Thin Pinstriped Line

  The long story of the aircraft carrier known as HMS HERMES / INS VIRAAT appears to be drawing to a close. On the 30 th of September, baring a miracle last minute intervention, she will be intentionally beached and the scrapping process will begin. This marks the end of a saga which began in 1944 when she was laid down as HMS ELEPHANT, and then commissioned some 15 years later as HMS HERMES. Her life in the Royal Navy was, apart from 1982 relatively uneventful. Indeed she spent much of her career as a carrier that felt distinctly unwanted, having been cited for decommissioning in 1966 as surplus to requirements, she somehow soldiered on as both a strike carrier (carrying about 19 jets) and latterly as an ASW/amphibious carrier with a limited harrier capability. It was really only the Falklands war that preserved her for posterity in the eyes of the public, when as the flagship of the Task Force, she led the successful liberation of the islands. Thereafter she remained in li...

  The Royal Navy aircraft carrier HMS QUEEN ELIZABETH (QE) is currently steaming in UK waters, with no less than 22 aircraft embarked, including 14 F35 jets from both the UK and the United State Marine Corps. This is the single largest deployment of UK fixed wing carrier airpower since HMS HERMES in 1983. Be in no doubt, this is a big deal. The embarkation of these jets marks a significant step forward in the journey for the Carrier Strike capability. It is the culmination of over 20 years of planning and effort by the UK, involving the efforts of the armed forces, civil service and the defence industry to generate two new aircraft carriers and their associated airwing. Image by Ministry of Defence; © Crown copyright It is worth thinking about the level of vision required to deliver this – in 1998, when the project was confirmed in the Strategic Defence Review, the UK had not operated a big deck carrier for 20 years, while the then First Sea Lord (Admiral Sir Jock Slater) had ...

  When things go wrong at home, or natural disaster strikes, there are often calls and demands to ‘send in the armed forces’. Often this is entirely sensible, permitting access to much required equipment, people and resources to render emergency support and save lives. This process is well tried and tested and works well. But there is also often suggestions that when things go more widely wrong that somehow ‘sending in the military’ is an essential requirement to fix whatever problem has emerged. The general argument is that they represent a disciplined, accountable force that will follow political direction and resolve the problems put in front of them with a ‘can do’ attitude and a sense of accountability. Is this really the case though and does involving the military in domestic crises help or hinder responses?  The big challenge with involving the armed forces in UK operations outside of their own pre-existing  commitments is that there are not many spare resource...

Should the Royal Navy up arm and up gun its River class offshore patrol vessels? A simple question, but one which seems to spur more debate on online naval debating space than any other issue. In many ways, although fantastic ships, the Rivers are perhaps the wrong size – too big to appear like an OPV, too small to be an escort, they strike many commentators as ‘the little big ships that could’. Much derisory comment is made about their main armament being a 30mm gun, while others see huge potential for upgunning them with masses of additional weaponry. Some of these suggestions are routine – for example maybe adding additional remote weapon stations or a UAV capability. Others seem determined to turn an OPV into a frigate – adding larger main guns or anti-ship missiles. Finally some suggestions veer on the radical – turning them into ASW corvettes for example. HMS FORTH in the Falkland Islands - Image by Ministry of Defence; © Crown copyright The challenge for all these u...

The Daily Mail has reported that the Royal Navy is looking at plans to deploy HMS QUEEN ELIZABETH to sea carrying more US than British F35 jets. This is reportedly due to the speed of planned procurement, and could see 20 US jets embarked to a smaller number of UK ones. This has led to criticism from MPs that the Royal Navy must not make the ship an multi-national one. Is this reasonable, and is this something that people should be concerned about? The plan for the carriers since their inception has been to build over a long period of time two aircraft carriers, supported by an F35 force, able to put to sea with supporting elements and deliver the Carrier Strike Group concept. This idea forms the centrepiece for the future operational vision for the Royal Navy, which sees itself as having two CSG’s able to deploy at high readiness around the world to support British and international missions as required. This is a slow project though, as the NAO has pointed out, the f...

Sometimes it is very easy to take things for granted, but never question why we do them.  We take the wearing of headgear in the armed forces for granted and probably don’t think about it in any meaningful way.   It was in this vein perhaps that Twitter user ‘ Sleepy Greenie’ (some may ask if there is there any other sort?) asked a very reasonable question today: “ In the 21 st Century, other than for ceremonial reasons, does the Royal Navy need headgear ”? The Royal Navy has four different types of daily headgear in use – the traditional sailors caps, the male officers and senior rates cap, the female tricorn and finally the generic beret.  All of these are worn for different reasons and circumstances, with, in the most broad of terms, the beret being worn in working circumstances at sea or operations, while the cap is more usually worn for office wear or on shore (although can be worn at sea too).  Different circumstances call for different outfits, and...