HMS Prince of Wales met up with the USS Mount Whitney on the way to Exercise Cold Response.

The ship tweeted the following.

HMS Prince of Wales is sailing to take part in a NATO exercise in the Arctic with frigate HMS Richmond, destroyer HMS Defender, a tanker and an Astute-class nuclear submarine.

The Royal Navy say here in a news release that around 35,000 troops from 28 nations are expected to be involved in Cold Response, which will show how a unified multilateral force would defend Norway and Europe’s northern flank from a modern adversary. Roughly 900 Royal Marines will spearhead the UK involvement from HMS Albion which is already in the region, the Royal Navy add.

“Aircraft carrier HMS Prince of Wales will deploy to the exercise, with frigate HMS Richmond, Type 45 destroyer HMS Defender, a Royal Fleet Auxiliary tanker and a nuclear-powered attack submarine escorting her. UK Merlin and Wildcat helicopters will patrol the skies, supporting commando operations and hunting submarines alongside a wide range of aircraft from across NATO, including F-35 fighter jets and attack helicopters.”

Brigadier Rich Cantrill, in charge of the UK’s commando forces, was quoted as saying:

“The UK is making a strong contribution to one of the largest Cold Response exercises for years. NATO as an alliance needs to be ready for anything, ready for all environments. It’s essential for us to support Norwegian partners and that’s why we train in the Arctic so often. Cold Response is an amazing opportunity for key NATO allies and partners to come together in the most challenging environment of the High North, prepare for any eventuality and learn to work together. What we’ll see is a strong maritime task force and then land exercises. We will see many nations come together from the UK to Norway, the USA, the Netherlands, France, Germany and Italy.”

The exercise will run from March 10 to April 10. You can read more on this from the Royal Navy here.

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
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54 COMMENTS

  1. They are also supposed to meeting up with the USS Roosevelt and her support group at some point. Which is also taking part in the exercise.

    • So’s the B52…

      But Whitney has the ability to soak up Int and the B52 to send the receiving end to hell. Complaints?

      Not from me.

        • The Mount Whitney is currently in one of the US Navy’s multi-year Extended Life Programs to take it to 2039. It’s a $100 million program.

          • Daniel ….. we just sell good ships to Chile
            We sell good ships to Australia
            We could use 1 x Bay and 3 x Type 23
            Well done Dave & George… hug a hoodie……

  3. Now is a good time to write to your MP’s requesting that there is a real need for an additional increase in defence spending above the last one. Even in these current times, there are those in government arguing against such an increase and quoting that there was an increase during the previous round, which was really introduced to fill the existing funding gaps. The army is being reduced, too little MBT’s being upgraded, ship building at a slow pace, no Harpoon replacement until 2030 at the earliest, too many cases of “fitted for but not with”, the scrapping of the Warrior upgrades and reduction in AWACS capability. List of actual cuts were significant and should be reversed as a minimum.

      • Good question. On a Forces Net, there is a good interview with Malcolm Chalmers, Deputy Director General, Rusi on the subject “Will UK defence spending rise as a result of Ukraine conflict?”. His opinion was it was too early to tell if there will be an increase. He added the longer the conflict, the better probability of the increase. Whatever the outcome, defence cuts has gone on for too long and too deep with all of Nato being lulled in to a false sense of security.

        • My thoughts exactly, HM Government hedging its bets. Not enough pressure is being applied as far as I can see but I do know MOD are in discussions with the treasury. As always it will be a case of this is what we need and the treasury will say this is what you will get. In the longterm the MOD and procurement need to clean house once and for all and get thier priorities correct.

    • You pretty much summed up all of the areas that now need attention John, maybe a further boost to cyber security also. One decision that I reluctantly agreed to at the time but now needs over-turning is the decision on ISSGW. If we look at the number of outdated items of military hardware Russia is fielding in the Ukraine the need to have the most up-to-date systems isn’t a must right now but an over-the-horizon anti-ship system is. OK, NATO isn’t at war right now but just think how long it would take to spec-out, find the budget, order, build, train and fit an ISSGW system. Maybe an UOR might see such a system available in 6-months but how long have we got (who knows? …. exactly). Our defence spending over more recent years has been ‘to a budget …. what we can afford’ and not ‘what we need?’. I can’t see Putin going anywhere and I doubt, even if he was bumped off, his replacement would be any more moderate. Given the time it takes to train pilots, build ships and procure a missile system the time to act is now. Even if the Ukrainian crisis miraculously and most unlikely ends abruptly, with no more land grab or lives lost, Putin has shown his colours and is now not just a risk but a clear and direct threat to freedom and democracy. I don’t think our children will judge us too harshly even if, by some fluke, this does all calm down quickly, if we committed to spending more on what we need right now, in view of the pending threat.

      • I don’t believe it will calm down even when Kyiv is taken. Probably not even if the rest of the land east of the Dneiper is “pacified”, along with taking the whole Black Sea coast, making Ukraine a land locked country. As I doubt Ukraine will just roll over, as they are too pi**ed off with Russia for that to happen! More likely a Government will be set up initially in Lviv, which is about 350 miles away from Kyiv. Giving Ukraine time and space to keep on fighting.

        If the Russian army does encircle Kyiv, Ukraine really must find a way to get their President out before its too late! Russian have already said he is a priority target and he has been giving hope to the Ukrainian people. If he is captured, it will make life much easier for Russia. Especially replacing him with a puppet.

        I really do think Russia have bitten off more than they can chew. It would not surprise me if Ukraine SOF started doing small scale raids over the border in to Belarus and Russia itself. Deliberately targeting fuel tankers and depots, perhaps even the odd airfield. At this point for Ukraine all gloves are off. Most of the intelligence for the targets is freely available on twitter etc.

        On to the subject of rearming our military. The problem we face is that there have been so many holidays for equipment replacement. That kept getting deferred, we are now at a position where it is going to cost a significant amount of money to put right. Has the Treasury got the capital or the stomach for such an outlay?

        I am sure everyone who uses this forum can put together a list of what our military should have, just to firm up today’s capabilities. Let alone what we propose they could have. For once we actually need the Chief of Staff and the Department Heads to stand up and stop being yes men. Then things may actually change.

    • Yes lets all spend money the country doesnt have, like the last 70 years based on a whim. drawing your pension are we,

  4. Knowing nothing of matters nautical but stand off weapons for the RN and FAA/RAF must be coming at the top of any shopping list.

    • …and I would add to that that the army/Army Air Corps need some sort of low-cost-missile carrying drone system for tactical air support as well as the big drones already looking at the wider theatre-level. Please can we not buy US or Turkish drones, but have a rolling program that nourishes the development of a UK drone industry for this. I think we are going to need it sooner rather than later…

      • I always had the view that the reason the west could field less numbers was the equipment was always to be better. This cannot be lost in this day and age.

  5. Sweden or Finland ought to invite this NATO force to do a few days worth of exercises on their territory. Let’s see how the Russians like that.

  8. Good to see NATO,Unite at this time, nothing could have put any differences aside like a threat such as RF, Thank you for your service #NATOBROTHERHOOD

  9. I spent a short time on her (alongside) when she was the US 6th Fleets command platform . She ran from Gaeta in Italy at the time which was around about an hour up the Autostrade from where I was based. As I was working in NCSA Naples the chance for a visit was to good top pass up.
    Fantastic command platform with state of the art electronics and systems …However the propulsion is a steam turbine and at the time (early to mid 2000s) the AirCon systems where struggling to keep up with the wild heat from the electronics.
    She has I understand been updated a couple of times since then but the USNs corporate knowledge for Boilers and Steam turbines was slowly disappeared so she is now run by MSC (similar, sort of, to the RFA) civvy sailors. The command tasks are still run by the USN.

  10. My word the Americans, seem tòo be getting their monies worth with the MT Whitney, in 1983 we carried out the same exercise in the Fjords around Tromso , and entertained their crew with a few tinnies

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