A new 878 Institute paper wants the Common Combat Vessel based on the proven Type 31 design, cutting production risk and keeping Rosyth working as the current frigate run ends.
Six Common Combat Vessels are to replace the cancelled Type 83, acting as command ships for four new classes of as yet undesigned autonomous platforms, the Type 9X. All of it has to be designed, built, tested, delivered and doctrinally proven by 2035, when the Type 45 leaves service. The paper calls these tight timeframes “especially for a procurement system known to move at glacial speed”.
Robert Clark’s fifth recommendation is to reduce that risk by not starting from scratch. The existing Type 31 frigate design should be the template for the CCVs, he writes, because “a proven platform would minimise production risk, utilise existing supply chains” and maintain shipbuilding at Rosyth once the Type 31 programme finishes in the early 2030s, just as CCV production is expected to begin. Elsewhere he argues the yards at Rosyth “should be utilised for the incoming CCVs”.
The Hybrid Navy concept was introduced alongside the Atlantic Bastion strategy by the First Sea Lord in December 2025, and at least £1.3bn has been allocated to it over four years. Clark’s broader reservation is that in practice this means “cutting proven (and crucial) crewed platforms for untested and uncrewed ones”.
He does credit the concept on its own terms, accepting that around 30 Large Uncrewed Surface Vessels working with a smaller escort fleet “could provide deterrence by denial” through distributed sensors and effectors, extending radar coverage over a wider area.
Type 31 is currently in build at Rosyth. The paper’s related recommendations cover the Type 26 as an export platform and extending the Type 45 to cover the air defence gap left by the Type 83’s cancellation. The Ministry of Defence has not yet responded to the report.
Britain’s Military Deterrence Gaps by Robert Clark is available in full from the 878 Institute.
Why is this nonsense report getting so much coverage.
T45 batch 2. It has the strength for a tall mast and it has the space to be a flexible platform, especially if it reduces VLS capacity and the re-design won’t take long or cost much. I’m not convinced small, cheap drone ships could provide the required radar coverage; even if forward deployed. Extra T31’s for Rosyth. Sorted!
If i read the DIP correctly, there is £1.3B to design, build and equip the CCV and affiliated drones. These vessels are not going to be well equiped or large i’m afraid. Capability will lie in the drones and given their unproven status, i think this is a huge gamble.
I hope that’s £1.3bn per ship rather than all 6! It is a gamble…one I don’t believe is necessary. Fingers crossed there is more money coming to defence with a friendly face at the Treasury, but I wouldn’t hold my breath. The cynic in me reckons Healey quit because Burnham offered him a juicer post rather than some matter of principle.
The 1.3 billion is for the first Four to five year development and production of the T9x autonomous platforms. Not the cost of the CCVs as they will be built later and funded in the next parliaments funding cycle… essentially the government quietly abandoned the whole concept of the 10 year funding plan that was meant to be the DIP and just planned up until 2030.
In the end if as is promised defence spending hits 3% of next parliament and 3.5% by the end of it then there will be buckets of money for capital expenditure.. as by that point most of the RNs big ticket capital items will have been built or already funded.
Indeed difficult to cost out a ship class that hasn’t even been fully conceptualised in size or capability yet, let alone designed and costed.
Aye. Part of me wonders if the RN are just hedging their bets, and purposefully slowing the CCV down, so that T45 can continue through to the 2040s, and construction on a true T45 successor can begin in the mid-2030s.
However, the government needs Babcock to survive, and so will want to give them frigate work of some kind, which is why the CCV is essentially T32.
I think maybe the RN are playing the long game.. they know the T45 has just had its systems and power updated so it’s not going to have an obsolescence issue and its hull can do 35 years.. so all the cost to keep them ticking into to the 2040s has essentially already been paid.
This gives the navy 20 years.
I think they see the CCV as a way to get more hulls now, as they did with the T31.. if they can get 6 more hulls and protect the T45s into the late 2040s they have got their 25 strong navy… all they need to do then is protect it, and they know the UK has bound itself in treaty to be spending 3.5+1.5 % on defence for 2035.. with the navy have essentially completed or funded its major surface fleet capitalisation, and a fleet at or heading to 25 escorts at that point and lots of money about for 2035, it’s the perfect time to come out and say… everyone else has a large AAW destroyer class.. we have tried but smaller autonomous vessels and CCV cannot protect the carriers from ballistic missiles and hypersonics.. we must a a large AAW vessel to function as a first rate navy.. can we have one for 2045-2050 to replace the T45s… ohh yes and BAE will be launching their last T26 in 2038ish so they need to build something as well….
Ten year equipment plans sound great but funding will never exceed four years so anything beyond year five will always be a statement of wishes. One parliament can never bind another. For all we know the defence picture might drastically improve post 2030, Putin can’t live forever and if that’s the case then no point is boosting spending to 3.5%. 3% of GDP is a perfectly adequate amount of long term spending.
Agree.
Well I think T45 won’t leave service with such an abrupt timeline, but when it is able to.
Also, considering how long it’s taken to get a single T26 built, let alone trials, I think this timeline is pie in the sky, even if it’s built to the T31 hull which is a simpler type.
Exactly: T31 isn’t exactly flying out of Rosyth.
I accept that one T31#3 has been built then there will be an experience efficiency gain that is very real but that is not yet reality and it looks like T26#1 will beat T31#1 into trials…..not the best look.
True but the simple fact is BAE have got a minimum of 13 T26s to build..and that’s filling their books to 2040… Babcock will need a hull to put on the blocks for 2030.
Simple fact is that Babcock need to deliver a warship fit for trials before they can be given any further orders.
No point in ordering ships that either are not fit or are not delivered even vaguely on time.
It sort of depends on where they go and how clever they are..
If they are clever beans, they will us the fact the T45 are just had power and capability upgrades that don’t finish until 2032 and that the hulls have hull plating thickness that will not likely be an issue until they are 35 years old.. using this it’s not going to be anything like as problematic keeping them running well into their 30s as the T23s.. the major works and costs on power and system obsolescence have already been paid and done…so cashing out these vessels before their hulls are nackered and need major works is foolish.
So keep the T45s running from 2045-2050 if they have to..and from 2032 onwards derisk the introduction of Aster 30 NT by putting it on the T45s..
Make the CCV a AAW focused Arrowhead 140 keeping as close to T31 as you can for commonality.. just add a volume search radar ( which it’s got the ability to take with no major changes) and give it 32 MK41s straight away.. fill the mission space with all your autonomous ship control gubbins via PODs ( this will allow you to bring the old T31s up to the same command and control standards with ease as well as the T26s). Have the first one on the blocks for 2030 launches in 2033 and commissioned in 2035-36 to them pop out one a year until the end of the decade.
In the early 2030s make the assessment on the need for a true high end AAW destroyer to manage the air defence ( and ABM defence) of the carrier battle group) .. at which point I think they will decide they will need something like the US, Japan, China, Korea and Italy are building and so they can order a number of big AAW destroyers for the mid to late 2040s as the T45s get decommissioned.
Your final RN in the 2040s then becomes:
1) 8 ASW frigates ( t26)
2) 11 Arrowhead 140 ( T31 and CCV as your basic GP/ second level AAW and drone control warship)
3) 4-6 AAW Destroyers ( T45 and true replacement)
This gives you 24-25 escorts as will as the autonomous ships.. which is probably about right.
I think this will probably happen simple if Russia and China are still strategic competitors, the US isolates more and we do go to 3.5% of gdp…
The fear is that the OSD for T45 is being dictated by the lack of budget lines for LIFEX.
So RN ends up in the T23 mess again.
I do think that some very large high end AAW ships will be needed even with all the dronesque ships around.
Having a large synthetic array on land is one thing but doing that on the water is quite another.
Arrowhead 140 hull, specifically the ‘large radar’ variant visible on Babcock’s website. 16 VLS forward, 57mm, single 40mm rear. Plenty of mission bay space replacing the previous central 32-cell VLS. Works with 2-4 T91 for a group total of 80-144 strike-length cells, and with 2 T94 to provide radar pickets, or, in a different configuration, volume search radars.
You trade individual missile depth on the CCV, but retain a relatively cheap price point, ease of production and rapid deliverability. Depth is compensated for by close escorting T91, which enhances survivability of the package on the whole. The main issue is the weakness of the CCV radar (probably Sampson+ performance rather than the massive system floated for T83), but this can be partially compensated for by the T94.
It’ll probably not be initially as capable as a dedicated T83, but it will be more survivable against enemy action. It will probably be less easily deployable, but that depends on how many T9X are constructed.
Type 31 too small to replace Type45 – I would personally like to see a production line of Type 45 hulls being built as an ongoing progression and upgraded as time goes on. Keeps production going, proven design, evolution and lower risk. We do need far more T26 and T31 but not at the expense of T45 – mass is very important these days – we need something that can fight off large numbers of enemy drones, that means a bigger hull to carry them. It is foreseeable to imagine a task force being attacked by 500-1,000 drones of different types in a mass swamping attack – don’t see a T31 type being able to cope.