This is part of a budget of over £12 billion over the next 10 years.
The information came to light via a written response to a parliamentary question.
James Cartlidge, Minister of State for the Ministry of Defence, stated:
“The March 2021 Defence Command Paper reaffirmed that that we will invest more than £2 billion in the Future Combat Air System (FCAS) out to 2025, and we have spent over £1.8 billion so far. This is part of a budget of over £12 billion over the next 10 years. The amount that we ultimately invest will be determined at future decision points.
Furthermore, the Ministry of Defence has invested over £1.1 billion in R&D through the Future Combat Air System Technology Initiative (FCAS TI), with a further £600 million from our Team Tempest industry partners to date.”
The Global Combat Air Programme
The Global Combat Air Programme is a multinational initiative led by the United Kingdom, Japan, and Italy to jointly develop a sixth-generation stealth fighter. The programme aims to replace the Typhoon in service with both the Royal Air Force (RAF) and the Italian Air Force, and the Mitsubishi F-2 in service with the Japan Air Self-Defense Force.
On 9 December 2022, the governments of Japan, the United Kingdom, and Italy jointly announced that they would develop and deploy a common fighter jet, merging their previously separate sixth-generation projects: the United Kingdom-led BAE Systems Tempest developed with Italy, and the Japanese Mitsubishi F-X. This was cemented with a treaty signed in December 2023 in Japan.
Under the current timeline, the programme expects to begin the formal development phase from 2025, with a demonstrator to fly in 2027, and production aircraft to begin entering service from 2035.
This project and AUKUS are the reasons I’d like to see defence spending upped to 3%. To show proper commitment to our partners and order sufficient quantities of both.
AUKUS SSN and Tempest are the two major defence items that sets the UK apart from everyone else. No other medium size country can build an international consortium and lead a design effort on a 6th Gen aircraft and build a nuclear powered warship every bit as good as the USA.
These projects are vital for our world standing as much as for defence capabilities. I just hope Australia and Japan are worthy partners. The Australian government is in a bit of a tiz on its defence procurement and Japan has zero export history for weapons systems and may prove to be every bit the road block that Germany was in the past for defence exports.
If we were moving up to 3% of GDP on defence spending an extra £20 billion a year I would be tempted to go it alone on Tempest.
Totally agree. As the f35 project has proven, you can’t build these hi tech equipment quick enough. If we can offer a genuine world class alternative to the American 6th gen aircraft then the potential for follow on orders from like minded countries is immense!
I don’t think the UK products are as good as the US ones. Typhoon no match for F22 Virginia class in a different ballpark to the Astute
The American military industrial complex -likely in association with Disney- likes to sell those fairytales, the real world reality is somewhat different
Virginia is in fact not. Its a great multi role submarine but does not fulfill the hunter killer role as well an an astute.
I get the feeling Hugh here is trying to be a troll.
😂
Not a troll but we’ll used to jingoism. Every time a new British system comes out we hear how fantastic it is and then later down the line issues come to the fore and we find that they weren’t so great after all. Think Nimrod, the current destroyers that couldn’t operate in warm waters and that have a gym where their ment to have missles
Yeah … It’s no wonder the Americans rely so heavily on our expertise and tech. Lol we are so rubbish at … *Checks notes* … Hmmm 🤔
littoral combat ship.
Fair and to to be honest I often call out the wild jingoistic nonsense that clearly has no basis in reality but on the other side of the coin I don’t think the UK weapons system are rubbish or a laughing stock as I’ve seen claimed recently. The major issue across the arm forces is that there is no mass. None!!!
A good mental exercise is to try and figure out how long the UK alone would last in a conventional fight with Russia with no aid from nato. I don’t see that ever happening thankfully but when you look at the lack of mass it’s depressing.
It’s a bit of a none argument around a fight with Russia….we would end up staring at each other across a distance than neither could overcome…..a UK Russia war would always be a slow burn affair due to the tyranny of distance and the lack of either nations ability to actually threaten the others core…the norther fleet could not handle the RN..the RN could not breach or likely Breach the bastions and even if it did and sunk the majority of the northern fleet..Russia is a continental land power….neither side could likely do much more than nibble and snarl at each other…apart from the fact the UK can do what it always does with European powers it’s at war with..deny them access to the North Atlantic and watch their trade suffer……a UK Russian war would either end a some form of peace treaty as both sides realised the futility of it…or both counties ending as functional states in a nuclear exchange.
My fear is although the UK would clearly have more modern and capable weapons, how much are there and how long would they last. Would there be enough sams to withstand the barrage of russian ballistic, cruise missilesand drone strikes in this hypothetical scenario? Would there be enough sams and fighters to deny them air superiority, again without help from nato?
Now I will admit that this is an unfair thought experiment as I don’t think the uk force structure is designed to be in a fight with an enemy as large as Russia all alone but it does highlight the need for more mass in most if not all areas of the military.
To be honest I think the stocks or Russia cruise missiles is pretty limited…so we probably do have enough and I think what Ukraine has show is that unless a nation nation can be punched out with a decapitation…your not going to really do much to it hurling around even a couple of hundred cruise missiles….so I suspect the UK and Russia would:
1) hit each other with cruise missiles..causing limited damage.
2) undertake semi regular penetrations of each others air defences..
3) I suspect the significant tec advantage of the astute will keep the northern fleet bottled up in its bastion but the RN would not risk losing its SSNs in trying to crack the bastion.
basically both nations would inflict pain but really could do nothing to the other that would force an armistice with terms….they would just end up in a face saving peace treaty after a few ships were sunk, a few hundreds of people were killed in missile attacks, a few fighter’s destroyed and some mutual economic damage….it would be a profoundly pointless war to be honest.
But it’s a bit irrelevant as the only way the UK and Russia would be at war on their own is if NATO had collapsed and if that was the case Russia would not be wasting its time or resources in a long distance pot shot type war with the UK but would instead be invading random Baltic states.
I seem to remember during the Libyan debacle that european nations had to ask the US for more smart bombs after day 2. Russia also had very few of these at the start of this war. Luckily the US has built well over 400,000 kits and can crank them out- but makes me wonder about other things. I fear SAMs will definitely be a shortage even for the US. I know Germany is building another Patriot factory but we need massive stocks of everything as cruise missiles and decoy drones are much simpler to build so numbers wise i don’t see how you keep up!
Sadly that is not the case. Russia has the ability to hit us hard. Whereas we would struggle to inflict serious damage on them, if everything remains conventional. They would not need to use conventional land forces. But rely on surface launch missiles, plus their Navy and Airforce launch cruise and semi-ballistic missiles.
The geography of Russia vs the UK. precludes a deep strategic strike by the UK. A lot of Russian heavy industry is set in and around the Urals, deep within Russia. Whereas the UK’s is clumped together. We do not have the assets with the reach, to get past Russian air defences to hit these targets. Unless Russian neighbouring countries were willing to let us overfly their territory.
Russia also has a vastly larger stockpile of long range cruise missiles and medium range ballistic missiles. When launched from Kaliningrad, they can reach any part of the UK. Whilst we have something like 100 Tomahawks, that from the North Sea could reach Kaliningrad, St.Petersberg and Moscow at a push. Storm Shadow has proved to be highly effective, but it has to be carried by Typhoon and needs to get within a published 500km of the target before launching. Only our Astutes carry a long range strategic offensive weapon.
Meanwhile we have 6 T45s in various states of readiness and a couple batteries of Land Ceptor to defend the whole of the UK. Crucially, we currently do not have a long range AEW platform. So if Russia launched cruise missiles at the UK, there’d be very little warning of them approaching. Unless a neighbouring Country informed us.
A lot of the defence against cruise missiles would depend on continuous combat air patrols (CAP) by Typhoon and F35. Where a saturation attack in a sector could easily overwhelm a CAP by depleting the weapons carried.
Russia could easily pummel the UK’s military bases, industry and infrastructure. The UK would be dependent on the few Astutes available, to bang off their compliment of Tomahawks. Plus Storm Shadow carrying Typhoons. Kaliningrad would be an obvious target, to try and suppress any weapons that could reach the UK.
Thankfully we are part of NATO!
In a U.K. vs Russia situation I would think the willingness of a lot of people to join the fight would be substantial. What is needed for that though is quick training which the U.K. seems to be able to do and a supply of arms to give them. 2nd one would be a bit challenging. The U.K. does have stocks, what’s in them I don’t know.
Hopefully all countries would be helpful with donations/arms sells.
Of course he is. Ignore.
Second hand water cooler gossip from Barrow back in the day – Astute Class Optronics and sensors are in a different class from Virginia. The UK’s pumpjet technology has already been adopted by the USN. Virginia is lrger and mass produced so costs a little less per tonne – but not much.
Didn’t the pumpjets on the Virginia’s originally come from the Swiftsure class? That’s like two generations before the Astutes…
That may well be the case
I remember they had a big tarp over that end of Astute boat three and four when you walked into the DDH, it was one of the areas BAE/MOD were very precious about
Yes it did.
Right u are Hugh….
Typhoon is superior in dogfights and has multirole capability too. Not forgetting the massive input we have to us equipment… The F35 is far more successful than the 22 already.
And it’s 2 times cheaper and there are 3 times more of them and its availability rate is much higher.
Typhoon has a much bigger weapons load and a far superior air to air missile and much better air to ground options.
Typhoon will outlive F22 in service by several decades as F22 is almost impossible to upgrade.
New AESA on Typhoon is significantly better with much wider field of view than F22.
Add to that there is also stalled (but developed) thrust vectoring engines and conformal tanks for the EF IIRC. Its a shame funding was curtailed as with all these toys the EF would be even better (and would have had AESA earlier).
The F22 was never on offer and exists in very small numbers and was a hugely overpriced white elephant ( very much like the German tiger two…supreme design but vastly overpriced and difficult to deploy) the typhoon is a far better platform than any contemporary US aircraft such as the latest f15 or F18 variants…the Virginia class is in no way better than an astute, infact as a hunter killer an astute is probably the better boat….the astute was reported to be able to hold the Virginia class at range as it has the more advanced sonar and sensor suite..the Virginia has a larger and wider array of weapons, the astutes are faster…they are going to be as quite as each other….even the captain’s of Virginia class boats have given dips to the astute when going boat on boat….but as a strike platform the Virginia is better….so depends what you want…hunting and killing another sub an astute wins….raining down strike missiles on an airfield Virginia wins.
anyone who knows about either boat isn’t going to be able to tell you much. the US is notoriously secretive about their subs and aren’t going to talk about how they do in exercises “holding X boat off” etc. i doubt RN submariners would talk about such things either… boat speed? no one on here who knows is gonna tell you, its all just speculation. all we know is they both have excellent reputations and come from an amazing pedigree and are no doubt world leaders. probably a lot more in common than we think- considering Electric Boat had to come over and help engineer/construct the astutes.
as for typhoon its an excellent aircraft, kinetically it does outperform the f-18 and f-15 but both of those jets (speaking of F-15EX) have just as good if not better technology in a lot of areas…
I can’t see the UK and USA fighting each other any time soon😉 so such comparisons are all just good clean fun, but as an Americophile I would say thank God for the US of A-long may the Special Relationship(flaws and all) remain! Recent statements by senior Russian politicians such as
Dmitry Medvedev who seriously poses the possibility of bombing London, Washington,Berlin and Paris are the issues which we need to face in these troubled times. He is a sinister individual who seems to believe the previously unthinkable is now a possibility. Nuclear war then makes all the talk of conventional arms comparisons entirely irrelevant.He clearly stated that if Russia has the eastern occupied portions of Ukraine recaptured by Western backed Ukranian forces then he would press the Nuke buttons! The Western nations need to set up some urgent dialogue with Russia to see if some sane answers can be found, without appeasment. If however Putin, Medvedev and the core gang are indeed Hitler and co.reincarnates then the future is truly terrifying
Indeed the RN did talk about Astute performed against the USS New Mexico, it’s on record. Astute sonar was far superior.
Virginia a great boat and I don’t doubt the block IV and V will be improvement over Astute but they are much newer.
Virginia can’t even find an Astute never mind torpoedo it you total clown . Also spearfish heavy weight is better than the yanks 👌
Typhoon is no match for F22 because it costs half as much. It would be ridiculous if it could match that much spending power.
Astute, in the Fleet Submarine role it was designed for, is unmatched globally. It is reportedly quieter, has better sonar and better weapons. Where Virginia’s clinch it is in their missile tubes, which allows them to operate more efficiently alone.
Ask anyone in the know and Astute is every bit as good as Virginia class. F22 and Typhoon are different planes for different roles. Besides if you are in the know, you will know in a dogfight the Typhoon is more manoeuverable than the F22 The F22 is at an advantage at BVR.
Astutes eat Virginias for breakfast.
Exercise ~10yrs ago an Astute held the latest Virginia at the time at (detection) ranges the Virginia had nothing.
France might disagree.
The French are always disagreeable 😉
They can disagree all they like, the FCAS program tells the real story.
Barracuda is an able boat but it is small and it needs refueling, it’s not in the same league as Virginia and Astute.
Agreed. However, the question/answer is about what a country can do, not what it chooses to do.
Jim Don’t judge the ability of the Barracuda SSN by its size it’s got most of the capabilities of ours but in a smaller package. And don’t assume that USN/RN reactor technology is leagues ahead of the French (OK I’m biased and would insist it is, but the evidence is bit interesting).
Their decision to use LEU for their SSNs is a deliberate one as they see it as being advantageous. They actually also build large HEU reactors for their latest SSBN because they need a big hull to accommodate the SLBM and that means more power than a LEU can provide.
They don’t see the need for using HEU as by accepting LEU as their reactor fuel and the need to refuel every 7/10 years it saves a lot of money. They use a much smaller reactor, which means a smaller diameter hull which needs less power for the same speed and a much smaller crew. So it much cheaper than HEU in a big submarine.
I’m a Scot and just because Archie Gemmil was small didn’t mean he wasn’t as good a Footballer than most of the bigger guys.
FYI It’s no secret that the US/RN are presently looking at LEU for the follow up to next generation HEU reactors (PWR3) rather than the existing design line.
Both fuels have certain advantages and disadvantages and there will be many deciding factors to weigh up. IMHO there possibly 3 factors that may make a change attractive enough to tip the scales towards LEU for SSNs at least.
It takes about 2 decades to design and start to introduce a new class of reactors in new boats. And if you need to either change from HEU to LEU or renew our HEU production we really do need to make up our minds reasonably soon.
Oh and soon in the world of Naval Nuclear Steam Production Industry is about 10 years so the correct investment path can be followed.
Jim ,well put ,it follows my thoughts entirely .
Agreed 👍
Australia isn’t in a Tiz they just took a re look at it and decided cut a bit and add a lot more overall. And as for Japan they tend to be very good reliable partners (just ask the Yanks). I am actually far happier being partners with Italy and Japan than either France or Germany.
And as for going it alone, sorry but that boat sailed with the Hawk and this one is way out of our ability to go it alone.
Totally agree with both Jim and Nevis ,spot on.
With Japan on board, they produced some very iconic fighters in the past the zero being the most iconic one,one thing with Japanese management no costly overruns they do it they do it right, Japan is the perfect partner and saab of Sweden,
It doesn’t strike me as a lot of money compared to Concord or TSR2 development costs adjusted for GDP growth.
I am of the, utterly inexpert, view that the game here is to build it biggish but build it fast.
Can you imagine if Typhoon had its original ISD how advanced it would have been?
Likewise F35…..
There is a huge cost and supremacy disadvantage in stringing it out. The risk being perfection(isn’t) rather than spiral development.
The first few won’t be front line anyway at least not till they get re-manufactured.
It’s peanuts. Eurofighter development costs were €20b unadjusted for inflation. Plus each generation of military items costs way more than the last.
“ Plus each generation of military items costs way more than the last.”
That has always been accepted as fact.
I’m not so sure it is true now.
Digital development and 3D printing will make some significant savings at least in terms of time.
Typhoon cost vastly more to develop to the French then German fun and games.
Main thing is to give it plenty of power, thrust, payload and volume so the shoehorn problem doesn’t come and visit.
B21 is four times cheaper than B2 without adjusting for inflation.
F14 in todays prices would be $300 million each while F35C is $120 million.
That’s the unit price not the design price.
Plus we have a bigger work shares and design lead.
There is going to need a significant release of funds at some point, what worries me is that it doesn’t appear to be budget for and its the normal political trick of leaving it to the next government to worry about.
It would be interesting to know what the cost of Kaan was to develop.
21 February 2024Turkey flies Kaan fighter for first time
“Turkey has flown its Kaan National Combat Aircraft (MMU) for the first time, Turkish Aerospace (TA) announced.The domestically developed ‘fifth-generation’ fighter departed TA’s Ankara facility for its approximately 15-minute maiden flight on 21 February. For the flight, the Kaan MMU was accompanied by a Turkish Air Force Lockheed Martin F-16 Fighting Falcon chase plane.
“We have carved another development in our history,” President of Defence Industry Agency Haluk Görgün said of the event. “May the first flight of our National Combat Aircraft, Kaan, be beneficial to our nation. We will [bring] not only a fifth-generation warplane, but also technologies owned by a few countries in the world to our country through Kaan.”
https://
janes.com/defence-news/defence/latest/turkey-flies-kaan-fighter-for-first-time
Based on the Wikipedia article it seems to be based on a load of existing technology, so not sure how it will stack up against existing jets for example the eurofighter which is shares an engine.
Turkey states its a 5th gen plane and the unit price is pretty low, so I’m guessing more basic jet than is planned for tempest.
I will be interested to see how it stacks up against 4th gen aircraft and some of the roles it intends to be used for.
Its a 5th gen fighter needed due to the F-35 ban imposed by the US after Turkey bought Russian missiles. Uses F-16 engines (at least in prototypes). BAe helped design airframe (200m contract signed in 2015), and Rolls Royce are working with a local company on an indigenous engine for production version. Is also designed to use MBDA missiles (Meteor and Spear 3) in addition to Turkish weapons.
Cheers, it should be a very worthwhile project in that case.
Ok, I’m going to put cones up around this post, everyone please keep moving along, TSR2 has been mentioned again, keep moving, nothing to see here….
Well unless we learning from mistakes well never progress. If we’re not allowed to bring them up then they’ll surely just repeat, like selling our world leading jet engine technology to Russia, turns out we didn’t learn as one of our universities was found to be helping Iran build better drones.
The lessons from TSR2 were learnt, we ventured into partnership with the Europeans, Tornado was a difficult but a relitivly amicable affair, Thypoon has been like pulling bloody hair for 30 years and the Germans are still causing problems all these years on!
Let’s hope this collaboration goes well, with Japanese no nonsense management involved, it certainly stands a far better chance.
What problems are the Germans causing with Typhoon? (genuine question, don’t know anything about it)
Hi Chris, the Germans have been a royal pain from about 1989 onwards, constantly delaying, objecting, attempting to cheapen and reduce capability and even threatening to collapse the whole programme in the mid 1990’s.
Their latest histrionics might well have cost us a second Saudi order of 48 aircraft….. Costing the partners billions.
Everyone is still waiting for contract signature….
If you want a recent example of UK, Japan, Italy industrial cooperation, may I present the Hitachi IET/class 800 train…god help us.
I don’t know anything about that Luke, I will have to look it up……
Yes it’s about 16 hours of UK government spending. Bit of a bargain by all accounts.
The expression perfection gets in the way of progress springs to mind. Happened too many times in the past to count.
I would agree that 3% is a better place to be. But, personally there need to be overhauls at a number of different levels- some of them within MOD itself and some before a percentage increase should be agreed.
MOD procurement needs to be more transparent, more accountable, and generally better at delivering (keep a professional cadre of complex projects delivery specialists in place, rather than uniforms on shorter assignments, for starters) before they get any increase in funds. The US military does this far better than we do, with their far larger budget. MOD and Treasury also need to work out a way of properly crediting domestic manufacture over buying from abroad, and a more sensible way of managing a multi-year project budget (they seem to be doing the second bit at least with Dreadnaught, which is good). Only once all of that is sorted should we be looking at giving them more money.
More widely, though, I think government spending in general needs a massive shake-up. I’m in favour of a social safety net, both NHS and wider services and support. But NHS keeps grabbing more and more “scope” in terms of what it looks to do, far outstripping government’s ability to fund it. We either de-scope the NHS, or accept higher taxes- this ridiculous attempt to constantly improve efficiency for savings won’t work. Likewise with social services, police, welfare payments- I do think there should be provision in all of these areas. But just expecting to keep cutting taxes and services doesn’t work, nor does keeping offering more types of service for the same money.
Unfortunately, I’m talking about a massive set of changes, and there’s no one/group in the Commons on either side of the House who has the clout and desire to do it.
Some government departments are ever expanding. NHS and pensions being a couple.
As the population keeps increasing it costs more to keep it all running. This should be matched by more incoming from the population.
Some policies like the £400m to Rwanda is just a complete joke. That should of been spent of processing applications instead
Agreed that population increase is an influence of the expansion, which is understandable. But I guess my point was that the services that the NHS now provides have expanded massively since it was first brought in. I don’t just mean that the treatments for illnesses have improved, but the NHS was originally for emergency care, natal care, that kind of thing. Dentistry came in later, as well as mental health, and these days a very large number of services that one could argue are not critical to life.
Most countries, including France (often considered rather more towards the socialist end of the spectrum in the UK) do not have such a wide range of services offered by their base national healthcare; this is more like the original NHS, with additional services covered by a government-regulated insurance scheme that prevents things getting like the US. That way, if you play sport you can get insurance that covers you for physiotherapy etc. in the event of an accident (for example), and as you get older you can select appropriate levels of insurance to cover your requirements. In my opinion, it is a far more realistic approach to healthcare- rather than our approach that means the taxpayer has to cover care for other peoples’ lifestyle choices.
Same, as you say with the Rwanda stuff.
Hopefully we get decent numbers and don’t end with less airframes than now
B21 is so far coming in on time and budge at a fraction of the cost of B2. It may be with full computer aided design that the days of less and less aircraft at higher and higher costs could be over.
That would be a treat for once….. hopefully thats the case and we see this plane arrive in good numbers and with good capability early doors
Yes, you are right to a certain point. Industry 4.0, robotics, digital twins and additive manufacturing backed up by an AI machine vision system to maintain quality are just the norm today.
We are working on it and other projects in the same space. The MOD has everyone on a tight leash. No one will break ranks as security clearances are at risk and losing the company’s ability to continue working on UKGov contracts.
Yes plus the future of BAE, the Italian defence industry and Japan aerospace sector are all relying on this one.
Exactly
If this doesn’t work out then cutting edge fighter design outside USA is dead.
USA did itself no favours with the way F35 was handled and nobody else wants the lock in effect.
USAF don’t want the tech of their next gen plane shared around either. Nor the general design by committee approach to keep everyone happy that drove costs up.
As far as I’m concerned, no price is too high for this project. We have a very strong aerospace sector but this is a project that cannot be allowed to die due to its importance to keeping and developing our cutting edge industry.
One of the interesting points on Tempest verses NGAD will be what is now being described as low frequency stealth. Basically it will be determined on whether or not the aircraft has a tail.
It’s likely that Tempest will continue to have a tail for high manoeuvrability while NGAD will have a blended body at-least for the USAF version maybe not the USN.
I’m sure Lockheed Martin’s PR department are already hard at work stating that anything with a tail will be a 5th Gen aircraft not 6th Gen aircraft.
However if we think about all the items currently being listed as potentially 6th Gen items like Adaptive cycle engines, directed energy weapons and gallium nitride AESA radars these are all likely to appear on upgraded 5th Gen fighters.
Other than low frequency stealth it might be hard to distinguish what a 6gen fighter really is beyond an upgraded 5th Gen fighter.
The large mission module payload Bay we have seen on tempest before may be another unique feature but not something I think NGAD will be going for, will this be a 6gen determinant.
Taranis had some interesting features too….. Can’t wait to see Tempest for real. Good posts mate…. 👌
Maybe we can still call the unmanned component of GCAP Taranis, too good a name not to use 😀
And not forgetting Magma of course. I’m not sure where we are with that at the moment, but we might just see this technology being used with Tempest and future Loyal Wingmen.
“At present, Magma is testing two variations of “flap-free” technology.
The first is called Wing Circulation Control. In this, air from the aircraft engine is bled off and blown supersonically through narrow slots around a specially shaped wing trailing edge to do the same job as the aileron. The second is Fluidic Thrust Vectoring. This involves deflecting the engine’s jet exhaust by blowing air inside the nozzle to change the aircraft’s pitch.
According to BAE, the Magma technology has the potential to improve both the control and the performance of aircraft that would be lighter, cheaper, and more reliable. In addition, by removing the gaps and edges of conventional control surfaces, the aircraft becomes stealthier by making them less radar-reflective.”
https://
newatlas.com/worlds-first-flapless-aircraft-maiden/59524/
May be connectivity is the thing regarding 6th gen. A longer range, a core networked synchronised with other planes…
Yes true but again that can all be incorporated in a 5th Gen aircraft with the right computers and antennas.
There is a real risk especially on the export side to the US military industrial complex moving the goal posts and Tempest being seen as a more expensive 5th Gen aircraft.
It’s much the same with SSN AUKUS,
If you listen to any Australian political pundit or ex admiral you think that Virginia class is somehow the best machine ever made and the Astute is a poor man’s substitute when the reality is quite different and it’s one of the main reason Australia decided to joining the UK program.
Now they are starting on the Type 26 because it’s carries less missiles than an Arleigh Burke class so it’s some how shit and they should just go and buy flight III Arleigh Burkes when the reality is the T26 design is massively superior for hunting submarines which is the reason that Australia was buying it.
Move the same logic forward to 2035 if the US NGAD aircraft has low frequency stealth design and Tempest does not then LM jumps on the same bandwagon and the message is you might as well buy an upgraded F35 5.5 Gen aircraft because Tempest is just a 5.5 Gen aircraft.
They did exactly this with Typhoon. For most of the 90’s Typhoon was being described as 5th Gen then LM’s marketing department pushed the narrative than only stealth made an aircraft 5th Gen and the Typhoon was only 4.5 Gen
The facts that typhoon could also super cruise was irrelevant and the fact that typhoon had infrared search and track and the ability to fire off offbore from helmet mounted sights that F22 could not do was all suddenly seen as irrelevant.
That’s the risk.
To be fair, like the F22, the US has no intention to export the ngad or the aim260 so I don’t think international sales competition is a concern for them when it comes to these weapons
Also they are not planning for many of them only around 200.
Yes but they will be using it to talk up the F35. F35 will be the biggest export competition against Tempest.
For me, the real risk of Tempest program is still F35. 600 of them have been sold in Europe, so the budget available to buy airplanes may be limited in short term. You may have the plane in 2035, with no key differenciator that will make people buy it, because at that time they may prefer to replace the engine of F35, or add a new software release… So back to the rational behind Tempest: you want to have your own plateform, with your own roadmap. This is what matters. Second thing is to deny any potential advantage US may claim. And then, you have a choice to make: double down on F35, or insist severly on the limits of this plateform to generate a counter narrative. The main features that the new plane will bring is not stealth, since counter stealth technologies will be everywhere. The real pain point I have heard is to rebuild airforce mass, range and firepower. On all these topics, whatever fancy will bring USA, it will be difficult to counter Tempest and all flying things that will fly along. Tempest and Scaf may have a lot more to share than we can think of right now. Take the drones and remote carriers, that’s where air power will be. America has been strong because they had a large production line. Imagine you or France make remote carriers with a special link that will be share among europeans… Then nobody will be able to disrupt this AirPower in the making. Tempest and Scaf are ment to be « quarterbacks or awacs ++ in the role to convey a force of drones. The real value of the system seems to be in how well drones do their duty and connectivity works. And if we share drones and connectivity, then nobody would be afraid to buy Tempest or Scaf since their would be plenty of manufacturing facilities behind all over Europe.
That’s a way we could tackle the 78% of military spendings of all European countries going to USA. Well that’s my opinion. I hope more people share it, because I really disliked the current situation.
For the fleet, I guess most pressing issues are not the model of ships we do but the price per ton we can deliver in Europe and the ability to make our steel. If manufacturing capabilities are here, then their is nothing really fearsome in US design beyond the sheer volume they can make. What about agreeing on commun design and larger components series…
Pleasure to hear from you.
the USAF is being extremely tight-lipped about NGAD (like they are about the B-21). I think its a lot further along than most think- they did say one was flying as of a year or two ago. One thing we do know is that it will be a system of systems- loyal wingmen integration will be key. I think it will be a massive fighter to deal with ranges in the pacific… i do think it will be tailless as manueverability is increasingly becoming less important.
i think one of the keys for determining if something is 6th gen will be power generation and cooling for directed energy weapons and to power its advanced sensors. thats not something you can really retrofit to a previous gen system. i really wouldn’t be surprised if its something that more closely resembles the B-21 than F-22!
Jim
My take on AUKUS and why British may not be better than US but we ended up building them (and possibly 10 of our own).
Australian Politicians are even less clued up on Defence than ours and regardless of common sense will always argue that their opponent is 180 degrees wrong (even if he is right).
The recent review of their Naval Strategy is one of the few times the opposition hasn’t immediately slagged the Government off.
Nope not even the sound of a Dijjery Do.
Simple reason some truly inspired individual decided to get a Retired USN Admiral in to lead the review. No 1 rule in Australian Politics “Don’t piss the Yanks off”.
The Virginia is an excellent boat but so is the Astute, they follow a very different design methodology but are similarly powered and equipped.
To an Australian Politician It’s Big, it’s beautiful, it’s American so it must be good, it’s got Ice Cream machines and it’s starred in many movies and the US always wins. So we want them, then reality sets in and they run into a brick wall. The US absolutely loves the idea of Australia having 12 nice SSN to help them fight off the PLAN. Unfortunately our Showroom is bare, we can’t get any more but don’t worry I have a M8 who is not only amenable but short of work so you’ll get a good deal. And their Dinky little boats are not bad at all if you like that sort of thing. Oh and they’re a relative of yours and you have the same Boss.
Reality is….
The US option is twice the price of ours to buy, needs 50% more crew, it doesn’t have room for Beer onboard and the Australians are struggling to get the USN to provide more than maybe 3. The US boat building capacity isn’t what it was and they are really struggling to meet their own Battle Force Requirements never mind anyone else’s.
The Astute would have been an excellent fit for Australia 10 years ago, its smaller, cheaper, needs fewer crew and most importantly of all we can expand our capacity to build them.
And we also play cricket and don’t insist on “Dry Boats”.
But there will be no more built as we have moved on to the next PWR3 powered SSN(R) design which will follow the Dreadnoughts being built.
It will be wider than an Astute, and it will be longer (100/105 m), it will be designed with larger accommodation space per crew member (Astute and Vanguards are cramped) and have dedicated Female crew quarters from scratch. It will have a smaller Torpedo room (as no TLAM) but probably 4 VLS clusters for 28 TLAM replacements or whatever we end up with in cooperation with France,
And it will be way cheaper than the US SSNX which may just tip out at over 10K tons. And that will not be built as soon as the SSN(R) despite sharing a hell of a lot of the same technology.
It’s a bit like VAG Group and Skoda release a car based on the next generation Golf with lots of extras, way cheaper and 5 years earlier than the comparable Golf or Audi.
6th gen isn’t a plane. It’s a system of systems. The plane is the centre of a selectable group of assets.
It’s not a system of systems, it’s a defining set of characteristics. The plane is the topic of discussion.
6th Gen like 5th Gen and 4.5gen is a marketing ploy that LM has used very successfully to combat export sales of Eurofighter.
But my point is that all the system of system stuff and the loyal wing men drones can all go along side an F35 or any other aircraft.
NGAD will be seen as the benchmark for 6th Gen.
Is anybody else curious just exactly how that much money gets spent?
I’m fine with it being spent, it’s a great use of money, but…
£1.8 billion.
One Thousand Eight Hundred Million Pounds.
6,000 staff for one year at £300,000 per year?
Or a 1,000 staff for 6 years?
It’s just design work so far, yeah?
It must be subcontractors charging anything they like.
Hypersonic wind tunnel testing fees etc.
Supercomputer rental.
Just as long as we get a fleet of them out of it.
I would very much like to know where £1.8b has gone and what there is to show for it. Taranis cost @£185m in total including flight testing of an actual aircraft. If formal development won’t start until 2025, what ” informal ” progress has been achieved to date?
LM has gouged the US government and every other customer by over promising and under delivering at prices way ahead of the affordable successor aircraft promised. We can’t afford to allow BAE to spend vast sums of public money in similar fashion. Concerns about costs were set out in detail in a RUSI article of April 23. To deliver a manned aircraft superior to the F35, the proposed funding looks far too small compared with the development costa of Typhoon (£100b) or of F35 itself (@$400b).
Perhaps concentrating on an unmanned ISTAR and strike platform whilst relying on Typhoon for air defence might be more achievable on the likely budget.
Mate. Our defence budget is bled by the MIC. It’s the way it is.
MIC? I looked it up but not figuring it out.
Military Industrial Complex.
Eisenhower warned back in the 50s at its growing power.
In other words, The UK Defence industry.
Tempest, Nukes, half our equipment budget that actually goes not on new equipment, but In service support.
How much of the budget does the military never actually see? An awful lot.
The “defence” budget is not just there to fund the conventional military with enough people and assets at a good price. We buy eye wateringly expensive kit in small quantities to keep our own industry going.
This^^^^^^^
Totally spot on mate, 100% agree …
Hi Daniele. Eisenhower was a good President and truly decent man. Later Republican Presidents were allies of the MIC so it took lots of guts not to mention integrity to challenge their position even in those days
Cheers from a very humid Durban
Seems obvious now you point it out
Indeed. The costs of modern equipment are staggering which inevitably leads to smaller numbers and the shrinkage of forces that everyone on this site deplores. £1b+ for a new frigate, £100 m for a combat aircraft and £9m each just to upgrade an MBT.
Deliberately settling for cheaper, less capable kit isn’t really an option. The only partial mitigation I can see is to have long production runs as the US has done with AB destroyers, F15 and F18s and with their regularly modernized Abrams. With the small numbers we buy, development costs are likely to be a higher proportion of overall cost, which is why I worry about the Tempest programme.
You say that, but an F-18E/F/G isn’t all that cheap. They are on a general level with the cost of an F-35A. $55m to $70m roughly. I am pretty sure by now that all the development costs for the F/A-18 have been recouped so perhaps once the F-35 reaches similar maturity we are actually going to see smaller prices…nah who am I kidding.
We have a similar though slightly different issue in France, because Rafale roadmap is in our hand. Hence DGA focus on Rafale F5 to carry more accompanying flying assets and be able to convey them beyond the front line. The main issue is not Rafale or Eurofighter, main issue is to go past the frontline. For this Rafale fly very low, but it is not enough. The plane will need the ability to clear a path. UK has created some powerful missiles to destroy (Brimstone, Stormshadow) or disrupt (Spear) all Sam. This is interesting, but expensive. Make a few drones to make the risquy first encroachment and we have a way forward to clear the path for several bombers. If drones are cheap, you have the war machine you want. Tempest will be great, but if you can bring more value to Typhoon, you will be even stronger. If the drone and missiles you make can be shared between Europeans, we will have flipped the table, whenever Tempest is ready. If Typhoon radar is upgraded to detect F35, what will then be the narrative of F35? Expensive flying object with an unstable software suite? US protection with DC isolationist policies? Cooperation in Europe may become the way to go.
I appreciate USA, but I want us to be on the table in international discussions, not on the menu.
Pleasure to read you.
As a subcontractor working on this project. The purse strings have been extremely tight. The R, D&D work is incentivised towards the contract in the manufacturing and maintenance post demonstrator testing in 2026. I cannot say anything other than that.
1.8bn is peanuts when it come to designing fast jet capability like Tempest. The complexity of such a project is mind boggling. It is not comparable to Taranis in anyway in terms of scale or complexity. All this will lead to a Tempest technology demonstrator flying. That is very different from a 1st production prototype, which is still a very long way away.
“To deliver a manned aircraft superior to the F35, the proposed funding looks far too small compared with the development costa of Typhoon (£100b) or of F35 itself (@$400b).”
Here we go again!
Those figures you produced, include procurement costs, not just development costs of the said aircraft. An over-inflated figure, in the case of the Typhoon.
Agreed 👍
In the UK, BAe are the prime contractor. Below them you have Leonardo, MBDA, Thales and Rolls Royce as the main subcontractors. Then there’s the smaller companies designing the undercarriage, wheels, environmental system etc. BAe has to pay each of them for their respective development costs. So that £1.8 billion gets spread around.
BAe is the Main Contractor, or OEM in the tree. Then we have the Tier 1 suppliers. They only engage other T2 or lower companies that are already qualified and cleared. They (Leonardo for example) only engage T2 suppliers/manufacturers/developers if they have been specified by BAe or the Royal Airforce/MOD.
Gulp
Hmm, 2027 for a demonstrator to fly and 2035 for it to start to enter service.
The money spent is impressive, but if they can keep to that timeline that will be very impressive… Here’s hoping.
Cheers CR
A miracle I’d say based on previous records!
It will have to be ready in two years IRL by the time it is made ready for test flights given all the duty holder stuff now. Test flying isn’t saying in a clipped voice ‘going to push her now….’ anymore.
Hi SB,
Yeh, I realise that mate. I trained as an aeronautical engineer, although my career took me down a different path so I don’t claim to be an expert.
The point I was alluding to is that even building a demonstrator requires an awful lot of very meticulous design and system testing work which suggests that the program is far more advanced than current statements and information might suggest.
Of course, getting an airframe into the air doesn’t require all the whizzy mission kit to be onboard, they can be ‘simulated’ with strategically placed ballast. However, given the stealth shape and probable application of an unstable flight control system, plus all of the other flight and life support systems that need to work (and be tested prior to installation) a 2027 roll out would be an achievement, even if it can only to tugged out of the hanger and we need to wait another two years for start up trials, power range trials, taxiing trials, etc… before it takes off and does it’s first circuit of the airfield.
Cheers CR
PS. I realise that you understand much of the above, mate, but I tend to explain in detail for a wider audience and I can also be corrected by others who know better…
Personally I do think they mean flying demonstrator and not a cardboard model.
I think a lot more will have been done by then.
BAE need planes to make to keep the skills alive post Typhoon. Although the skills for Tempest will be very different to Typhoon.
As I’ve said before, just what will the military actually see from that 12 billion? The MoD budget supports primarily the MIC and Nuclear, not conventional forces.
This is another reason why F35A is not happening.
Unless this is cancelled and we lose the aircraft industry.
Just to add, I support both this and AUKUS. But posters wonder “where does the money go”
Here is another example.
It’s going to need a lot more than 12bn to deliver this project. Getting the technology demonstrator airborne will be a major milestone. But that is just one part of the Tempest system. To those expecting manned Tempest numbers to match or exceed Typhoon numbers. Then I think you are going to be disappointed. Future Air combat mass will come from the unmanned element of the Tempest system. Future force structures will not be like they are today. On the plus side. Typhoon will still be in service into the 2040s and F35B into the 2060s and beyond. As a guiding metric. The USAF only plans to purchase around 200 NGADS with a price tag estimated to be in the $350M range per airframe. And that’s presuming all goes to plan and on budget. Nothing comes cheap. And it is interesting that the official requirement for possible Tempest numbers has never been discussed in the public domain to date.
Interesting, had not read previously of a NGAD cost estimate more precise than ” multiple hundreds of millions” per copy.
The trouble is that we also sometimes get into the trap, of one of this project can do the work of five of the previous project which is all well and good but the net result is that the kickback from the treasury is that one can replace five then.
tempest has to offer customer nations more than the f35 program did
Close to a case of ‘all fur coat and no kn*ckers’. Meanwhile supporters of factions and regimes hostile to our entire way of life meet up and march about London free as air every weekend.
Highly trained, agile and mobile forces to deal with small to medium conflicts alongside regional allies. That and our famous capacity for dirty tricks out of sight.
Due to its complexity unfortunately will probably be obsolete by the time it arrives.
It is cheaper and faster to develop long range missiles than this.
Haven’t we heard that before?…
It was the death knell for our leading aviation industry then and would be even worse now…
Correct, it will be its the death knell, but i think deserved.
The point i am making is that super performance jets that takes ages to be operational, cost several billions to operate and train just to lob missiles do not make sense. All that not necessary performance have consequence they cost too much are too complex and will be bought in very low numbers.
Just use that money to make more and better missiles and better detection sensors (SAT’s , drones)
So between the UK, Italy and Japan, £5.4billion has so far been spent on this hairbrained ‘project’? I mean joint project, equal shares, equal costs?
How many F35’s could the UK have purchased for £1.8billion??? Why didn’t we???
How many personnel, how much kit, how much equipment could £1.8billion have bought?
Not much if it’s top of the range.
Tempest supports the British defence industry and will make billions for the UK like F35 is doing. And that and nuclear is a priority for HMG regards the “defence” budget.
Sooner posters realise that, the better.
Hi DM… An injection of that amount of money, would do a lot especially to the Army.
The UK (Italy Japan) are working on a next gen bit of kit… why would we want to flog it to anyone else? The US has not, and will not (for some time yet) sell their F22 to anyone else. That’s what keeps them ahead of the game.
The last F-22 was delivered to the USAF in 2012 and hasn’t been in production since. What keeps the US ahead of everyone else is its sixth-generation fighter which will have a production contract signed this year.
£1.8b gets you a frigate and 8 typhoons. Even 12 billion doesn’t get much.
This money is being spent in the U.K. so the a large amount of it goes back through the tax system.
14 x F35Bs. I would rather have Tempest.
You are assuming that this tempest thing is going to outclass anything already out there. Personally I don’t see it that way.
besides… when this new jet fly’s (in 2040 or whenever) the US, China and everyone else with the money, will start producing their own.
It’s an endless cycle of arms manufacturer’s bamboozling idiots at the Mod, with their nice shiny sparkly new concept toys.
Aircraft design has moved on, considerably since the 60s/70s! Aircraft are designed mainly on a mainframe supercomputer in 3D, including the airflow simulation, before a model is built for a wind-tunnel test.
12 Billion over 10 years in the context of a 230 billion MOD CAPEX over the period, is really a very good use of resource.
When you consider the industrial spinoffs, the potential exports, this and AUKUS are the pillars going forward
The date for the first flight has quietly slid two years to the right… There is no way this will be in service in 2035.
Maybe 2037, possible.
Bang on! mebbe by 2040 at the earliest.
great news but surely the sweet spot for our aerospace industry is in drones.
really is worrying that Sweden can build a proper fighter and turkey & Israel can be world leaders in Drones, but we seemingly can’t build one from a much higher base.
loyal wingman is a game changer and we should be focusing hard on creating the no1 product in that space using current tech. Everything is here in the UK except the political will (seemingly)
Current leading loyal wingman is the Ghost Bat from Australia. Boeing (Australia) is the lead as to airframe. BAE (Australia) is supplying the smarts. There are governments & there are companies. There is an invisible line. Leakage, I am sure, does not exist.
The UK is the largest supplier of drones to Ukraine, who says we can’t build drones? In fact the drones we got from Israel ended up being the mess that is Watchkeeper.
Gripen is still inferior to Typhoon.
BAE aim to have a stealthy, Hawk sized loyal wingman flying within 2 years and there are plenty of other companies making drones here.
is that hawk sized loyal wingman going to cost less than £1m, because if its not – it will have no customers.
loyal wingman cost is set – it has to be disposable asset.
Gripen may well be inferior – but it is half the price and is very good – its also made with lots of British components.
if we don’t want to take on the costs involved in a major new build alone, that’s fine – but we should be able to deliver better products than some of the countries that are currently beating us to the punch given we have a vibrant sector.
What do you mean by disposable?
If it’s designed to operate alongside F35, Typhoon and Tempest, it won’t be as disposable as a little drone held at company level.
If it can’t penetrate enemy air defences alongside an F35 or Tempest then not only is it disposable, it’s also just a waste of money and bad.
And why a million pounds anyway? If it gets shot down by a laser which costs ten pounds per target then it’s also a waste of money.
The whole point of loyal wingmen is that they are more disposable than a Typhoon/F35, and them getting shot down wouldn’t compromise the mission and cause any loss of life. Therefore it just needs to be cheaper than a manned aircraft.
The ISR equipment and weapons it will carry will cost more than a million pounds, so a cheap, bad loyal wingman will just end up wasting more money than a better, more expensive one.
from memory that is the stated requirement of the RAF loyal wingman.
what you are proposing is essentially what Taranis was / could have been. but was cancelled in preference to the above, which itself has been cancelled, leaving us to purchase off the shelf.
unless, you know something I don’t know and the RAF have some sort of capability under development
for the record – big supporter of Taranis – yet another missed opportunity – which is my point
BAE needs to be told to ‘go fly a kite’, and the Mod needs to open up the drone market (within the UK), to anyone who can come up with a very good piece of kit, at a good price.
BAE is the only British company capable of making a loyal wingman for F35/Tempest/Typhoon.
Elsewhere the market should be opened up, but at the very top end BAE is the only option.
Well Watchkeeper was modified, britishied 🙂 , The original model is operational all over the world.
£1.8bn spent so far? So that’s the BAE boards’ Christmas Party and bonuses covered, when do they start work on the aircraft?
A stated in the article, 2025. It’s short and worth reading, including the paragraphs that follow the headline. Perhaps your sarcasm would cut sharper if whetted by knowledge.
Wow, someone’s had a sense of humour failure, are you a member of BAEs board by any chance?
Maybe they should have spent it on Trident testing instead…
Surely by then pilots wont be needed.
Seems to me the whole Tempest project is just that. Another project that never goes anywhere. Whats the betting. All talk and no action.In fact a ‘paper’ plane.
This is a genuine line of questioning, in order to try and get the real ‘picture’, when it comes to new military designs and concepts.
So the tempest jet (looks like a Shenyang FC-31 to me). The UK. Italian and Japanese governments fund the research and development of this new aircraft?
When all the tests and experiments are successfully complete, the UK buys theirs from BAE, the Italians buy theirs from Leonardo, and the Japanese buy theirs from Suzuki?
Is this how it works?
Be handy to have some Harriers just now to boost the numbers.
I hear they are pretty good at shooting down Houthi drones.
Of course, we got rid of the Navy’s Sea Harriers even before the Politicians and the RAF stabbed them in back by axing the GR9.