With all the discussion recently about cuts and rising costs, gap filling and cheap solutions what are the most appropriate design drivers for new equipment?
It’s a problem that seems to afflict all nations with a defence industry, performance is always involved in a race; higher, faster, further and more destructive but given the huge disparity in equipment quality between modern capabilities and the most common opponents is it time to change the runners and riders in the race?
Instead of putting performance at the forefront of equipment should we, as a fundamental requirement, be demanding cost reductions, maintenance overheads and other cost related characteristics?
Of course, these are always design factors and the reality is that sometimes the scope for doing so is limited but if a manufacturer of say, a combat aircraft, were to design something that had a modest performance but at a fraction of the cost of the latest hi tech toy, would it be a success?
How good is good enough?
Simplicity is very difficult but perhaps we are making things more difficult than we need.
This is by and large what I have ben arguing since the fall of the wall.
Examples: -
Such an aircraft was and is the AMX.
The A10 was designed from day one with simplicity in mind.
How about basing our wheeled apc’s etc on current truck technology like the MAN trucks, rather than the Stryker type suspenisons and engines. something like the Ratel south african vehicles for example.
I know we in the UK tend to see armoured recce through a CVR(T) shaped prism but that aside, look at the design, a model of simplicity and it is this basic simplicity that has given it longevity, 40 odd years in service with constant upgrades.
It wasn’t designed with ‘growth’ it was designed with ‘simplicity’
As you say, look at big trucks, in many ways, some of the underlying technologies are ages old but designers have concentrated on making them easier to maintain and cheaper to run instead of making them go faster
Is there a lesson there
ah the siren song of simplicity.
don’t be fooled by its allure. simpler times, simpler issues, simpler weapons…sounds good in theory but in practice they get ripped apart on the modern battle field.
you could build a simple destroyer…watch how long it lasts in modern warfare. simple aircraft…they’d be destroyed before the pilot even knew there was a threat. simple armored vehicles and your crews will be destroyed so quickly that you would in essence have an infantry force (because the troops would abandon the vehicles).
oh and lets take some of the examples. the A-10 simple? double and in some places triple redundancy. hardly simple…and we haven’t even discussed the gun. the CVR(T)? it would be shredded by infantry … probably with modern AT-4′s or even RPG-29′s.
sorry guys but simplicity saves money and costs lives.
Come on TD, you have done a post on all the brilliant vehicles that we could have had to replace CVR(T) over the last 20 years !
It’s longevity in service has nothing to do with simplicity and everything to do with the truly frakked up attempts to replace it !!
“Higher, faster, further and more destructive”.
given the state of the equipment our armed services a operating, most shuold in the short to medium term be replaced like for like with obvious conditions such as we can’t reopen the CVR(T) productions line. The opportunity should be taken to rationalise where possible and every effort should be made to keep operating costs down.
Whenever people mention not going for top of the line equipment the “Big Bad Enemy” Mafia raise their collective heads and start quoting things based on the belief that every bad guy from now on is going to have 100s of SA-XX, or Kirov type ships that need state of the art equiment to deal with them.
I am not advocating basing all our future defence needs on fighting wars like Afghanistan but we need a large dose of realism. Do we need to be able to conduct day one operations again a top tire opponent by ourselves? I would say yes in a limited way yes, with systems like TLAM. Do we need to put the majority of our efforts into equipping ourselves to fight intervention operations the scale like Sierra Leone and other lower tier opposition by ourselves? Yes Should we be able to support our allies in larger operations? Yes Should we match all the capabilities of our allies? NO
With the current funding issues quantity now needs to take priority over quality. The RN is the prime case for this arguement though the recent and planned future cuts in the RAF almost put it on par. we now need more Platforms as against Systems. Once you have the platforms you can add the systems later when funds allow.
There is a major caveat though. WE must ensure curretn platforms are utilised to their full potential before we start looking for new ones. In the case of the CVR(T) this has happened and more. Other platforms lie Typhoon have been starved of developement funding in order to fund other projects putting its evolution well behind the proper curve and actually in jepardy of never reaching its potential.
There has been a debate abour “Vanilla” platforms comming into service with the bare minimum specs. This for me is the future. AS long as there is a planned and funded growth programme it allows new kit to be brought into service cheaper and on time. Contractors know where a programme stands for the outset and cam plan accordingly allowing them the keep costs down. It alos encourages designs to be future adaptive where space and capacity are built in to allow future growth. The T23 was a good example of how this was not done. Though an effective platform its growth was limited and more by luck was able to adapt to changing roles. The planned CVR(T) replacement also falls into this catagory. the basic platform is large enough to be adapted to a number of additional roles over time that could allow it not only to replace the CVR(T) family but also the remaining FV430 family and even the Warrior. Typhoon should have been in this catagory also but this programme should be written up as not how to do things and how to waist a golden opportunity to adapt the RAF for the 21st century.
So before we go looking for the next Biggest, Fastest, deadliest lets look at what we actually need, and want we need to do.
Withdraw from international development projects where there isn’t a) a clear leader to the project in terms of workshare (eg about 50%) and b) no off the shelf solution we cannot license produce. That should clear off most of the crap
In the west we have always looked at technology to balance the lack of manpower compared to our potential foes. Having a relative technical lead is still important today, but what we need is a more balanced approach. Still have a core of sophistication, but ensure that the bulk is simplier which match our current requirements. For example, if we had designed the T45 as a GP vessel we could have bought fewer high end escorts in total and then designed the T26 to be much simplier, or dare I say it bought off the shelf.
This leads me on to my next point, which is defence is more about business and politics than it is about the need to defend the country. Military kit is like any commodity with suppliers selling their new improved versions, the MOD is like a consumer who cannot bring themselves to buy the ‘basic’ range. Also, better coordination and less sensitivity around sharing technical secrets with our strategic partners would help things enormously.
As I’m sure specific programme examples will be batted back-n-forth in the comments, lets see if we can agree that although simplicity for simplicity’s sake can be take too far as to be counterproductive; it is none the less useful, with a sliding scale of complexity, to see where appropriate simplicity can be applied (if nothing else to help out the poor in-theatre maintainer!).
To use one of the most frequent misquotes of Voltaire:
Perfection is the enemy of good enough.
Hi Repulse, a good guiding thought
“Still have a core of sophistication, but ensure that the bulk is simplier which match our current requirements. ”
- I think the countries that squeeze the most of their defence “dollars” like Israel, Singapore, Finland, Denmark… follow this principle
- they stay on the “tech curve” with items that most relate to countering likely threats effectively, but they upgrade other kit several times over their service lives (to maintain the quality/ quantity balance)
Hi LJ,
RE ” the basic platform is large enough to be adapted to a number of additional roles over time that could allow it not only to replace the CVR(T) family but also the remaining FV430 family and even the Warrior”… and the tracked field artillery
All we need is that kind of programme put in place, to run over, say, ten years, and have
- a limited number of MBTs
- a limited number of wheeled formations (Stryker has finally got the v-hulled, mine-resistant variant), for which the heavier punch is delivered by resurrecting the Supacat platform for (R) and (G)
- all the rest coming out of the ASCOD programme (but with the low rate of production, to conserve budget, thus the Warrior upgrade deal should still go ahead… it is now on a year’s hold, but will that repeat so many times over that in the end it is not worth it anymore?)
Just as Stalin once said that “quantity has a quality all of its own” so I think quality can have a quantity all of its own.
That is to say that there comes a point where a high performance platform will simply trash anything that is too many rungs beneath it in the technology ladder. At that point the numbers game becomes prohibitive for an enemy. Even though their platforms are cheap, the sheer number required makes the cost unbearable.
This is one of the reason America has such a dominant position. Who else can afford to go toe to toe with them on defence spending?
I have a lot of sympathy with the original post, and also with LJ’s response. We really do need to get the politicians (preferably via an all-party commission, but that’s probably expecting too much rationality) to decide on what they want the military to be able to do in the foreseeable future before we can sort out what capabilities we need. Equipment requirements would be defined by the required capabilities.
Having said that, there are certain areas which can be looked at in order to save money – and certain areas which shouldn’t be.
A family of AFVs with a sound basic design and the flexibility to be adapted to a wide range of purposes is a very obvious given. These should use COTS components wherever possible (eg engines and transmissions) but should include military-specific features where needed (eg mine-protected structure, seating etc).
One area of costly sophistication which may soon prove necessary (for at least a proportion of the AFV fleet) is a hard-kill self-defense system to knock out incoming missiles.
Turning to warships, it has often been remarked that for most purposes, we could use very much simpler and cheaper vessels than we do. A twin-screw diesel vessel of maybe 2,500 tons with a medium-calibre gun, one or two close-in guns and a chopper pad+hangar would be more than enough for the great majority of missions.
However, we have to bear in mind that anti-ship missiles are increasingly common and that anything designated as a warship should have some realistic protection against them. One possible answer is to make the gun a 76mm OTO and buy the Strales anti-missile ammunition/fire control system for it. Stick a Phalanx on the hangar roof and you’ve got two overlapping anti-missile systems which are also useful for other purposes (the Phalanx 1B has an EO aiming system for dealing with small boats etc).
One complication is submarines, which are proliferating in second and third level navies. Modern conventional subs can be very good indeed, especially in the littoral, so some sophistication in terms of detection system and preferably hard-kill defences against torpedoes may also be needed.
Aircraft are possibly the area of greatest uncertainty, both because modern top-level combat aircraft are so incredibly expensive and because their roles are increasingly threatened by other solutions – such as guided missiles and UCAVs – in a way which the roles of warships and AFVs (in general) are not. The obvious economical solution is to buy small numbers of something reasonably state-of-the-art off the shelf.
If we go this route there needs to be a complete change in the way mod cost programs and people view them. To have more redundancy longer times between maintenance ect means initial unit cost goes up but thru life comes down. Cradle to grave cost will need to be the baseline. Compare the often criticised type 45 to Spanish ship type 45 more expensive but requires half the crew and half as much refueling life cycle costs significantly less but that’s not seen. Also as much common chasis for vehicles (oscelot is the future) same for ships and a/c with engines electronic ect. Stop each service defining specs for similar capabilities and then buying 3 different systems from 3 different suppliers would be a gd start
What we need is a sensible foreign policy. One that rules out intervening in third world civil wars. i.e. Afghanistan, Libya etc.
Such a policy would concentrate on defending the UK and contributing to NATO’s defence of its members territories.
This would make equipment provision much simpler.
I’m afraid I’m not on side.
Although maintainability matters, and through life costs are massivly important, we need effectiveness and survivability far more.
There isnt political will to maintain a large standing military, even if its cheaper than maintaining a small elite military.
There isnt political will to suffer losses either.
And As Chris B points out, there comes a time when technology makes any advantage in numbers irrelevent.
Seriously, how many T55′s do think you’d need to beat a Chally2?
Enough to run it out of ammunition and fuel?
The primary problem F22 would have against the F4 is running out of missiles and bullets.
I think we do a pretty good job of prioritising maintainability, the Eurofighter is better than the Tornado by any measure, but requires less maintenance, the T45 makes the T42 look like a flack emplacement, but has 100 less crew.
I maintain, our problems are primarily caused by simply doing the wrong thing out of tribal loyalty and inertia.
Most common opponants is a very bad measure.
Because every time we do it, it turns around and bites us on the arse.
If you have to choose wether you lose the indian mutiny or the second world war, only the mad pick India.
I think theres often a wrong headed view that ‘presence’ ships can be low end. Lets say Indonesia gets a bit uppity and threatens to slap around Malaysia and Singapore.
We decide we dont like that, so send the Far East Guard ship to have a poke around.
If that guard ship is a corvette with starstreak, a 40mm autocannon and a commerical sonar, no one will care, even if its 5 of them.
If its an extended T45/23 hybrid with a 128cell cruise missile launcher, it can make a difference.
Psychology Matters.
Statisticaly speaking, North Vietnamese SAMs were ineffective, yet American pilots feared them above all else.
During The Falklands, the Argentine Navy was prepared to put to sea and take on the Royal Navy, despite being outnumbered and outclassed.
But they ran to port when a solitary submarine struck.
Simplicity is not the problem, unlike making assumptions about the context of the question, asking the wrong question, or been unclear in your objectives.
Expensive, fragile, white elephants, a product of a cossetted defense industry and bloated MOD civilian staff and top brass self-aggrandizement.
Political not Navy.
http://debka.com/article/20917/
“If the Atlantic Alliance, and especially Britain and France which are spearheading the Libya campaign, are short of the resources they need for overcoming a Libyan army consisting essentially of four to five brigade-strength military frameworks fighting without air cover, hard questions must be asked about the alliance and its 26 members’ real military worth.”
Efficacy: capacity for producing a desired result or effect
In terms of capacity, availability, flexibility, effectiveness, quantity, sustainability etc.
Against Somali Pirates, Libya or more capable potential opponents like Russia or China etc.
Potential opponents with just AK47′s and RPG’s or the full spectrum with area denial weapons including missiles and submarines, with respect to Aircraft carriers.
It may be off topic for this blog.
Just curious, and provocative.
@DJ
“I think theres often a wrong headed view that ‘presence’ ships can be low end. Lets say Indonesia gets a bit uppity and threatens to slap around Malaysia and Singapore.
We decide we dont like that, so send the Far East Guard ship to have a poke around.
If that guard ship is a corvette with starstreak, a 40mm autocannon and a commerical sonar, no one will care, even if its 5 of them.
If its an extended T45/23 hybrid with a 128cell cruise missile launcher, it can make a difference.”
Low-end ships are for low-end threats (i.e. business as usual). Two (or more) substantial countries squaring up to each other does not remotely count as a “low end threat”; in fact we would be foolish in the extreme to try to intervene even with the best we’ve got, except as a part of an international task force (including the USN).
Incidentally, Singapore is well able to defend itself against anyone else in the SE, anyway – and possesses armed forces appreciably more powerful than anything we could send out there.
One argument I find interesting is that between platform-centric and capability-centric. It is why I like concepts like auxiliary (containership) cruisers, packplanes, pimped up Hawks, transport-bombers, airships, etc. These are not a complete answer – we still need expensive dedicated hi-tech platforms for specific missions – but increasingly it appears sensors, weapons, and carriage are becoming distinct; do you need a smart vehicle to deploy a smart weapon?
The UK is too small to be simple, you have to compensate with high tech. As mentioned above, Stalin could have worse tech than the Germans because he had so much in quantity. The UK does not have quantity and so needs the highest quality. That is why the UK should be entirely naval-centric, the UK could go against China’s navy and win, forget about going against China’s army. China could have more people in its army that the entire population of the UK.
@JS, you make a fair point but, within a given sum of money, would it be better to have (say) 12 high-end warships, or 8 high-end plus 12 low-end so you don’t waste the high-end ones on routine tasks?
TW
12 high end.
Because we’ll never have enough to win the war and fly the flag, and winning thwe war is the more important of the two.
I dont get this fascination with “low end” warship that just dont do anything.
I’m fine with assault ships mounting CB2020 anti piracy patrols, because assault ships have a war purpose as well.
I dont get “low end” frigates, because they have no war purpose and frankly arent that effective at anti piracy either.
OK been out at work all day so here goes the counterblast to the posters who are arguing carry on regardless…..
Solomon
Why would simple kit be destroyed quickly??
Why would a MAN 8×8 truck based MICV be any more vulnerable than a FRES??
Why would a ‘simple’ destroyer be destroyed quickly. What anti ship missile cares about whether the ship is deisel or gas turbine powered?
A10 yes its triple redundant etc, however lets take a checklist of things it hasent got
computer controled relaxed stability wly by wire- no
Ultra expensive low bypass let engine developed for the plane – no
High end composite airframe – no
Designed from the beginin to be easily repaired in the field – yes
Deliberatly avoided complex flap systems – yes
Designed to use state of the production art equipment- yes.
Chris B
Obviously simpler cannot mean crap the T55 is simply an obsolete design.. and witha transversly mounted v12 alloy deisel engine not that simple to fixe etc.
How many 8×8 wheeled antitank missile vehicles could a Challanger destroy before one got lucky?
Mark
As one of the ‘OFT’ who criticise the T45, there are a lot of assertions about how cheap it is to run (whe will see when one is finally steaming arround fully equiped).
JS
Not sure stalin’s army was that much low tech than the germans.
The comparative testing of soviet V German tanks carried out by the soviets and published after the end of the wall, was most interresting.
EG King tiger V JS2 Rusians thought, (and this is the interresting bit; that KT was mechanically not fit for the battlefield being completly unreliable. The armour was of poor quality and test firing found that when hit by the JS gun even when not penatrated the hull had the habit of the plates springing apart. This was the tank that caused every western tanker to sh*t himself… Just one example.
AK47 anyone.
Ok so where are we?
Currently we have the best strike aircraft in the world, the best fighter in the world, the best cruise missile in the world flown by the best pilots in the world, from the best airforce in the world…
V
One bonkers dictator and a bunch of thugs in 60′s era equipment with no air defence. Result score drawer at best.
Thank god we’re not facing an enemy that can shoot back or had real airforce. Not the best war for the quality V quantity argument.
Simple does not have to mean 2nd rate. it means good engineering and design. MY late father in law was an engineer (He helped to design the original electric milk float). He always used to say
“An engineer is someone who can do for a shilling what any damn fool can do for a pound”
I think in terms of procurement we are doubly doomed. Not only are we now seeing another generation of politicians who have never seen war. (Which I suppose is a good thing really!) Our politicians increasingly have never had real jobs; the graduate, researcher, MP route. At least previous generations of MPs whether they were drawn from ranks of factory owners or from the factory floor knew about how “machines” came to be.
I think the industries should develop export-capable (if not promising) hardware and the MoD -focused more on developing its personnel’s competence than its hardware inventory- should simply buy what it needs at competitive prices.
IXION said “An engineer is someone who can do for a shilling what any damn fool can do for a pound”
Reminded me of how Lines re-jigged the already austere Sten and saved a parcel of parts.
X yes
One other point why, if we had all this high end Kit warriors and challangers etc, did our soldiers die in plastic landrovers because we had so many warriors sitting in sheds or on car parks in the UK we couldn’t afford a decent armoured car.
John Knott said we did not need a large RN fleet & planned to cut it. Then came the 1982 Falklands conflict.
Then it was said the British Army would never fight in the desert again & we sold our desert uniforms to Iraq! Then came Saddams invasion of Kuwait (1990).
The end of the Cold War left many to think no chance of war in Europe. Then Yugoslavia fell apart violently.
The SDSR did not predict the “Arab spring” or UK air operations over Libya.
Predictions saying “we will not need this or that ever again” are usually wrong.
We might be fighting a Mumbai style attack on the streets of Britain, or resource wars with developed nation states in the polar regions. Remember Clausewitz said “the enemy has three courses of action open to him & of these, he always adopts the fourth”.
The money is development phase; simple is the enemy of profits.
@ IXION
“How many 8×8 wheeled antitank missile vehicles could a Challanger destroy before one got lucky?”
Enough to warrant the price. Using back of the fag packet numbers, a Chally 2 would only have to hobble 4 Strykers to make it worth the while. Given the range advantage (to my knowledge) of the Chally’s main gun over the Strykers ATGM, plus the optics and all that business, I’d say the Challenger 2 has a lot going for it.
That’s before we factor in that the Challenger 2′s (admittedly bloody expensive) armour can probably take a few hits from said ATGM’s, then yeah, I’d pay for the Challenger and take my chances.
Chris B
I was thinking generaly, eg about MAN or tatra truck based (or multi rolled track chasis) dedicated anti tank vehcle poss with hellfires or other heavy atgw, rather than any particular current set up.
However your point is valid; clearly I would rather be in a challanger shooting out, rather than something else shooting in.
My (and I think TD’s point) is that it sounds like we are going to be lucky if we end up with 120 or so challangers. Which will be expensive to run individually to the point of being almost undeployable. Its not like we are going to have enough of them to put up a decent armoured division into a major conflict.
In other words is it worth keeping a small penny packet of challangers or rather more not quite so deadly cheaper and easier to deploy vehicles, well able to deal with all the T72′s arround
Given the damage the latest soviet missiles reportedly did to the Merkava in Lebanon it seem any passive armour package is penatratable, without even getting into top attack etc.
Israeli armour losses to ATGW during the last Lebanon border conflict were less than 3%.
We should keep 3 regiments worth of Challenger (plus driver training plus BATUS.)
Um. We are still waiting for TD’s Future of the Army……..
JH
I am not saying that at some time in the future there will not be a high end war, threatening the borders of our realm, or it’s strategic supplies. Which will require us to tool up and get loaded for bear in a total war situation.
BUt that is not going to happen any time soon in europe; why; because no one in europe (despite some impressive sounding inventories) is tooled up for it themselves. if such a threat starts building we will have to start retooling re arming etc with modern weapons. (Re arming too early for such a conflict can be as deadly as not re arming in time. Italy’s poor performance in WW2 was at least in part down to the fact it re-armed in the late 20′s early 30′s and started the war a generation behind anyone else.)
As for threats to our strategic supply it is air and naval power that will deal with those (together with some underwater knive fighters).
IF we are going to ever deploy serious amounts of armed forces over seas again it will not be divisions made up of regaments of challangers, warriors and Ascods.
But
It could be regaments of of more simply equiped high commonality, commercially based and supported forces.
Take a look at the Merc Zetros truck, designed to use commercial componants, you could actually deploy that to any continent in the world and get the bits at your local merc truck dealers! There are many Unimog based armoured vehicles around we could use. These are just examples.
X
We should, but will we, remember the immutable law of tank warfare, one on the road, one in the workshop, one available to engage the enemy.
Assuming we could get our 120 or so challangers all working and all in theatre we would still only be able to use 40 at one time.
Against an enemy that is so equipped with heavy armour of such quality as to actually need the kind of edge that a challange might have over a missile vehicle, 40 really don’t sound like it’s going to cut it.
I don’t want to get too tank centric over this argument this applies to planes ships etc.
Hi x,
“We should keep 3 regiments worth of Challenger (plus driver training plus BATUS.)”
- I think the current smaller regiments have 38, so times three plus the other uses is in the “ball park”
- which takes me to what I said earlier that we also need wheeled formations for very extensive theatres of operation (with the current, limited vertical lift). Incidentally the planned LIMAWS purchase was 36, which is 2-3 bde’s worth
=> 2 intervention bde’s, 2 wheeled formations, 3 bde’s retaining elements of MBTs and tracked 155mm’s
If there is any credence to the 120 figure, I would assume that is the number with formations and more would be kept in “moth ball”, as I agree with “Assuming we could get our 120 or so challangers all working and all in theatre we would still only be able to use 40 at one time.”
@DJ:
“12 high end. Because we’ll never have enough to win the war and fly the flag, and winning thwe war is the more important of the two. I dont get this fascination with “low end” warship that just dont do anything.”
What war? What tiny subset of possible future conflicts would we be able to win with 12 high-end warships and lose with 8 of them?
The vast majority of tasks which fall to a warship can be achieved with a relatively simple corvette at a small fraction of the cost (purchase and running) of a top-level frigate.
The consequence of choosing a small number of high-end ships rather than a high/low mix is that we have far fewer ships in total, unable to carry out the range of tasks that we KNOW the RN needs to do, as opposed to some theoretical and improbable future conflict which requires us to maximise the number of high-end ships.
One thing I would say on this issue, is that we’re not the only ones with problems.
We all (myself more than included) have a tendency to take a “Grass is Greener on the other side” approach to some of these issues.
If we’re struggling with the number of tanks we have in service, think what some of our peers must be going through. If we can only field one in three, then that applies to everyone equally, not accounting for the fact that we can afford proper training for the technical crews etc.
We also have a tendency to look at countries like Norway, Sweden, Denmark, etc and admire the way they put together their army/navy/air force and what value for money they get. But then they play their political hand very differently to us.
Limited deployments (in time and scale) with more of a focus on “how do we protect home soil (or salt)?”
Britain? “Now let’s see Prime Minister, what war can we get our boys involved in next…”
One of the things that struck me reading TD’s recent article is how we often (but not always) restricted ourselves to small scale involvements, with a few planes, helicopters, a carrier and maybe one regiment of bods on the ground.
What happened to that philosophy of limited intervention? Of building strong diplomatic ties around the world, even with some of the “bottom feeders” of the political stage in order to gain staging bases and influence?
I think that should be dictating our kit more than a pre-prescribed idea of “we need to emphasise this or that”.
Now I kind of knew where I was going with this, but now I’ve forgotten, so I’ll leave you for now with these two thoughts;
1) Don’t forget that war is about gladiators and not a bricklayers. If that doesn’t make sense yet then fear not, I’ll try and explain.
Basically, if you could hire one brick layer who hypothetically cost £25 per hour and layed 100 bricks per hour, OR two brick layers who cost £10 per hour each and laid just 50 bricks per hour, you’d take the two cheap guys. Together they lay the same amount of bricks and they cost £5 less per hour combined.
Now imagine that for some entirely arbitrary reason you have to hire a gladiator. He’s going to be representing you as your champion in a one on one, knockout tournament to the death.
There is a various motley selection of these guys, all quite cheap, but there is also one chap who is bloody expensive (three times the cost) but very, very good. It pays to hire the expensive gladiator, because in a series of knockout battles his superior skills will win each successive fight.
This is kind of the issue you have to consider when thinking about military kit. Yes, Mig-29′s are cheaper than Typhoons and you could probably buy them at a 5:1 ratio or better. But you’re not going to deploy 10 MiGs everytime you have a radar contact.
A pair of Typhoons should be able to win each successive battle against a pair of Mig-29′s, until eventually the MiG’s give up or are exhausted numerically.
2) Now, TD mentioned earlier about desirable traits in your kit other than just speed etc. Versatility would be one that springs to mind. Reliability is another that I would look for.
Overall, I just don’t think it is any longer plausible to compete in modern warfare with cheap, substandard kit.
@Cris.B:
“Overall, I just don’t think it is any longer plausible to compete in modern warfare with cheap, substandard kit.”
Nobody’s saying that we shouldn’t have top-level kit. Only that we should have a mix of top-level and lower-level if we are having difficulty in affording the numbers of top-level needed to cover routine tasks (as we certainly are with warships, and may be soon with other expensive items of kit).
You seem to be defining “modern warfare” as “high-intensity, involving equally high-tech forces”. That certainly needs to be considered, but it’s only one among a whole spectrum of different levels of warfare, and is probably the least likely. We need to consider the whole spectrum when shaping our capabilities.
There’s a parallel with the late 1950s, when the Government decided that the only type of warfare we’d face in the future was all-out nuclear war, so we didn’t need to bother with conventional forces. Reality soon caught up with them.
Hi Chris B,
RE “A pair of Typhoons should be able to win each successive battle against a pair of Mig-29′s, until eventually the MiG’s give up or are exhausted numerically.” I fear that your pair would not fare as well in a melee, which would be the more typical type of encounter when we are talking about high intensity conflicts
Definitely not the next biggie, but while we wait, one can try to nibble at the edges of the problem, one of them being the number of hulls, as in “choosing a small number of high-end ships rather than a high/low mix is that we have far fewer ships in total, unable to carry out the range of tasks that we KNOW the RN needs to do”
- consider just two stations: Falklands and narco-patrol on the way down to the S. Atlantic (ok, a slight detour)
- on average two frigates and the hired Antarctic ship (any weapon fit on it yet?); forget the sub (stays constant in this equation)
- buy the 2 Holland-class not going to be used
- rotate them through these stations and talk the Dutch who have presence and interests in the Caribbean to share that patrol
- still need a frigate/ a Daring at times to fill the gaps in rota
=> one and a half frigates more available for other tasks (as the SDSR-stipulated decommissionings are now happening)
I can appreciate the need for some low intensity specific equipment and I’m not adverse to say; a counter piracy/counter narcotics ship that basically consists of a floating hangar and flight deck for a helicopter, with a gun on the front end.
But I don’t necessarily define modern warfare as being pure high intensity, I just remember that for a long time the buzz in the defence world was that in the future we would be entering “4th generation warfare” with Nations vs terrorists etc. Then along comes a situation like Libya.
I’ve always believed that what is happening in Afghan is nothing new. We’re told it’s new. We’re told it’s the dawning of 4th generation warfare and network centric whatever the acronym is.
But I see it simply as just another guerilla war. Nothings fundamentally changed. Maybe some of the weapons have. Maybe some of the tactics have. But it’s still just the same old thing in a new look package.
Therefore I feel a large paradigm shift in the military towards coping with low intensity conflicts is not healthy for long term defence.
If you spend too much of an already limited budget on “low cost” solutions, that can survive in low intensity theatres only, then you risk degrading your high intensity assets too far.
A much simpler way to handle pressures like the various committments to fighting piracy might be to respectfully bow out and play the “charity begins at home card”.
Or else convince someone in the treasury that investment in defence can literally reap savings and other financial rewards for the country.
@ ArmChairCivvy
“I fear that your pair would not fare as well in a melee, which would be the more typical type of encounter when we are talking about high intensity conflicts”
???
Really. Major air campaigns in the last 30 or so years have produced, to my knowledge, zero melee situations.
The more typical engagement from what I’ve studied is that of pairs of aircraft on patrols/sweeps/interceptions etc coming together, usually decided at range.
IXION
Your comment on armoured cars led me to dig out the bumf on the Ferret 80. Another, if only. All those hot spots UK forces have been in over the last 20 years. If only we had had at least 100 Ferret 80, those ops might have been a bit easier.
On a general point. It is much cheaper to deter a war, than to fight one.
Hi Chris B,
RE “Melee, “mixed”, referring to groups of fighters interlocked in close combat”
- if, in a high intensity conflict, you have a defined centre of gravity developing, air superiority over it will be decisive, and you are automatically into a melee (assuming that SAMs of one side do not dominate)
- “close” combat got slightly redefined with A2A missiles and with BVR we can draw a radius around that “epicentre” of at least 70-100 mls.
- 10 opponents, each carrying say 8 A2A, fired in salvos of two with mixed aiming heads
- 40 salvos coming at the two planes, even if they have the best ECM, getting one out of each salvo does not affect the other too much
- even if the launching opponents, or some, have been taken out by now, put the probability of kill (varies by type, not an expert in those)into it (40 missiles, 2 targets) – any thoughts?
Did no one like my Buccaneer idea remake then?
Ixion, have a look at a Ferret 80 and compare that with this
http://panhard.activcompany.fr/webtv/english/panhard-1.html
http://www.deagel.com/library/Sphinx-EBRC-vehicle-with-40mm-cannon-and-MLP-missile_m02010061500066.aspx
I meant tank regiments in training/ready to go to the old 50+ MBT orbat. Lets wait until we play fantasy army………
As late as the 1700s there was still who believe the UK should field longbows.
Yes I thought it was excellent TD would have the engine type to the new ge one but I’d take 100 please.
Can you get around the high low argument in the land/naval side but using plug and play sensors and weapons. Have a gd basic hull chasis and bolt different things on depending on threat you can then buy less of the really expensive stuff but still keep vehicle ship numbers up. A la oscelot and type 26 hopefully. It will be much more difficult in a/c but still doable to a extend
Hi TD,
RE the Panhard, the FFL drive around Africa in those. There’s good footage on u-tube how they have tied building slabs of stone around the turrets… that’s against opposition with AK47s and old models of RPG
RE “Did no one like my Buccaneer idea remake then?”
can’t find it, but the parameters you set out in its last sentences would apply to the transport bomber.
C-17 (being the one we have in the fleet) an extremely costly airframe, but it can switch between roles (when we are not doing a “Libya”), and thereby the much increased weapons delivery, at a distance from base & defences, could be judged affordable
- having said that, one-offs are never affordable, and there has been no take up where the idea originated