Royal Navy has a carrier again

[IrishGunner]

The Royal Navy’s largest vessel, the massive 65,000-tonne warship HMS Queen Elizabeth, is floated for the first time at the at docks in Rosyth.

http://www.military.com/video/logistics-and-supplies/naval-equipment/hms-queen-elizabeth-float-up-and-move/3695093226001/

[Mervyn Mitton]

There is a companion carrier - to be called the Prince of Wales. The British Govt. is debating moth-balling her - or, even selling her.

They claim 'lack of money'. The same lack of money that has seen our Army decimated to the point that I doubt it could defend

The Isle of Wight.

I find this attitude quite unbelievable - Britain is still one of the wealthiest Countries in the World - and heads most of the summits.

Yet we cannot find the money to see the Country properly protected. Even the Police are being cut back and restricted - right

at the time that some of the immigrants we have allowed need special attention.

The most annoying thing is that we are still giving aid and money to people like Mugabe in Zimbabwe -- and to India , which has

become one of the richest countries.

[Ocad]

Fantastic news about the new aircraft carrier. Shame it has taken so long and I still regret the decision to get rid of the Harriers... very bad call...

[Mervyn Mitton]

Ocad - the new carrier will be equipped with a new updated Harrier that the Uk and the US are developing jointly. Mervyn

[paul wood]

Given the present dodgy international situation the last thing we need is to reduce our military capabilities. If the Argentinians were to decide to take the Falklands again with our present strength we would be able to do absolutely nothing about it.

Paul

[Jock Auld]

With the Argentine economy in tatters I would guess they want a bit of the oil money from around the Falklands, 'watch and shoot watch and shoot'! It is still a few years before it will be in service with suitable aircraft onboard. I think if they made their move soon they could take the Falklands and there is not much we could do about it. If we lost conrol of the airfields then it would be a bit different to the 80s

Edited August 1, 2014 by Jock Auld

[Dave Danner]

Re whether to go through with the Prince of Wales: if you want to have a carrier, you do have to have at least two. One carrier cannot be at the ready year-round. France has had this problem with the Charles de Gaulle not being available at times where it might have been of use.

Even six-month deployments would be taxing, so one really needs three. One on station, one preparing for deployment, and one recovering from deployment. The US carrier fleet was built to 15 carriers during the Reagan Administration precisely to have 5 carriers at sea at any one time (at the time, two in the Pacific, two in the Atlantic and one in the Med). We have fewer carriers now, but the end of the Cold War also changed the threat environment, so, for example, keeping two carriers in the Atlantic was no longer seen as necessary.