A fleet of Royal Navy support ships is being built with foreign steel in another blow to Britain’s battered industry, we can reveal.
A £452million contract for four refuelling tankers was handed to South Korea-based Daewoo in 2012.
And now the Government has been forced to admit foreign steel is being used to build the 37,000-tonne vessels.
Defence Minister Philip Dunne said: “Manufacture of the four Tide Class tankers will in total require 44,000 tonnes of steel.
“Daewoo Shipbuilding and Marine Engineering source this steel locally in South Korea.”
Despite the Tories rejecting plans for at least one of the ships to be built in Britain, Mr Dunne blamed Daewoo for buying steel from South Korea.
“Under European and UK procurement regulations, the Ministry of Defence could not contractually mandate the use of particular suppliers,” said Mr Dunne.
“Decisions on the source of steel are a matter for the contractors who take into account the cost, timeliness of availability and the quality of steel used in defence contracts.
“These considerations allow defence contractors to deliver value for money for the taxpayer.”
Roy Rickhuss, General Secretary of Community, the steelworkers’ union said: “This Government needs to make up its mind.
“They say they’re doing everything they can to support our steel industry, but they are quite happy to let foreign steel go into building our ships.
“British steelworkers are doing all they can to save the industry, but they need their government to support them.
Former SAS sergeant Andy McNab has hailed the role of Land Rover Defenders in the British military after the last one rolled off the production line yesterday.
He said Land Rovers were “synonymous” with the Armed Forces for their role as “huge weapons platform”.
Current and former workers at the Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) plant in Solihull, West Midlands, cheered as the final Defender was presented, with its lights flashing and horn blaring.
JLR used the occasion to announce the launch of a heritage restoration programme for what is one of Britain’s most-loved and long-lived road vehicles
More than two million of the 4x4s have been built over the past 68 years.
A team of experts will restore a number of early Land Rovers at the Solihull plant, with the first going on sale in July.
The scheme will also ensure spare parts are made available to enable existing owners to keep their cars on the road.
Motoring experts said production was ended because of difficulties in meeting modern safety and emissions standards.
Mr McNab, now a successful author, recently bought his own Defender after learning that no more new ones would be made.
“I got one at the end of last year because of this,” he said.
“I love them. I learned to drive in one. They’ve always been there because it’s been the main vehicle for the military since about the Fifties.”
He described Defenders as “the basic workhorse” and compared them favourably to the US Army’s equivalent. “The Humvee is a great machine but it’s so wide and cumbersome,” he explained. “The larger machines can’t get into areas as quickly as Land Rovers, it’s as simple as that. They’re fantastic.”
Defenders are a favourite with the Queen and have featured in a number of films such as James Bond movie Skyfall and Edge Of Tomorrow starring Tom Cruise. The vehicle, which was exported all around the world, represented the continuation of the very first Land Rover which arrived on the scene in April 1948 and was modelled on Jeeps – the US’s primary light four-wheel vehicle during the Second World War.
JLR chief executive Dr Ralf Speth told the gathering of workers in Solihull that the vehicle is “the origin of our legendary capability”.
He said: “[It is] a vehicle that makes the world a better place, often in some of the most extreme circumstances.
“There will always be a special place in our hearts for Defender, among all our employees, but this is not the end. We have a glorious past to champion and a wonderful future to look forward to.”
The Royal Navy's most modern warships are to be fitted with new engines because they keep breaking down.
In an email seen by the BBC, a serving Royal Navy officer wrote that "total electric failures are common" on its fleet of six £1bn Type 45 destroyers.
The Ministry of Defence said there were reliability issues with the propulsion system and work to fix it would be done to ensure "ships remain available".
One Royal Navy officer said the cost could reach tens of millions of pounds.
In a statement, the MoD told the BBC that to "address some reliability issues" it was considering options to "upgrade the ships' diesel generators to add greater resilience to the power and the propulsion system".
That will involve significant work, though the Royal Navy insists that the six destroyers will still be deployed all over the world.
'Major weak link'
But from 2019 each will begin to undergo a major refit that will probably involve cutting a large hole to insert at least one new generator into the ship.
The work will be staggered to ensure the Navy still has ships to send on operations.
The MoD would not give any details on cost.
Admiral Lord West, a former First Sea Lord, said the development was "very worrying" and the MoD must have known "three or four years ago" that the destroyers had problems.
The ex-Labour security minister said any delay in rectifying the problem would leave the Navy's surface fleet badly stretched, as the Navy can already "only just do some of the tasks we should be doing around the world".
"What I would hope is there is already in place a 'get well' programme and we must move very quickly to rectify these problems," he said.
A former naval officer, Rear Admiral Chris Parry, said the problems could not continue: "It's rather like buying a high-priced television to watch your favourite football team but because you don't have secure power supplies, the power goes off about every 10 minutes.
"You can't have that in combat, you can't even have that in normal operations - it is not safe."
I experienced one of the many power outages on board HMS Dauntless, off the coast of Senegal, in 2012.
Suddenly all the lights on the ship went out. It was quickly fixed but it appears to be a problem that has plagued the entire fleet.
In 2014 Dauntless had to abandon a training exercise and, in 2009, HMS Daring lost power in the Atlantic on her first voyage to the US. She suffered more propulsion problems off Kuwait in 2012.
Initially the MoD dismissed these electrical failures as "teething problems".
But it has now admitted that there is a bigger problem - one that could be disastrous for a ship and her crew in combat.
Nick Childs, of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, said: "It's an unfortunate extra cost the Royal Navy will have to swallow to sort out an unreliable propulsion system - the major weak link in an otherwise world-beating system.
"They're essentially going to have to squeeze in an extra generator to improve reliability."
The warning signs were there in 2009 when the Commons Defence Committee published its report on the Type 45.
MPs noted "persistent over-optimism and underestimation of the technical challenges, combined with inappropriate commercial arrangements" leading to rising costs.
Each destroyer ended up costing about £1bn. The Royal Navy wanted 12 ships but ended up with half that number.
The Type 45 has an integrated electric propulsion system that powers everything on board.
'World's most capable'
The problem won't be solved quickly and it is likely to put a strain on the Royal Navy, which has already shrunk considerably in size.
It is now down to a surface fleet of 19 frigates and destroyers.
A spokesman for Rolls-Royce, which makes the WR-21 marine gas turbine used on the warships, said the company continued to work with the MoD on upgrading the performance of the propulsion system.
BAE Systems, the company which builds the warships, said in a statement that the destroyers were "among the world's most capable air defence destroyer".
It said it was working with the MoD "to deliver improvements to the power generation capability of the Type 45 destroyers".
Boeing will further equip the U.S. Navy and Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) with maritime patrol capabilities, building 20 more P-8A Poseidon aircraft following a $2.5 billion U.S. Navy order announced yesterday.
India on Thursday, January 28, 2016, test fired its indigenously-developed surface-to-air Akash missile as part of a user trial from the Integrated Test Range (ITR) at Chandipur. The missiles, with a strike range of 25 km and capability to carry warhead of 60 kg, were test fired from 11 AM to 2 PM from the launch complex-3 of the ITR.
The U.S. is expected to deploy a cutting-edge attack drone in South Korea this year as part of the allies’ efforts to bolster their reconnaissance and combat capabilities and better counter North Korean threats, Seoul officials said Wednesday, Jan. 27, 2016.
In spite of the statements by Russia’s military-political leaders about their lack of plans for ground operations in Syria, the foreign media have been reporting both Russian troops’ active participation in the ground fighting and numerous losses sustained by the Russian Armed Forces in Syria.
The demise of HMS Hermes rekindles indelible memories of the carrier’s emotional return to Portsmouth after serving as the Royal Navy’s flagship in the Falklands War.
The warship, which is set to make her final voyage after ending her service life with the Indian Navy, was greeted by thousands when she returned from the conflict in 1982.
Relatives and friends crowded the dockside to welcome home the 1,700-strong crew and her complement of Royal Marines plus survivors of the sinking of HMS Sheffield.
The rust-streaked aircraft carrier - named after the winged messenger of the Greek gods - had begun her 8,000-mile mission to the South Atlantic on April 5, 1982.
Just over 100 days later, she was saluted by flypasts by RAF Harriers, Army Lynx helicopters and a naval Hunter training squadron as she arrived in Portsmouth, replying a 17-gun national salute.
One side of the ship has been daubed with a scoreboard marking the 46 enemy aircraft shot down by the Sea Harrier fighters launched from her deck.
The Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, had been flown onto the carrier by helicopter as she approached port.
Captain Lynley Middleton was modest about his ship’s role in the South Atlantic. ‘It was all absolutely routine, daily attacks, nothing untoward’ he said.
Hermes had been set to be decommissioned in 1982 after a 1981 defence review but when the Falklands War broke out, she was made the flagship of the British forces.
She set sail for the South Atlantic just three days after the Argentine invasion of the Falkland Islands, carrying 12 Sea Harriers - to be famously counted out and then counted back in again by BBC reporter Brian Hanrahan - and 18 Sea King helicopters.
The Royal Navy's flagship, Devonport-based HMS Bulwark has a new man at the helm.
Captain James Parkin has taken over command of the warship which has been at the forefront of some of the armed forces major operations, including as the main platform for security at the London Olympics.
He said: "I am hugely honoured to assume command of HMS Bulwark.
"The ship has a demanding future programme to meet and a faultless reputation for sustained excellence in high profile situations.
"I am certain that my sailors and marines under my command will continue to deliver operational success in the future, whatever 2016 holds."
Capt Parkin joined the navy as a warfare officer in 1997. He commanded Plymouth-based HMS Montrose from 2012 to 2014 to conduct deployments to the Middle East, Mediterranean and Baltic.
He worked in the Ministry of Defence from 2014 to 2015 and was selected for promotion to captain in 2015.
He has also served on HMS Berkeley, HMS Manchester and HMS Somerset, commanded the patrol vessel HMS Ranger and was deployed to Baghdad to work in the US-led multi-national force HQ.
Capt Parkin succeeds Capt Nick Cooke-Priest who now begins a job in the Ministry of Defence in London.
In another celebration, the ship has been presented with the Royal Navy's Capital Ship Fleet Effectiveness Trophy.
The award recognised unwavering performance through 2015 including migrant search and rescue operations in the Mediterranean, the poignant 100th anniversary of the Gallipoli Campaign and the amphibious Cougar 2015 deployment to the Mediterranean, which included security support to two international summits in Malta.
HMS Bulwark also scooped numerous other awards in 2015.
It won the Desmond Wettern Trophy for 2015, awarded to the ship considered to have done most to project a positive image of the Royal Navy.
The ship was also a finalist for the Plymouth Herald's Pride of Plymouth awards and her sports teams have equally triumphed gaining a Fleet Sports Trophy.
HMS Bulwark faces training and maintenance prior to a varied and exciting programme of exercises and operations through the year.
Based in HM Naval Base, Devonport, HMS Bulwark is one of the Royal Navy's two amphibious assault command and control ship with a crew of 350, a quarter of whom are made up from 4 Assault Squadron Royal Marines.
The ship is designed to carry up to 225 marines in dedicated accommodation for long periods and another 500 in austere conditions for short periods.
A large floodable dock holds four large landing craft – with another four on the ship's side. The larger craft can carry up to 120 troops or a Challenger 2 main battle tank. For humanitarian missions, they have been loaded with lifejackets, water, food, medical supplies and shelter.
HMS Bulwark is retained at high readiness of five days' notice for operations – whether combat operations, providing humanitarian assistance or disaster relief.
Typhoons and Tornados hit locations near Fallujah, Haditha, Ramadi, Habbaniyah, Mosul, and Raqqa over the last week.
The MoD said it carried out four attacks in and around Ramadi on buildings, ammo dumps and "an armoured personnel carrier which was being converted into a large truck-bomb" on 20 January.
Three IS strongholds and an explosive stockpile were destroyed in the Hadditha area the next day, along with a fighting position and mortar team in Qayyarah.
More strikes took place on an anti-aircraft gun placement near Ramadi, a network of trenches near Habbaniyah, a bunker near Mosul, a sniper team firing on Kurdish forces near Sinjar and a Reaper drone hit an IS position inside Sinjar.
"Meanwhile in Syria," a statement said, "Tornados used Brimstone missiles to successfully attack three mobile cranes, being used by Daesh (IS) to repair damage from coalition air strikes."
The RAF released a video that showed the Brimstone missiles hitting the cranes parked up at an IS base.
Pictures have also emerged of Syrian refugees struggling to stay warm after after moving from their homes in Aleppo because of attacks by Russian and Assad Regime forces.
Other pictures showed relatives mourning the death of a young Syrian reportedly killed in airstrikes in Douma, a rebel-held town near Damascus, as the United Nations prepared to hold peace talks in Geneva later this week.
Russia's federal tourism agency said on Wednesday that IS militants were planning to abduct Russian citizens in Turkey.
The agency said in a statement: "According to the competent agencies, leaders of the IS terrorist group plan to take hostages from among Russian citizens in Turkey.
"Hostages can be transferred on to territories controlled by militants to hold public executions and to be used as human shields in combat with Syrian government and coalition forces.
"Therefore we draw the attention of all independent tourists departing for Turkey to the necessity of taking all possible measures to ensure personal security."
Turkey's popularity as Russia's number one foreign tourist destination came to an abrupt end following the shooting down of a Russian military jet by Turkish planes on the Syrian-Turkish border in November.
Russia has been conducting air strikes in Syria, its ally in the region since Soviet times, since September.
The Saudi-backed section of the Syrian opposition demanded an end to the bombardment of civilian areas and the lifting of blockades on besieged areas before the start of the peace talks.
Pressure is mounting on David Cameron to explain the role of British military personnel in the Saudi-led bombing campaign of Yemen after a UN panel ruled the operation contravened international humanitarian law.
Jeremy Corbyn and Hilary Benn, the shadow foreign secretary, sent a joint letter to the prime minister on Wednesday asking for details about British involvement after a leaked copy of the panel’s report concluded there had been “widespread and systematic” attacks on the civilian population.
The 51-page report, sent to the UN security council last week and obtained by the Guardian, documented 119 sorties by the Saudi-led coalition that were linked to violations of international law.
It said that many of the attacks “involved multiple airstrikes on multiple civilian objects”. It added: “Of the 119 sorties, the panel identified 146 targeted objects. The panel also documented three alleged cases of civilians fleeing residential bombings and being chased and shot at by helicopters.”
In another key finding it said: “The panel documented that the coalition had conducted airstrikes targeting civilians and civilian objects, in violation of international humanitarian law, including camps for internally displaced persons and refugees; civilian gatherings, including weddings; civilian vehicles, including buses; civilian residential areas; medical facilities; schools; mosques; markets, factories and food storage warehouses; and other essential civilian infrastructure, such as the airport in Sana’a, the port in Hudaydah and domestic transit routes.”
Yemen’s civil war began when the Houthi rebels, allied with a former Yemeni president, overran the capital in September 2014. In March 2015, a coalition of countries led by Saudi Arabia began airstrikes and, later, a ground operation to retake the country. More than 5,800 people have been killed and more than 80% of Yemen’s population is in dire need of food, water and other aid, according to the UN.
The UK has been furtive about its role in the bombing campaign, with details trickling out only gradually. Earlier this month, the Saudis revealed that UK and US staff were in the command and control centre where the bombing operations are directed.
The Ministry of Defence has refused to reveal how many personnel are involved, saying only it is a small team and insisting its role is not operational. On Wednesday, a spokesperson said: “UK military personnel are not directly involved in Saudi-led coalition operations. We are offering Saudi Arabia advice and training on best-practice targeting techniques to help ensure continued compliance with international humanitarian law.”
After prime minister’s question time, at which Corbyn called for an independent inquiry into the UK’s arms exports policy to Saudi Arabia, the Labour leader and Benn wrote to Cameron. In their letter, they ask him to “set out the exact nature of the involvement of UK personnel working with the Saudi military”.
They add: “Can you confirm whether the British government has received any reports from these UK personnel of actions that might constitute a potential breach of international humanitarian law?”
The question is aimed at establishing whether, if the role of the British team is to advise that an attack on a residential area would contravene humanitarian law, that advice has always been taken.
The two called on the prime minster to suspend arms sales to Saudi Arabia. “In the light of continuing reports from the United Nations and other organisations of breaches of international humanitarian law in the conflict with Yemen, we are writing to call on you to launch immediately a full review of arms export licences to Saudi Arabia and to suspend arms sales to that country until the review has been concluded.”
According to the Campaign Against the Arms Trade, UK arms sales to Saudi Arabia totalled £2.95bn for the first nine months of 2015, and about £7bn since Cameron took office, including a contract for 72 Eurofighter Typhoon jets.
David Mepham, UK director of Human Rights Watch, said the findings of the UN report “flatly contradict repeated statements made by British ministers about the actions of the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen”.
“For almost a year, [foreign secretary] Philip Hammond has made the false and misleading claim that there is no evidence of law or war violations by the UK’s Saudi ally and other members of the coalition.
Kuwait has reached an agreement with the Italian government linked to the planned acquisition of 28 Eurofighter Typhoons.
“We are delighted to welcome Kuwait as the newest member of our Eurofighter Typhoon family,” says consortium chief executive Alberto Gutierrez, who also describes the selection as providing “a great opportunity for further Eurofighter orders.”
After waiting for almost three years since its last international sale, the programme is now seeing “growing interest across the globe, and in the Gulf Region in particular,” Gutierrez adds.
Current operators are European partner nations Germany, Italy, Spain and the UK, plus export users Austria and Saudi Arabia. Twelve of the type are also to be delivered to Oman, under a contract signed with the UK in December 2012.
The Eurofighter consortium says total commitments to the Eurojet EJ200-powered combat aircraft stand at 599 units, including the planned Kuwaiti acquisition
Italy and Eurofighter partner company Alenia Aermacchi have led the consortium’s export campaign in Kuwait, where the type has faced competition including the Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet and Dassault Rafale.
Earlier this year, Boeing officials spoke optimistically about the prospects of a Super Hornet deal with the Gulf nation, which already operates the legacy F/A-18C/D.
A PLYMOUTH-based ice ship has arrived in New Zealand as part of her historic Southern Ocean patrol.
HMS Protector, the Royal Navy's designated ice patrol ship, has recently completed a five-week patrol in Antarctica – the first UK vessel to have visited the region and travelled so far south in 80 years.
The arrival of the specialist ice ship in Christchurch marks the close cooperation that exists between the UK and New Zealand in protecting the Southern Ocean from illegal fishing activities.
Acting British High Commissioner to New Zealand, Helen Smithsaid HMS Protector's Antarctic patrol was a good example of the relationship between the two countries.
"With New Zealand, we have shared scientific programmes and stewardship roles in the region," she said.
"This patrol has deepened that co-operation and will ensure fishing and other commercial activities in the Ross Sea region are carried out in line with international conservation agreements."
During her five-week patrol, and with the support of New Zealand and Australian officers, Protector inspected a number of fishing vessels to ensure they adhere to the strict licensing regulations in the area.
In addition, the ship also paid a visit to the Italian Antarctic research station, Mario Zucchelli, while members of the ship's company paid homage to legendary British Antarctic explorers, Captain Robert Falcon Scott RN and Sir Ernest Shackleton.
Commander Trefor Fox, Protector's Second in Command, added that it was good to be working with Australian and New Zealand partners.
He said: "One hundred years after Sir Ernest Shackleton's epic Endurance expedition, it is an honour for HMS Protector to have made our own 'trans-Antarctic' visit to East Antarctica and the Ross Sea region.
"We are delighted to work in partnership with our Australian and New Zealand colleagues to underpin our shared Antarctic Treaty objectives."
The U.S. Marine Corps on Monday said it would send a pair of Lockheed Martin Corp F-35 fighter jets to two air shows in Britain this summer, a key milestone for the $391 billion weapons program after its thwarted international debut in 2014.
Some U.S. Air Force F-35 jets will also take part in the events, according to sources familiar with the plans. Air Force officials could not immediately be reached for comment.
A fleetwide F-35 grounding ordered after an engine fire in 2014 prevented what would have been the jets' international premiere at the annual Royal International Air Tattoo and an appearance at the world's biggest air show in Farnborough, outside London, both that year.
Since then, an F-35 jet assembled in Italy has made its inaugural flight there, but this year's appearance at RIAT will be the first by the stealthy, supersonic new warplane at an international air show.
"The U.S. Marine Corps is looking forward to demonstrating the capabilities of the F-35B Lightning II in the skies over the United Kingdom this July," Deputy Commandant for Aviation Lieutenant General Jon Davis said in statement to Reuters.
Davis said a joint U.S. Marine Corps and UK detachment would use the flights to validate overseas deployment activities and prove program interoperability. The Pentagon's F-35 program office and Lockheed would support the work, he said.
The British defense ministry had no immediate comment.
One of the sources said Britain planned to send at least one of the four F-35 jets it has already received to the air shows. The British jets are currently training in the United States.
Lockheed is developing three models of the jet, also known as the Joint Strike Fighter, or Lightning II, with key suppliers Northrop Grumman Corp and Britain's BAE Systems Plc. Pratt & Whitney, a unit of United Technologies Corp, builds the engines.
Besides Britain, seven other countries helped fund development of the jets: Norway, Australia, Canada, Denmark, Turkey, Italy and the Netherlands. All but Canada and Denmark have since ordered jets, as have Israel, Japan and South Korea.
The F-35 program, the Pentagon's single largest weapons project, ran into technical problems and cost overruns for years, but U.S. officials say it has improved and that costs have fallen for the past five years.
The Marine Corp's F-35B model can take off from warships and aircraft carriers and land like a helicopter. The service branch plans to buy a total of 420 F-35B-model and C-model jets, which can fly onto and take off from aircraft carriers.
The Air Force plans to buy 1,763 A-model jets, which take off and land on conventional runways.
Davis said lessons identified from the deployment would help the Marines as they set up a second F-35 fighter attack squadron this summer and prepare for the first one to move to Iwakuni, Japan, in 2017.
The Marine Corps in July announced an initial squadron of 10 F-35 jets ready for combat, and the Air Force is due to follow suit this summer.
Jeremy Corbyn , I am afraid, will win no brownie points, let alone votes for his public view that the Falkland Islands should be handed back to Argentina as part of a power-sharing deal.
His view has not only angered members of his own party, but will horrify the families of the 255 British military personnel who died in the 1982 conflict after the Argentine invasion.
His remarks have, unsurprisingly, met with the approval of Alicia Castro, the outgoing Argentine ambassador in London. She warmly described Corbyn as “one of ours”.
Corbyn, and those of a like mind, seem to forget that virtually the entire population of the Falklands want to remain British, and want nothing to do with Argentina.
Some members of the Labour Party were clearly shocked to hear Corbyn’s views at a private party meeting at Westminster.
Shadow Leader of the Commons, Chris Bryant said scathingly: “You can’t make policy on the hoof over the Falklands.”
And the shadow Foreign Secretary Hilary Benn was even more telling. He simply said: “We have not changed our policy on the Falklands.”
Corbyn seems to be making more enemies within his own party than those of his political opponents.
The British parliament should be ashamed of itself for even considering that Donald Trump should be denied entry to our country.
England, as John Bright once said, is the mother of parliaments, yet the House of Commons, earlier this month, disgraced and demeaned itself to the gutter level of those neo-fascist university students who have, in some cases acted almost violently by gagging even eminent figures from speaking on their campuses if their views do not coincide with their own.
This is intolerance writ large, and it is scandalous that Trump, the front-runner in the Republican battle for the White House, should be treated in this way. Trump may have views that are anathema to many people, but he is no criminal – and could be sitting in the Oval Office sooner rather than later.
All right, ban known criminals, people who advocate violence or who try to brainwash others – but Trump could be leader of the free world by this time next year.
People like feminist Germaine Greer and historian David Starkey have been banned from speaking on campuses. These are people with controversial views, but they are always entertaining – and more importantly, they provoke debate, which I would have thought is what universities need.
And for politicians to downgrade themselves to such a level leaves an ugly stain on the present incumbents at Westminster.
• What good news it is that some of Britain’s money-grubbing and bullying charities, that prey on the old and the vulnerable, are to be brought to book.
The methods some of them use to raise money, by, for instance, bombarding people with begging letters – sometimes with dire results – have been condemned by MPs who say they now have a last chance to mend their often cruel ways.
Some of them have been using what are described as “outrageous boiler-room tactics” to raise cash. Charity work is now very often not voluntary, but big business with its leaders strutting around in Armani suits – paid for, of course, by unsuspecting people who want to help the deprived, not finance designer wear from Savile Row.
