Royal Navy with F-8 Crusader instead of F-4 Phantom II

zen said:
Comparing the hidden stick, with the visible stick is not really apples with apples.

One preys on the mind by the possibility it is present but unseen.
The other preys on the mind by it's very visible presence.
Click to expand...

No 60s era SSN/SSGN had or could have anything other than token land attack capabilities, and even that would require virtually total offboard sensors for targeting. They were either big missiles like the regulus that required special boats to carry 2 missiles, or what small missiles that could be fired from the torpedo tubes. Either case is pitful compared to what the Hermes Harriers delivered on 1 May 1982, let alone what the Ark Royal could deliver a decade earlier.
 
Whilst the submarine force was a factor in the 1966 decision, in that the government made it very clear that something had to be cut from the RN's force structure and procurement plans, and the RN refused to budge on cutting procurement of either submarines, escorts, or carriers, and only the submarines made it out of the resulting defense review intact. That is only the most tangential of connections, and in fact the First Sea Lord of the time, and one of the advocates for the big carriers, was a submariner himself!

Further, on review of Edward Hampshire's The Royal Navy in the Cold War Years, it's pretty clear that submarines did not factor into questions on maritime strike and land attack. The choice, made by the RAF and not countered by the RN, was between RAF aircraft and RN carrier aircraft.
 
Let me be clear. If the UK had been a successful economic and industrial power in the 60s and 70s the choice between fixed wing carriers or SSNs would not have been necessary.
Unfortunately it was, both in 1966 and again in 1981. Healey and Nott both saw the SSN as the RN's essential capital ship.
I agree with them. But I accept it was not an ideal choice for the reasons you give.
It is significant that noone suggested abandoning the SSN force to pay for fixed wing carriers. Only in this Century have we seen that option implemented (HMS Triumph has only just retired).
 
uk 75 said:
Let me be clear. If the UK had been a successful economic and industrial power in the 60s and 70s the choice between fixed wing carriers or SSNs would not have been necessary.
Unfortunately it was, both in 1966 and again in 1981. Healey and Nott both saw the SSN as the RN's essential capital ship.
I agree with them. But I accept it was not an ideal choice for the reasons you give.
It is significant that noone suggested abandoning the SSN force to pay for fixed wing carriers. Only in this Century have we seen that option implemented (HMS Triumph has only just retired).
Click to expand...
I have seen no indications Healey saw the SSN as the RN's capital ship. Nott did - and Nott has been derided as not understanding the significance of surface warships and seems to have been hostile to the RN in general, given he tried to cut Trident of all things.
 
uk 75 said:
If the UK had been a successful economic and industrial power in the 60s and 70s the choice between fixed wing carriers or SSNs would not have been necessary.
Click to expand...

This is partly true, but I think that even if the UK was in a somewhat better economic (or fleet management/procurement) position and Labour came to power in Oct 1964 they'd still have an ideological aversion to the Conservative's defence policy and want to change it. After all the Defence budget increased every year from 1964 to 1968, went down in 1969 but then back up to higher than 1968 levels in 1970. Or looked at another way the Defence budget plateaued 1967-70 at about 2.7 billion pounds, considerably higher than the 2.27 billion the Conservatives spent in 1964.
 
Scott Kenny said:
Polaris eating the construction budget.
Click to expand...

I saw years ago, and haven't seen it since, that Polaris was funded by tri service 'strategic' vote. I recall it was in the context of RN having to pay for Trident from its own budget. If that's the case then Polaris impact on the RNs budget in particular wasn't overly bad.
 
Rule of cool said:
This is partly true, but I think that even if the UK was in a somewhat better economic (or fleet management/procurement) position and Labour came to power in Oct 1964 they'd still have an ideological aversion to the Conservative's defence policy and want to change it. After all the Defence budget increased every year from 1964 to 1968, went down in 1969 but then back up to higher than 1968 levels in 1970. Or looked at another way the Defence budget plateaued 1967-70 at about 2.7 billion pounds, considerably higher than the 2.27 billion the Conservatives spent in 1964.
Click to expand...
Is that allowing for inflation? IIRC (1) in the 1966 Defence White Paper the Wilson Government wanted to reduce defence expenditure from £2.4B at 196-I've forgotten prices to £2.0B at 196-I've forgotten prices. The sum of HM Forces with strike carriers was more than £2.0B at 196-I've forgotten prices and the sum for HM Forces without strike carriers & land based aircraft doing their jobs was less than £2.0B at you get the picture.

IIRC (2) British defence spending in the middle 1950s was about 10% of GNP, the Sandy's Review reduced it about 7% of GNP, the 1967 & 1968 cuts reduced it to 5.5% of GNP and the Mason Defence Review of 1974-75 reduced it to 5% of GNP which is what the Thatcher Government inherited.
 
NOMISYRRUC said:
Is that allowing for inflation? IIRC (1) in the 1966 Defence White Paper the Wilson Government wanted to reduce defence expenditure from £2.4B at 196-I've forgotten prices to £2.0B at 196-I've forgotten prices. The sum of HM Forces with strike carriers was more than £2.0B at 196-I've forgotten prices and the sum for HM Forces without strike carriers & land based aircraft doing their jobs was less than £2.0B at you get the picture.

IIRC (2) British defence spending in the middle 1950s was about 10% of GNP, the Sandy's Review reduced it about 7% of GNP, the 1967 & 1968 cuts reduced it to 5.5% of GNP and the Mason Defence Review of 1974-75 reduced it to 5% of GNP which is what the Thatcher Government inherited.
Click to expand...

The key thing there is ".....the Wilson Government wanted to....". This is the Wilson government that if some 900 votes in 8 seats had changed wouldn't have won the 1964 election.

Also due to their compulsive tendency to make bad short-term decisions to deal with immediate budget problems the British never got good value for money for what it did spend.
 
Rule of cool said:
This is partly true, but I think that even if the UK was in a somewhat better economic (or fleet management/procurement) position and Labour came to power in Oct 1964 they'd still have an ideological aversion to the Conservative's defence policy and want to change it. After all the Defence budget increased every year from 1964 to 1968, went down in 1969 but then back up to higher than 1968 levels in 1970. Or looked at another way the Defence budget plateaued 1967-70 at about 2.7 billion pounds, considerably higher than the 2.27 billion the Conservatives spent in 1964.
Click to expand...
I put the spending at 1970 prices into a bar chart.​

UK Defence Spending 1948-79 from Carver at 1970 Prices.png

Defence expenditure increased from 1964 to 1968 (from about £2.6B to about £2.8B).
Then it fell in 1970 to about £2.45B (about £150M less than what was spent in 1964).
And didn't return to 1968 levels until 1975 & 1976 (about £2.8B & about £2.9B).​
 
Rule of cool said:
This is partly true, but I think that even if the UK was in a somewhat better economic (or fleet management/procurement) position and Labour came to power in Oct 1964 they'd still have an ideological aversion to the Conservative's defence policy and want to change it. After all the Defence budget increased every year from 1964 to 1968, went down in 1969 but then back up to higher than 1968 levels in 1970. Or looked at another way the Defence budget plateaued 1967-70 at about 2.7 billion pounds, considerably higher than the 2.27 billion the Conservatives spent in 1964.
Click to expand...
Here's the same data as a percentage of defence spending in 1948.

UK Defence Spending 1948-79 from Carver at 1970 Prices at Percentage of 1948.png

It shows a similar pattern.
1964 was 150% of 1948.
The peak was 1967 when it was 163% of 1948.
The trough was 1969 when it was 140% of 1948.
And it returned to 1967 levels in the middle 1970s.
That is.
158% of 1948 in 1974.
161% of 1948 in 1975.
And.
166% of 1948 in 1976.​
 
Rule of cool said:
This is partly true, but I think that even if the UK was in a somewhat better economic (or fleet management/procurement) position and Labour came to power in Oct 1964 they'd still have an ideological aversion to the Conservative's defence policy and want to change it. After all the Defence budget increased every year from 1964 to 1968, went down in 1969 but then back up to higher than 1968 levels in 1970. Or looked at another way the Defence budget plateaued 1967-70 at about 2.7 billion pounds, considerably higher than the 2.27 billion the Conservatives spent in 1964.
Click to expand...
I put the spending as a percentage of GDP into a chart too.

UK Defence Spending 1948-79 from Carver as a Percentage of GDP.png

It started at 7.1% in 1948.
It fell to 6.5% in 1949 when the British Austerity Era became more austere.
Climbed to 9.8% in 1952 which was the height of the 1951 Rearmament Programme.
Fell to 7.8% in 1956 - the year before the Sandys Defence Review.
Fell again to 5.9% in 1964 when the First Wilson Government came to power.
Was 5.8-to-5.9% for the three years 1965-67.
In 1967 the Government decided to withdraw from "East of Suez" by 1975.
Which was soon brought forward to the end of 1971.
It was 4.7-to-4.9% for the nine years 1969-77.
And 4.6% in 1978.
The table didn't have a figure for 1979.​
 
This comes from the website UK Public spending. These are raw numbers, not adjusted for inflation or anything, and it shows that the UK governments of both stripes found the money to spend more and more on stuff. While defence spending did grow spending on other stuff grew much more, indicating that Defence was getting less and less of a larger and larger spending pie.

Red is Defence, blue is the rest of Government expenditure.

1734562603875.png
 
Rule of cool said:
This is partly true, but I think that even if the UK was in a somewhat better economic (or fleet management/procurement) position and Labour came to power in Oct 1964 they'd still have an ideological aversion to the Conservative's defence policy and want to change it. After all the Defence budget increased every year from 1964 to 1968, went down in 1969 but then back up to higher than 1968 levels in 1970. Or looked at another way the Defence budget plateaued 1967-70 at about 2.7 billion pounds, considerably higher than the 2.27 billion the Conservatives spent in 1964.
Click to expand...
I used the data from the table in Post 290 to make a guesstimate of British GDP 1948-78 at 1970 Prices.
This was the result.

UK Defence Spending 1948-79 from Carver - Estimated GDP at 1970 prices.png

The average growth rate was 3.1%.
Although there were some anomalies.
E.g. 10.30% 1948-to-49, 9.50% 1954-to-55, 7.06% 1963-to-64 and 5.76% 1972-to-73.

EDIT.
3% Compound Interest doubles in about 24 years.
In the Bar Chart GDP doubled from £24,465 million in 1948 to £48,805 million in 1968 - 20 years later.
It was £60,174 million in 1978 which was about 2½ times 1948 - 30 years later.​
 
Last edited:
Part of Post 295.
Rule of cool said:
While defence spending did grow spending on other stuff grew much more, indicating that Defence was getting less and less of a larger and larger spending pie.
Click to expand...
I believe "No shit Sherlock!" is the correct expression. It would also indicate that there were more votes in spending much more on "other stuff" than there were in spending much more on Defence. To which I believe "No shit Sherlock!" is also the correct expression.
 
NOMISYRRUC said:
Part of Post 295.

I believe "No shit Sherlock!" is the correct expression. It would also indicate that there were more votes in spending much more on "other stuff" than there were in spending much more on Defence. To which I believe "No shit Sherlock!" is also the correct expression.
Click to expand...

No doubt there were more votes in hospitals etc than bombs, but the constant refrain is that Britain was broke, couldn't afford things etc. The fact or the matter is that Britain did have the money and could have made different decisions. What's more the amounts of money aren't that vast, in 1963 CVA01 was expected to cost 60 million pounds over 8 years, 7.5m per year in a budget of 2.4-2.8 billion.

Perhaps if the SGHWR power plant was selected instead of the AGR the money wasted building dodgy nuclear power plants could have instead gone to CVA01.
 
Rule of cool said:
No doubt there were more votes in hospitals etc than bombs, but the constant refrain is that Britain was broke, couldn't afford things etc. The fact or the matter is that Britain did have the money and could have made different decisions. What's more the amounts of money aren't that vast, in 1963 CVA01 was expected to cost 60 million pounds over 8 years, 7.5m per year in a budget of 2.4-2.8 billion.
Click to expand...
Fair enough, no offence was meant and I broadly agree with you.

Plus, you, David Hobbs and I suspect that the building & operating costs of 3 CVA.01s was less than double the equivalent costs of 3 Invincibles & the RAF's TASMO force. E.g. the money spent on Nimrod AEW.3 would have paid for Ark Royal (V)* 4½-times over (about £1 billion v £220 million).

Furthermore, I've argued that more defence spending between the World Wars wouldn't have broken the Bank of England, but that's in a "No Geddes Axe" timeline, because he cut taxes as well as cutting spending and in my timelines the extra spending is paid for by extra taxation.

However, we don't know how far CVA.01 would have gone over time and budget or whether the increase in the cost would have been more or less than the Retail Price Index.
Rule of cool said:
Perhaps if the SGHWR power plant was selected instead of the AGR the money wasted building dodgy nuclear power plants could have instead gone to CVA01.
Click to expand...
I say spent rather than wasted because they were (eventually) made to work and it's par for the course for advanced technology projects to take longer than expected to come to fruition and cost to more than expected.

The prototype Spitfire flew later than expected, the first production aircraft was delivered later than expected and the last aircraft from the first contract (for 310 aircraft) was delivered about 6 months late. I wouldn't be surprised to lean that the R&D cost was more than expected, the production cost was more than expected and that when it did enter service the Spitfire had more than its fair share of teething problems. Was the Spitfire a waste of money?

Would the TTL SGHWR reactor programme have been managed any better than the OTL AGR programme? I don't know for sure, but I'm not hopeful.

If SGHWR was cheaper than AGR the money saved could have been spent on some CVA.01s. Unfortunately, I suspect that 3 strike carriers (instead of 3 through deck cruisers) would have been several lines down the list of HMG's priorities, behind motorway extensions in marginal constituencies, bypasses in marginal constituencies and bigger pay rises for public sector workers (except members of the armed forces).

Footnote: *Ark Royal (V) was the third Invincible, which was built 1978-85 and roughly corresponds to the Nimrod AEW programme (1977-86).
 
Last edited:
I think it is important to remember how poor the living standards of ordinary Brits were both in the inter war and post war years. My father who grew up in Huddersfield and began his architecture studies before enlisting in the Royal Engineers was shocked by how good housing was in Belgium, Holland and Germany compared with Britain.
Both wars also revealed the poor health of many ordinary men. So popular votes for housing and health were justfied.
Once India and Pakistan became independent the rationale for East of Suez and colonial rule elsewhere dissolved.
Korea tends to be forgotten but it was a nasty war which left scars in Britain.
There was little appetite for "guns not butter". Once W Germany and Japan overtook the UK in prosperity the case for high defence spending became even weaker.
Wilson kept Britain out of the Vietnam war, which again was in accord with popular sentiment. Less popular was the blockade against Rhodesia.
 
NOMISYRRUC said:
Would the TTL SGHWR reactor programme have been managed any better than the OTL AGR programme? I don't know for sure, but I'm not hopeful.
Click to expand...

Hard to say, but the prototype SGHWR was the only reactor in the period to be built on time and on budget. Whats more the selection of the AGR was a long shot by a consortium that was about to go under and technically flawed, its rejection would mean Britain would be down to 2 consortia capable of building nuclear reactors which is halfway to the ideal of having a single consortia.

The reason I bring up the reactors is because they're one of the things that put pressure on the budget that meant cuts needed to be made across the board to balance the books, more or less.
 
uk 75 said:
I think it is important to remember how poor the living standards of ordinary Brits were both in the inter war and post war years. My father who grew up in Huddersfield and began his architecture studies before enlisting in the Royal Engineers was shocked by how good housing was in Belgium, Holland and Germany compared with Britain.
Both wars also revealed the poor health of many ordinary men. So popular votes for housing and health were justfied.
Once India and Pakistan became independent the rationale for East of Suez and colonial rule elsewhere dissolved.
Korea tends to be forgotten but it was a nasty war which left scars in Britain.
There was little appetite for "guns not butter". Once W Germany and Japan overtook the UK in prosperity the case for high defence spending became even weaker.
Wilson kept Britain out of the Vietnam war, which again was in accord with popular sentiment. Less popular was the blockade against Rhodesia.
Click to expand...

I have no problem with butter not guns, I have made extensive use of the welfare state and universal healthcare over my life and don't want that imperiled by unnecessary military spending. My interest in this topic these days is not 'paper' planes etc but actual aircraft/ship/AFV programmes and their success/failure, with success being measured the biggest payoff for the taxpayer. This payoff comes in many ways; the greatest amount of deterrence and defence of national interest, generating export earnings and foreign influence with exports, creating high-value jobs and fostering advanced industries from the necessary evil of military spending are a few.

As a result some 'tail wagging the dog', where they make or buy something that is less than ideal on a strictly technical or capability standpoint, may be required in order to satisfy 'whole of government' needs.
 
In fairness to Whitehall the transition from global empire in 1945 to European regional power in 1985 was something only shared with France.
Both countries had to make hard choices.
 
uk 75 said:
In fairness to Whitehall the transition from global empire in 1945 to European regional power in 1985 was something only shared with France.
Both countries had to make hard choices.
Click to expand...

Yes, but they come at the problem from different angles. France's decline happened all at one during the war and she struggled to reclaim her place as a great (but not super) power in the decades that followed from almost a standing start. Britain's decline happened over a few decades from the position of a semi-superpower, this was a difficult process, full of minor humiliations and back-downs.
 
F-8 was practically a match made in heaven for RN carriers except for overall length. Spey powered, which coupled to Spey-Phantoms simplified motor logistics. It had generous range and five durable hardpoints. Dual role. Was possible to remove the guns from F-8s to lower launch weight.

Could have hung British missiles off of them. One unusual feature of the four-Sidewinder installation is that none of the missiles are mounted at the same angle in order to clear its partner on the Y-mount as well as the in-flight refueling probe on upper left side and the ram-air turbine on the lower right. So the missiles would have to have been slightly mounted assymetrically.
 
Rule of cool said:
Yes, but they come at the problem from different angles. France's decline happened all at one during the war and she struggled to reclaim her place as a great (but not super) power in the decades that followed from almost a standing start. Britain's decline happened over a few decades from the position of a semi-superpower, this was a difficult process, full of minor humiliations and back-downs.
Click to expand...
Plus France was helped by having the "Glorious 30 Years" of economic growth (1945-75). On the other hand France had its share of humiliations and back-downs too. E.g. Vietnam and Algeria.
 
Yet France developed the Mirage family and backed it to the hilt precisely when Britain did the opposite with it's equivalent combat aircraft.
 
interestingly the French, who supported their own industry to the hilt, found themselves in the same position as the RN at about the same time. The need for a carrier fighter fleet that was too small to make it worthwhile to develop and build themselves. The RN tried the joint P1154 path before going with the F4, while the French abandoned their home grown efforts in favour of the F8.
 
MadRat said:
F-8 was practically a match made in heaven for RN carriers except for overall length. Spey powered, which coupled to Spey-Phantoms simplified motor logistics. It had generous range and five durable hardpoints. Dual role. Was possible to remove the guns from F-8s to lower launch weight.

Could have hung British missiles off of them. One unusual feature of the four-Sidewinder installation is that none of the missiles are mounted at the same angle in order to clear its partner on the Y-mount as well as the in-flight refueling probe on upper left side and the ram-air turbine on the lower right. So the missiles would have to have been slightly mounted assymetrically.
Click to expand...
I wouldn't want to remove the gun's even if lowers the weight.
Guns are useful.
Speaking I wonder how weight and space would one or two 30 mm Aden's take up in lieu of the 4 20 mm cannons ?
 
GK Dundas said:
I wouldn't want to remove the gun's even if lowers the weight.
Guns are useful.
Speaking I wonder how weight and space would one or two 30 mm Aden's take up in lieu of the 4 20 mm cannons ?
Click to expand...
An Aden with 200rds is 196kg, while a Mk12 is 46kg. Assuming the cannon rounds at 500g each, that makes an Aden some 50kg heavier than a Mk12 20mm.

I don't think you'd really save any weight going to a pair of Adens versus 4x Mk12s.
 
MadRat said:
F-8 was practically a match made in heaven for RN carriers except for overall length.
Click to expand...
54' 6" for the F-8E. The TF-8A was the same length, which required deleting the forward ammo magazines and the two upper 20mm cannons (the lower guns originally fed from the forward magazine, the aft magazine feed chutes were altered to feed the lower guns).

57' 7" for the Phantom FG.1.

63' 5" for the HS Buccaneer S.2.

Note that the Phantom and the Bucc fit in the 54' long lifts of Eagle & Ark Royal (both aircraft) and Victorious* & Hermes (Bucc only) just fine - thanks to a folding radome (both aircraft) and the split airbrake tail (Bucc).

The F-8 could simply have a folding radome and all would be well.


* Victorious' aft lift was 54' long while her fore lift was 58' long.
 
Last edited:
bobtdwarf said:
Scott Kenny said:
An Aden with 200rds is 196kg, while a Mk12 is 46kg. Assuming the cannon rounds at 500g each, that makes an Aden some 50kg heavier than a Mk12 20mm.

I don't think you'd really save any weight going to a pair of Adens versus 4x Mk12s.
Click to expand...
you wouldn't but you would gain a whole lot of reliability
Click to expand...

Only if the ammo belt feed chute runs were altered - the Crusader's "gun problem" was actually the belts jamming in their feed chutes during high-G maneuvers.


Armament System.jpg

F8U-1 Cross section gun and ammo crop.jpg
 

Similar threads

Please donate to support the forum.

Back
Top Bottom