HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Queen Elizabeth are both at sea with British F-35 jets onboard.

HMS Prince of Wales departed Portsmouth earlier this week whilst HMS Queen Elizabeth is on a global deployment.

HMS Prince of Wales left Portsmouth to perform training with F-35 Lightning jets and to undertake the vessels first participation in the largest military exercise in the UK, Joint Warrior, off the Scottish coast.

“The first will pave the way for front-line carrier operations, the second will test her ability to work alongside other naval, Air Force and Army assets and broader task group operations,” according to the Royal Navy.

HMS Queen Elizabeth is now in Japan.

British aircraft carrier to visit Japan

As part of her maiden operational deployment, the Ministry of Defence say that HMS Queen Elizabeth and her Carrier Strike Group will sail over 26,000 nautical miles, engaging with 40 countries from the Mediterranean to the Indo-Pacific and back again.

“This deployment will provide tangible reassurance and security to our friends and a credible deterrence to those who seek to undermine global security.”

The group comprises nine ships, 32 aircraft and one submarine and is manned by 3,700 sailors, aviators and marines from the combined forces of the UK, US and the Netherlands.

George Allison
George Allison
George has a degree in Cyber Security from Glasgow Caledonian University and has a keen interest in naval and cyber security matters and has appeared on national radio and television to discuss current events. George is on Twitter at @geoallison
Twitter

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR

72 COMMENTS

    • They don’t require an escort group when operating around the UK.But RN escorts will be taking part in ex Joint Warrior.

    • May the Gods help us if we ever need to deploy both carriers to different theatres. With such a depleted and over stretched fleet, mechanical failure issues aside. Not only would there be no reserves but the loss of a single ship would be catastrophic. Looks like the Amphibious Group will be defended by Admirals in rowing boats.

      • We needed and deployed 2 carriers in the Falkands conflict – same theatre.
        I hear that MoD do not envisage both carriers deploying operationally at the same time – thats some crystal ball they are using!

        • OK Firepower of the QE class over Invincible and Hermes. and at any point, post-1982, did we ever have 3 carriers or 2 on conflict-active duty.
          same as Albion and Bulwark one active one in readiness or refit.

        • as i was there it was the loss of atlantic conveyor that robbed the task group a third carrier with the RAF harriers to fly from

      • Yes. And god forbid if the US needs to deploy more than 5-6 carriers in 5-6 different theatres, or if the French needs to deploy more than 1 carrier anywhere. Same applies to Italy, India, China and any other country that had any carrier forces whatsoever. You can’t deploy it all at once, that’s not what it’s made for.

        If they decided they needed to deploy two carriers to different theatres simultaneously they would have needed to buy 3-4 carriers + logistics, crew, escorts, and aircraft.

  3. Fantastic news. We have come a very long way this last few years. And with so much more to come in the coming years. Bravo RN, and all involved in the Lightning wing. 🇬🇧

  4. Whilst the headline is a factual statement, it’s hardly a case of two carriers with maybe 40 British owned aircraft on each, unlike the days of Ark, Eagle, Victorious, Hermes (add Centaur, Bulwark & Albion if you wish). Don’t get me wrong, we are stepping in the right direction, but it’s early steps yet.

    • But the plan was never to have an air wing on both carriers at the same time?

      One carrier with say 18 – 24 F35B is massively more than anyone else can field who we are likely to take on.

      If the other carrier is not in dry dock then it would be usefully deployed as a helicopter carrier allowing a higher tempo on the F35 carrier and providing redundancy.

      • Theoretically though, if we had to, and we had our full(full…) complement of 48 F-35s then could we not deploy both carriers simultaneously with 24 aircraft/2 squadrons on each + helos? It would take most of the navy’s active ships (4 T23s, 4 T45s, 2 SSN) but we also have enough T45s/T23s to provide escorts for both. At the moment the only thing (only!) are the fleet solid support ships and aircraft numbers.

      • Does anyone here know what the actual capacity of QE is? I’ve seen numbers ranging from 40 aircraft overall to 36 F-35s + 36 choppers to 72 F-35s.

        • Depends what you mean by capacity…..?

          How many planes and cabs can you fit on a QEC; or

          How many planes and cabs can a QEC use fir optimal sortie generation; or

          How many planes and cabs on a QEC for a particular tasking?

          Then you need to take account of the rest of the CSG and where the cabs are and what they are doing – ASW AAW, AEW? This then changes the arithmetic.

          Honestly: I would guess 36 F35B would be optimal in terms of being able to move things around.

          The big problem on carriers is when you get into Tetris all the time. In moving plane A form the workshop to the lift you need to move planes B, C, D then all of a sudden a 10 min plane move takes 40 mins and you sortie rate is stuffed.

          • this is where the lack of a folding wing option bites. all nato carriers including the spanish and italianships could carry more than their mid thirties numbers

    • AGM-138 is currently being integrated, thats 1 ton 4m long and has a range of about 500 miles (two carried externally). Joint Strike Missile 400kg, just under 4m and a range of about 350 miles (carried internally on A&C but could be carried externally on B) and the RAF is integrating SPEAR 3, thats 1.8m, 100kg and a range of about 80-100 miles (carried three to a hardpoint internally).
      RAF is also integrating 500lb Paveway IV interial guidance bombs which have a range of about 17 miles, Meteor AAM have 80 mile range and ASRAAM AAM have about 16 mile range all carried internally.

      • ASRAAM is external only and Spear 3 is 4 in each internal bay on individual hardpoints. Max internal load is 8 x Spear 3 plus 2 x meteor

        The triple spear 3 hardpoint is concept based on Brimstone for Typhoon.

        JSM would be a fantastic addition. Extra range and punch.

    • I believe Storm Shadow was going to be integrated for external carriage some time ago but the project was subsequently cancelled. Other than money saving it’s hard from a military point of view to see why – low observable air launched cruise missile + 5th gen stealth fighter would be an ideal pairing one would think. Plus it would significantly increase the strike range of the carrier strike group (> 500km). Plus we built over 900 of them and I believe still have most of them. ~100-200 being fired in combat/training etc.

      • Cancelled because they are very heavy store’s to bring back to the carrier, and if only one missile is fired then you have an uneven load which has many safety implications. Also, we have TLAM capability with 1000+nm range. SPEAR3 is coming with 100km range, and the F35B can carry 8 of them internally.

        • maybe look at design and procurment of a similar system to the russian club k system could be put on anything in the r.n

  8. We are beginning to see the pressures on public spending- NHS,social care, education, local authorities all want more. In normal times the £16b uplift in the defence budget would have been challenged but it was lost in the covid spend.
    I don’t think we are likely any time soon to see a large increase in F35s which means these huge carriers will be underused.
    After 2024/5 ( by which time the contracted 48 should have been delivered) I suspect we are more likely to see defence cuts beyond those already announced than any increase.
    Both RN and RAF are pinning a lot of hope on affordable unmanned systems. I fear they won’t be affordable enough.

    • If it became necessary, we could drop £200bn on F-35s within a moments notice. We would just print the money, since we have our own currency. And it is likely that it wouldn’t sink the economy in inflation since this happening would mean the US was also in the same situation printing trillions of dollars.

      • It’s all fake wealth backed up by nothing. I don’t know why people think that national debt is actually borrowed money from someone who has it, it’s not it’s printed by the federal reserve Bank in America and bank of England here. Which are owned by private banks and secret societies then lent to our governments who are then charged interest on the money that never existed. It’s not federal and there is no reserve. It’s the biggest financial scam in history. The tax payer foots the bill.

        • It is, indeed, fake wealth. However it isn’t lent to our governments by anywone; our governments create it. The U.K., EU, USA can each decide how many pounds, euros, and dollars they want. Let’s say we start with 1 of each. If Britain decides to print another 1 pound it halves in value against the euro and the dollar. Like I said though, us printing such large amounts for defence purposes would likely mean the US was printing which would mean the GBP-USD rate wouldn’t suffer negatively for either country.

        • Hi Gareth,
          Spot on! That’s exactly how it works, and you’re right, most people do not realise it. Of course, when the Government issues bonds, often they can be bought by institutions or people with money already in the money supply, but when there isn’t enough interest in Government debt or you hear the magic phrase “Quantitive Easing” the BoE steps in (hence the phrase “lender of last resort” I’m sure most people have heard) to buy the bonds with money created out of thin air, and this adds to the National Debt. Of course, these bonds carry interest but the money to pay the interest is not created and has to be paid by the taxpayer out of their existing money – they don’t get to create more to meet the shiny new debt! Further, the truism that “there is no such thing as a free lunch” applies and the extra money introduced in to the money supply doesn’t increase real wealth and de-values the pound which drives inflation and reduces the wealth of ordinary people, as this is measured in Pounds Sterling! As you say, it is a scam.
          @eclipse, I’m afraid you are wrong about how it works, but you are right in that how you describe the process COULD be how it works. After the First World War, Lord Bradbury, the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, issued actual Treasury issued money, so-called Bradbury Pounds to cover expenditure, but the bankers soon put an end to that. There is no reason why this could not be the norm, although profligate issuance would also lead to inflation. As a side note, JFK did something similar, issuing $6bn of US Treasury notes, rather than Federal Reserve notes… just saying…

          • when it comes down to kit the u.s has vast reserves of military equipment 3,000 aircraft of every kind you can think of at AMARGin arizonal google the inventory 400 f 16’s 200 f 15 100 f18 and 1 tomcat even b1 lancers.(new R.A.F bomber command.the inventory of ships at the philadelphia naval inactive ships facility. maybe a first buy option on retiring u.s military kit from bicycles to nuclear delivery options such as the b52 AMARG has A LOAD OF THEM. it might stretch the defeence budget and make it go further but i can hear the harumphing at the M.O.D from the defence chiefs at getting second hand equipment. everyone else trades military why don’t we? all we do is give away whole classes of ships(like the t22. 6 of which are still operational with romania(2)brazil_2 chile-2 buy these back put artisan and ceptor on them and you could designate them as destroyers pie inn the sky i know but the u.k needs to think outside the box if the projected budget is to result in the required growth of the u.k arsenal.x

      • Yep we could but seeing as ships take years to build and it’s not like LM have apron full of B’s built waiting for a buyer it would be years until we actually see an increase in phyical assets available. UK couldn’t re tool and start producing aircraft quickly all the idiots in West minster have seen to that.

        • Yes that I realise. It would take us a year if not multiple to be remotely ready for a war with one of our enemies. And like you say it’s not like we have an enormous industry capable of churning out jets (or ships at the quantity that would be needed) within a moments notice. The problem is people don’t see the value of military equipment until war breaks out. The fact of the matter is that having military equipment prevents wars in the first place, so it’s doing its job.

    • “Both RN and RAF are pinning a lot of hope on affordable unmanned systems. I fear they won’t be affordable enough.”

      It all depends on how much we will get after selling the tranche one’s off!

      “The UK’s recently revealed plan to prematurely retire its Tranche 1 Eurofighter Typhoon combat aircraft will see the fleet axed with more than half of its airframe fatigue life remaining, the government said on 7 September.”

      https://www.janes.com/defence-news/news-detail/uk-to-retire-tranche-1-typhoons-with-more-than-half-of-airframe-hours-remaining

    • the u.k f 35 order is further down the production line than the u.s(no surprise there) but rate of delivery in all things military buying or selling is dictated by the supplier, hold the knaphand of we’ll buy more if we get them faster is a big bargaining point$ when dealing with the land, run by the$ i’d like know how many f 35’s the u.k will get as oppossed to the projected 148.

    • Err, no, the F35s and helos on PoW are all British. The “handful” of F35s on the QE are not many fewer than the USMC embarkment. Why are some of you Brits so slow to get it that neither carrier is yet fully operational and that fast jet numbers will take some time to build up?

    • I think you’ll find all the aircraft on PWLS are British.
      If you are talking about QE then… 10 USMC aircraft vs 18 British….

  13. Should we consider basing one permanently at Fleet Base East, Garden Island and encourage RAN and RSN Singapore to purchase B variants and provide a Tri- nation interoperable force? Robbo

  14. Proud day and really nice to see. But the old carriers should have still been in service until the replacements were up and running. Very poor “forethought and strategic planning.”

  15. I have never read such a pile of guff in all my life as the comments section on this thread. There is no need for these ships. Our defence theatre is Europe.

  16. I have never before seen such an utter waste of tax payers money in a deeply flawed analysis of where British strategic defence interests lie.

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here