[shortbread]

A scathing report on the state of affairs at UK's Royal Navy. Albeit to the smart punter one there must be a lot of opportunities! Technical collaboration & transfer, purchase of vessels due early retirement, sharing of facilities, joint exercises etc..etc... I am sure much smarter folk sitting in the upper rung of India's Naval forces must be thinking the same as well.

All of the Royal Navy’s £1billion destroyers are tied up in dock - The embarrassing sight of the half dozen Type 45s confined to port is a far cry from when Britain ruled the waves - and comes at the close of what was meant to be a historic 12 months for the Fleet.

The 8,000-ton guided missile destroyers are stuck in dock through a devastating combination of equipment failures, manpower shortages and routine maintenance.

The revelation comes after it emerged the £3.1billion Queen Elizabeth aircraft carrier - which will become the flagship - has sprung a leak and needs repairs just a week after she was commissioned into the Navy.

There are mounting fears the Navy’s two amphibious assault ships, Bulwark and Albion, will be scrapped in a looming defence review. And the helicopter carrier HMS Ocean is due to be pulled out of service within months, with no replacement.

Last month MPs warned the Navy was increasingly being forced to “cannibalise” its warships and submarines for spare parts after funding was cut.

“There has been hollowing out of defence and in the Navy’s case this means that there is not enough training, there aren’t enough spares, the work that needs to be done on the 45s hasn’t been started on any of them yet. There are insufficient people to man various ships - the hollowing out is very damaging, and in the Navy’s case it has an impact on our ability.”

Labour peer Lord West, whose ship HMS Ardent was sunk in the Falklands and who was a Security Minister from 2002 to 2006, added: “We don’t have enough frigates, our destroyers need to have repair work, we’ve got insufficient people, we’re going to pay off Ocean - which is a strategic nonsense – overall it is a very gloomy picture.

HMS Diamond became the sixth destroyer in dock when she limped home from a high-profile NATO deployment in the Gulf after breaking down. She suffered problems with a propeller that could not be fixed at sea. The destroyers have been plagued by engine breakdowns in warm waters and need repairs which involve cutting holes in their hulls. Embarrassingly, the Navy was unable to send a replacement.

In 1985 the Navy had four aircraft carriers, two assault ships, 15 destroyers and 41 frigates.

Today, it has one aircraft carrier which leaks, has no planes and does not come into service until 2020, and a second which is being built and which critics fear may never enter service.Two assault ships face being scrapped, the six destroyers are all in dock and 13 ageing frigates, which start to be retired in 2023.

Reminds one of the state of affairs in Russia during the late 90s. Perhaps not as grim, but the Rn now looks a shadow of what it once was.

Source: http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politic...pe-45-11722210

[V.Narayan]

Originally Posted by shortbread

A scathing report on the state of affairs at UK's Royal Navy.
Reminds one of the state of affairs in Russia during the late 90s. Perhaps not as grim, but the RN now looks a shadow of what it once was.

Source: http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politic...pe-45-11722210

Yes it is rather dismaying to see the Royal Navy (RN) gradually fade down to this level. It is still an institution of excellence and it will be a sad day for naval enthusiasts world over when if it gets reduced further by second grade politicians. Other than its very competent submarine arm and a still effective amphibious capability the RN is short on all other fronts. The RN today has only 22 general surface combat vessels (Destroyers, Frigates, Corvettes and large ocean going Off-Shore Patrol Vessels) in comparison to 59 with the Indian Navy, 42 with Japan's Maritime Self Defense Force and 48 with South Korea. Note I am not even talking about China or the US Navy.

[shortbread]

Originally Posted by ads11

Coming back to Brazil, they are most definitely looking at HMS Ocean to replace the Sao Paulo. Instead of a costly late life refit of a geriatric vessel, they quickly saw the opportunity to grab a much newer one and have wisely scrapped those plans. Real shame for the aviation aficionados as it spells the end of the last Naval Skyhawks still in use. I think the Ocean would be better placed for the Brazilians. Would offer them more flexibility in terms of what it could be used for, including what I imagine will mostly involve humanitarian aid ops.

Looks like its confirmed now. Wow, what a steal, £85 million for a ship that had a £65 million refit in 2014. Amigos bem feitos!

Brazil has now confirmed the purchase of British helicopter carrier HMS Ocean.

We were informed by a source in the Brazilian defence community that the vessel has been sold for £84 million.

https://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/braz...an-84-million/

[SmartCat]

Indian Navy amphibious ships are equipped with WM-18 rocket launcher, made by L&T Defence. These are used to clear out a beach just before an amphibious landing.





https://www.lnt-defence.com/our-offe...auncher-wm-18/

Rocket Launcher WM-18 is used for beach clearing operations by the Landing Ship Tank class of ships, before executing amphibious operations. The weapon system comprises two launcher mounts, one each, for port and starboard. This launcher is a complete electro-hydraulic system, stabilized against ship's roll and pitch. The Rocket Launcher WM-18 can be slaved to a Director Sight and is equipped with a weapon reloading system.

Defensive/Offensive weaponry of Shardul-class landing ships:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shardu...k_landing_ship

[V.Narayan]

LST's {Landing Ship, tanks}, INS Cheetah, INS Guldar and INS Kumbhir decommissioned

Three medium Landing Ships, Tank or LSTs have been decommissioned ie retired simultaneously after 40+ years of service. These ships have been written about at the opening of this thread and were the second batch of the first set of modern, post WW2 amphibious ships of the Navy. Collectively these 3 fine warships sailed 17 lakh nautical miles, clocked 12,300 sea days and 1300 beach landings over their commissions. In its era this was one of the most successful LST designs if not the most successful - 111 were built. One thing about the Soviet Navy is that they always gave us the most proven and reliable designs of what they had. The fact they were kept in commission for about 5 to 8 years before their normal life span indicates the shortage of vessels in the Navy. On one hand we are not commissioning ships fast enough and on the other we have forced schemes such as agniveer/agnipath on the Navy where we need highly skilled technical manpower.

Class: Polnocny Class, Soviet design, Polish built
Type: Medium Tank Landing Ship
Displacement: ~1150 tonnes full load
Length: 84 metres
Beam 9.7 metres
Capacity: 8 to 10 armoured vehicles + 150 to 180 troops
Armament: 2 x Twin 30mm AK230 anti-aircraft guns {and in some cases CRN91 30mm single barrel surface attack gun} + 122mm rocket artillery launchers for shore bombardment.

INS Cheetah at sea