In October 2018, the British Government began negotiations with Boeing and the Royal Australian Air Force regarding the potential replacement of its E-3D fleet with the E-7 Wedgetail.
A $1.98 billion deal was signed in March 2019 by then Defence Secretary Gavin Williamson, confirming the purchase of five E-7 Wedgetails, which would be designated as Wedgetail AEW1.
However, recent developments reveal that the UK must fulfill payment for all five RADAR systems, even though its order has been reduced from five to three aircraft.
The March 2021 Defence Command Paper, titled ‘Defence in a Competitive Age,’ stated that the UK’s order would be scaled down to three aircraft. This reduction could frequently result in the availability of only one aircraft for operational tasking.
What is the aircraft for?
The E-7 Wedgetail is an advanced airborne early warning and control (AEW&C) aircraft designed to provide comprehensive situational awareness and command and control capabilities.
Equipped with a powerful Multi-Role Electronically Scanned Array (MESA) radar system, the aircraft is capable of detecting, identifying, and tracking potential threats both in the air and on the ground over long distances.
It plays a crucial role in supporting military operations by coordinating and directing assets, such as fighter jets and ground forces, while also serving as an information hub for decision-makers in rapidly evolving situations.
Three aircraft, five radars
A recent Parliamentary Written Question has disclosed that the UK remains contractually obligated to pay for all five MESA radars that were initially ordered for the E-7 Wedgetail programme.
Mark Francois, MP for Rayleigh and Wickford, raised a question regarding the matter, inquiring, “To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, whether his Department is contractually obliged to pay for all five MESA radars originally ordered for the UK E-7 Wedgetail programme.”
James Cartlidge, The Minister of State, Ministry of Defence, responded to Francois’ query, providing an explanation: “At the time of the Integrated Review decision to reduce the scope of the UK E-7 Wedgetail programme from five to three aircraft, the MESA (Multi-Role Electronically Scanned Array) radars for aircraft four and five were in production. It was decided that production and delivery of all five MESA radars would continue as planned, allowing a saving/offset of initial procurement and sustainment spares from the overall programme cost.”
Not all bad
As you have read above, Cartlidge provided a perspective on why this payment for five RADAR systems could be a good thing.
According to his reply, continuing the production and delivery of all five MESA (Multi-Role Electronically Scanned Array) radars as planned allows for a saving/offset of initial procurement and sustainment spares from the overall programme cost.
This implies that the UK could potentially benefit from cost savings in the long run, despite the initial financial obligation for the extra RADAR systems, especially if the RAF is hoping for more E-7 Wedgetail early warning aircraft.
At a recent meeting of the Defence Committee, Air Chief Marshal Wigston was discussing the number of E-7 Wedgetail aircraft. Initially, analysis had identified a need for five airframes, but only three were purchased as a result of the Integrated Review.
The Air Chief Marshal stood by the decision to purchase three of the type but stated that the aspiration for the future fleet is five aircraft, you can read more about that here.
What is the betting that the radars are the most expensive part of the system?
You can see why the RAF is hopeing to be able to grow the fleet to 5 in the future, which will undoubtedly cost more than building them now… Another bean counter short term waste of money. Irritating to say the least.
Cheers CR
Looks like the NATO AWACS replacement will also be a Wedgetail. They will need somewhere to do the conversions etc…A country that has experience of doing the conversions and actual facilities…I wonder what is top of the list?
The US….
Can’t we just sell the radars to another country that is buying wedgetail.
ITAR restrictions… The free trade con the US Uses.
Can always sell back to US (or do ITAR restrictions also work in reverse?).
US are also now in the queue for radars. NATO has left their run a little late. If they were sold now, UK would go to the back of what is looking like a fairly long queue, if 5 is still the long term target. Best to hang onto them for a few years yet & try hard to find a couple of “too good to pass up” 2nd hand airframes.
They will be specific to the requirements of that other country. They may also have specific UK technologies in them that we don’t want to share. I wonder why we couldn’t have a credit on account for the future though
Australia actually – Australia developed the platform and persevered through all of the early teething problems – The RAAF know the systems capabilities inside and out and are best placed to train other operators – Final four of the RAAFs fleet of six were assembled in Australia – The RAAF is the largest operator of the E7 and has the most experience flying it including combat operations over the Middle East – Australia has the facilities for maintenance and flight testing of the system – NATO has stated it is looking to extend its influence to the Pacific (recent examples… Read more »
My point is in the NATO theater… Well aware that the RAAF brought it into service and developed it. However can you see Nato Command sending 737s down under for conversion?. Nope it’s going to be done in the northern hemisphere.
Not being flippant but I am 6 hours into an all you can eat and drink brunch and I’m surprised I can still type!
God save Gunbuster!
There is nothing more expensive than HM Treasury “saving” money.
So true 😂
If we have to pay for five then we should have them. If the case of only one out of three aircraft are only going to be available to fly at any one time. We should definitely have five. What we have as a government at the moment is a cheapskate government who have had nothing but peace and security all their lives and think that it will remain infinitum. They are wrong and history proves that. They need to wake up and build are armed forces to a strength that can not only defend this nation but at the… Read more »
Seriously, what a bunch of absolute silly buggers. For crikeys sake someone order another two aircraft and get it sorted. Maybe a few more P-8s too. 🤷♂️
Yes just get two more air frames. Bloody nuts. 😎
Hope the two spare sets are at least covered with dust sheets and not left out in the rain somewhere… Lol 😁
I think they are currently in discussions with the view of adding two tarpaulins and the rolling rent on a north London council garage to the contract…
👍
The issue there was that RN had a £6Bn budget to buy T45 as part of Horizon. Then they went their own way as they wanted to use SAMPSON. So that cut the program from 12 -> 8 It would have been possible to order 7 & 8 but they were sacrificed for a promise to expedite Global Combat Ship…..T26. But that would have met cutting something else. That was the conversation. I’m not sure that we really needed 8 never mind 12 T45 AAW ships. What for? Unless you are going to use very expensive big ships for GP… Read more »
So at one point the UK had zero AAW ships, all were in refit. Sending patrol boats to do the job of warships ad we do now puts the crews at risk. The navy is for fighting wars not peacetime. The UK does not have sufficient warships we have forgotten the lessons of the Falklands.
Also the UK went its own way because Horizon was a complete mess caused the the French not wanting to retire their Suffrens whilst the T42s were ancient.
Horizon project built 4 (?) ships IRL.
T45 is a six ship class.
I agree T42 was falling apart and needed very urgent replacement.
Exactly, More type 26 not type 45 needed then the Tory’s and libs delayed T26.
“ I’m not sure that we really needed 8 never mind 12 T45 AAW ships. What for?”
8 would be useful in a conflict to cover potential losses. 8 allows us to contribute AAW support to other NATO countries.
When up against China/Russia (hopefully will never happen) high end AAW cover by T45 will be invaluable and we will wish we had more.
Italy and France have Horizon.
The Dutch have their own flavour.
The Danes have their full fat T31 parent.
UK T45
That is a lot of AAW combined with the huge USN fleet.
As I’ve said a few times the effect of putting containerised CAMM-ER onto all the RFA and other platforms in a CSG (even remote fired) would be far greater than building a couple more T45’s (not that you could now).
There is also what can be remote fired from T26’s VLS or T31’s (hopefully VLS).
You’re under-selling your point a bit on current AAW capability in West European navies. Spain has 5x Álvaro de Bazán-class with SPY-1 and 48-cell Mk41, second to the UK in number of AAW destroyers, Germany has 3x Sachsen-class albeit with just 32-cell Mk41 but they do have the L-band radar.
Good point.
That said I don’t think the Spanish and German editions are first rate AAW systems.
I suppose it depends on the definition of first rate, but not sure why you have that perspective? Sachsen has similar radar suite to De Zeven Provinciën-class and is in a program to upgrade the L-band radar, so apparently paralleling the Dutch in improvements. The Álvaro de Bazán-class has AEGIS and SPY-1 as a base. Granted the Spanish may not have continuously upgraded over the lifetime but it certainly started life as an AB-class capability.
The issues with German kit and spending patterns are well known. It may have 32 VLS but are there any missiles and if there are what is their status?
Things have moved on a long way from in AAW and the Spanish haven’t fully upgraded their kit. Now there is a bit more urgency things might change!
My concern with any conflict with China in the SCS is that they can throw more aircraft and AShMs at our Type 45s (acting as AAW protection for the carriers) than we have missiles to defend. Even if we had a 100% hit rate, they can easily loose that many and still come at us with even more – then what? Hopefully this would be somewhat rectified with the additional 24 CAMMs but that doesn’t start fitting until 2026!
With China, it’s going to be a numbers game and right now they have way more than have!
A fully functional T42 undertook which tasks?
A T45… should… be able to go into harm’s way (no operational sonar crew) and give good account of herself. We need 12.
Adding a hull mount sonar to T45 is perfectly possible as the compartments and arrangements are already there.
However, not the bods, more’s the pity.
It depends how the training pipelines have been altered?
I think ASW is seen as a priority now.
Can sonar not be done mostly by a computer now? Finding frequencies, types of noises etc. Then if something really needs attention it could be passed to a human.
Thing is that ASW isn’t that simple and is part art part science.
Sure you can do really complex filtering and get incredible passive results but what is next in the game? Launch Merlin? Drop sonar buoys where? What are we trying to achieve: detect or protect?
The high skill human is still needed.
T45 already has a capable hull mount sonar.
Really?
It has a hull mounted sonar: not a terribly good one.
Or do you mean that it has been upgraded?
I was simply correcting your previous statement that it didn’t have a sonar. It has a capable sonar, so let’s leave it at that. There is a lot more to ASW than the sensor and the T45’s primary mission is above water, not below.
I find you comment puzzling in the extreme and actually quite a logical void. You state that ‘there is more to ASW than the sensor’ – true enough. But if the sensor can’t detect the submarine then no amount of tactics, training and synthesis can help you. You can make the same comment about AAW – but in the end it is the whole system that counts. The fact remains that T45’s original fitted sonar wasn’t great. I’ve made the point on here that upgrading it isn’t a terribly big deal as the dome opening and inner watertight compartment are… Read more »
The stupidity of the in year financial balance of government departments knows no end. The need to balance budgets in year costs the taxpayer so much money in the end as well as reduced what is financially delivered due to lost efficiency.
Now this is bullshit, unless it proves a escuse to buy more wedgetails
well this could prove to be the silver lining. Of all the bad moves (A400M/C130 cut, Typhoon retirement, etc) this is the most widely criticised and there is hope of it being reversed in June esp if we’re already buying the radars.
Be cheaper to build new Shackleton’s. This is like April Fools Day on a constant loop.
would it be to late just to go ahead with 5 if it is at least there are a couple of spare radars, but knowing our bean counters they will sell them at a stupid low cost..and then want praise for it..
Classic MOD mess… but 3 is simply not enough to provide a nation wide AEW/AWACS capability, as soon as one is undergoing maintenance you’re at an absolute minimum. That neglects the chance of one being shot down or damaged and gives zero capability to provide aircraft as part of expeditionary forces. If they’re building the radars they should just build/buy the other two airframes.
How many of the Boeing AWWACS did we have originally? Cuts cuts cuts.
7 Sentry AWACS instead of this ill fated project – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Aerospace_Nimrod_AEW3
Hopefully the other 2 will be ordered eventually. As for the radar, I’d rather have them than not anyway, so I don’t see the problem here.
Hopefully. Also is it just the the radar panels or the full suite with housing? Does it include the wiring, computers and all the other bits.
The next question should be how much more bits are needed including the airframes?
Do you think, just because we’re paying for two extra, we’ll actually get two extra? They’ll need storage and monitoring and maintenance, and that costs money over and above buying them. What’s the betting there’s an argument being made for paying for them but not actually accepting them? The madness of financial-based decision making should not be underestimated.
Surely if we had signed a contract for 5 radar suites we might as well just get 5 aircraft surely? Makes an absolute mockery of reducing the number to 3 to “save money”.
Just madness. Put the order back upto 5 aircraft.
2 more E-7 is much much more important than any of T32.
👍
The type 32 are never getting built, there’s no money in any future budget
A better utility than T32, would be a mothership of about 20Kt with a welldeck to launch LXUUV’s of 100’s tons.
Defensive aids fitted on ship.
Well, “silly buggers” might be one approach but I see some potential for optimism in this sort of news. Obviously I’m sure the details are radically different but it does remind me a bit of how PoW was saved from getting cancelled when it was discovered that it would cost the government more to cancel her than to complete her. Just maybe this increases the chances of the Wedgetail numbers going back up to 5 if a big cost component of the extra 2 aircraft has already been incurred. I do sometimes wonder whether a government with a good and… Read more »
With T45 the budget envelope was fixed at about £6Bn. It was never cut. However all of the R&D and design costs and BAE’s inefficient build costs fell to RN one they had left Horizon.
Agree, RAF is beginning to use a page from RN’s playbook, once the camel’s nose is w/in the tent, the body follows in due course. Cannot predict the year, but the other two airframes will be funded. Virtually guaranteed. Eventually…🤔😉
If we learned one thing from the illegal aggression of the kremlin in the democratic nation of Ukraine, it is that situational awareness is key to victory and freedom.
More Wedgetails and continued NATO collaboration with RC135 Rivet Joint is a no brainer. Let’s hope that the RAF have learned from the RN how to deal with HM Treasury.
God save the King!
Using the further two for spares could be of rather limited value, considering how often these systems need updating? Better to have them installed in two additional airframes under current circumstances maybe.
Just duct tape them to a Ryanair flight. After this blunder, I would be surprised if the raf will be able to afford the tape. Lol
Just duct tape them to a Ryanair flight. After this blunder, I would be surprised if the mod will be able to afford the tape. Lol
The most expensive part of the system is paid. Now, buy some second hand platforms and get them fitted out and into operation.
If we are getting five radars we should drll 2 back to the US as they have also selected tgis system. Alternatively we should just get on with getting two extra planes. Having five radars and three planes sounds like a much use as a chocolate teapot…
If we have already got the most expensive bit it makes little sense not to push on with the five planes…
Used BBJ variant 737’s are about 10 million USD. The line is already set up for the conversion in the UK. The radars are bought. Really getting taken for a ride here if this is the ‘best’ solution.
Those three airframes, will be really worked hard, and the MoD will have to replace them earlier than expected!
Yet another brilliant UK project managed as always with total ineptitude followed by excuses as to why they didn’t really b..ls it up.
👍
Three Wedgetail, three Airseeker, and nine Poseidon. No doubt ASW is important and P-8 also brings other ISR capabilities with, but this is a very barebones AEW capability to be working with.
I notice you omit to name the party that reducednthe 12 to 8. These decisions are made by civil servants not MPs
RN did actually.
RN had been given a budget for 12 x Horizon that was eaten by going solo and having all the R&D costs as well as SAMPSON.
So no: the budget was never actually cut.
RN did have the ability to sacrifice other things for hulls 7&8 but chose not to do so. They did still have a bit in the T45 pot but not enough to fund both.
The funds were then moved to accelerate (ha, ha) what became T26.
3 Aircraft provide bare minimum, below minimum coverage, with nothing for breakdowns or losses. These are masive enablers, command & control assets we’re demented to neglet. So please provide aircraft for all 5 radars before it’s too late.
So conversely, if we lose one, we lose far more capability. Ergo, we should have more to enable the AAW, rather than starting with or below the bare minimum.
Only in the UK,