UK GOVT ACCUSED OF 'CVF BLACKMAIL'

Political Correspondent Francis Beaufort reports on a scathing attack on the shabby manner in which the current UK government has treated the Royal Navy. Beaufort also comments on the Scottish dilemma new Prime Minister Gordon Brown must tackle if he is to be regarded as a credible national leader.

A WESTMINSTER-BASED lobbying group has claimed the UK Government is using the promise of two new super-carriers for the Royal Navy as a tool to force the Service into scrapping operationally useful warships.
The accusation by First Defence, which aims to put Defence at the top of the British political agenda, has been carried in a recently published pamphlet entitled ‘The Desperate State of the Royal Navy’, written by Tory Shadow Defence Minister Dr Julian Lewis, whose party portfolio includes Royal Navy and nuclear deterrent issues.
Dr Lewis told this magazine: “The purpose of the pamphlet is to draw together the succession of dangerous cuts in a single paper so that the pattern of systematic blackmail, using the carriers as the incentive to make the Navy swallow cut after cut, clearly emerges. None of our wartime enemies could ever have dreamed of inflicting such losses on our frontline Fleet - and it’s not over yet.” The ‘blackmail’ claim comes as Gordon Brown, the man many charge with starving the UK Armed Forces of cash while Treasurer, is scheduled to take over as Prime Minister from Tony Blair.
It is anticipated that shortly after he moves into Number 10 Downing Street Mr Brown will announce the order for the two new 60,000 tonnes carriers - Queen Elizabeth and Prince of Wales - in order to boost his reputation as being a man who can be trusted with Defence. The fact that the two new ships are being assembled at Rosyth Dockyard in Scotland, where many people who voted him into Parliament work, is another benefit for the former so-called ‘Iron Chancellor’. With the Scottish Nationalists taking power north of the border, the assembly of the carriers is also a useful means of reminding Scots how they benefit from projects on behalf of UK Plc. The launch of Astute, the first in a class of new nuclear-powered submarines, at Barrow in Furness on June 8, is also fortunate for Mr Brown. The refreshed New Labour administration he leads will also benefit from the ordering last month (May) of a fourth Astute Class submarine (Audacious).

It again serves to show the Brown government’s commitment to strong defence. The fact that the new hunter-killers are to be based in...yes, you’ve guessed it... Scotland, is also politically useful in combating SNP moves to push for independence. It’s very generous of taxpayers in the rest of the United Kingdom to pay billions for these new submarines and surface warships only to see them base ported (subs) and built (carriers, Type 45 destroyers and new auxiliary LPDs) in Scotland, which enjoys all sorts of economic and social benefits funded (mainly by England).
In the meantime a new round of defence cuts - implemented due to Brown’s refusal while Chancellor to significantly raise spending on Defence, and due mainly to inflict pain on England - is expected to cut a swathe through the UK Armed Forces, most notably the Royal Navy, which stands to lose even more vital  (Portsmouth or Plymouth-based) surface units and possibly an (English) naval base.
The fact that Babcock, who run Rosyth Dockyard and support facilities at HM Naval Base Clyde, now control Devonport Dockyard has even handed Scotland the potential to suck what little surface refit work remains in Plymouth to further reinforce Scotland’s dockyard (which prior to Labour winning power was actually supposed to stop doing naval work after failing to win the £5 billion Trident refit contract to Devonport). Or, is Babcock obtaining an insurance policy for the day when an independent Scotland gives the nuclear Royal Navy its marching orders? Devonport is certainly big enough to accommodate ballistic missile submarines and the Astute Class boats. The latter were, anyway, originally meant to be based in Plymouth. It’s all a mess, and many see it very much as the responsibility of the tight-fisted Chancellor who at the end of this month assumes the reigns of power as Tony Blair’s successor. In his recently published pamphlet Dr Lewis is scathing in his criticism of the UK government’s handling, or rather mishandling, of the Royal Navy. 

He claims an initial sacrifice of three frigates and two submarines, in return for the promise of the two new aircraft carriers, has turned into the devastating loss of 14 major front line vessels, with ships being sold off in a reckless fashion, when many of the vessels are quite new.  Dr Lewis claims 19 frigates and destroyers are having to do the work of 30, with perhaps just seven submarines performing the roles of the 10. Dr Lewis points out that the vast majority of the 28 vessels which the Government boasts have joined the fleet in the past decade were ordered by its Conservative predecessor, with only a single warship – the offshore patrol vessel HMS Clyde – being ordered in the past five years. Despite admitting that the Armed Forces are facing more complex and more numerous operations than expected in the 1998 Strategic Defence Review, the Government is inflicting massive damage on the front line and supporting infrastructure. Dr Lewis claims spin has been used to suggest warship numbers no longer matter in the hi-tech age. The crux of the matter would now appear to be the carrier issue and Lewis makes the point in his pamphlet that “the Royal Navy is threatened not just with a choice between losing more warships and closing a major base, but quite possibly with the loss of both. How much longer will this process be allowed to continue, on the back of the promise – yet to be carried out – of a firm order for two Future Aircraft Carriers? And how secure is the carrier project itself?”

Furthermore, Dr Lewis points out: “When one considers the catalogue of cuts inflicted on the Royal Navy – first five major warships, then a sixth; then eight more and now the threat of yet another half dozen – with the incentive of the two giant carriers used to buy compliance at every stage, the feeling of betrayal at the top of the Service is palpable. If after all this pain and humiliation one or both of the carriers fails to be ordered that feeling of betrayal will rightly become absolute.”
As a postscript, Dr Lewis sums up the folly of present policies and the dangers Britain faces in the future as a result of mismanagement of the Royal Navy.
He writes: “Presumably the extra costs of going to war are now to be requisitioned from the peace-time defence budget – formalising the Government’s practice of increasing military commitments whilst reducing resources in relative terms. Thus are the infrastructure and front line of the Royal Navy being sacrificed to finance the waging of current campaigns: an act of folly which future generations will bitterly regret.”

Pictured: The destroyer HMS Edinburgh, which has so far survived defence cuts.
Photo: Dave Cullen.

• A more in-depth look at the CAN report will be carried in future editions of WARSHIPS IFR.