With the biggest players from its defence industry showcasing their products at the Farnborough air show, this year's main aerospace event could offer an ideal platform for the UK government to outline its equipment and investment priorities for the years to come.
The results of two major planning activities are being eagerly awaited: the publication of a broad-reaching combat air strategy document; and a so-called "refresh" of the Ministry of Defence's 2015 Strategic Defence and Security Review (SDSR): the Modernising Defence Programme (MDP).
Scheduled for release "in the summer", the combat air strategy represents a "bold and ambitious" attempt to "bring together the best of British engineering, skill and design, and deliver a compelling vision for the future of air power", defence secretary Gavin Williamson announced in February.
"The MoD will work across government and closely with industry and international partners [to] examine the operational capability needed in the future and the skills and resource required to deliver it," the ministry said earlier this year. This process will also "take new and emerging technology into account and consider export potential".
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Speaking at the Royal Aeronautical Society in London ahead of the Royal Air Force's formal centenary milestone on 1 April, chief of the air staff Air Chief Marshal Sir Stephen Hillier challenged industry to shorten development cycles and reduce costs for future equipment, asking: "Why can't I have better capability at lower real-terms cost, in an information-enabled air force?"
ALL CHANGE
The RAF is entering a period of transition in offensive capability, with 617 Sqn's first four Lockheed Martin F-35Bs having arrived from the USA last month and its remaining two squadrons of Panavia Tornado GR4s to be retired by April 2019. The short take-off and vertical landing F-35B is on schedule to achieve initial operational capability in December 2018, with the Lightning force to operate alongside the RAF's Eurofighters. To soon gain new ground-attack capabilities via the Project Centurion activity, the Typhoon is expected to remain in use until at least 2040.
Another significant element of the UK's future capability is, meanwhile, due to make a debut appearance immediately before Farnborough, with General Atomics Aeronautical Systems' SkyGuardian, due to make its first transatlantic crossing to appear in the static display at the Royal International Air Tattoo at RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire from 13-15 July. The UK is launch customer for the medium-altitude, long-endurance type, which will be fielded under the name Protector. To be certificated for flight in non-segregated airspace, the evolution of the Reaper is expected to carry UK weapons including the MBDA Brimstone air-to-surface missile and Raytheon Systems Paveway IV precision-guided bomb.
In a 12 June publication, Beyond 2 per cent: a preliminary report on the Modernising Defence Programme, the UK's parliamentary Defence Committee described the new combat air strategy as "a valuable opportunity to consider how UK design, development and manufacturing expertise, from programmes such as Tornado and Typhoon, can continue to contribute to future capability". The document also refers to it as " an opportunity to reduce the reliance on off-the-shelf purchases from overseas when domestic or collaborative alternatives are available".
UNCERTAIN OUTLOOK
BAE Systems earlier this year welcomed the opportunity to "further develop the UK's world-leading combat air capability", but the path for such work remains to be determined. A bilateral future combat air system (FCAS) initiative with France appears to have lost all momentum since the results of a UK referendum that set it on the path to exiting the EU in March 2019. Indeed, the French and German governments have pledged to work on their own FCAS project, intended to develop a capability to enter use as the Dassault Rafale and Eurofighter reach the end of their useful lives.
In its report about the MPD, the Defence Committee calls for the government to increase its financial commitment to the armed forces, ideally to a level that equates to 3% of UK GDP: roughly £60 billion ($78.6 billion) per year.
"Defence spending is far too low," the report charges. "On the government's calculation, the UK is narrowly exceeding the 2% [GDP] target; but it is still facing a range of financial challenges. The government now needs to apply the resources that are necessary to keep this country safe, and must begin moving the level of defence expenditure back towards 3% of GDP, as it was in the mid-1990s."
In a separate report published one week later concerning relations with NATO, the committee noted: "The UK has long supported US calls for all NATO members to achieve the 3% of GDP metric. We support the government’s commitment to exhort and encourage our allies to improve their capabilities and increase their defence spending; but we note that such exhortations would carry more weight if the UK led by example and invested more in defence."
Pointing to the "minimal challenge in the maritime and air domains and minimal direct risk to the homeland" faced over the past 20 years, the committee notes: "The strategic environment has changed for the worse, and this defence review must reflect this. The UK needs to be in a position to deter and challenge peer adversaries equipped with a full range of modern military technologies who seek to use them in ways that confuse our traditional conceptions of warfare.
It adds: "The personnel and equipment requirements of Joint Force 2025 that were laid down in the 2015 SDSR were insufficiently funded and consequently are unaffordable under the current settlement."
Pointing to a lack of clarity from the MoD over the F-35 programme's expected costs, the committee says it "should also use the MDP as an opportunity to make clear whether it remains its policy to buy the intended complement of 138 aircraft and what mix of variants it now envisages purchasing for the remainder".
With the UK's first 48 F-35s being acquired in the STOVL version, the potential exists for some of its further examples of the Lightning to be produced in the conventional take-off and landing, A-model variant. This model is cheaper to acquire, carries a greater internal weapons load, flies further and has improved manoeuvrability over the B-model.
At the Farnborough air show in 2014, the UK government announced a £1.1 billion windfall for the MoD. Around £800 million of this was assigned to continue operations with the RAF's Raytheon Systems Sentinel R1 ground surveillance and Shadow R1 intelligence-gathering aircraft, reversing earlier retirement decisions. The rest was to fund further development of an active electronically scanned array radar update for the Typhoon – it has still yet to fully commit to integrating this with part of the fleet.
Then-prime minister David Cameron used the 2016 show to announce a deal to acquire nine Boeing P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol and anti-submarine warfare aircraft for the RA, to fill a glaring capability gap left since the retirement of the British Aerospace Nimrod MR2 and subsequent cancellation of BAE's Nimrod MRA4. Its investment is valued at £3 billion over a 10-year period.
In mid-April, infrastructure work commenced at RAF Lossiemouth in Scotland, under a £132 million investment that will provide operational conversion unit, squadron and training and simulation facilities, plus a tactical operations centre and three-bay hangar. The UK's first Poseidon will arrive at the site in 2020.
While welcoming the P-8A acquisition, the Defence Committee is concerned over its limited scale, and suggests that a minimum of 16 of the 737-based aircraft could be required. Also alluding to the Royal Navy's modest future fleet of eight BAE-built Type 26 frigates and 30 Leonardo Helicopters AW101 Merlin HC2 rotorcraft, it warns: "If the UK’s anti-submarine warfare capacity remains unchanged – or is even diminished further – then the UK will be failing both its citizens and its allies."
A creeping degradation of the UK's airborne warning and control system capability is also a worry, the report states.
"The capability provided by the RAF’s [Boeing] E-3D Sentry fleet has been allowed to decline. The 2015 SDSR committed the RAF to keeping the fleet in service until 2035, but the E-3D aircraft are no longer maintained and upgraded to the required avionics standards, and flying hours in recent years have been substantially reduced."
Pointing to the type's crucial battle management role, it adds: "The full range of available options including (but not confined to) an upgrade of the E-3D Sentry aircraft should be considered by the RAF to restore its AWACS capability." Replacement candidates could include Boeing's 737-based AWACS platform and potentially Saab's Bombardier Global 6000 business jet-derived GlobalEye.
The outcome of the combat air strategy and MPD could set the tone for investment decisions over the coming decades and confirm whether – as with previous reviews – other aircraft types could be heading for early retirement.
But with major procurement programmes already running and budgets strained, perhaps the most welcome announcement that politicians could make as the industry gathers at Farnborough would be a commitment to dig deep for defence.
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Source: FlightGlobal.com
