harried into retirement
The Sea Harrier was retired yesterday (that’s a video link and might not work outside the UK).
There is a quote in that video segment by the captain of HMS Illustrious about a known gap in air defences; but they’re “confident that they won’t need the support of Sea Harriers for any coalition led carrier operation”. In other words, the RN will now rely on the Air Force and other members of the a potential coalition to provide air cover for their carriers. Gone are the days where the naval air arm was self sufficient. The most obvious counter to that argument is the Falklands war, I suppose.
The most likely replacement seems to be the JSF, but there is no official word on when they’ll be made available.
On 01-Mar-06 at 11:56 am,
elric wrote:
I remember watching news footage and videos of the Falklands war and being dazzled by the Sea Harrier.
From what I gather, aircraft operations from the Invincible class are almost exclusively strike missions in support of ground forces. As you say, air cover has been outsourced the other forces. I’m not sure how much use the SH is these days against credible opposition in any case. That’s a heavily debated topic of course. Of course, there’s debate over the capability of the JSF in A2A as well.
On 01-Mar-06 at 12:34 pm,
drac wrote:
The MarStrike role is said to incorporate both ground support and air interdiction taskings - but yeah, almost exclusively ground support seems right to me too. It’s just the removal of an air strike option for an untried and untested JSF that left me puzzled. Also, yeah.. the SH looks pretty darn awesome in video footage
The gist of the response in that interview above seemed to hint that credible air opposition would be in short supply, though. Since the Falklands, the UK has (IIRC) just fought the odd Serbian or Iraqi jet, nothing more. SAMs pose a bigger threat than enemy fighters. Training accidents are probably the biggest killer
On 01-Mar-06 at 12:39 pm,
elric wrote:
Plus they’re getting those funky new Type 45s for fleet defence so I guess there’s logic to the the arguement about not needing much A2A.
On 01-Mar-06 at 12:47 pm,
elric wrote:
ack, realized the point I was trying to make in the first comment wasn’t completed. The RAF fly their Harriers off the Invincibles so the UK will have a strike capability until the JSF is available. I shall now stop hogging your comments and using them as a discussion board
On 01-Mar-06 at 1:08 pm,
drac wrote:
discussion board, comments - it’s all good
Mmm, I hadn’t seen the Type-45 before (and they used Flash on the promo website *scowl*).. The blurb on BAE’s site makes it sound like Aegis crossed with a carrier.