Defence Secretary John Healey has announced the retirement of several ageing military assets, including Royal Navy ships, drones, and helicopters, as part of a broader effort to modernise the UK’s Armed Forces and address significant financial pressures in the defence budget.
The decision, which will see several key platforms taken out of service by March 2025, is expected to save up to £500 million over the next five years.
Retiring Key Royal Navy Ships
The Royal Navy’s amphibious assault ships, HMS Albion and HMS Bulwark, will be retired almost a decade earlier than planned. Describing the vessels as “effectively mothballed,” Healey revealed that they have not been operational since 2017 and 2023 respectively, yet were costing £9 million annually to maintain.
“These ships provided a valuable capability over many years, but we must look to the future,” said Healey. The two ships will be replaced by the upcoming Multi-Role Support Ships (MRSS), which are part of the government’s long-term naval modernisation strategy.
In the interim, the Royal Navy’s Commando Force will continue to be supported by the Bay Class auxiliary landing docks and RFA Argus.
The Type 23 frigate HMS Northumberland will also be retired in March 2025. According to Healey, the ship was “uneconomical to repair” after structural damage was discovered during its current refit. The Type 23 fleet will gradually be replaced by the advanced Type 26 frigates, with the first, HMS Glasgow, scheduled for delivery in 2027.
Additionally, two Wave Class auxiliary oilers, RFA Wave Knight and RFA Wave Ruler, will leave service by March 2025. Neither ship has been operational since 2017 and 2022, with their roles to be fulfilled by the newer Tide Class auxiliary oilers.
Drones and Aircraft Decommissioned
The Watchkeeper Mk 1 drones, introduced in 2010, are also being retired. Healey cited rapid advancements in drone technology and operational lessons from Ukraine’s war as key reasons for the decision. “A modern army must self-evidently have a modern drone capability,” he said, confirming that the Army will rapidly adopt a new uncrewed aerial system.
The announcement also includes the accelerated retirement of fourteen Chinook helicopters, some over 35 years old, as well as the Puma fleet, which will leave service when its support contract expires in March 2025. While Chinooks will be replaced by the H-47(ER) variant in 2027, the Pumas—currently based in Cyprus and Brunei—will be replaced by Airbus H-145 helicopters starting in 2026.
Balancing Financial Pressures and Modernisation
Healey acknowledged that the decisions, while necessary, would resonate with many who served on these platforms. However, he emphasised that the retirements are critical to modernising the UK Armed Forces and addressing what he called “serious financial pressures.”
“These decisions will deliver better value for money and ensure we are in a better position to modernise and strengthen UK defence,” Healey said, adding that savings will be “retained in full in Defence.”
The retirements are expected to save the Ministry of Defence (MoD) £150 million over the next two years and up to £500 million over five years. These savings, Healey stressed, will be reinvested into defence as part of the government’s wider strategic defence review.
As Healey put it, “We face increasing global threats… Defence needs increased resilience and readiness for the future. Difficult decisions are required.”
The Puma is being replaced with the H-145? that is a much smaller helicopter: Surely this is a misprint? what happened to the Medium Helicopter programme?
Only mentions Puma in Cyprus and Brunei – Hopefully NMH is a different issue?
I was thinking that when I read it on BBC news website surely they mean the H-175. I thought it was a BBC typo given that it is repeated here I hope it’s a government press release typo.
6 are being bought for Cyprus and Brueni.
Unless FMH is confirmed the RAF SHF has just lost it’s medium lift capability and probably RAF Benson with it.
Can’t see the point of retaining Benson
New garden village in Oxfordshire soon or new solar farm. Waiting for the estate agents at Bensons Guardroom…
So they save £500mil but ignore the current world threat and need for reserves. Note cuts before any announcement of replacing (let alone growing) capability. True colours shown. Head in sand. same old same old.
We’ve a nation on the sick, too many migrants that don’t pay taxes or don’t work (verified on gov.uk), nhs and civil service fattened beyond belief and they cut our navy while there’s a war on! Unbelievable!!
I was vilified on this platform when I said that this government would be savage with cuts so much so I’ve stopped commenting on this platform.
Really? There aren’t many in here who were not expecting this!
There are a LOT of Labour lovies here mate, they only ever see Tory cuts and I’ve debated many of them.
Rose tinted glasses might be coming off shortly.
I get some of these cuts, it’s the lack of replacements that concern me.
All to save what is effectively chicken feed over 5 years.
Buddy, some of it is down to lack of crews and in part that can be blamed on industrial relations over the years – you work in the railway and so know a thing or two about that…
Totally with you on lack of replacements but until the manning is sorted, is there any point OR do we jettison the carriers which take an inordinate amount of manning? I was green, so can’t comment.
Good old Labour. We need to modernise, the same old excuses.
Yes….we also need assets!
MRSS will “replace” the LPDs. You’ll find they only replace
the 3 Bays, Argus at a push.
Northumberland. Ok, she was already gone.
The Tides DID NOT replace the Waves, the Tides replaced the Rovers and Leafs.
But let’s move the goalposts there as people don’t remember.
Puma being “replaced” by H145s amounts to 6 cabs, and presumably means FMH is gone too?
And by extension, RAF Benson?
So alongside heavy aircraft like Atlas doing the work of the smaller Hercules, battlefield muedium lift is now non existent.
Watchkeeper is a surprising one. Labour spent over a billion bringing it in, and now scrap it leaving nothing in its wake, just as it was starting to provide useful capability.
Some thing is better than nothing, where is it’s replacement?
Chinook, another gap, at least, so far, 14 new builds are coming and that was always the plan to replace
the older examples in the fleet.
All of this is made worse considering that it is to save just £500m over 5 years, very little when you consider a budget of almost £60bn per year but at a very significant loss of capability.
It won’t be long before the Armed Forces are reduced to a very expensive home defence force with CASD, with the government still telling allies it can take the lead on XYZ for headlines and politicians talking tough to unfriendly nations with nothing to back it up and losing credibility on the world stage.
It’s more important for them to be able to say we spend x highest on defence rather than say we have the actual capability to do x.
The Chinese make some lovely cheap Golf buggies our troops can ride around in. The Russians use them a lot and the Ukrainians always seem happy when they turn up instead of one of those nasty BMP things.
Is there anything official on FMH being gone or is that just a reasonable guess at the moment?
Yep, no massive surprises here, all out of the way before SDSR25….
I suspect SDSR25 will announce Watchkeeper will be replaced by a smaller and cheaper off the shelf option, with the rest of its mission taken over by Protector…
Perhaps an uplift in Protector numbers??
Puma replacement, either cancelled without replacement and it’s mission handed off to Chinook fleet, or a blank cheque handed to Leonardo…
Actually understand and potentially agree w/ some of the announced measures. It is obvious that the MoD is compelled to extract even marginal savings from the existing budget in order to fund future acquisitions (as documented by the anticipated deficit in the 10 yr. equipment plan). At this juncture, the only viable option for HMS Northumberland may indeed be salvage. However, jettisoning the LPDs a decade before potential replacement vessels become operational would seem to be a significant calculated risk. Perhaps the USN could provide conveyance for the RM, but that could be assured under all circumstances.
From an intra-alliance PR perspective, it may have been wise to announce reductions during the interregnum before the Donald regains POTUS status. Given his previous conduct and pronouncements, one could almost guarantee that any additional reductions in the RM or RN would prove to be a continuing source of irritation. Regardless of US defense and foreign policy issues w/ ENATO over next four year period, believe that UK/US relationship will remain relatively intact, not least because of the AUKUS relationship. Would willingly wager that the Donald (and supporting troupe) from a transactional perspective, consider every potential future RAN and RN SSN-A as, at least, an indirect benefit to the US in the I-P. Especially if the RN SSN-As are armed w/ SLCM-N.
…could NOT be assured…🙄
Yes, likewise, some of it makes sense- especially if most of the vessels are tied up alongside anyway.
That said, the key thing will be the replacement types across the board- how quickly and how much of a direct replacement they really are.
Also, the comments about Puma were surprising to me, they seem to imply that our medium lift capacity is pretty well atrophied at this point, which is a concern…
Hey mate, makes for heavy news. I’ve seen it suggested that they’re making the cuts now so that the actual SDR is more positive, but that may be an optimistic position.
I will offer a partial counter to your position, while agreeing with a very core part of it:
If the ships are drawn up alongside with no crews, have been for a while and likely will be for a large portion of their time until replacement, it makes sense to cut the costs now and move them on. I can’t comment on whether the stated replacements are like-for-like in all cases, but I think we need an honest review of our amphibious and expeditionary aspirations Vs capability anyway. For the record, I’m probably having it, but the government needs to accept it’s an expensive capability and they need to fund accordingly; and the RN needs to look at how they deliver when everyone has AShMs.
I’m given to understand that Chinook is like-for-like with new models, so happy enough with that. But the Puma thing is confusing; the announcements suggests that we’ve only been using them in Cyprus and Brunei (presumably for supporting training and similar activities), not for supporting ‘airmobile’ operations and training elsewhere? If so, we don’t functionally really have a medium lift capability as most military people would understand it. Have I misunderstood? To me, that’s pretty poor showing, and a strong case for revisiting the current status quo in terms of which service looks after medium lift. Also, NMH becomes more important in my view.
As for Watchkeeper, they have a fair point- it’s too big and slow to be an artillery spotter on the modern battlefield.
Where I strongly agree with you is this: there needs to be a focussed push to get true replacements for all on the books at accelerated pace. I await the SDR with interest…
The problem with the MRSS is that under the last government, we were told that we were going to get ‘at least three and up to six’ ships – that’s not a guarantee that we are going to get six. How many are we going to get? Based on today’s announcement, we need all six!
Why six when they’ll only be replacing four ships? Good job we got rid of the Albions, Ocean and Largs Bay or people would have said we needed eight. If only we could find a way to decommission a few more before the MRSS order, there won’t be any amphibious capability left to replace at all. Think of the savings! I suppose we can kill a couple off in the SDR, leaving two. Argus is really old and was due to go this year. If we keep pushing the numbers down slowly enough nobody will notice.
No issue with the T23, Helos and Watchkeeper, but do wonder about Albion, Bulwark and the two Wave Oilers.
So much for the SDR
The amount saved by scrapping the Albions is tiny- enough to fund the costs of a weeks worth of illegal migrants. But it probably doesn’t make sense to retain them, given the change of operations by the RM. In the long interval before MRSS arrive, there is always the option of using one of the QEs in an amphibious role, alongside the Bays.
Northumberland too far gone to resurrect, but it would be better if some acceleration of the build schedules of T31 and T26 could be achieved.
With so few surface ships able to put to sea, the Tides appear to be sufficient so deleting the 2 Waves makes sense.
I don’t fully understand why Watchkeeper is going.
Chinooks and Puma scrapping is long overdue and I don’t think the Airbus replacement has any implications, yet, for the NMH project.
It does make me laugh how utterly defenceless we now are as a nation…only a couple of decades ago we were never going to dip below the 50 frigates and destroyer , then it was 35, 23, 18, 15, and now 9….
We could muster a fight for a couple of days then raise the white flag….
All manner of assets have been removed from our once ” armed forces” Today we have no more than a ” non armed forces” …
Within less than 100 years we’ve gone from ruler of the seas to barely able to put a flotilla to sea! The River B2s are a joke warship, the carriers have barely any anti ship capabilities (just 2x surface ships with ASuW). Our mine hunters are down to a few. As for troop transport getting rid of C130s, Chinooks and Pumas leaves very little for tactical movement. The complacent commentators on this forum tend to look at our forces and NATO with rose tinted spectacles when in reality we’re now a 2nd tier European power with 2 carriers and a CASD. Treasonous really and with Trump coming to power I fear a few chickens will come home to roost as Putin and NK know he’ll only look after team USA.
Reality Check: we have neither the global power nor the economy to support the Navy of 100 years ago. Such a comparison is pointless. Countries have the militaries they can afford.
Labour always weak on defence.
Devastating.
These ships should be being put to sea, not sold.
All UK political parties are weak on defence, because there are few votes in it. I blame the media who have ignored defence in their coverage for decades instead focussing on domestic matters. If defence became higher profile just watch that % of GDP rise. Sadly with the passing of the generations that have experienced the horrors of war, we have become a nation of ostriches.
All parties are weak on defence – no votes in it. I blame the media who fail to educate the public on what is really happening in the World and the horrors of war. Disarmament only works if everyone does it, and unilaterally encourages war. These are the same people who are happy to let the USA finance their protection, but whinge when we have to follow their foreign policy as a result. If defence became more prominent for voters the %gdp would soar.
What idiots!
The naval cuts are particularly stupid.
Island nation, with a decades old critical amphibious assault capability. Cut it. Frigates… (resiting Nelson). Cut it. Fools!
Clearly cannot read the room …I didn’t see anywhere the new national school syllabus for russian & chinese languages – lowercase intentional.
Well done (sic) UK voters.
It’s high time the USA dumped Europe and NATO: this defence review is just sending the incoming President the wrong message about the UK’s commitment to fight the Russians. We should be not just replacing obsolete equipment, but adding to it in order to strengthen our offensive capabilities.
But then the UK public and their politicians have always loathed their Armed Forces: UK defence policy has always been to reduce them to the lowest possible level, and to get someone else to do our fighting for us. Since 1990 it’s been the USA, and Ukraine from 2014 onwards.
So you want us to be at mercy of a monster like Putin?
Don’t expect anything but cuts dressed up as future investment . The First responsibility of government sacrificed for spending on the sacred NHS to ensure they are re-elected.
What idiots!
The naval cuts are particularly stupid.
Island nation, with a decades old critical amphibious assault capability. Cut it. Frigates… (resiting Nelson). Cut it. Fools!
Clearly cannot read the room …I didn’t see anywhere the new national school syllabus for russian & chinese languages – lowercase intentional.
Well done (sic) UK voters.
What is the point of the Defence Review then; is this not a bit premature given that any replacements are years away? Also, to continue to blame the previous government about “the state it (everything) was left in” is old (and factually incorrect) news. The financial amount “being saved” is miniscule in the great defence scheme of things. Finally, what (expletive deleted) message does that send to Russia , China and above all, our allies?
Incredible!
Reeves clearly won’t give the MOD a penny more than she announced in the budget – she needs every £billion (or rather £40 billion) she can scrape up for the NHS. RUSI calculates that after inflation and pay rises the MOD’s budget in 2025/26 will be just 0.1% higher in real terms than 2024/25. Clearly the plan now is to announce defence cuts ASAP in order to give the SDR team a small amount of financial headroom. Come Q2 2025 the government will then be able to trumpet increased expenditure on AI, drones, space, … without actually committing any new money. I now don’t expect to see the 2.5% GPD target ever being reached under this government. At this stage it looks like the Navy will be the loser under SDR 2025, the RAF a gainer, and the Army a slight net winner. A dark horse decision will be the fate of the Royal Marines – if they were absorbed in to the British Army then the latter’s strength would increase by nearly 6000.
Just because they look like imbeciles, talk and think like imbeciles, don’t let them fool you, they really are imbeciles.
Okay, there’s some justification behind some of these cuts, but still, it does feel like we’re accepting our fate here a little. Once this kit is gone, it ain’t coming back. We’ve been promised jam tomorrow numerous times.
What idiots!
The naval cuts are particularly stupid.
Island nation, with a decades old critical amphibious assault capability. Cut it. Frigates… (resiting Nelson). Cut it. Fools!
Clearly cannot read the room …I didn’t see anywhere the new national school syllabus for russian & chinese languages – lowercase intentional.
Well done (sic) UK voters.
Hmmm well (in theory) this is just the bad news the great new kit is yet to be announced (we hope). Whilst I will reserve judgement until then it is perhaps worth noting that some of this kit (especially Watchkeeper) was giving trouble. That said in this day and age I’m not sure scrapping anything is a good idea. I thought the original plan for Albion & Bulwark was a good one. We don’t need these ships everyday but we do need them.
Trump takes office and opens the Defence red box: Item 1. Due to world events, the UK government is urging the USA and other NATO allies to increase their defence spending significantly; Item 2. The UK government has announced major defence cuts. Mmmm
Why is the British military allowed to become deadbeats and a liability all those ministers who cut , cut and cut should be held accountable
With an aging population, the UK government priority (now and for the immediate future) is clearly going to be the NHS above all else. It makes sense given the power of the elderly voting block in a democracy. But it leads to so much else being neglected.
Every defence review since WW2 has made immediate cuts with the promise of a bit of jam years down the line. It looks this government is deviously trying to get the bad news out early, so the SDR White Paper when published will appear to be an all good news story – without even one extra pound actually being allocated to the defence of the UK.
It appears that Labour and successive Tory governments want to reduce our armed services to a level which would make it inevitable that to be effective would have to join a EU planned force! To see Prince of Wales floating around with nothing on the deck is embarrassing and basically makes the UK a laughing stick around the world. Was it 2 billion to build! A nation that can’t defend its own borders is dangerous and I believe we have now reached that point. We now have 5 years of these lunatics in charge and forget the Tories were no different! 60 billion defence budget!! Just lining the pockets of the Blackrock shareholders and the like. We are being fleeced and all we do is shrug our shoulders. Wake up Britain.