables should be viewed in the context of the damage a catapult carrier would do to BAE’s hugely more lucrative Typhoon business.

A BAE spokesman said: “As part of the Aircraft Carrier Alliance, we played a leading role in delivering the two Queen Elizabeth Class carriers as per the requirements of the Ministry of Defence.”

Fourth, it remains a fact that the Queen Elizabeth class Adaptable CVF carriers were specified, designed and sold from the outset with the ability to have catapults fitted at any point in their lives. It’s not believable that fitting catapults could cost anything like as much as an entire new ship.

That option is still there. We could swap our handful of F-35Bs to the US Marines and get F-35Cs instead – and, better, buy a powerful force of affordable F-18 Hornets to fill up the rest of our carriers’ huge empty decks and hangars, using a small fraction of our planned combat-jet spending.

What we do about all this is up to us, but China is watching.

Many of the facts in this article come from the National Audit Office report “Carrier Strike: The 2012 reversion decision”.

The report doesn’t name the 13 mandarins but does list them by job title, emphasising that “access to information was limited to a small group” and that this was a “unique governance structure”. General Richards’ memoir ‘Taking Command’ is also informative.

A Ministry of Defence spokesperson said: “The Queen Elizabeth Class carriers and their aircraft provide the UK with formidable choice and flexibility to operate anywhere on the global stage. With fifth generation stealth jets, which the US and other advanced nations consider a world-class asset, it reassures our friends and allies and presents a powerful deterrent to a would-be adversary.

“Last year’s deployment saw the UK’s message of peace, prosperity and security delivered to millions across the globe, through professional exercises and enduring engagement with key allies and partners. Crucially, the seamless integration of United States Marine Corps aircraft showed our joint capability for cross-deck operations.

“This activity can only happen because departmental and ministerial teams work closely together to make settled decisions over many years to bring major projects and capabilities from concept to reality. It would not happen without this professional co-operation.”

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

laughing-stock Tornado F3

You would expect me to differ strongly with this view.
The F2 with the concrete nose was indeed a joke.
The F3 did its job, and in my personal experience of DACT and Affil, I shot more F18s than got shot by them.

One would, of course, get creamed 1 on 1 in a dogfight with any of the teen fighters, so one did not do that.
And indeed, after a few years, those aircraft started using similar tactics to ourselves when flying 4v4 or larger fights.

And as soon as it gets dark, all single seaters start losing big time.

[FD2]

I thought the criticism of the F3 was a bit 'broad brush'. Some detail to back his point was needed.

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

..which is why it was missing.

A mix of single and two-seat Super Hornets was the way to go, if the UK was economically blackmailed to buy American (which it probably was). Or we could just have bought Rafale (and built them at Warton), especially given the Thales involvement with the carriers. I note the French switched to more two seaters.

[FD2]

Single crew combat aircraft, as one who has only flown Chipmunks in training, makes me think of one armed paper hangers in a gale!

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

It's fine against an enemy where you have a good numerical superiority, a good technical superiority, and/or a good training superiority.
In fact, it makes sense - single seaters are cheaper so you can have more of them.
Much of this applies to China and Russia, usually two of the three.
Whilst I talk about F3 vs F18, the fact is that fight would have been F3 vs Flanker/Fulcrum, or F18 vs Flanker/Fulcrum, or of course F3 + F18 vs Flanker/Fulcrum*.

But, try it supersonic in the dark at low level against someone who knows what they are are doing....

Just after I left, the F3s were for the first time in Nevada doing a Flag exercise (Green Flag, I think). My friend told me the F3s were doing night, low level, supersonic escort for B1s, against F15s.
The B1s had never had a supersonic low level escort available before, despite it being their primary role.**
The F15s never got a valid kill on either the F3s or the B1s, and lost a quarter of their own, every night.

* or Chinese copies thereof.

**The F15 could theoretically do it, but the ride was bumpier than one of those bucking bulls you find in Texan Rodeo bars. Try playing with the radar whilst doing that.

[Boac]

Single crew combat aircraft, as one who has only flown Chipmunks in training, makes me think of one armed paper hangers in a gale!

What, you mean like the Lightning radar control joystick with 23 functions (for the left hand) while using that hand for throttles and arse-scratching?

[Woody]

Wonder how long it will last this time

https://www.forces.net/qe-class-aircraf ... hs-repairs

[Boac]

Well, it seems to have got as far as Virginia which is good news, and it seems that she will soon be having some F-35s on board rather than a Portaloo/Portacabin

https://seapowermagazine.org/britains-l ... eployment/

[FD2]

It's a pity we have to rely on the 'cousins' to supply the extra aircraft but what can you do when you can't afford to buy the stuff yourself, the money tree being nearly bare. Scrapping most of HS2 might let the country buy a few more - at least people could travel between London and Burminkham a couple of minutes faster!

Anyway, I thought the operating limits of the aircraft had already been established through trials with HMS QE leading to its CofA release.

[Boac]

I think part of the trial is to look at what we used to call an 'RVL' on the Harrier (rolling vertical landing) which will increase max landing weight to help with returning with unspent stores.

[FD2]

Yes but they've already done that with HMS QE and it will be in whatever manuals they use these days. Perhaps they just mean training a new lot of pilots to do it.

At least they will know how to talk to each other and what to say when they go ashore. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/0 ... privilege/

Navy personnel told to introduce themselves with pronouns in trans guidance

Navy staff urged to ‘avoid micro-aggressions and to ‘keep constantly educating and researching about trans matters’
By Steven Edginton 30 September 2023 • 1:46pm

Royal Navy personnel are being told to introduce themselves with their pronouns before meetings in official guidance seen by The Telegraph.

A guide on trans and non-binary awareness tells staff: “Introducing yourself with your pronouns at the start of meetings and interactions is a good way to be inclusive.”

The guidance, available on the Royal Navy intranet, says: “Some people do not associate with gender binary and may use different pronouns like they/them or neo-pronouns like ze/hir/hirs. You should use the pronoun that a person shares with you.”

Navy staff are urged to “avoid micro-aggressions like backhanded compliments and unhelpful tips” and to “keep constantly educating and researching about trans matters”.

The Royal Navy advertised Ministry of Defence (MoD) diversity events for staff to attend on its intranet page for National Inclusion Week, which took place from Monday to Friday this week. The MoD encouraged staff “to actively participate in as many events as possible”.

The Navy trans guide also displays a “trans umbrella” that features different gender identities including gender neutral and pangender, defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as “a gender identity [that] encompasses multiple genders, which may be experienced simultaneously or in a fluid, fluctuating manner”.
‘Doesn’t help cohesion of the Navy’

Elsewhere, Royal Navy officers are told to brief sailors on white privilege and intersectionality, the idea that “different societal aspects (race, class, gender etc) of a person’s identity combine to create a unique experience of disadvantage or discrimination”.

A briefing note aimed at Navy personnel claims that “if you are ‘white’, whatever situation you are in, it is almost always the case that the outcome has not been affected by your skin colour”.

Admiral Lord West, who served as the First Sea Lord from 2002 to 2006, said: “I am surprised that the Navy wishes to try and divide ship’s companies by focusing on people’s gender rather than seeing them as all of one company.

“This initiative seems to me confusing, and doesn’t help the cohesion and fighting ability of the Navy I love.”

The guidance also boasts of the Navy being a “Stonewall top 100 employer” last year. Membership of Stonewall’s diversity schemes has been dropped by several government departments in recent years after the LGBTQ+ charity was criticised for pushing controversial ideas on transgender issues.

A Navy source said: “The main concern about all of this from a professional perspective is that it muddies the waters. If I tell a lad to fight a fire, I don’t want him saying that I’m oppressing him because of his skin colour or whatever.

“The only thing that matters in the military is that people do their jobs and work well in a team. We couldn’t care less who you sleep with or what your skin pigment is. If you have a good attitude, we like you. If you don’t, then we don’t like you.”
‘You may not even be aware of disadvantages’

The document, published on July 5, features a section on “intersectionality and privilege”. On privilege, it states that “‘white privilege’ has been talked about in the context of the Black Lives Matter protests” and “refers to the idea that skin colour can affect your lived experience such that it can either give you an advantage or be a barrier to almost all areas of life”.

It also claims that “If you are white, it also means you may not even be aware of the disadvantages that black, and minority ethnic people experience”.

Officers are given an example of privilege through a “vignette example”, entitled A Letter to Phil, which they are encouraged to use “during their meetings as a means of encouraging discussion and comments from their teams”.

The letter says: “No, Phil, you don’t get it because you haven’t spent your entire career being an afterthought. You’ve never had chafing from clothes that were designed for women. You’ve never worn three pairs of socks because the smallest pair of boots was still too big for you…

“So no, Phil, you probably don’t get why being patronised and treated as an afterthought, a misfit and a problem yet again is getting extremely dull for so many women. But maybe if you listened for five minutes rather than assuming you know it all, you might get it.”

A MoD spokesperson said: “The Royal Navy is entirely focused on protecting the UK and its interests, both at home and abroad. It’s important to encourage personnel to be respectful of others. However, this guidance does not reflect our standards and is currently under review.”

"Hello, I am 'She Ra' Goddess of the Aircraft Handlers, but you can call me She R. Any micro-transgressions will be reported to 'Crusher' Collins of the Navy Police in the Regulating office".

Will this crap never end?

[FD2]

A MoD spokesperson said: “The Royal Navy is entirely focused on protecting the UK and its interests, both at home and abroad. It’s important to encourage personnel to be respectful of others. However, this guidance does not reflect our standards and is currently under review.”

If this really is the case then who put this guidance 'out there' - we need to know who 'they' are and what has happened to 'they' after 'they' published/disseminated this crap against MOD 'standards'.

"Hello Phil I'm a victim..."

[PHXPhlyer]

If this really is the case then who put this guidance 'out there' - we need to know who 'they' are and what has happened to 'they' after 'they' published/disseminated this crap against MOD 'standards'.

But did you ask they/them if they/them were their prefered pronouns?
You might be offending and not even know it.
Oops. I (my pronoun) made an assumption about the pronoun of choice used by the entity known as FD2.

PP