Plans for Littoral Strike Ships and Fleet Solid Support Ships may be scrapped in favour of more numerous ‘Multirole Support Ships’, the UK Defence Journal has learned.
An inside source that asked not to be identified recently attended a briefing at the Commando Training Centre, also known as CTCRM, discussing information relating to future UK amphibious and littoral capability
Over the last few months, the competition for the Fleet Solid Support Ship was halted and nothing has been heard about the Littoral Strike Ship programme, now it seems there is good reason.
I was told “LSS and FSSS likely to be sacrificial lambs at forthcoming review in order to get MRSS in larger numbers”.
“Ellida will require some tweaks but would appear to reflect the requirements of littoral strike and needs of Carrier Strike”, the source added.
The deletion of FSS and FSSS in favour of smaller but more numerous MRSS vessels fits with current views, “thinking is larger number of smaller targets”.
“It’s a solution that fits the new doctrine. LSS was going to be a 40,000t conversion of merchant ship, big poorly protected target.”
How will this be paid for?
One option appears to be gapping the capability currently provided by the Albion class.
“Probably be a capability gap taken with Albion and Bulwark too as amphibiosity doesn’t fit with littoral strike requirements. Neither were mentioned in the brief other than saying that through “disinvestment” there would be gaps to pay for new capability.”
Please note however that this not a solid plan, merely an option.
What is Ellida?
The ELLIDA concept is a 195m multi-role support and logistics vessel designed to provide the capabilities needed in “future global operations, offering the flexibility of a large hull, with internal vehicle and stowage decks, weather deck stowage and additional accommodation”.
It has the utility to transport and deliver troops, vehicles, equipment and supplies from anywhere in the world in support of amphibious warfare and littoral manoeuvre. Its mix of ship-to-shore offloading and logistics capabilities allow support to naval operations through landing craft, boat operations, multi-spot aviation and replenishment at sea.
Does this sound familiar. Based on a promise we will sacrifice future ships FSSS, LSS and loose the LPDs so we can afford more of these new ships. Except by the time they are designed and orders negotiated we won’t be able to afford the numbers promised and they will be smaller, stripped back and fitted for but not with.
Just how many T45s and 26s were we getting.
So 3 Fort, 2 LPD, Argus, and reportedly 2 LSS become, what?
How many will we get?
Anything less than 6, as we were to get “up to 3” new FSS, which no doubt means 2, and bingo, numbers reduce again.
I think they are a Lidl special buy. £250m each. Once they’re gone, they’re gone!
Please tell me they will just moth ball Albion and Bullwark rather than sell them off for peanuts? I get that we do not get as much use out of them as we seem to with the Bay LPD’s but they are irreplaceable if we ever do need them to transport troops and equipment to the Nordic’s, Falkland’s or anywhere else for that matter. With the stimulus package the government is forking out for this f…ing COVID 19 disaster I worry the defense budget will be decimated to pay for it. Who would have thought eating a bat could cause… Read more »
All the COVID stuff should come out of the Aid Budget; end of. It came from Overseas (China as usual, sorry to say) and that’s what should pay. Which reminds me who is going to present the invoice for this in Peking?
I agree although looks like the costs will be much greater than the entire foreign aid budget.
I do think on Principle though all funding to build and maintain RFA ships that are primarily used for foreign aid should come out of that budget, including funding for atlas, merlin and chinook helecoptors to remove the huge shortage we have of them including spare parts.
Agreed.
I very much agree that China should pay for this damage from the Virus some how! China Should Stop their military build up, to pay Europe and others to correct the damage.
The render has 24 20-foot containers, fantastic to see that. I think we need 8 of these.
We’ll be lucky to see 8 containers at this rate…with no ships.
With employment likely decimated for the next few years, military ship building is one useful way to help people get skills and cash to put food on the table for families. Can’t see we need any new Cruise Ships for a while.
Besides we really do need to build up our merchant navy rather than allow outside powers to run our lives.
We don’t build cruise ships anymore. We dont crew them, except for Yorkshire singers.
And there is no point saying numbers will be cut when the numbers have not been given out in the first place.
A good concept, but politics will see to it that we never have enough to fulfil the gap that will be left by Argus and the Bay classes.
It is worth reading the article on the Save the Royal Navy website about the Ellida concept. They range in size from 120m to 195m, which currently do not have the necessary ammunition storage facilities required by a FSSS. They have all the hallmarks of something that is trying to doing everything in one hull. They are not vessels that you can consider as replacements for the LPD’s as they are like the Bays only built to merchant ship standards and are not front line ships.
My initial impression also.
We’re BMT tipped off?
Why did they suddenly produce this concept out of thin air at DSEi?
Don’t think so. As you know, BMT are fundamentally involved in the design of numerous vessel classes for many differing clients, including the FSS for us, of course. I gather Ellida was apparently a separate concept for navies without FSS type requirement. BMT are admittedly very clever, but the tweaking is still going to tax them pretty severely, I’d have thought. Ammunition has already been touched – how about HRAS, etc? At present, 1SL is still as upbeat as any RN boss I can recall, stating the next 5 years are going to see further significant operational changes within the… Read more »
I’m sure no-one would risk it. But it just seemed odd that everyone was expecting a big show of BMT/Navantia’s FSS concept at DSEi and there was comparatively little…but instead the Ellida concept turned up. Not complaining. In some respects Ellida makes more sense than LSS. But not at the expense of FSS… I’m a big fan of BMT’s work, their original Venator (not the 110) was a prescient design way ahead of its time, and the Venari looks like an ideal replacement for Hunt/Sandown. The RN really did, in hindsight, get FSC right. 3 classes of ships is what… Read more »
What is ‘FSC”?
Future Surface Combatant. Ended up being T26, RB2, and T31 rather than 3 types of same base design.
Or, as Paul says.
A vessel that’s jack of all trades and master of none….
All
Please read
https://www.rusi.org/publication/occasional-papers/requirements-uks-amphibious-forces-future-operating-environment
Thanks Lee. Lots to digest there.
Page 32 on of great interest.
Hi Daniele Yep, the whole chapter gives you an idea of the thinking going on behind the scenes. Future Commando Force is doing a lot of work behind the scenes with Fleet and STRATCOM to make sure that the new structure and offering they put together for defence is fully integrated – by that I mean can seamlessly operate from the tactical to the strategic within the wider MoD and NATO. Gen McGOWAN RM now the 3 star at STRATCOM said last week at RUSI – integration is the key, the example he used was RM orientated and he didn’t… Read more »
So Ellida is the ‘Black Swan sloop’ equivalent of an LPD?
All depends what tasks we are serious about doing. We’ve not been serious about sending and sustaining a large force over the beach for at least the last 15 years. Strike Brigades will need a port to disembark. So ships to put a raiding fore ashore to seize a port could be sufficient. They don’t have to be like for like Albion replacements. Amphibious command and control will come from the Carriers.
Unfortunately the carriers won’t have the stores to support an operation if FSS is cancelled…
That is exactly the thought I had when I was reading the piece. These relacements would never do as good a job of supplying a CSG as the FSS could.
That’s a valid point. What do we expect and what could we potentially need to do for the next few decades? The Falklands always comes up, and for good reason. However, we weren’t exactly landing battle tanks and heavy artillery last time. Air assault platforms and auxiliaries are arguably better suited than dedicated assault ships. It’s a similar case in the Middle East. China and the SCS are one big question. Lots of islands with heavy defences to overcome that an assault ship would be very useful for, but it would also be a big priority target. There’s even the… Read more »
Who cares about the SCS. The chances of an RN force being able to deploy there in time for any conflict are minimal. And quite frankly without FSS they wouldn’t be able to deploy for long anyway. When you’re talking about real defence needs for the UK you’re talking about CASD, ASW and the Northern Flank. Has anyone told the Norwegians that they’re not going to get re-inforced with a Marine Brigade in future?? Don’t get me wrong, the Norgies who are spectacularly minted need to pay the full 2%, and probably more. But they’re never going to have the… Read more »
Seriously, you believe a raiding party can seize a port? Possibly with no opposition, strategic and tactical surprise. All of those three must line up or that raising party will either quickly get overwhelmed or caught in prolonged house to house to fighting, allowing the oppositions reinforcements to arrive. You must have the option of landing on a beach away from a town/port to allow you to better control the area, thus allowing you to form a secure beach head. The days of massed invasion may be over, but the ability of landing heavy vehicles is still very much in… Read more »
The commandos made an few great port raids in France in WW2 crippling the western nazis only big dock to suport their fleet. Then the commandos got the hell outathere, well some did lots died and got captured and executed.
I think out of the 611 men who took part 170 were killed and another 215 captured which dose not include the air crews.
But they did destroy the dock and the Hitler sacked the chief of staff to OB west.
Yes, but the action was a raid. It wasn’t designed to hold the port. If we are talking about Operation Chariot the raid on St. Nazaire? Its primary mission was to jam the dry dock gate thus preventing its use by German capital ships. This is a completely different concept to taking a port then holding it so heavy equipment can be disembarked. For starters you will need a significantly stronger force, think more along the lines of Arnhem, where the small force had to hold out waiting for reinforcements. What I’m saying is that we should not get rid… Read more »
Well they need something to RAS the F35 engines because nothing can at the moment.
The Chinook can.
Don’t expect too many shiny new toys anytime soon folks, I’m sure we can all guess where the money is coming from to pay for the emergency economic measures. ? “It is currently trading at $1.15, a fall of almost 5% in just one day. It comes as financial markets tumbled again after major stimulus plans failed to quell fears about the economic impact of the virus. The Dow ended down 6.3%, while the S&P 500 fell 5.1% and the Nasdaq dropped 4.7%. Earlier the Dow and S&P 500 had plunged more than 7%, triggering an automatic temporary halt to… Read more »
Could argue the same for most of the european nations and indeed the US stimulus packages. What magical place are they all getting the cash from?!
Anyways good news in that China has no new internal cases today, gives other countries some hope and a time line for potential spread to stop. What happens next, all eyes on China!
Yeah china doesnt lie.
I have no doubts they have lied quite badly at the start of this world wide issue, especially throughout December when it was virtually unknown but I don’t think they would be that stupid to do it now. WHO and far too many other countries/scientists are watching how it pans out in the country. Iran, Russia and quite a few others however………
Are you saying the virus was man-made and released by accident?
The only thing that might help the economic situation, is that absolutely everyone is in exactly the same boat.
So the economy may temporarily tank, but it will tank along with everyone else and post the Corporal Jones “don’t panic” mentality, the entire world will be desperate to kick start and turbo charge trading again…
Expect to see international trade barriers come crashing down and global free trade like we have never seen….
Trump’s policy of US isolation will be left trailing in the dirt after this .
Plus we will likely do whatever is needed to have free trade with the EU, which might be unpalatable for some but after this crisis I think they will just have to get used to it.
Breaking News.
Bank of England cuts interest rates to 0.1%
The Bank of England has cut interest rates again in an emergency move as it tries to support the UK economy in the face of the coronavirus pandemic.
It is the second cut in interest rates in just over a week, bringing them down to 0.1% from 0.25%.
Interest rates are now at their lowest level in history.
The Bank said it would also increase its holdings of UK government bonds.
The first developed country to get heard immunity either through vaccine or infection rate will be the first to bounce back economically that where investment will go initially, those where their could be reinfection will continue to be weak economically. Ironically if its through infection rate that could be countries that have had the highest death tolls.
herd damn auto correct.
Vaccines?
Why pick on the UK, everyone’s economy is hit.
Spending on armaments in fact is an easy way to kick start the economy. Filling potholes as well. Giving vouchers to spend… say a free 50p on every £1.
Sort of on subject but what is the reasoning behind the historic seperation of the RN and RFA? Considering that these days the roles of the two seem to have become more intertwined, would it not make a case for combining the two? I am thinking in particular of the recent deployments of for example the Bay Class to the Caribbean performing essentially the same work as their RN counterparts. What are the advantages in retaining the the two commands and could savings be effected by combining them?
The saving is gained by not combining them.
RFAs like the Bays doing a job in the Gulf or WI are cheaper than having the RN do it.
Understood but most other Navies do not separate the two components so I am wodering why we do?
The reason for the seperation is historical. The RFA comes out of the old Vicualling and Transportation Board and the Ordnanace Board. The first was to supply food, stores and spares for the RN the second was to supply guns and munitions to the fleet. They were and the RFA still is a government orginisation (Act of Parliament), the RN is with the perogitive of the Monarch.
So thats the reason for the seperation it goes back to Henry VIII.
Thank you for that Ron. Like much of the history and structure of the UK, delightful anachronisms and age old traditions but I wonder(and merely pose the question) if maybe time to relook at that arrangement aling with the House of Lords!
regards from Durban
I wonder if the RFA get the same training and pay as RN. If they are merged, I worry it’ll be an excuse to lump the numbers together to make them sound bigger, allowing yet more cuts, or the shifting of numbers away from the more highly paid/trained crews.
I think the RFA can also have access to more ports, bith friendly and neutral, as they are seen as “Merchant” ships rather than “Warships”
Howrya doin Mark! Good point and one that had not occurred to me. Certainly the Bays have been well received in the Caribbean
That is a good point, the RFA can sometimes go where the RN would be seen as a military force.
Possibly the design for the MRSS could be based on the Karel Doorman/Johan de Witt concepts of the Dutch Navy. However if so they would need to find an extra five knots. I would keep the Albions possibly in the mother ship role for ROVs, autonomous mine sweepers etc.
Funnily enough, I mentioned the Karel Doorman concept in another thread some months back!
You can find out more about her via this thread. Timescales look reasonable too?
https://www.naval-technology.com/projects/karel-doorman-joint-logistic-support-ship/
Is that effectively a new take on an HMS Fearless concept
No. That was HMS Bulwark and Albion.
It is very negative discussion, I think. SSS never needs well-dock. It takes huge space, large door (with powerful hydro arm requiring huge maintenance load), and large pumps to fill/dry the dock. Huge wast of money (We know USN America-class LHA lost huge amount of aviation facility and internal storage, by adding a well-dock from hull-3). LPD-like hull shape will make the ship slower = needs larger engine = more cost and fuel to meet the speed required for CVTF supply. All in all, with the same amount of supply capability, ELLIDA-like ship will cost much much more (by nature).… Read more »
In my mailbox today, You may be aware that the Government reaffirmed its solid commitment to protecting and supporting the Armed Forces in the Queen’s Speech of 19 December 2019. The Government will maintain its commitment to spend at least 2% of GDP on Defence every year of this Parliament and increase the Defence budget by at least 0.5% above inflation year on year. An additional £2.2bn has been invested in Defence over 2019/2020. This additional Defence spend will ensure that our world-class Armed Forces can continue to modernise to face intensifying threats, prioritising key capabilities such as offensive cyber,… Read more »
Thanks Nigel.
Welcome!
Thanks, Quick question how did you get this update?
Hi Ron, like Daniele Mandelli you are most welcome.
Sadly I am unable to comment further, but hope you find this of some interest?
I like this concept, we need to move away from small numbers of very large single use vessels, however, the loss of the Albion’s would be a huge loss of capability. Therefore, how about we build a fleet of 8 Ellida, but in two different variants. 4 which have more space allocated to stores, fuel, munitions etc and tasked primarily with supporting carrier strike and larger task groups, but still retain a lower level of.multirole capability. The other 4 could be designed to operate more individually in the LSS, mothership and LSD roles but have a higher level of defensive… Read more »
??
SSS budget was 1B GBP. LSS budget was zero (ref. NAO report), and needs at least 400M GBP. Also, basically there are 3-13B GBP shortage in equipment budget, even though the “2% GDP”, “0.5% more” blah-blah is committed.
If it is 8 hulls with 1B GBP, it is 125M GBP per hull… What size of ship you are thinking of? At most, something a size of HMNZS Canterbury = a 8000t FLD “ferry” with 19knots top speed.
No Donald, I am not just talking about a like for like, but a change in fleet structure. I would like to see 2 or 3 variants of this base design built over the next 15-20 years to fill the FSSS role and also replace the Waves, bays, Albion’s and the forts. In fact 8 is not enough! These would be the workhorse of the fleet, all being multi role but with each variant having a different specialisation.
Thanks, T.S.-san But, Fort Rosaile and Fort Austin are to decommission by 2024, while LPD/LSDs will be there until 2035-40. If you replace two Forts with 2 Ellida-like, it is a huge drop in cargo supply capability, and until 2035-40 it will not be filled. If the capability can be gapped for another 15-20 years, do RN need it anyway? Good way to kill QNLZ/PoW actually. “Carrier without supply” is just a box. It is much better to disband them. SSS must be there. As the allocated 1B GBP was “not enough”, capability required for SSS can be relaxed to… Read more »
This 195m ELLIDA concept looks interesting. I think we need a stretched-out version though! As it may not fit all the requirements as it is.
Everyone’s panick buying so you would think the ships are doing their best business in decades.
Couldn’t agree more with this 9 x MRSS with similar capabilities to the dutch Karel Doorman type would be a game changer. Yes this will need tweaked for our requirements, but if we get it right its a game changer. You only have to look at the specs of the Karel doorman to see that what it offers is incredible. Add in S2S connectors, or Caimen 60’s and a munitions capability (potentially via hardened containers) and we can have a very good capability. These should be capable of holding 4 x Merlins or 2 Chinooks 8 x CB90’s or 2… Read more »
Pacman 27, I agree with your comments, possibly the MRSS could be based on either the Karel Doorman or the Johan de Witt class vessels with a speed of 22-25 knts. Nine of these to replace the Bays, Argus, LSS, FSS would be good, but how about a few more, operating as forward repair ships or a hospitality ship. Yeep crews need to relax, down time, and the locations where British troops work does not always give the possibility. Think about it for a second, in WW2 when the British Pacific Fleet was sent out they sent a hospitality ship… Read more »
that’s the beauty of the FLO Flo’s Ron order 15 Flo Flo’s at 100m each and then build the mega modules as needed. Think Defence has an article that is pretty enlightening. You need solid stores, put the SS module on. Hospital – no problem, Tanker – easy….. All you need is storage space to keep the modules and some bloody big cranes. they also help pay for themselves as there is an annual trade in moving ships around. perhaps this isn’t ideal – but like a lot of things it does offer a really good solution and almost takes… Read more »
When is a Fleet Solid Support Ship not a FSSS? When you cross it with an amphibious platform dock. The correct solution for the RN is to: Replace Albion, Bulway AND Ocean with 2 Canberra / MIstral type amphibious platform dock / helicopter assault ships. 2 such vessels would be cheaper and have more capacity than at present. Build the FSSS as originally thought of; without which the reach of the Carrier Groups will be very much restricted. Build 3 Littoral Support Ships to replace the Bay class and charge it to the foreign aid budget as that is what… Read more »
Bulwark – even..
The problem with this Rob, is that they sit tied up as they are niche capabilities and are then targets for the bean counters.
I believe we are better off having something we can use all the time, re role as necessary and get a volume and drumbeat that means when we do actually need a niche capability we can build it.
or we can do Flo Flo’s with mega modules and have it all when we need it
Unfortunately whilst it might seem attractive those same bean counters will reduce the number of your flexible vessels because they can undertake so many different roles. It will be another excuse to cut numbers and would prove totally counterproductive. I also fail to see the logic of investing in two super carriers that are ultimately used to effect events on land if you then reduce your amphibious lift to nothing more than a ferry service. Whilst technology certainly changes and new ship to shore systems are required the LPDs and LSD(A) we actually have are relatively modern and are bought… Read more »
Fair points all, I am certainly not advocating ditching stuff immediately every comment I make about shipbuilding is set in context of a 25 year timescale We need to always be thinking about what the fleet will look like in 25 years time, not today and making decisions based upon that. I suspect it would take a good 10-20 years to get through rebuilding the amphib/RFA fleet and FLO FLO’s are inexpensive hulls with the actual capability in the mega modules. We just build more modules than we need and if push comes to shove, we either buy some Flo… Read more »
Pacman27 your points are always well considered and my comments are certainly not aimed at your logic because they always seem sound. It is in the political context where based on experience potentially good ideas nearly always seem to be undone by the MOD.
Yup – it is sad and now it looks as if further cuts will be on their way. I hope the government dont cut jobs themselves in order to fund paying for private sector, but wouldn’t rule it out. It would be a good time to invest in highly skilled defence jobs in the UK, post Brexit/Corona and whilst I dont expect that to happen as, but we should remember that defence industrial sites are often located in the poorest parts of our nation (barrow, Glasgow, preston etc) and are the lifeblood of those areas. Either way we pay for… Read more »
I’m reasonably in favour of more vessels such as ellida & could sacrifice lss. They could do the role & replace Argus. Not sure about FSS as this seems more a specialist role & I didn’t think the Ellida design was design for large ammunition supply? Also as FSS is nothing to do with amphibious operations I’m a bit cynical this would be directly discussed with commandos!? I could understand and accept the optional 3rd going, but thought FSS was pretty integral to carrier operations & Ellida isn’t the answer. Getting rid of the Albion class would be absolutely foolish.… Read more »
The biggest issue regarding amphibious assault is our ship to shore connectors are too slow and this is recognised in RUSI before we start buying new vessels I’d rather us look at the replacement & possible argumentation of LCUs so all the new ships don’t get destroyed
“Amphibiosity” ?
Delay is the deadliest form of denial.
Is this the quality of bearing a likeness to a Frog?
The QE’s have unique replenishment requirements that are best met by one or preferably two specialist supply ships. It doesn’t make much sense to inflate the unit cost of a MRSS to add capabilities that most units will rarely, if ever, use. I wonder if there is any possibility that RFA Fort Victoria could cost effectively be given a life extension refit (adding HRAS?) to keep her going in to the 2030’s? Scrapping her sister ship, Fort George, after just 20 years service is still looking like a big mistake. The RN seems to have long regarded trying to replace… Read more »
From a quick skim through the RUSI paper, the authors are proposing this LSS for a small first-wave Commando landing, any larger reinforcement – they posit a Commando and possibly a light infantry battalion – would be by Albion and then, maybe, the Carrier strike group would pitch up. They do not appear to be proposing the replacement of Albion and Bulwark by LSS. It is only an idea – and a debatable one – of how the reduced Commando force might operate in the future. It would be a mistake to conflate the RM’s quest for a new, slimmed… Read more »
Totally agree about the RUSI paper and it is clear they are not suggesting the LSS replace anything but supplement what we already have. To me the very obvious mistakes and pointed out at the time was the scrapping of Fort George and selling Largs Bay. Very simply extending the life’s of Fort George and Fort Victoria would probably mean an order for only two FSSS would now be required. The four Bay class vessels with a proper hanger reinstated could provide a poor mans LSS. The Navy could then be looking at extending the lives of the two LPDs… Read more »
Would this design fit into replenishing the two super carriers? Can they deliver the same dry solid and liquid supplies? Do they fit into Staff requirments? What are staff requirments? How much would they cost to build per ton compared to a full FSSS? Is this just a BMT offering that the navy will have to accept even if it does not fulfill staff requirments? What happened to RCNC? Would a in house elite in house but can do commercial ( and do well because it has RN connection) RCNC be better value for the tax payer than BMT? These… Read more »
Time to poor a bucket of cold vomit on the idea, here is the well known and knowledgeable about ship building matters ‘Not a boffin’ comments about this on the Save the Royal Navy blog: “N-a-B This is the worst sort of good ideas club nonsense. Here’s a few facts to help the debate. 1. There is no capability requirement for LSS (ie rationale for its existence), let alone a detailed requirement (ie how many troops, helicopters, boats etc). It remains an NCHQ wet dream unsupported by any rigour. 2. The FSS requirement does exist, was derived from extensive studies… Read more »
☝?What he said