“O, brave new world that has such people in't!” - The MOD Future Combat Air Strategy

On the opening day of the Farnborough International Air Show, the UK has published its ‘Future Combat Air Strategy’ (HERE), a document that sets out how the MOD will develop and acquire its next generation of fighter aircraft to replace the Typhoon, led by a team to be called ‘Project TEMPEST’.

This announcement has been greeted with a mixture of delight and some concern across the defence social media space, with people pleased to see the UK investing in future airpower, but with questions being raised about the cost. So what does this announcement actually mean?

The plans to replace the current fast jet force have developed considerably over many years. Looking back to the early 2000s there was a project known as ‘FOAS’ (Future Offensive Air System), which was intended to provide a Tornado replacement in 2017. Nothing came of it, and in 2005 it was cancelled and replaced by the Deep Persistent Offensive Capability (DPOC) programme, which in turn was cancelled in the 2010 SDSR.

Since that point, while the RAF has fully recognised the need to replace Typhoon, only very limited studies have been carried out, while the 2015 SDSR extended the out of service date to the late 2030s, if not beyond. Buried deep in the 2015 review though was a commitment to fund £2bn of public and private research by industry into capability demonstrators to help inform on decisions in the mid 2020s to deliver a Typhoon replacement. On July 16^th, it was announced that the UK Government was funding the delivery of a strategy to begin to develop a range of options to in time order a new generation fighter aircraft in 2025.

“Now I will believe that there are unicorns...” 

The importance of this announcement is that it recommits the Government to taking forward work on delivering a replacement for Typhoon and not kicking the decision into the long term ‘to do’ list. In itself this is important – it recommits money found during the 2015 review from both MOD and BEIS (rather than announcing new money) and publicly confirms that the UK will be committed to this work.

The key thing to note firstly is that this is not about creating a brand new ‘British Wonder Jet’ called Tempest. The mock up that the Secretary of State stood next to was merely a technology demonstrator highlighting what could be done in due course and was in no way reflective of any specific design. The jet has also not actually been named ‘Tempest’ yet either, rather the programme team that has been set up to look at this will be called ‘Team Tempest’ – a pedantic point that will doubtless keep internet trolls and Wikipedia editors busy for years to come…

The second key point is that it is exceptionally unlikely that this jet will be a purely British build – anyone who thinks otherwise would do well to read the strategy, and the lengthy chapter entitled ‘international by design’, which offers a clear statement on the UK Governments views about the benefits of international co-operation in aircraft design.

From a practical perspective, the sheer cost of the project relative to the likely small number of airframes to be purchased (replacing a current force of approximately 160 Typhoons) means that unit cost will grow exponentially if a partner nation isn’t found. Realistically there is no way that the UK (or other nations in a similar position) could afford to develop a new combat aircraft from scratch and manufacture it in affordable numbers.

The plan instead is that the MOD will over the next year or so scope out potential international partners who could be approached to form a consortium, similar to the Typhoon or Tornado project and then establish a credible partnership to design and deliver these aircraft.

“I would not wish any companion in the world but you” 

In realistic terms there aren’t that many nations who the UK will realistically want to approach who are going to be in the market for a future generation fighter. The French and Germans are already engaged in talks to design a new aircraft, while Italy, Spain and Sweden will all wish to replace their Eurofighters and Grippen aircraft.

At the risk of delving into the Brexit debate, one of the key challenges now is going to be to secure a deal which permits easy transfer of parts between manufacturing locations. Anyone who has been to Warton and stood on the production line will know well that it relies heavily on ‘just in time delivery’ from across Europe to manufacture aircraft on an almost Airfix kit like basis. If the ability to conduct this sort of seamless manufacturing process is disrupted, then it will make the UK a far less appealing partner for many European nations who may otherwise be in the market to build aircraft.

It is likely that Middle Eastern nations operating Typhoon will be interested, particularly given the emphasis in the region now of upskilling local workforces (such as Saudi Arabia’s 2030 Vision project) and they may wish to put capital in now, ahead of securing a manufacturing plant in due course.  

In those circumstances, where non NATO nations were involved, there would be issues both with technology transfer, ITAR and also arms control agreements like MTCR if the UK designed an unmanned aircraft too, that would restrict the nations able to co-operate with us to design and export this capability.

The US may be interested, but the UK would be a very minor player and would need to accept considerable compromise in the amount of manufacturing that it got from any design, albeit with the reward of significantly reduced manufacturing costs. Outside of this, the market in the next 2-3 years will be relatively small for nations looking to design and develop new aircraft – not merely buy off the shelf.

This is the crucial point – from a timing perspective, the UK is looking for partners now to deliver an aircraft in about 20 years time – getting nation states to commit funding and resources this far out to a project, particularly those who have maybe not built aircraft before, will be challenging.

“Misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows.”

Assuming the UK can find a partner, or if the decision is taken to go it alone in the interim period, it is likely that a decision on the initial type of aircraft to be built will not be taken before 2020, with no firm decision taken before 2025, pending an initial operating capability in the mid 2030s and full operational capability in the early 2040s.

This is a long period of time to sustain a major expensive project, particularly noting that two of the main review points will straddle a Defence Review and a General Election (depending on when the next 5 year SDSR is held – 2020, or 2023 if the MDP is counted as a ‘review’). This provides a lot of opportunities for projects to be deferred, delayed or descoped.

At a time when the MOD is facing significant budgetary challenges, and there is as yet no clear signal on the MDP Review outcomes being announced, it is a sign of how seriously the UK Government places investment in its aviation sector that this 2015 funding commitment will still be honoured in full. This is a reassuring sign that the strategic importance of the UK aviation industry is fully recognised, and that there is a long term plan in place to nurture and sustain it.

It is also important to note that the Department for Business Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) is playing a central role in supporting this work. Putting a complex strategy at the heart of cross-departmental outputs isn’t always easy as it requires getting two organisations with vastly different goals and objectives to co-operate and deliver effectively. This announcement helps underpin the importance of the wider HMG Industrial Strategy and should be seen in very positive terms as helping demonstrate the recognition that sustaining the defence aviation sector is not just a job for the MOD to worry about.

“Be free, and fare thou well!” 

Overall this announcement is good news for the UK – it marks the the ongoing commitment by HMG to work with industry to ensure that the UK remains a world leading aviation nation, capable of manufacturing the most advanced aircraft out there.

It also demonstrates the long-term plan for the RAF is to continue operating highly advanced aircraft long into the middle of the century. However, time is tight and the 7 years between todays announcement and the final investment decision are likely to go quickly, as is the 10 years between that and IOC. The challenge will be for HMG to make decisions in a timely enough manner that ensures industry does not have unavoidable gaps in construction – the lessons of the ASTUTE class, where gaps between finishing the TRAFALGAR class and then moving to construction of the A class were a painful lesson in the enormous cost associated with procrastination.

It perhaps too makes a mockery of the ridiculous story in the Sunday Telegraph that claimed that Airbus was being punished for its comments on Brexit by losing a key contract to Boeing (HERE) In a world where procurement decisions are made in cycles of several years, the idea that in less than a month the MOD can be agile enough to take a decision that is nakedly political in nature, and which would were it actually true be a serious breach of procurement rules, highlights how over the top and ill-informed some media coverage on defence has become recently.

There is a long road ahead before Team Tempest produce a design, let alone a decision on what the future capability will be. But it is certain that whatever is produced, it will benefit from the world beating skills and capabilities of the UK defence and aviation sector. There are hugely exciting times ahead for the RAF as it enters into its second century.

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