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Ian

I am very pleased and relieved this is happening. IMHO it is the UK’s most important defence project, the only truly strategic capability and deterrent we have. I would drop it only when [insert country] troops were marching down Whitehall after a formal surrender.

don

Wait ’til you get the bill…:(

don

Yes, the truth hurts- but it doesn’t make it less true.

Graham

Yes it will be expensive but worth every penny.its about time we are able to stand up for our values.

Ian

Absolutely willing and prepared to pay that bill.

Simon

Two billion a year over the life of the project for a rock solid gold plated guarantee of national sovereignty in a changing world. Sounds like a bargain to me. I cannot think of one other defence or security priority I’d rank higher, including the army and aircraft carriers. If the British and French deterrents didn’t exist there would be nothing to stop Trump simply conceding Europe as a Russian sphere of influence, certainly not the German or French armies now down to 60,000 each.

Malcolm

A bill is better than a bayonet.

Geoffrey Hicking

I should probably have my head kicked in for the stupid thing I’m about to ask, but… is it POSSIBLE that there might be an internal bay to hold UUVs? I guess not and that everything would be loaded pre-mission, into the tubes,, but I’m asking out of sheer curiosity here.

SomeoneSomewhere
julian

How about building 8 and using some as pure Tomahawk boats to go with the carriers freeing up astute for other duties. Ie 4 for snb and 4 as escort.

Barry Cawdery

A great project that few countries can manage.But I have one worry,with many nations including the UK spending lots of money improving anti sub. technology will they be able to stay difficult to detect?

XYZ

I suspect that it’s one think to find a sub that’s actively tracking your surface units and another to find a sub that’s aim is to avoid all other ocean traffic. The ocean is a big place to hide in.

Challenger

Quite…as shown in a rather horrible way by ARA San Juan recently, which was a 30 year old SSK to boot.
Names wise i was a bit disappointed they didn’t continue with letters of the alphabet, i felt felt something like HMS Invincible, Inflexible, Indomitable, Implacable would have sounded good!

Julian Edmonds

One of them ought to be called HMS Margaret Thatcher.

Rick

Right you are Julian, Margaret had the right idea, Britain needs a firm hand.

don

If by ‘firm hand’ you mean gutting the RN prior to 1982…how many sailors died in the South Atlantic for her and Tory perfidy?
FFS, you’ve got Jellicoe…Nelson…Beatty…Vian…Somerville…at least name a proud ship after someone who’s served and NOT tried to wreck the Senior Service.

Rick

Thatcher inherited an economy ravaged by “state socialism”. The 1981-82 recession forced the government to make cuts. The Falklands War changed Thatcher’s attitude toward the Armed Forces and the proposed cuts were rescinded. As a result, throughout her premiership the
military was properly funded. As for the “firm hand” quote, Thatcher tackled a lot of difficult
issues and showed great courage in standing up to special interests and unions.

UKExpat

Definitely NOT “Beatty” his arrogant stupidity not only lost us three battlecruisers at the Battle of Jutland but nearly lost the battle when he failed to advise Jellicoe of the German fleet’s whereabouts.

Andy

So true , his failure to understand the fact that his guns had a longer range than the Germans and his ignorance of the superior British predictor technology nearly led to the destruction of his squadron.
Add on the fact he failed to utilise the fast bb of the Queen Elizabeth class to destroy Hipper shows him for being tactically stupid.

andyfromstone@live.co.uk

The Astute class crashing into cargo ships and rocks, Daring class can only function in tepid waters, 65,000 ton/tonne Queen Elizabeth carriers with no aircraft…is the MoD hoping to join the Edinburgh Fringe comedy set? ‘General’ purpose frigates, maybe six can actually hunt submarines…good luck in a war scenario, what a shabby over-funded but utterly under performing squadron the RN has become.

Rick

“over funded”… wrong, “under performing” wrong again.
The Royal Navy’s problems are not internal, they are political.

Anon

I know this is unrelated but why would they issue veterans i d cards what is the point
Does anyone else think something else may be brewing considering they are putting on the driving licence?

Navy Guru

The plan is for the UAVs to be interlocked into the inverse UVV pocket without the DPD valve axling impacting the atomic packing factor ratio. Whether the computational fluid dynamics studies have yielded products of infrasound to the detriment of the hexapod will determine the success.

UKExpat

On the subject of names they might well use both historic names and names starting with the same letter i.e. “D” for instance HMS Devastation, HMS Defiance, HMS Defence, Duke of York, etc.

Joe B

I read here (https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/monographs/2011/RAND_MG1128.3.pdf) that the US shared construction techniques (vertical outfitting) with BAE during the astute boats 1-3 construction . However in photos I have not seen any evidence of this actually being used, do you know if this was ever put into use? Also with the upgrading of the DDH and CYC, I’m not sure if the units are tall enough for this to happen?

TopBoy

Just 12 missiles with 5 warheads each? Hardly a deterrent! Arm then to the teeth. 16 missiles with 8 warheads each!!
That’s a bit more like it considering 25-50% could be intercepted….

wasp snorter

I think it is deadly enough, who wants to be in a position of firing interception missiles to incoming nuclear missiles – no one. Even if that happened we are all finished anyhow, as the retaliation (or first strike) would wipe us all out forever and its the end of the world. Even if it they had only 4 missiles it would have sufficient deterrence – as they will never be used (hopefully).

There's Grey In My Beard

Dreadnought looks much sleeker than Astute. And hopefully the lack of a ‘construction and design holiday’ means that mistakes and teething problems will be fewer.
Wonder if you could chop out the mid-section and use to replace Astutes as they age?