UK to swap JSFs to carrier variant, axe Harrier and Nimrod

[Fouga]

http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/2010/10/19/348641/cameron-uk-to-swap-jsfs-to-carrier-variant-axe-harrier-and-nimrod.html


Aircraft
DATE:19/10/10
SOURCE:Flightglobal.com


Cameron: UK to swap JSFs to carrier variant, axe Harrier and Nimrod
By Craig Hoyle



The BAE Systems Harrier GR9, Nimrod MRA4 and Lockheed Martin’s short take-off and vertical landing F-35B have been confirmed as the main casualties of the UK coalition government’s Strategic Defence and Security Review (SDSR).

Announcing the results of the review process on 19 October, prime minister David Cameron said the Royal Air Force’s long-delayed Nimrod MRA4 programme is to be cancelled, while the UK’s remaining Harriers will be retired early to safeguard the service’s fleet of Panavia Tornado GR4s, which he says deliver more capability in Afghanistan.

Cameron also slammed the previous Labour government’s selection of the F-35B, and says the UK intends to switch its selection to the JSF’s “more capable, less expensive and longer-range” carrier variant (F-35C pictured below). The decision will also require one of the Royal Navy’s two Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carriers to be equipped with catapult launch equipment.



Previous plans to greatly increase the size of the RAF’s Boeing CH-47 Chinook fleet have also been watered down, with the Ministry of Defence to acquire just 12 more aircraft. This will increase the RAF’s inventory of the type to 60 aircraft, Cameron says, with an earlier commitment to upgrade the service’s Eurocopter Puma transports to be safeguarded.

Other actions announced by Cameron include plans to cut 5,000 RAF personnel by 2015. This will leave the service with an operating strength of 33,000.

Cancellation of the Nimrod MRA4 programme brings to an end a troubled acquisition programme worth around £3.6 billion – the bulk of which has already been spent. Contracted in 1996, the project was originally to have delivered 21 maritime patrol aircraft, but had subsequently been slashed to just nine.



The decision leaves the UK with no dedicated maritime patrol aircraft capability, and extends a gap caused by the retirement of the RAF’s last Nimrod MR2s earlier this year.

Cameron says the measures to be adopted will result in financial savings worth £4.7 billion over the life of the review period. The process was launched to address a defence budget “Black Hole” totalling £38 billion.

[Pink Panther]

The canx of Nimrod with no replacement will have a knock on effect here where top cover is concerned. I know C-130 j's are filling this gap for the UK where possible, but they too are also for the axe.

[Fouga]

The canx of Nimrod with no replacement will have a knock on effect here where top cover is concerned. I know C-130 j's are filling this gap for the UK where possible, but they too are also for the axe.

Axe a C-130J? Are you sure? The J Model is the latest in the Hercules Design.

[Frank]

The RAF are retiring the C-130J's by 2022(ish), 10 years earlier than planned. They'll be flying C-17's, A400's & A330 tankers only by then.

[Fouga]

The RAF are retiring the C-130J's by 2022(ish), 10 years earlier than planned. They'll be flying C-17's, A400's & A330 tankers only by then.

I know what they were buying but im shocked at them doing that to the Herc, would this also have something to do with the closing of RAF Lyneham?

[Frank]

Dunno about base closures yet...

[Fouga]

Dunno about base closures yet...

Lyneham is going in 2012 and Kinloss is to go too.

[Paul McA]

Some crazy and dangerous descisions in my opinion.

Rumors the R1 Sentinal is also for the chop when the Afghanistan mission ends.

Looks like the RAF/RN have been well and truely kicked in the nuts.
I think the F-35 is an expensive and unproven aircraft-why not just buy new Harriers?;probably because the yanks don`t want to build them anymore (The Harrier project went to McDonnell Douglas as BAE could not afford to develop the aircraft on it`s own)

The two carriers are to go ahead,but one will NEVER be used-can`t find any logic in that  ;and to axe the MR4A project only a few months before it was due to enter service and cost over £3.5 Billion is plain bonkers 

I wonder if the 4 Rivet Joint aircraft lease/purchase is still going ahead?

[Irish251]

The Sentinels are to go as you say, post-Afghanistan, on the basis that their role can be effectively discharged by unmanned assets in the future.  It seems the RC-135 plan is still live.