Britain and France Build Robocarrier

Britain and France finally signed the deal to build three new aircraft carriers. This followed several years of negotiations. What's surprising about all this is not the large size of the carriers (about 58,000 tons, the largest ships ever for both navies), or the unique cooperation (two of the carriers are British, one is French, and both nations will cooperate on design and construction, with the Brits taking the lead.) No, what is amazing about all this is the aggressive plans for automation. These "Queen Elizabeth" class carriers are planning on having a ships crew of 800 (or less) and an air wing complement of 600 personnel. Currently, you need a ship crew of about 2,000 for a carrier that size. The reduction in size of the air wing personnel is even more aggressive.

These carriers are going to cost about $4 billion each, and are to be in use for half a century (including several refits and refurbs). But the biggest cost will be personnel. Currently, it costs the U.S. Navy a bit over $100,000 per sailor per year. Do the math ($7 billion in crew costs over the life of each carrier.) So the smaller the crew, the greater the savings, and the more you can spend on upgrading the ship, buying new aircraft and the like.

The carriers will haul 34-45 aircraft and helicopters and be able to handle about 110 flight operations every 24 hours. That's with current aircraft. The F-35B will be the primary warplane on the British carriers. But it's also likely that many, or all, of the next generation of aircraft on these ships will be robotic. But first, the ship has to be equipped with an unprecedented degree of automation. While 250,000 ton oil tankers can operate with a crew of under 40, all those large vessels do is move their cargo from place to place. An aircraft carrier must fight, and find the enemy, and do a lot of other stuff. The new class of 100,000 ton American CVN-21 carriers are trying to get their ship crew down from 4,000 to 2,500.

Warships have a lot of unique functions, like damage control, and manning many systems for high alert, and combat, situations. Some crew reduction ideas are pretty obvious, like installing conveyers to help move supplies when ships are replenished at sea, or even when in port. Many maintenance tasks can be eliminated by using materials that require less effort to keep clean, and are just as safe as those used in the past. It's also been noted that many maintenance tasks can be left for civilians to do when the ship is in port. Most navies has also not kept up on automation. There is still a tendency to have sailors "standing watch" to oversee equipment that, with the addition of some sensors, can be monitored from a central location. If there is a problem, a repair team can be sent. But in the meantime, thousands of man hours a week are saved, and another few dozen sailors are not needed. Another angle is removing a lot of administrative jobs from the ship altogether. All warships are connected, via satellite, to military networks. So many sailors can stay ashore, and do their work without ever going near the ship. Some sailors have long noted that their administrative jobs aboard a carrier rarely brought them in touch with the people they were serving. Carriers have phones and email. Why use it aboard ship when you can use it from some (much cheaper) shore location? Moreover, many of these admin jobs can be done, more cheaply, by civilians.

But the new British/French carriers aim to take warship automation into uncharted territory. This should be interesting, and it is certainly bold and daring. All three carriers are expected to be in service by the middle of the next decade. Just in time for the centennial of the First World War. Hmmm, that's ominous.

....... but aren't we going towards more UAVs and less pilots? Isn't this like building a better catapult, when the other side is pondering explosives?

1) Yes, we are working on UCAVs (for instance Boeings X-45C and Northrop's X-47B UCAVs), but so are a whole lot of other nations. In reference to this thread, so are the French and the British.

The French have the lead on the nEUROn UCAV program, while the British have been working on the CORAX UCAV program.

nEUROn:

CORAX:

Thus UCAV development is not only been done by the US ....goodness, even South Africa has a developed UAV called the Bateleur that is currently undergoing developments to give it UCAV capability.

2) There have been comments that the automated systems will be a liability, particularly if the carrier is damaged by an attack. For one that is highly improbable .....both navies will be using destroyers equipped with the PAAMS system in the future, which is exceedingly capable in dealing with incoming threats. Now, if the British or the French navy decided to go fight the United States Navy, then they would have significant problems since we could simply saturate them. However they will NOT be facing the USN.

Moreover they will not be going solo against .....say ....China, because any action against the Chinese will either fall on Uncle Sam (being realistic), or most probably some coalition. Thus the British navy, or the French one, will not be trudging forth to shoo off Chinese attacks on Taiwan by themselves. In a nutshell, the likelihood of these carriers being 'hit' are very small (and in case people have forgotten, both navies are quite professional ....yes, even the French navy).

Add to this the cost considerations, where the savings brought about by the automated aspects will allow both countries to spend the saved billions of dollars towards weapon procurement. Now, a couple billion here and there is chump change for the United States military, but for Britain and France every cent matters (especially when they have a cadre of politicians that would rather have extra social programs and reduced military spending). Thus the automation facets of these carriers make perfect sense to Britain and France, which have to tighten their belts quite a bit when it comes to cost horizons.

3) Someone stated that these carriers 'barely carry enough planes to do more than a small strike while conducting CAP.' One has to consider which navies we are talking about. The British navy, and the French navy. This is not the United States navy .....they do not need over 10 carrier groups as we do, nor do they need each carrier group to have more offensive power than most countries in the world have in their entire nation. Take Britain for example .....during the Falklands war the UK was able to reach out 8,000 miles away, and win with just two carriers (the Hermes and the Invincible). Same thing here. These carriers are not meant to engage in surge operations around the globe, but rather to allow the nations in question to fulfill the requirements that their navies may be required to do. If a 'big baddie' arises then what will happen is a coalition will be formed, with the USN carrying the big sticks and everyone else coming along for the show.

Anyways, this is not a bad idea. Especially considering the cost benefits (particularly once this is looked at from the perspective of certain parts of British and french society wanting larger social programs at the cost of a potent military), as well as the fact that these carriers (as well as the navies that they represent) will not be off fighting impossible foes all by themselves. Now, if the British navy was going to be fighting the USA, then this would be a problem. If the French were going to be engaging the Chinese in the next 10 years, all by themselves, then they would face a problem. However the British will not be facing off against the USN, and the French will not be steaming off solo to take on the whole of China, and thus this idea makes sense. Especially when one considers that the alternative would mean trying to run through a political gauntlet comprised of sots who would rather pay to build more mosques for Islamic immigrants in Europe than spend coin towards a strong military.

4) Not every military faces the same requirements as the various armed forces of the United States, and no nation in the world has the expenditure bracket of the US. None whatsoever. Thus those nations have to do with what they have, and they have to orient themselves towards what they can do. Sometimes compromises have to be made ....compromises that wouldn't make sense for (say) the USN, but make absolute sense for (say) the British Royal Navy. And to be honest these are not 'compromises' in the true light of the word, since they would meet all the requirements that would arise (for Britain and France). Britain will never find itself having to handle the military requirements that the US has to, however they often do find themselvs having to do a whole lot of work (eg take Iraq .....they do not have anywhere near the same number of soldiers we do in Iraq -I believe the Brits have around 8,900 troops doing the good work .....but they still are our biggest pal over there). These carriers do the same thing .....they will not be bludgeoning a rising China in the coming decades by themselves, nor will they be the most potent force sailing the seven seas. However they will be a very potent force, and they will allow the Royal Navy to makes its presence felt. And they will fulfil that requirement perfectly. Do they have power equal to that of all our carriers put together? No! However one should also note that the Royal Navy is not trying to be the USN.

Anyways, this is not as bad an idea as some are trying to make it.

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