CANZUK alliance

Calliban · 2022-07-19 03:45:17

This is being talked about more seriously, following BREXIT, the spat between Australia and China and the AUKUS deal. It seems to have popular support in all four countries, though it opposed by some politicians on the left, who do not like the fact that common racial solidarity is a uniting factor behind it. Make of that what you will!

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/CANZUK
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LbP6X9yGd9Q
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LbP6X9yGd9Q

Many elements of it already exist, through the five eyes network and AUKUS. Advantages would be:

1. A close confederation that includes an investment base (UK), manufacturing and commodities bases (Australia and Canada) and an agricultural base (New Zealand). Total population woukd be 140 million, which is equivelant to Russia and greater than Japan, though still less than half that of the US or EU.

2. Shared military development and cooperation, reducing costs and bringing all four countries under protection of a blue water navy second only to the US. The agreement would probably require expanding the UK nuclear weapons umbrella to protect the other three nations.

3. CANZUK would probably fulfil a role that the US is retreating from, as it would depend strongly on maintaining security of global sealanes for its stability.

4. As a space player it could be very significant. The Canadians have space mechatronics expertise; the UK is a major player in satellite manufacturing and Australia is a good launch site.

5. CANZUK would likely have deeper ties with the US, economically and strategically, than other political and economic blocks. This is clearly an advantage for access to a consumer base and key military technology. As all member states are NATO members and US allies, the relationship will be mutually beneficial.

Problems: The main problem that I can see is that CANZUK would be spread across the globe. The countries are too distant from each other to form a strategically sound union without a huge and expensive navy, both merchant and military. Nuclear powered ships would be a huge advantage in overcoming this obstacle. Canadian pressure tube reactors seem like an obvious fit for this application. CANZUK would probably develop super carrier groups similar to the US, but would need more destroyers because of the length of the trade routes. If the ships are nuclear powered and have unlimited effective range, then policing those sea lanes becomes are lot more practical.

A large scale CANDU would be the obvious technology of choice for a CANZUK nuclear power reactor programme. Australia and Canada have abundant uranium and the UK has reprocessing technology. Collectively, these countries could develop a world leading nuclear programme that would make them almost invulnerable to energy supply disruptions.

Other potential member or affiliate states might be Egypt (Suez canal and large consumer base), Singapore (manufacturing base and trade hub), Scandinavian countries (oil, gas, iron ore, abundant hydro and a modest consumer base), Sri Lanka (consumer base and potential military base close to the Persian Gulf).

Last edited by Calliban (2022-07-19 04:06:43)

Void · 2022-07-19 07:10:07

If you don't mind me commenting, I guess associations with a confederacy, the one you mention may have benefits.

I don't think it has to be about race. That just occurs naturally. English, by its history has influences both from the South and North of the places of its origination. As such, it can work fairly well in those zones between. I don't believe that it has maintained function because of any sinister, or brilliant plot, it just happens that its structure can interact with both EurAfrican and EurAsia to some extent. That is not going to go away.

Anyway, that is what I think is true, but I always look for more evidence for or against it.

Done.

Last edited by Void (2022-07-19 07:13:46)

kbd512 · 2022-07-19 18:44:23

Calliban,

Australia / Canada / United Kingdom / New Zealand need CATOBAR aircraft carriers, period. All the very real threats you face from countries like Russia and China cannot be defeated by aircraft operating from static land bases. Why do you think the US Navy operates so many CATOBAR aircraft carriers? America recognizes and accepts that the time to deal with military threats is not AFTER they have arrived at your doorstep while you recover from the death and destruction that the enemy causes as your military struggles to get into the fight. Have any of you paid attention to what the Russians did in Ukraine? Ukrainian airfields were obliterated at the outset of the war.

If Russia and China did not have long range tactical fighters and bombers equipped with long range cruise / supersonic / hypersonic missiles, aircraft carriers, and submarines, then I could see how paying for those assets would be viewed as wasteful military spending, but that does not describe reality. There's no need for nuclear powered "super carriers" of the variety that only the US operates, in order to adequately defend yourselves. However, you do need CATOBAR capabilities to hold enemy assets at risk, wherever they happen to be located. Every attempt I've seen to circumvent basic physics leads to wildly expensive and sub-optimal solutions. The Harriers and Lightning B variants are superb aircraft, but they're not CATOBAR aircraft replacements.

A ship about the size of LPD-17 class is perfectly adequate using micro fighters. Aircraft carriers of the size and cost of the new Queen Elizabeth (QE) class only make sense in the context of mutual support provided by the United States, sufficient numbers of indigenous jump carriers and air wings which will never be built at QE's and F-35B's price points, or if QE was equipped with catapults and arresting gear.

From the Wikipedia article on Queen Elizabeth:

In April 2022, the Deputy Chief of Defence Staff, Air Marshal Richard Knighton, told the House of Commons Defence Select Committee that the MoD was in discussions to purchase a second tranche of 26 F-35B fighters. Plans for frontline F-35B squadrons had been modified and now envisaged a total of three squadrons (rather than four) each deploying 12-16 aircraft. In surge conditions 24 F-35s might be deployed on a carrier but a routine deployment would likely involve 12 aircraft.

QE is a 65,000t warship, very nearly as heavy as the CV-63 Kitty Hawk class super carrier that America built in the late 1950s to mid 1960s and only slightly smaller, but QE is nominally equipped with 12 to 16 F-35Bs or 24 at most. The notional ability to carry 36 is largely theoretical, meaning technically possible but not practical to do. You could validly argue that some of the rest of Kitty Hawk's air wing is not required because the F-35 fills multiple roles so well, thus requiring far fewer strike package assets, but you cannot work around the fact that Kitty Hawk routinely deployed with 75 to 90 aircraft, including organic aerial refueling support.

IMO, Kitty Hawk and her sisters should've been provided to Australia / Canada / United Kingdom at scrap value. They were clearly much more capable platforms and already paid for. So what if it cost a couple billion dollars to transform them into what each allied naval service required? They still would've been cheaper than the alternatives, and could be pooled to provide cooperative defense when and where required. The frigates operated by your countries could've been retrofitted with modernized weapons like ESSM to provide adequate long range air defense, with RAM or ASRAAM or IRIS or similar weapons for point defense. CIWS and similar gun-based defensive systems are no longer adequate. However, it's probable that this opportunity has already passed by and those hulls are being or have been scrapped as I write this. QE and PW are what we have to work with. The problem is that two hulls and 75 jets is not enough to patrol both the Atlantic and Pacific.

There's a vague assertion that QE can generate as many sorties per day as the Nimitz class, although I doubt that. Perhaps it can generate the same number of sorties, but I can guarantee that they're much more brief in duration, at greatly reduced combat radius with a given payload. Without aerial refueling assets nearby, combat radius is limited even for CATOBAR aircraft. If QE was primarily operating near friendly coastal waters, then maybe not such a big deal. However, QE is clearly a blue water aircraft carrier. The closer you position your aircraft carrier to a competent enemy's shoreline, the greater the defense of the carrier battle group required to assure its survival. This is why the US Navy has traditionally placed a premium on combat radius and payload carrying capability, but less on stealth and maneuverability. The original Hornet was a fail in that regard- technically capable but not practical to use. US Navy has paid dearly for that decision. Wars are lost when sufficient ordnance fails to find its target. Wars have not been lost because someone's jet was a little slower or less maneuverable. Combat doesn't work that way. It's everything you have against everything the enemy has, at the time required.

From the Wikipedia article on Queen Elizabeth:

Although the F-35B is fully capable of performing vertical landing, in a similar fashion to the way that the Harrier and Sea Harrier operated, this method of operation places limitations on the loads that the aircraft is capable of returning to the ship with. As a consequence, to avoid the costly disposal at sea of both fuel and munitions, the Royal Navy is developing the Shipborne rolling vertical landing (SRVL) technique for its operation of the Lightning II. SRVL is a hybrid landing technique that uses the Lightning's vectored thrust capability to slow its forward speed to around 70 knots to allow it to make a rolling landing, using its disc brakes, without the need of an arrestor wire. A special type of metallic 'thermal paint' is being developed to withstand temperatures of up to 1,500 °C in the vicinity of jet nozzles.

The Nimitz and Ford class typically carry 4 squadrons of Hornet or Super Hornet or Lightning C variant strike fighters, as well as additional squadrons of AWACS / EW / logistics / ASW aircraft. QE carries 2 squadrons of F-35Bs, possibly 3 squadrons if carries almost nothing else. The notion that you can work half or a quarter as many jets at least twice as hard, or do that for any significant length of time, is absurd. On any given day, even when all the spare parts and maintainer attention is immediately available, up to 1/5 of your jets can be down for maintenance. The longer combat operations go on, the more maintenance is required. You run out of hours in a day to produce mission capable jets for the next day of flight ops. I've personally seen this during OEF when spares were plentiful, fuel and technical expertise were no object. Were we working with older airframes at the time? Yes. Did that make all the difference? I doubt it. In general, all naval combat jets break things at an alarming rate, to include relatively "young" airframes. These airframes will also age at an increased rate.

Your Merlins and Wildcats are pretty solid navalized rotary wing assets, so I don't think those will become a limiting factor. Unfortunately, F-35B is sub-optimal for blue water carrier operations. USMC operates F-35Bs because their smaller jump carriers are operated closer to enemy shorelines. I can't see QE or her sister getting that close to Russia or China. For QE to become a factor in the thinking of the Russians and Chinese, UK and her allies need to build and operate at least 4 more of them. 2 are needed to defend Europe and 4 are needed to defend Asia from China. In practice, that means 1 or 2 are actually available. America will still show up to help, but bear in mind that in the Pacific we're sailing from Japan or Hawaii, San Diego more likely, or Norfolk if the threat is in the Atlantic. There's one forward deployed carrier in Japan as a matter of practice, but the rest are home ported in San Diego. If Australia and the United Kingdom want their territorial waters patrolled on the regular, then they need their own aircraft carriers to do it.

This isn't about achieving force parity with Russia or China, either. It's about maintaining enough over-match capability that those nations are never emboldened to initiate an attack, falsely believing that they'll be able to pull off some sort of "blitzkrieg" campaign against you. You should also consider the possibility that a sneak attack might sink or disable one or two carriers. The oldest Nimitz class super carriers are rapidly nearing the end of their lives, after more than 40 years of service. They're supposed to be replaced by the new Ford class on a one-for-one basis, but that is far from guaranteed.

Incidentally, both the US and UK are not building the sort of Navy required to do global patrol of shipping lanes. That requires about 800 ships total according to all of our experts, but when combined our navies won't come close to that figure. The only way to come close to achieving that capability is by using much smaller conventionally-powered CATOBAR-equipped "sea control" type small deck carriers / amphibious ships capable of carrying significant numbers of microfighters to generate enough sorties per day to provide overwatch, as well as landing forces capable of taking and holding ground (expeditionary fighting capabilities). There's an Australian guy on YouTube, nicknamed "Perun", who calls this "all metal, no manpower". His statement and video was an admonishment directed at the problems that caused Russia's actual military capabilities to deteriorate to the point of uselessness in a shooting war with a much smaller country (Ukraine).

In the future, smaller / less costly to operate ships with more practical aircraft and weapons will be required to stave off the coming wars of attrition. If we fail to do that, then we will pay a steep price for our lack of forethought on this matter.

kbd512 · 2022-07-20 03:24:42

Rather than scrapping all of the existing Nimitz class super carriers, what are some thoughts on Australia / Canada / United Kingdom / New Zealand repurposing America's existing super carriers using smaller air wings comprised of F-35Bs or F-35Cs?

This would create the option of using CATOBAR-enabled drones, such as Boeing's new MQ-25 Stingray, to provide aerial refueling capabilities to embarked F-35Bs, as well as better AWACS, EW, COD, and UNREP. The increase in onboard jet fuel quantity, relative to the Queen Elizabeth class, is considerably greater (1.85M gallons total ship and aircraft fuel for Queen Elizabeth vs 3M gallons for Nimitz), but this increase in capacity would be offset by using more fuel to power the ship. The pair of nuclear reactors would be removed and replaced with 8 Trent MT30 gas turbines or 4 LM9000 gas turbines. Alternatively, 4 Wärtsilä-Sulzer RTA96-C, would burn around 133,000 gallons per day at normal cruise speed, which represents the most fuel efficient option. The two bow catapults could be removed and replaced with a ski jump. Nimitz's JBDs would deflect engine exhaust so that the next jet in the launch sequence could remain just behind the previous one. The two waist catapults would remain in place for launch of MQ-25s (tanker drones) and C-2s (COD). All of your existing Merlins (AWACS), Wildcats (ASW / ASuW / SAR), Chinook (UNREP / airborne assault), and AH-64s (gunships) could simply be cross-decked.

Alternatively, you pay to refuel the existing nuclear reactors at a cost of approximately $2.5B USD per ship, which provides for an additional 25 years of operations, you trade in your F-35Bs for F-35Cs, and then you have true blue water capabilities that rival any potential adversary. That way, the western world has 20 nuclear powered super carriers to call upon, which would mean Russia and China could not defeat the western world. This is obviously the most expensive option, even though you essentially get brand new F-35Cs for free. The ships could essentially be delivered as-is if this option was selected. I'd recommend replacing the existing Phalanx / CIWS mounts with 21-cell RAM mounts. Pilot re-training to operate CATOBAR jets would obviously be required, but your pilots are among the best in the world and I don't see this as a show-stopper, especially given that some of your exchange pilots are already trained to fly aboard our ships.

If the nuclear option is selected, then Australia and New Zealand could operate Queen Elizabeth and Prince of Wales for territorial defense and sea control. Australia has already repurposed some of our old Oliver Hazard Perry class frigates, re-equipping them with Mk41 VLS and ESSM (RIM-162). It occurs to me that with additional refit to cut out the unused Standard Missile launchers and below-decks hardware, those ships could be armed with an additional 3 Mk41s, for a total of 128 ESSM per escort frigate. In the future, we will need large numbers of medium range radar-guided and short range IR-guided anti-aircraft missiles to repel cruise missile barrages and suicide drone attacks.

If we're forced to defend Taiwan against China, then I think we need dozens of 250t class missile boats armed with Mk56 32-cell ESSM launchers, RAM or LAWS for point defense, and perhaps a 57mm gun. These ships would use aircraft-type AESA radars, EO suites, and networked cooperative engagement capabilities to distribute defensive platforms around a defended objective, in order to provide adequate missile screens to counter the inevitable barrages of incoming cruise missiles, drones, and attack jets, which is what Ukraine has suffered.

That's why I think small deck carriers / sea control ships, microfighters, and flotillas of missile boats are the future of naval warfare. There's still some utility to the super carriers / destroyers / frigates, but those are so large / capable / expensive now that they're better categorized as offensive or first strike platforms, and unsuitable as missile sponges due to their cost.

If we lose a single super carrier to a barrage attack, it'll be another 10 years and $15B to replace it. The lives and experience lost are irreplaceable, which is why we shouldn't put so many sailors aboard small numbers of very large, albeit very capable, ships. We've seen how easily an Arleigh Burke class destroyer can become so badly damaged from a simple navigation error as to require towing back to port. All these very-high-end super weapons are incredibly expensive to procure and maintain, to the detriment of frequent realistic training and all other considerations, such as total numbers of available warships.

Calliban · 2022-07-20 07:14:47

Repurposing the Nimitz class would be a preferable option to new build for CANZUK, as the Australians are rattled by Chinese expansionism and want power projection capabilities right now and Russian expansion into Europe needs to be halted by building up an effective detterant capability. Time is of the essence.

I am unsure of the exact reasons for QE class not including nuclear propulsion. I don't know if it was cost or some other complication from the 1958 agreement. But powering a blue water aircraft carrier with diesel strikes me as a strategic weakness. It means we need a fuel tanker following it around.

I don't know where the US would stand when it comes to handing over a fully equipped nuclear powered ship. There would need to be ammendment to the 1958 agreement to cover surface ship reactor plants. That agreement covers the UK, not Canada or Australia and applies to submarine reactors. The Australians would have no objection to operating nuclear powered ships as they are already actively pursuing this option. Cost may be more of a stumbling point.

Last edited by Calliban (2022-07-20 07:15:47)

kbd512 · 2022-07-20 09:51:14

Calliban,

I'm guessing it's a function of cost and too few nuclear engineers in the UK to support nuclear powered surface ships in addition to their nuclear powered submarines. However, if America provided training and then handed over fully functional ships, then I'm guessing that this would be less of a problem. Please be aware of the fact that none of our nuclear powered super carriers cost less than our conventionally powered super carriers to own and operate. Fuel cost alone was not the overriding reason for the US Navy choosing nuclear power over fossil fuel. Fuel availability and logistics simplification were the primary factors that made nuclear power the more appealing option.

With respect to "having a fuel tanker following it around", that would be the case regardless of the propulsion method selected. F-35s are incredibly thirsty aircraft. We UNREP once per week during flight operations. You never want to go below 50% of your total fuel capacity. Every UNREP delivers fresh fuel, food, munitions, and sometimes personnel, even though the C-2s can also ferry personnel. We tended to UNREP everything we could, and anything that didn't "fit the schedule" was sent via C-2, typically limited to personnel, mail, and replacement engines for the jets. You'd UNREP twice per week with a diesel burner, meaning two fleet oilers per carrier.

I wasn't aware that Australia would accommodate nuclear powered ships. If that's the case, then yes, they could operate the Nimitz class. I still think asking them to operate such a large warship would require increasing their allocated naval budget.

I would also like to point out that the large crew of the Nimitz class, around 3,500 ship's company, could be reduced to some degree if the air wing was smaller, the defensive weapons were the same kind (remove the old Phalanx / CIWS and Sea Sparrow launchers to replace them exclusively with RAM launchers), and the sensors were upgraded. I estimate that 500 to 700 crew members could be removed if the ship was simplified and upgraded.

That said, you need to increase recruitment (the following only lists active duty personnel):
Royal Navy: 34,000
Australian Royal Navy: 15,000
Canadian Royal Navy: 8,000
New Zealand Royal Navy: 2,000

For comparison purposes (also active duty):
United States Navy: 350,000 active duty, 101,000 reserves, 280,000 civilian employees

America has more reservists, as well as civilian support personnel, assigned than the total combined strength of all assigned United Kingdom / Australian / Canadian / New Zealand naval services. Your services would need at least 100,000 but probably more like 200,000 active duty personnel to effectively operate all of those Nimitz class super carriers. However, you would also have a truly effective deterrent to Russia and China that prevents war from ever visiting your shores. If air power availability is less of a concern, then you could at least turn the Nimitz class into floating command post / amphibious ships (airborne assault only) / arsenal ships that have a minimized at-sea logistics tail.

Terraformer · 2022-07-20 14:54:57

Re. affiliate countries, yes I think Scandinavia would be a good place to consider. England may well have ended up as one if William hadn't conquered (and committed genocide upon) us. Norway in particularly would be good for Britain to build a strong alliance with, given our mutual interests in the North Sea and other energy assets. Iceland and Greenland are between us and Canada, so they would be natural to draw into a North Atlantic CANZUK region (CANZUK may be dispersed globally, but really it forms two regions that are internally connected by sea). Ireland, well... yeah, that won't happen for a while

One interesting opportunity, that I wish the Australians would pursue, would be to relocate Hong Kong to somewhere in Australia. They have the space for a new charter city. Can't really ally with Chinese-controlled Hong Kong, but New Hong Kong we could. And Singapore too may be a good affiliate for the Southern Region. I'd be wary of having too large a gap in income between countries, given that such a union would almost certainly include free movement...

RobertDyck · 2022-07-21 01:49:31

This discussion appears to have become derailed. The discussion started about a trade alliance. I see Terraformer trying to bring it back on track. Trade does have to worry about pirates, but realize pirates typically use small boats like Zodiac (inflatable tenders) for the raid. A frigate or destroyer is more than enough, especially if the navy ship is equipped with helicopters. Large scale naval combat from actual combat ships are unlikely. If a major nation were to attempt such a thing, then NATO could deal with it. Remember, most of the proposed member states of this trade alliance are already members of NATO. Australia and New Zealand have counter-piracy and technology agreements with NATO.
Wikipedia: NATO partnersnips with third countries

kbd512 · 2022-07-21 11:57:57

Robert,

You mean the way we're "dealing with" Russia? How's that going?

Use all the "strong words" against Russia and China that you want to, but it won't change their behavior. These will be the new "pirates" that you get to deal with.

India and China are building out their naval forces for a reason. The writing is on the wall. Nation-state combat is coming to a primary shipping lane near you. America is no longer interested in world policing. Now it's everyone else's turn to go broke. We'll show up after the shooting starts, but not before.

SpaceNut · 2022-07-21 19:49:37

We have been dancing around the edges and hoping that Russia will take care of Russia its self.

RobertDyck · 2022-07-22 10:54:51

kbd512,

America has maintained a military capable of engaging in a war on two fronts. That's a mistake. World War 2 saw a war on two fronts, but formal military strategy says never fight a war on two fronts. Your country should not do that. Cut back. Close military bases in western European countries. Close most foreign military bases. And why does American need 11 assault carriers (super-carriers) and 9 amphibious assault carriers? China has 1 CATOBAR carrier (80k tons), 2 STOBAR carriers (60-70k tones), and 2 landing helicopter docks. Russia has 1 STOBAR carrier (55k ton). I recommend America limit building Gerald R. Ford class carriers (100k ton) to 4. Currently has 10 Nimitz class carriers, but they're scheduled for decommissioning. Together with 9 amphibious assault ships (8 Wasp class 41k ton, 1 America class 45k ton), that's enough.

Canada fielded 3 divisions of army during World War 2, at one point they briefly had 4 divisions, but that has been scaled back due to peace. It's supposed to. Now the army has 3 regiments, which has a vague size but currently size is equal to a battalion. So effectively 3 battalions of infantry, plus tanks, plus air force, plus navy. Canada has coastal patrol vessels and ice breakers. The blue water navy included 2 surplus light carriers from the UK right after WW2. When they wore out, Canada purchased just one, also a surplus light carrier, but applied upgrades before putting it in service. She underwent mid-life refit April 1965 - August 1967, which cost $8 million in dollars of the day. But she was decommissioned July 1970. With mid-air refuelling, combat aircraft can operate from land bases. Carriers allow a military to project power, but Canada has no intention to invade any country. Canada will participate with it's allies, so Canada can use air bases of those allies. Not carriers, land bases. If carriers are the most power defence against nation states attacking shipping, then the aircraft are the weapons of those carriers. Why base the aircraft on a ship? That ship is just a multi-billion dollar target. An island cannot be sunk. An ally's air base(s) on land cannot be sunk. Canadian CF-18 Hornet aircraft could attack an enemy ship from an air base, if necessary using mid-air refuelling to reach it's target.

RobertDyck · 2022-07-22 11:08:46

Instead of CANZUK, why not expand the relevance of the British Commonwealth, aka Commonwealth of Nations, or simply "The Commonwealth"? This includes all members of CANZUK, plus more, a total of 56 countries. The only members that were never British territories: Samoa, Namibia, Mozambique and Rwanda. Why did they join the Commonwealth considering they were never British territories? I'm not sure, but there are benefits to membership.

Terraformer · 2022-07-22 14:55:19

CANZUK have a common language, common political structure, and yes, common heritage. Maybe we could consider the other Commonwealth Realms, but I wouldn't go beyond that if we're talking about freedom of movement and a shared free trade zone. Too much variance. And free visas for 2+ billion people really, really, really will not go down well in Britain...

RobertDyck · 2022-07-22 16:54:40

You have a point. I was thinking of maximizing economy, but culture is an issue. Here in Canada we've had so much immigration during the current administration that our city is hardly recognizable. Yes, we have the largest multicultural festival in the world, but its gotten to a point where people are surprised when I say I was born here. A number of people think we need to slow down immigration. More immigration from Australia / New Zealand / UK would help dilute other immigrants. Sorry, but when parts of the city have billboards entirely in Chinese, we have an issue. Winnipeg has been strongly influenced by eastern European cultures. The tradition of the wedding social as a fund-raiser for the wedding has been considered a Winnipeg tradition for over half a century now. So long that people forgot it came from Ukrainian culture. The government made a deal with several indigenous groups creating a major urban reserve. Winnipeg has the largest per-capita population of indigenous people of any major city in Winnipeg, but this will increase it. Many people think we need to slow down introduction of other cultures, absorb what we have now. As I said, bringing in more ANZUK citizens would actually help.

The reason the government is doing this is the crash in birth rate. Geographers use the term "fertility rate" to mean the number of babies a woman will give birth to during her life. It's a calculated average. You might think the number must be 2 just to sustain the population, but due to child deaths before reaching adulthood and other technicalities, it must be 2.1. In 2019 it was 1.47, in 2020 it dropped to 1.40, so we have a problem. The current government's solution subsidized daycare, Canada Child Benefit, and immigration. Most people don't realize the Canada Child Benefit is a bribe to have babies.

But getting back to economy. Russia is only about half the population of the former Soviet Union. The Commonwealth of Independent States is a free trade area with many of the former Soviet republics. It now has 236.446 million people (2021 estimate). Georgia has 4,012,104 people (2022) if you include Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Ukraine had 41,167,336 people excluding Crimea, as of January 2022 (before the war). Which helps explain why Russia wants them. The European Union has 447,007,596 people (2021 estimate). North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) has 497,576,989 people using current data for USA (Census Bureau), April data for Canada, and 2020 data for Mexico. CANZUK would have 136,649,018 people (2020 estimate).

Void · 2022-07-22 18:40:50

I think that there has been an association between parts of the former empire and the USA, and it would be good to continue it.

It is not a question of one trying to convert the other. Where the win is that we are not the same, and can look out for each other it can be hoped. One does well one way and the other another way. Chances are at least someone is awake to handle trouble.

Done.

RobertDyck · 2022-07-22 20:09:02

Canada joined many trade agreements. Canada will continue to be a member of NAFTA, or whatever name you want to use for the renewed NAFTA. Canada also joined Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) with the EU and Britain. Which raises the question: how would CANZUK differ from CETA?

kbd512 · 2022-07-23 05:02:44

Robert,

America maintains a military capable of defending ourselves and our allies. Fighting a war on multiple fronts is never desirable, yet sometimes required, as history proves. Your argument is with Russia and China. America isn't threatening to nuke her neighbors. We have repeatedly requested that our European allies bolster their defense programs. Until Russia invaded Ukraine, our request fell on deaf ears. Our Asian allies need no convincing, as China does that for us. The lesson to be learned is that an enemy will take advantage of anyone unprepared for war.

America maintains military bases in Europe and Asia to present a credible defense to any would-be aggressor. Our presence there is a direct result of their inability to effectively fight against tyrants who mass murdered tens of millions of people. To this day, they have yet to mount a credible collective defense. I don't like the current state of affairs anymore than you do.

We explored overseas military base closures under President Trump. He wanted to close American military bases in Germany and Japan unless they were either willing to pay for our military to be there, or pay to put their own military there. They ignored both suggestions. PM Angela Merkel accused President Trump of "abandoning our allies" for doing the very thing you and I both want America to do. PM Shinzo Abe's government immediately voted that America's military would not leave. The Admirals have wanted to leave Japan entirely since at least the time I was still in uniform, on account of how expensive it is to operate there and how close we are to China. Their request was placed in the trash can by SECDEF and POTUS and the Japanese government, regardless of which political party was in charge at the time.

If you want America to leave, then ask your collective governments to start staffing those military bases and to stop balking at the costs. Go ask the Ukrainians how much it cost them to have their country utterly destroyed by Russia. We maintain our overseas military bases in Europe and Asia at the specific request of the governments running the countries where our bases are located. Every time it looks like we might be able to leave, we ask them, "Hey, you got this, right?" Nope. They don't "got it". Will this time be different? I hope so, for their sake.

Germany doesn't have a functional military to speak of. The Fatherland can scrape together about 200 tanks total on a good day, a few dozen fully operational strike fighters (aging Tornadoes and some Eurofighters), and a literal handful of frigates, only 3 of which have AEGIS. Germany spends $400B USD on defense, meaning over half as much as the US spends. I was dumbfounded by how much money the Germans spent, relative to the end result. I guess I shouldn't be, given how badly their Energiewende project is going. The other European countries also field modern hardware, especially the UK and France. How much of it is fully mission capable and how many hours per month have been spent on realistic combat training?

Canada fielded 3 or possibly 4 division during WWII. The US fielded 91 divisions, the UK fielded 85, Australia 10, Russia fielded over 250 divisions, and China fielded over 246 (at least in theory, as many of them didn't even have weapons until they were provided weapons by foreign powers at later stages of the war or retrieved the weapons dropped by their dead comrades). That's how many divisions were required to defeat nazi Germany, which fielded 315 divisions, and Imperial Japan, which fielded 220. Those two historical "enemies" only ever had a tiny fraction of the food and petroleum resources of America or Canada or Russia or United Kingdom and Commonwealth, but it took 5 years of utter brutality and 120M to 170M dead (military and civilians) before the fighting was finally over. Numbers do matter.

Airfields and parked aircraft are more easily destroyed than an aircraft carrier. That's why every military air base immediately becomes one of the first targets destroyed during an invasion. It's only a matter of knowing where an airfield is and then sending aircraft or missiles to destroy it. Destroying a carrier battle group is much more difficult. I agree that America should field smaller aircraft carriers and jets, because I recognize that some ships will be lost in a shooting war with a competent enemy. I think America should field a single class of 25,000t warship with lots of 500t class missile boats armed primarily with ESSM and RAM. The LPD-17s would run ~$2B each. The missile boats ~$100M each, excluding weapon systems. There's no other practical way to get to an 800 ship Navy, which is required for global patrol vs power projection.

RCAF CF-18s could attack enemy ships if they had the weapons, training, and tanker support to do it, but no anti-ship missiles in service. RCN has RGM-84 Harpoon missiles that the RCAF could theoretically rob from the Halifax class frigates to mount to their CF-18s or P-3s / CP-140s, but no on-hand AGM-84s. RCAF has some AGM-65s and JDAMs, if your CF-18s can fly to within visual range of an enemy warship and live to tell the tale. Canada has a total of 98 F/A-18s of one variety or another, 4 short range C-130 tankers and 2 longer range Airbus A-310 tankers. Assuming half of those assets are on each coast, that leaves 3 tankers and 1 squadron of attack jets. Of the 98 Hornets, more than half are down hard for lack of spares. There are probably 24 partially mission capable jets, ignoring airframe limitations that prevent them from getting too aggressive with evasive maneuvers. If your pilots are willing to attack an enemy destroyer squadron or aircraft carrier battle group with that, my hat's off to them.

I think we both want America to spend less money on defense, but other countries must increase their defense spending, which puts America between a rock and a hard place, because we will never go into another large scale war totally unprepared. If you get to tell America to spend less on defense, then America has every right to tell Canada and our other allies to spend more. Deal?

RobertDyck · 2022-07-23 11:42:07

The total will never *NEVER* equal what America is spending now. Military contractors will whine and complain that they have dramatically reduced sales. That's what this is really all about.

kbd512 · 2022-07-23 15:49:39

Robert,

Nobody here is even suggesting that CANZUK should spend what the US spends on defense. Combined, your countries spend less than 1/7th of what the US spends on defense, but all of your countries are counted amongst the primary beneficiaries of what the US spends on defense. No other country has attacked Australia, Canada, New Zealand, or the United Kingdom since our post-WWII military alliance began, so regardless of what anyone thinks about the relative merit of what was done decades ago, the net effect is that it has deterred further aggression up to this point in time from Russia and China.

CANZUK GDP is $7.6T USD. US GDP is $21T. CANZUK's GDP percentage is 0.3619 that of the US. If defense spending was in proportion to what the US spends, then that equates to $271B USD. I would be completely satisfied with $200B USD. In turn, the US could lower its defense spending to around $500B USD. This equates to Canada spending 2.6% vs 1.4% of its GDP on defense. Health care spending in Canada is still 7.2X that amount. The bulk of the spending is clearly not defense related at all, so this is not an unreasonable ask. All told, we're still spending less than Russia and China after relative cost and accurate reporting of their defense spending is taken into account.

I don't care about what military contractors want. I'm not an advocate or spokesman for their industries. I don't think military spending is a virtue unto itself and never have. I think national defense sufficient to prevent future nation-state wars is a virtue unto itself. I do care about achieving military capabilities superior to Russia and China or other would-be aggressor nations like Iran and North Korea.

I don't think America needs to spend as much as it does to achieve its defense objectives. I think far less money could be spent for a better result. However, that starts with having practical military capabilities. That means aircraft, artillery, tanks, and ships with well-trained crews are ready to deploy within 24 to 48 hours, which is our standard for a fully capable combat unit. That means weapon systems are fully modernized and mission capable, not chronically short of spare parts and fuel. That means realistic and appropriate weapon systems are selected so that requested capabilities align with actual combat usage, regardless of what paper doctrine states. That means our allies have broadly similar capabilities, even if to a lesser degree.

I don't want America to have any overseas military bases, because I don't want an empire. That's built into America's DNA, even if we have had globalist / corporatist warmongers running the show in years past. If we end up creating a de-facto global empire, then it should be a series of mutually beneficial military and trade arrangements with our allies. Mutually beneficial doesn't mean America provides all the military forces to assure the smooth operation of global trade while our allies incessantly criticize America for the military deterrent it provides at its own cost. You'll find that most Americans don't want or agree with our foreign military misadventures that clearly don't improve our overall security and are an economic drain on the tax payers.

Combined China and Russian Defense Spending Exceeds U.S. Defense Budget by Jim Inhofe

From the article:

Here’s a myth often repeated: “The United States defense budget is larger than the next 10 countries combined.” You hear it all the time from progressives, led by the Senate Budget Committee Chairman, in their arguments to cut funding for our military. It’s time to remove this false talking point from our vernacular. Here’s the truth: our defense budget is almost certainly smaller than the combined Chinese and Russian military budgets after you adjust for basic economic realities.
Let’s be clear. Because the Chinese and Russians manipulate their defense budgets, measuring their actual spending is very difficult. Both Beijing and Moscow lie about just about everything—the coronavirus, genocide, poisoning political opponents—so it should be no surprise they intentionally hide significant parts of their defense spending. For instance, the Chinese don't report any research and development spending in their defense budget, and significant portions of their space program and basing costs are omitted. (By comparison, the U.S. R&D budget was about $100 billion, or almost 15 percent of our military budget last year.)
This isn’t a new problem – but our lack of study on it is. During the Cold War, we had legions of Kremlinologists who spent day and night trying to understanding Soviet defense spending. Yet today, almost no effort has been put into understanding our adversaries’ defense budgets. That’s why last year’s National Defense Authorization Act tasked the Pentagon, alongside an independent research center, to give us better tools to understand Chinese and Russian defense spending as it compares to ours.
So these ill-considered comments about our “larger than the next 10 countries” defense budget are not doing an apples-to-apples comparison, and they also aren’t using the appropriate metrics to make an accurate assessment. While most people who parrot the “10 countries” talking point probably don’t bother to look at the data, those who do always cite the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) military expenditure database.
The SIPRI database compares defense spending adjusted by market exchange rates, a metric appropriate for traded goods, like food and household electronics. But market exchange rates are extremely volatile, and they are not a good metric for measuring non-traded goods—like military equipment. A dollar spent on military equipment—developing, purchasing and maintaining weapons—goes much further in lower-income countries.
Instead, purchasing power parity gives us a better picture of actual spending. This adjustment in part helps us account for the significant difference in the cost of labor—whether in weapons manufacturing or in military personnel pay—in the United States, Russia and China.
Here's what that picture looks like using the more accurate purchasing power comparison: the SIPRI-reported 2017 Chinese defense budget of $228 billion actually equates to $467 billion, according to Heritage research. If you adjust that 2017 number to reflect four years of consistent and significant growth of the Chinese defense budget, as has been reported, that puts China’s defense budget at about $604 billion in 2021.
Using the SIPRI market exchange rate data, Russia spends roughly the same amount on defense as the United Kingdom or France (about $55-60 billion USD each). Yet as two Russia experts, Michael Kofman and Richard Connolly, wrote, “One need not be a Russian military analyst to have a general appreciation for the fact that the Russian armed forces, including conventional and nuclear components, are vastly larger in size, greater in fielded capability, and in a higher state of readiness than those of France or the United Kingdom.” They concluded that actual Russian expenditures likely top $200 billion in adjusted dollars and are sustainable in the long term.Of course, neither of those comparisons account for tens of billions in additional off-the-books or hidden spending in China or Russia. But when you combine the estimates for China and Russia using purchasing power parity, even without adding in the hidden spending, that's already greater than our budget. Myth busted.
Simply put: China’s approximate $604 billion defense budget and Russia’s more than $200 billion defense expenditures, put together, total more than $800 billion — well higher than our defense budget of $741 billion.
Lastly, these comparisons don’t account for the different responsibilities of each military. The U.S. military has extensive commitments around the globe to protect our interests, including interests that align with our allies and partners. By contrast, the Chinese and Russians focus almost all of their defense spending and military forces on limited regional objectives in close geographic proximity.
The United States needs to increase its defense spending to keep up with China and Russia in competition—and we need to innovate and outthink our adversaries, too. This competition will require a whole-of-government national security approach with a strong military at its core. We can’t spend our way out of our national security problems, but we can certainly spend too little to give ourselves a chance. The fact is, maintaining deterrence is about both how much money we spend and how well we spend that money—measured against the spending of our adversaries. What’s clear is that we’re lacking – and President Biden’s insufficient budget topline this year will only put China and Russia further ahead. We have to rectify this before it’s too late for us to catch up.

Approximately $112B of America's $750B FY2022 defense budget is direct research & development. Analog dollar figures are not even reported in Russia or China's military budgets. That means they actually spend far more money than what is actually reported. Since the petroleum industry in China is almost entirely run by corporations created by their government, does anyone think they charge themselves for the oil they use to power their military vehicles? This is the sort of thing that makes like-for-like comparison a bit silly. Russian AK-47 rifles are built in state-run factories.

Here in America, small arms are procured from private or public but not state-owned or state-run defense contractors, like pretty much everything else. We have a literal handful of munitions plants, like Lake City or Watervliet Arsenals or Lima Tank Plant, run by a rotating set of competent corporations on behalf of the government, with fixed profit margins. It's capped at around 5% profit. It's a "sure thing" if you do a good job, but very modest total dollar figures involved. Everyone employed there has "skin in the game", meaning their relatives are active duty military and/or they were active duty military. It's mostly mothers of young soldiers or soldiers themselves. Everything else is a cost-plus contract, which is only now starting to change, with new systems like the General Dynamics Griffin tank which was not funded with tax dollars until after the prototype was ready for government testing to see if it's a suitable M1 Abrams replacement.

The same is true in the UK. HK Defense built their rifles in a state-owned but privately operated munitions factory. Most other major weapon systems were procured on the open market in a competitive bidding process. The Queen Elizabeth class immediately comes to mind. That typically costs more money per unit delivered, but means the tax payer is not directly paying for the continued existence of privately-owned corporations. Defense contractors can still fail if poorly managed and acquired by other defense contractors or disbanded entirely. We went to that model because government-run arsenals took simple items like the M-14 and SA-80 rifle and made them almost unusable in combat- numerous serious manufacturing defects and no ability to fire and replace those responsible. Initially, complex weapons like missiles were also developed and procured that way, but it became apparent that the talent attracted to those government-run organizations was often sub-par with what private industry could provide, which is why it took an American government arsenal in WWII almost towards the end of the war to admit that our torpedoes were failing at alarming rates due to basic design flaws and manufacturing defects. After the war, it was decided that the government's job was testing and evaluating new complex weapon systems for conformance to contract specifications, rather than development-to-deployment of complex military hardware like aircraft, radars and other sensors, missiles, engines, and transport vehicles. In corporations, you had design by fiat rather than design by committee, so no more analysis paralysis.

You once told me that Canada spent $10B USD to refurbish a few old diesel-electric submarines purchased from the UK. That amount of money would easily pay for refueling and refurbishment of two Nimitz class super carriers, which costs about $3B to $3.5B ($2.5B for refueling and the rest for refurbishment). I can't think of too many defense scenarios for Canada where having 3 old diesel-electric submarines with aging weapons provides more defense capability than having your own super carriers. So, what if that pair of super carriers were the only commissioned warships that RCN operated? If RCN actually had them, then your military would have more real defense capabilities than most of the rest of the world, and arguably pose a much greater threat to Russian bombers when you have the ability to strike their airfields. Defensive engagement alone is a losing proposition. You only stop the killing by destroying an enemy's ability to wage war. If the carriers are inviting targets, then so are RCAF airfields. At least any weapons directed at those ships would have to be capable of engaging a moving target and the carriers have to be located before they can be targeted. Do you think any competent enemy won't attack aircraft parked at airfields?

If Russia was truly only spending $60B USD, does anyone else wonder about how they were able to create a nuclear-powered supersonic cruise missile at all, similar to the American nuclear-powered Project Pluto with its Tory series reactors, even if their ill-conceived experiment blew up over their test range and killed a bunch of their nuclear scientists with radioactive fallout? How about their hypersonic conventional missiles that have been used to blow up apartment buildings and shopping centers in Ukraine. If Russia was hurting for money that badly, then how the hell are they able to procure incredible numbers of IADS (S-300 / S-400) and hypersonic weapons, maintain nuclear weapons stockpiles equivalent to or better than the US, and blanket Ukraine with 152mm artillery shells? Ukraine is the size of Texas, yet there are huge areas that look like the aftermath of a Viet Nam era Arc Light bombing campaign. Russia may be deploying older weapons and munitions because they have them available and after a certain age they become use-lose, but they're talking about firing upwards of 60,000 shells per day. At no point in time during the Iraq and Afghan Wars did America approach that figure. That's an astonishing amount of firepower for such a poorly equipped military. Can you imagine what it could be like if their officer corps was less corrupt and spent all of their funds on training and equipment?

If China decides they're going to destroy Taiwan instead of allowing those people to live in peace, are our allies going to stand up and fight the Chinese? If military alliances are worth more than the paper they're printed on, then I think we have to. If China jumps off that cliff, what makes anyone think they'll stop there? Why would China not start attacking our global trade system at that point? These are not hypothetical "thought exercises". Their military academies have published numerous policy, strategy, and tactics papers about what the younger generation of their officer corps would like to do to the west. Their predecessors didn't like the west, but wanted more amicable relationships. Their children don't think that way anymore. They're angry about their lot in life and blame the west, rather than themselves. Maybe some of you should read what they've written before being so dismissive of the security concerns that accompany a global trade network amongst mutually supportive allies. This is why I brought this up to begin with. These people state, both publicly and in writing, that they mean to do us harm and are only searching for the correct opportunity or perceived weakness to exploit. I choose to take them seriously, because I have no reason to doubt their sincerity, even if they presently lack the ability to do what they say they want to do.

Yes, China could implode as Peter Zeihan thinks it will, although I remain skeptical of the end result (I think it's more communism and more brutality, rather than a fracturing of communist China), but it could also explode. For the most part, the Chinese know who they are and what they're about. They want a Chinese global empire. The Chinese leadership views their present geopolitical position as some kind of ongoing humiliation on the part of the west, some of it related to WWII and some of it cultural in nature. This is a strange concept to people such as myself, because when I was in the Navy we made a concerted effort to ingratiate ourselves to the Chinese, but to little effect. Their military is still openly hostile to American ships.

Global trade will always involve Russia and China in some form or another, like it or not. However, our geopolitical positions will always be in conflict with each other, because their leadership wants hegemony, much like our not-to-be-trusted neo-cons and neo-liberals who have been replaced with populists who appeal to the general public rather than globalists. The Cold War is over. There is no more thumbing your nose at your neighbors. You have to learn to live with them, even if doing so carries some risk (and increasing risk, IMO) of surprise attack with it. By being ready, we deter opportunistic bad behavior.

RobertDyck · 2022-07-23 17:55:22

In the late 1950s, the United States government pressured Canada to cancel the Avro Arrow. They pressured all NATO allies to not buy it. Canada wouldn't sell it to just any one, just allies, so with no customers the aircraft became too expensive. It was the best interceptor in the world for it's time. It was cancelled. The United States signed an agreement to build cars in Canada as a concession, something for factory workers to do.

After World War 2, the United States insisted Canada not manufacture nuclear bombs. They insisted Canada purchase any nuclear warheads from the United States. At insistence from the United States, Canada purchased CIM-10 Bomarc missiles to defend against Russian Bear bombers. These were the replacement for Avro Arrow. Because the guidance system of missile in 1958 was not nearly as accurate as today, the missile was equipped with a nuclear warhead. Detonating a nuclear warhead over Canadian soil meant any homes beneath that detonation would be exposed to initial radiation from the explosion, then fallout. The missiles were 1958 era, but deployed in Canada from 1963 through 1972.

Voodoo fighters were expected to defend against Bear bombers from 1972 until CF-18 fighters arrived. The plan was a squadron of CF-101 Voodoo fighters from the Maritimes would fly to US air force base at Bangor Maine, swap out conventional air-to-air missiles with ones that have nuclear warheads. A squadron of US fighters would fly from Bangor to cover the Canadian maritime provinces. Then the Canadian fighters would intercept the Bear bombers. Again the missiles were not that accurate. Even though the missiles had nuclear warheads, in order to ensure a kill, the Canadian fighter jet had to launch it's missile so close to the Bear that the fighter jet would be within blast radius of the nuclear warhead. This was a suicide mission. All Canadian fighter pilots knew it.

I have to emphasize, part of the Avro Arrow program was a new guidance system for AIM-7 sparrow missiles. These missiles had conventional warheads. In the 1950s, the guidance system required the fighter pilot who launched them to manually use a remote control to "fly" the missile into the target. The missiles were not self-guiding. The manufacturer tried to develop a fire-and-forget guidance system, but failed and gave up. The Canadian program was to develop a fire-and-forget guidance system that actually worked. You may take such a guidance system for granted now, but it didn't exist in the 1953 when the Avro Arrow development program started. Avro Arrow aircraft armed with AIM-7 Sparrow missiles with a proper guidance system meant pilots did not have to kill themselves, and no radiation fallout.

Considering the US demanded Canada cancel it's programs, you can't complain that Canadian military spending was greatly curtailed.

kbd512 · 2022-07-24 16:18:28

Robert,

You continually bring up events that happened before I was born that neither of us have any ability to change. America won't stop spending more on defense until the rest of our allies start spending more of their own money on the same. Let go of the past and stop reliving what you believe to be mistakes. Our ancestors did what they did. We bear no responsibility for their actions. If we believe they made mistakes, then we endeavor not to repeat their mistakes. If you're expecting me to apologize over your inter-generational hissy fit about some particular weapon systems that were purchased or cancelled around the time my father was born, then you're wasting your time.

Compromise means all parties get something that they want. America requests that our allies spend more on their own defense so that there is no catastrophic invasion or sneak attack inflicted upon you in the future. This request is not intended to hurt our allies in any way. America may have a well-equipped military as of right now, but none of what we have is a magic wand that can reverse what Russia or China are capable of doing. America's military is spread too thin and it's increasingly obvious. The force structure realignment you see going on right now is a direct result of the very real possibility of fighting with Russia or China. You cannot appease Russia or China's government, in much the same way that you could not appease Hitler or Stalin or Mao. Hoping that a hungry lion eats you last is not a good long-term survival strategy. Lions understand physical fighting power and nothing else. That's part of what makes a lion a lion.

If you want a global trade alliance, that can only be assured with global naval patrol. As global economic outlook changes drastically with demography and resource availability, other nations will become desperate enough to engage in opportunistic attacks and seize vessels if they think they can. There is no reasoning with a mother who has a starving child. She will do absolutely anything, and woe to thee who thinks otherwise. That was the way of things prior to the post-WWII abundance associated with cheap and readily available energy. Good luck convincing people to return to serfdom. They will fight you. Farm boys in tractors in The Netherlands are willing to risk being shot by their own Police. The party is over. It was great while it lasted. Your countries produce valuable commodities traded around the world. Other countries that can't afford those commodities or want to deny your nations the prosperity they've toiled to achieve will do what they can to throw a monkey wrench into the works. That world is already upon us. I would like to prevent that from escalating further.

We've repeatedly stated that our allies may purchase weapons from wherever they want or they can make their own. We routinely purchase weapons developed elsewhere if they meet our requirements. FNH or SiG or H&K make most of our small arms, we field Canadian APCs, BAE IFVs, Rheinmetall tank and artillery cannons, Israeli APS for vehicle protection, Bofors or OTO Melara automatic cannons, Kongsberg anti-ship missiles, AUSTAL fast transport ships and frigates, Rolls Royce aircraft engines, etc. The best reason for purchasing highly sophisticated weapon systems like stealth fighter jets that the United States has developed is that America spends more money on R&D than the total combined military budgets of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom. Everything we develop is exhaustively tested and generally works as advertised by the time it enters full series production. If not, then its faults or limitations are not hidden from its operators or prospective buyers. For similar capabilities to be completely re-created elsewhere would involve inordinately more funding than purchasing and operating thoroughly tested weapon systems with known performance.

The Italians wanted to own their own F-35 production plant and to customize their jets to their liking, so they committed to the project and now their own workforce fabricates and assembles their own fighter jets. All of these jets are a product of international collaboration between Lockheed-Martin, BAE, and a myriad of other defense contractors in Canada and Europe. Everything that was requested of the design was provided. Now it's time to commit to purchasing the airframes and equipping our front line combat units. Some nations proceeded with the purchases while others balked at unit costs. Now the production cost of the F-35 is at or below the production cost of any non-stealthy fighter with similar sensors and weapon systems integration and payload-to-distance performance. F-35 carries more gas internally than anything except the F-15E or Su-27, which consume fuel at an even faster rate. Strike Eagles and Super Hornets are more expensive, as are the latest variants of the Eurofighter, Rafale, and Gripen. Some are a little more maneuverable, some are a little faster in configurations unsuitable for combat, and some are cheaper if they have greatly reduced sensor capabilities. None will ever find a F-35 except by dumb luck. In the end, the advertised product and the unit production cost targets were met, if a bit late. So, buy the Gripen or Rafale or Eurofighter if that's what Canada really wants to do, but you'll only pay more money for less capability. America doesn't really care, so long as you have combat capable jets. Wars are won or lost based upon the ability to destroy enough enemy ground forces and ships to force them to go home. There's a reason the UK selected the F-35 over other options and it had nothing to do with pleasing America or irritating their other allies. Russia, China, India, Japan, and South Korea are all developing or have developed their own indigenous designs that mimic F-35 capabilities. It's not a "me, too" movement. The F-35 works and everyone who has flown Gen 4 vs true Gen 5 fighters know it works.

Fact #1:
No nuclear warheads were ever detonated over Canadian soil. Lots of nuclear warheads were detonated over, on, or under American soil. We don't complain about what actually happened here in America while you complain about what could've happened but didn't. You assert that the United States wouldn't allow Canada to build and tests its own nuclear warheads with no direct knowledge of the decisions made or why they were made, then bemoan the fact that the Bomarc missiles, had they ever been used, would've scattered radioactive fallout over some parts of Canada. In point of fact, your own government had a very contentious debate about even allowing Canada to possess nuclear weapons to begin with. Furthermore, no Canadian pilots were ever sent on suicide missions chasing down Soviet bombers while armed with nuclear rockets. If those bombers did come over the pole, then American pilots also would've been sent on suicide missions armed with the exact same weapons. If the Bomarcs or Air Genie rockets were used, that would've meant the Soviets were flying nuclear-armed bombers intended to annihilate Canada and the United States. We should all thank our lucky stars that such an event never happened. Meanwhile, we should do what we can to deter the Russians or Chinese or North Koreans from thinking that they could pull off such an attack in the future.

Fact #2:
Whatever other grievances you, as a Canadian, have with America, your country also benefits enormously from trade with America and other countries, which was only made possible by the fact that anyone who even thought about interdicting Canadian flagged vessels immediately ran into the US Navy. Canada has always contributed to its own national defense and we're grateful that they have.

Fact #3:
There are no purpose-built interceptors today. These one-trick ponies are not found in the stables of modern air forces because they have no reason to exist. Even Russia uses its remaining MiG-25s and MiG-31s to carry hypersonic missiles in attack roles. Long range SAMs are much faster than any interceptor ever built and have replaced jet aircraft for intercepting bombers and incoming warheads. The F-106 Delta Dart was the last purpose-built interceptor for America, which had a 170 mile greater combat radius than the Arrow, 580 miles, same as the F-14D that came decades later. After the 1950s, a fighter jet's ability to carry bombs was as much a priority as intercepting enemy fighters and bombers. If interception speed or range alone were the only factors, then the F-14 was technically an interceptor, but in reality it was intended to do interception, dogfighting, recon, and strike missions for the Navy.

The American "Arrow", the XF-108 Rapier, was also cancelled in 1959, same year as the Arrow, because it wasn't a practical weapon and costs were going astronomical, just like the Arrow and TSR-2 programs. The XB-70 Mach 3 bomber was another highly impractical weapon, and also cancelled after a series of high speed test flights. It's almost as if there's a pattern there that has nothing to do with offending the sensibilities of Canadians who think America killed their favorite project out of spite. It's as if the people in procurement thought that no Mach 3 interceptors or bombers were worth the cost, but even if they were, the technology was too immature to do it at all in 1958.

SR-71 pilots who briefly manually flew the plane at Mach 3 said the experience was exhausting, because your hand could twitch and unintentionally "adjust" your altitude by several thousand feet. That doesn't seem like a problem I'd want to have while trying to locate and shoot down an incoming nuclear armed bomber carrying enough firepower to vaporize everyone and everything I ever cared about, but that's just me. That's probably why the US developed computer-controlled missiles that can fly at Mach 6+ so accurate that they physically strike an incoming warhead or missile to destroy it.

The A-12 variant of the SR-71, which routinely achieved Mach 3 speeds because it was truly designed to fly at those speeds, unlike the Arrow, was a total fail. The GAR-9 missiles were another fail. The F-111B variant... Yep, you guessed it, another fail. GAR-9 eventually became the basis for the AIM-54 Phoenix, which was never used in combat by the US because it was another highly impractical weapon, even after decades of further development work. The final variants that were available decades after the 1950s fighters were retired were deemed "acceptable" and nothing more. The Tomcat drivers I interacted with aboard the boat said the Phoenix was ballast and preferred AIM-120s over AIM-54s any day of the week (Edit: once they transitioned to F-18s, they finally received AIM-120s, but to my knowledge no F-14 had AIM-120s). Reality is often incompatible with the alternate history fantasies of our armchair generals. All the Navy had with the AIM-54 was a theoretical capability to shoot down long range bombers and cruise missiles. It worked in highly scripted tests that were propagandized to no end by the Navy, but thankfully nobody had to put theory into practice. The only reason the F-14 lived as long as it did was its ability to carry TARPS pods and drop 2,000 pound guided bombs. Apart from burning gas like mad, they weren't good for much else. I'm sure the pilots loved their Tomcats, but they were hangar queens to an even greater degree than the original F/A-18s.

Edit #2: F-14s could and did carry 1 to 4 LGBs (laser-guided) or JDAMs (GPS-guided) on the center body Phoenix missile pylons. Any theoretically greater capability was not used from what I observed (too much drag and can't land, from what I was told). Even Air Force jets have landing weight limitations, they're just higher than Navy jets. They also carried a LANTIRN pod or relied upon ground-based laser designators that our troops carried in Iraq and Afghanistan, usually JTAC or SOF. Each F-14 would also carry 2 AIM-7 and 2 AIM-9 for self-defense. After it was apparent that there were no more aircraft to shoot down, they ditched the AIM-7s and only carried the pair of AIM-9s. In general, though, there were standard loadouts. Fleet Air Defense was 2 Phoenix to 4 Phoenix (I think I once saw 4 carried), 2 AIM-7, 2 AIM-9. Bombcats typically carried 2 bombs after the first few months of the wars because that was all you could return to the boat with, so carrying more was use-lose. Ditto for the F-18s, 1-4 bombs (if you carried more, then they had to be dropped), 2 AIM-120s, 2 AIM-9s. Our air wing's Bugs would also later ditch their AIM-120s to save drag and therefore gas. I saw a few missions where up to 8 1,000 pounders were carried, but when those jets returned they were clean, so they were sent after a specific target and intended to drop everything over the target. Pilots were instructed not to punch off empty drop tanks because those cost thousands of dollars, which came out of their squadron's funding, and could injure friendly forces or civilians, as well as possibly set fire with any residual fuel in the tank.

For all its straight-line speed, the Avro Arrow ran into the same problems as the XF-108 and TSR-2 and XB-70. The technology of the day simply wasn't capable of providing the desired capabilities, which is why all of those projects were cancelled. They weren't practical weapons, given the limitations of 1950s or even 1960s technology.

Some other notable aircraft also had their first flights in 1958 when the Arrow first flew:
F-4 Phantom II - Went on to a lengthy career with many operators, since it could carry 4 Sparrows, 4 Sidewinders, 12 to 18 Mk82 bombs, and still achieve a combat radius equal to the Arrow, despite being launched from an aircraft carrier; later UK variants benefited from an approximate 25% range and combat radius increase due to 25% more efficient Spey turbofan engines

If I had to select a single historical multi-role fighter jet to maintain and upgrade, then this would've been the model for the job. The F-4 demonstrated more real combat capability than any other fighter jet from the 1950s. Israeli upgrades rivaled the then-new F-14 and F-15 programs, so the upgrades were declined by our services. If the upgraded F-4s used the F-404 and later F-414 engines, with modernized avionics and radars, then they would've served until the F-35 could replace them.

Edit #3 (I almost forgot about this jet, which first flew in 1954 but was introduced in 1958):
F-104 Starfighter - This one had a mid-mounted trapezoidal delta wing and T-tail, somewhat unusual as fighters go, but had a spectacular initial rate of climb, 48,000fpm vs the 44,500fpm initial rate for an Arrow equipped with Iroquois engines.

The TF-30 powered CL-1200 low cost multi-role export variant of Lockheed's Starfighter, with conventional tail and LERX-type wing reminiscent of the much later F-16 and F-18 designs, could've achieved the same combat radius as the Arrow while carrying 4,000lbs of external stores. The CL-1200 would've been equipped with Sparrow II missiles, since radar and missile electronics miniaturization had progressed to the point, 10 years later, where that was possible. A strengthened naval variant was also proposed. The wings were so short it did not require folding wings to put a pair of them on a super carrier's aircraft elevators.

If there was an American medium fighter of the era to keep and continue to develop, then this would've been the model. Single-engine, single-seat, lower-cost relative to later alternatives, able to be upgraded with new engines and avionics, kinematic performance equal to or better than the alternatives (F-104Gs were capable of 7g sustained turns at low-level with full afterburner), and could carry all the basic weapons of the day, albeit less than other purpose-built or much heavier airframes (A-4, A-7, F-8, various Mirage models).

If Mirage III, which first flew in 1956, was re-engined with a J79, then I would've kept the Mirage III design due to its much greater payload, more than double that of the F-104G. I like the French design much better than our own F-104, including the CL-1200 / CL-1400 concepts, especially for carrier operations, but its kinematic performance was significantly inferior using the SNECMA Atar engine of the day, with an initial rate of climb only about 1/3rd that of the J79-equipped Starfighter. South Africa's Atlas Cheetah variant that appeared some 30 years later was equivalent in kinematic performance to a 1950s-era Starfighter using an up-rated Atar engine (slightly less thrust than a J79). Anyway, the Mirage series was still quite successful in combat and exported around the world.

From evaluating all the heavy fighter designs of the 1950s and 1960s, there were no other serious attempts at fielding a general purpose multi-role heavy fighter design like the McDonnell-Douglas F-4. There were a lot of specialized airframes for going fast or flying great distances or carrying heavy payloads, but nothing combining the mix of desirable attributes the way the Phantom did. That's why it was designed, produced, and exported so extensively. Alternatives like the F-8 Crusader III were unsuitable in various ways, even if they would eventually become practical decades later as a result of electronics and sensor improvements.

In the medium fighter space, there were more designs with great potential, but again, F-104 or Mirage III were the extent of what the West produced that were solid combat jets. The various British designs were always specialist airframes that would never be built in the same numbers because they were designed with a single role in mind, which they normally performed quite admirably. Had the Arrow been built, it would've become Canada's equivalent to the F-106 or F-108, and never used for anything except bomber interception.

In the light fighter space, there were good options that came and went, but the T-38 / F-5, which first flew in 1959, was the most widely produced by a lot. In practice, the F-5 was pretty close in payload performance to the Mirage III, though nowhere near the same combat radius as the Mirage III, which greatly limited its potential, but with much better kinematic performance in climbs and turns. There's something of an ongoing myth that the US doesn't emphasize performance the way it should. It's more like the US emphasizes practical performance and is willing to forego that last little bit of climb or turn rate or take-off roll, etc, if it makes the overall design more usable in combat. The Iranians took this design and upgraded it quite a bit over the years, producing a design with a much greater combat radius than anything the US ever produced. If the F-5 had been equipped with a single J-52, which was a much heavier engine with much better fuel economy, then it would've dominated all competition. The empty weight and MTOW of the A-4E and F-5E is nearly identical, so this was definitely a possibility. Between the two, the A-4 carried more internal fuel (810gal) compared to the F-5 (677gal).

All the "what if" in the world won't change how things ended up. We had different competing design concepts of that era, no real idea which would end up successful since this was all being done for the very first time, some of them worked quite well, others not so much, and the specialty airframes were eventually not deemed viable at all. IMO, the A-4 and F-5 should've been one light fighter design that filled all the roles of the F-104 / Mirage III / A-4 / F-5, with capabilities such as carrying radar and Sparrow missiles integrated as they were ready, rather than when armchair generals or historians thought they should be.

There's one thing does stick out in my mind, though, and that's the notion that America could've said bundles of cash by further developing far fewer designs and relegating good but not great designs to prototypes not purchased in great numbers. There was basically no reason for a lot of these specialty aircraft to exist because technology advanced so rapidly that what was cutting edge one year was obsolete the next, which is usually a clue that you don't have mature designs or operational concepts.

I would argue that the B-52, KC-135, F-3 and later F-4 (same concept as the F-3 or F-8 III variant, but with 2 engines / crew members / more payload), A-4 / F-5 amalgam (a true multi-role light fighter as opposed to medium fighters almost as expensive as heavy fighters), A-10, and OV-10 had a reason to exist. The century series of fighters, as well as the F-8 / F-11 / A-7 / F-14 / F-15 / F-16 / F-18, did not. The second generation jets were continuations of previously developed concepts that were only marginally superior as compared to the upgraded prior generation models. They certainly cost a lot more, but did little to truly change the nature of the game. The F-111/FB-111/EF-111 was a very unique capability, which doesn't really fit in fighter or attack or strategic bomber categories. There's something of a case for a medium range low-level precision strike bomber for eliminating high value targets prior to stealth. The F-22 was an immature and insanely expensive F-35 built on a generation of technology that wasn't ready for its intended use. F-22 was supposed to replace the F-15, but never did. The B-47 and B-58 were expensive diversionary projects that were not true strategic bombers, unlike the B-36 and B-52- someone in the Air Force had an idea that existing technology couldn't deliver. The B-1 and B-2 were immature concept bombers, not as bad as the XB-70 but still impractical in their intended roles. B-1 actually makes more sense as a survivable gunship / persistent ISR / persistent CAS using PGMs only / high speed tanker than as a strategic bomber, but that's not what it was sold as. B-21 will become the first generation of practical stealth bomber. The rest of the stuff we designed and built was something that looked great on paper but didn't translate into dramatically better capabilities, but hindsight is always 20/20.

At this point, we've explored all of these concepts and refinements to the concepts and many of them have seen extensive combat use. We can make a case for a single-engine heavy fighter like the F-35, a single-engine light fighter like a scaled-up X-36, stealthy tankers, and stealthy penetration strike drones. We can make a case for retaining the old strategic bombers as long range cruise missile launchers. We can't make a strong case for keeping the F-15s or F-16s or F-18s or A-10s unless we get to use them in benign threat environments. CAS primarily means PGMs these days, not guns, and modern PGMs can present less of a threat to friendly forces than a gun run. F-22s (F-15 MkII) or its replacement don't have much practical combat utility because the only way they differ from a F-35 is range and slightly better kinematics, which are still insufficient to out-turn modern missiles. This jet will be F-15 MkIII, because the USAF still hasn't given up on this yet. They'll be too expensive to procure and operate in quantity.

You'll see more drones over modern battlefields, especially stealthy ISR / CAS / ELINT / tanker, a few classes of stealthy light or heavy multi-role fighters, virtually no purpose-built air superiority fighters because they're inordinately expensive and provide little in the way of additional air combat capability, and a plethora of very light observation drones for ground maneuver units. However, all the prior generation equipment is on its way out, because any IADS with sensor fusion will be able to see them and lock them up from about the time they leave the ground. Whenever they stray within missile range, they're toast.
End Edit #3

F-8 Crusader III - Powered by a J75 with more afterburning thrust than an Orenda Iroquois but significantly lower fuel consumption at full military power, albeit with less dry thrust than the Iroquois- same 3 Sparrows as the Arrow plus 4 Sidewinders and 4 20mm cannons; not selected over the F-4 because the workload on its single pilot was far too high

F-11F-1F Super Tiger - Despite lively performance thanks to its J-79 engine, its role as a day light fighter armed with 4 Sidewinders was also deemed inadequate for naval service, which has always been an all-weather environment

A-5 Vigilante- more than double the combat radius of the Arrow, briefly in US Navy service before being scrapped as not practical and dangerous to fly; all other / new naval fighter jets have basically wound up at the same MTOW as the A-5 / RA-5C (63,000lbs), to include the F-4 (62,000lbs), F-14D (74,000lbs; in practice limited to about 67,000lbs because you can't land at 74,000lbs), F/A-18E/F (66,000lbs), and the F-35C (70,000lbs; in practice limited to around 67,000lbs)

It's as if there's a basic naval aircraft design pattern being followed that has nothing to do with the technical capabilities of a given airframe. In the past when engines were less reliable and produced less thrust, we put 2 engines on a fighter jet because a single engine couldn't generate enough thrust. Now the Pratt & Whitney F-135 engine that powers the F-35 can produce up to 50,000lbs of thrust and models in testing achieve up to 20% greater fuel efficiency, which directly translates into increased range, meaning the 670 nautical mile range of the F-35C suddenly becomes 804 nautical miles, which is beyond what the current F-15E Strike Eagles can manage with CFTs and second only to the latest Su-35 land-based fighters in terms of combat radius.

Grumman's A-6 Intruder has the exact same fuel load as Grumman's F-14 Tomcat, but its loaded weight with full fuel and no weapons is less than the empty weight of the Tomcat. Tomcat is much heavier to accommodate heavier engines / radar / avionics. It has nowhere near as much thrust, but cruises at a speed only 100mph slower than the F-14s best cruise speed. As a result, Intruder's combat radius is a little more than double that of Tomcat. In practice, A-6E, F-14D, F/A-18 (all models), F-35C are 6g to 7.5g jets. A-6 and F-35 can carry 18,000lbs of external stores, F-14s 14,500lbs, Super Hornets 17,750lbs, A-10 Warthogs 16,000lbs. All listed jets have cruise speeds within 100mph to 150mph of each other. Some can go much faster than the others, but only at the expense of depleting fuel in mere minutes. As a result, afterburner (when available) is used on takeoff, missed-approach / go-around, and emergency combat evasive maneuvers only. For jets with lots of excess power like the F-14 and F-35, often they don't even need to use burner to take off so they won't. In Afghanistan where there was no air threat, jets from our air wing would sometimes use burner to reach troops in contact a little faster, but in practice no jet flew faster than Mach 1.5 and Mach 1.1 was near the limit of what external stores drag and remaining fuel would allow, assuming you were landing at Bagram (no enough fuel to make it back to the boat) or had tankers (USAF KC-135s in practice, even though we had our own buddy stores which are more like "top up" for an extra 15 to 30 minutes of flight for a strike package unless all of it is transferred to one bird, which means you need as many tankers as strike package aircraft).

Each Mach 3 SR-71 required a conga line of 4 to 7 KC-135s. The Blackbird would drain each tanker in turn, arriving at the area of interest with enough onboard fuel for a 1 hour and some change overflight of parts of the Soviet Union. The rest of the tankers were for getting to the target and back home. It should go without saying that this would be wildly impractical for a penetration strike, which is why we developed B-52s, B-1s, B-2s, and the new B-21s. In practice, they all fly at high subsonic speeds like the fighter jets do, because going any faster drains fuel far too quickly, as-in you don't make it to the target quickly.

Speed is great, but remaining fuel and sensors that tell you everything and accurate weapons to exploit what the sensors found is still best. You can only tweak so many different design parameters and arrive at useful combat jets. In all scenarios, fuel is equal to life, so the more fuel you can save during a mission, the longer your range or endurance and the more you can do if something goes wrong. In practice, "doing something" means running away from or turning inside an inbound missile. Most pilots who get hit are totally unaware that they're being shot at. There are no supersonic dogfights, because turning radius is measured in miles. Any time you can avoid dogfighting and snipe at the enemy from a distance using AIM-120s or something similar, that is what you will do. All of this is what the new stealth jets are purpose-built to do or avoid doing.

I know they don't take the time to explain this stuff to civilians, but that's probably because they never ask. Looking at numbers on paper doesn't tell you much about what a jet can actually do. Yeah, the jet can take off with 18,000lbs of ordnance hanging off it, but can it land that way? Most of the time they can't land with full fuel and weapons, which is why you almost never see them loaded that way unless they know they're going to dump every last bomb on a target and come back clean. After you see how they're used, then you start to understand why they're designed and built the way they are. What's possible versus what's practical are two very different things.

Last edited by kbd512 (2022-07-26 07:07:36)

Calliban · 2022-08-25 17:49:13

Nuclear powered destroyers?
https://destroyerhistory.org/coldwar/nuclearclasses/

The US built several of these, but with cheap diesel and good logistical supply lines, the benefits of infinite range did not justify the extra cost. They remained in service until the early 90s, after which post cold war cutbacks led to their scrapping. They remained in service forover 30 years and were succesful.

With global oil production in decline and global supply lines for fuel products looking more precarious, nuclear powered ships may come into their own. Destroyers like the Type 45, typically require about 40MW of engine power. A large container ship, about the same. There may be a market for standardised reactor power system that can raise about 20MW of shaft power and can be installed on military and civilian ships alike. The aqueous homogenous reactor may be a good fit for this application, as its potentially excellent neutron economy would allow enrichment levels to remain low and its high power density allow it to fit into the confined volumes of a military hull. An 80MWth unit would have an active core volume of about 1m3, with perhaps 8m3 per unit when inbuilt heat exchangers and shielding is included. This is easily compact enough for two units to fit into a destroyer, providing a full 40MW of shaft power. Spent fuel will be liquid water with dissolved actinides and fission products. It would be stored in steel casks within a water tank for passive cooling, until unloading in dock.

One problem with this idea: water based reactors have longer time constants than gas turbines. It is more difficult to design a steam system that can ramp up power in seconds, the way gas turbines can. Thermal shock needs to be carefully managed and power levels need to ramp up slowly enough to avoid temperature swings within the system. This can be partially mitigated through the use of a steam drum. One of the neat things about water based reactors is there ability to naturally load follow. Open the throttle valves on the steam turbine inlet and boiler temperature drops as pressure drops and more water turns to steam. This makes the moderator and fuel colder, which adds reactivity and increases reactor power. So within limits, control rods do not need adjustment and the reactor load follows. Not such a big deal for a tanker or container ship, but worth a lot on a destroyer, which needs to ramp up power quickly.

Nuclear ships may be particularly valuable to a CANZUK or Commonwealth alliance. The sea lanes linking these countries are literally globe spanning and in the future, not all ports will be as reliable or safe as they have been in the past. We need commercial ships that can sail thousands of km without stopping. For protection of sea lanes, we cannot match the legacy US navy in terms of numbers. To police the sea lanes, we need destroyers with the ability to respond quickly and cover long distances at high speed without fuel concerns. We need destroyers that can police vast distances and maintain high speeds without stopping to refuel and without the vulnerability that refuelling imposes. Only nuclear reactors can do that. But we need a solution that combines capability with affordability.

Last edited by Calliban (2022-08-25 18:16:40)

Mars_B4_Moon · 2022-10-16 08:41:43

Independent Scotland would rejoin European Union - Sturgeon

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland- … s-63260224

Brexit was long, expensive and time consuming but not the Doom and Gloom predicted by media, seems to have very limited impact on the British space sector which has continued to grow by billions, Brexit had more of an impact on longer passport lines and the political relationship between Britain and on the European Union. ESA already had many international partners like NASA, Canada, JAXA, China, and works with EU and non EU and non Eurozone countries like Norway, Switzerland, Poland, Sweden and I think another country joined maybe 'Solvakia'?

Mars_B4_Moon · 2022-10-24 18:36:40

Rishi Sunak to be next Prime Minister after winning leadership contest

https://news.stv.tv/politics/rishi-suna … source=app

kbd512 · 2022-10-24 22:01:35

Calliban,

Are you accepting of the minimum tonnage requirements, sailing restrictions, and costs associated with operating nuclear powered destroyers?

Most of those vessels displace around 15,000t or so. Maybe you could do 10,000t with modern reactor designs, but that's near your lower limit for a practical nuclear powered destroyer, and its ability to operate directed energy weapons would be limited. Most of the time, you won't sail a nuclear powered ship anywhere with less than 60 feet of water beneath the keel, and 100 feet is your comfort zone. That means staying out of the littorals that a lot of shipping traffic transits through. This tends to limit their effectiveness in patrols of shipping lanes. On top of that they're very costly to maintain. When money was no object during the Cold War, America built a literal handful of nuclear powered guided missile cruisers to protect their new nuclear powered super carriers, which were also very large ships with sailing restrictions that closely matched those of their nuclear powered escort cruisers.

I would rather have more ships with a pair of gas turbines, a powerful short and medium range anti-air capability (ESSM or Peregrine), and light helicopters or drones carrying light torpedoes to counter enemy submarines or serve as spotting platforms to locate and target enemy warships to attack using stealthy medium-range cruise missiles. If possible, it would be better to disable rather than outright destroy the enemy's ships using next generation anti-air weapons like Peregrine or small cruise missiles or small diameter glide bombs that target an enemy warship's radars.

The notion that crippling damage has to be done using a single large missile or torpedo is false. If you set fire to a ship or destroy its mast-mounted radars and sensors, then that's a mission kill for the duration of any modern war. VLS variants of Raytheon's Peregrine or GBU-53 Stormbreaker, MBDA UK's Brimstone or SPEAR-3 could deliver the blinding shots at relatively low cost. You can purchase 6 of them for roughly the same cost as a Harpoon, which means the enemy has to contend with a half dozen weapons instead of 1 or 2. 4,000t gas turbine-powered frigates are therefore the best way to maintain sea control. FFG-7 frigates drew between 20 and 25 feet of water and had a cruising range of 4,00 to 5,000 nautical miles, IIRC. That's across the entire Atlantic Ocean and back at something close to 20 knots, I think, on a single load of fuel. UNREP is less problematic than some people make it out to be. We do it all the time.

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