amphibious assault ships, which only support aircraft with vertical takeoff, than U.S. The Queen Elizabeth more closely resembles U.S. and Chinese navies, the two largest fleets in the world. “The Royal Navy, although much smaller than in its heyday, is downsized to an appropriate level where they can still contribute punch above their weight with two aircraft carriers.”Įven if the British navy can punch above its weight, it is in a different weight class from the U.S. Navy’s 6th Fleet, responsible for Europe and Africa, and who now leads the Center for Maritime Strategy at the Navy League of the United States. They do live-fire missile shots, they do anti-submarine warfare, they do maritime interdiction operations, humanitarian assistance stuff, rotary wing from one ship to the next, cross-checking of personnel,” said James Foggo, a retired admiral who commanded the U.S. But experts who watched the 65,000-metric-ton HMS Queen Elizabeth, sporting a flight deck the size of three football fields, drop anchor near the Statue of Liberty saw hope for London’s promises to reemerge as a global naval superpower, pledging to have 24 surface ships underway by the first half of the next decade. Once the world’s largest navy, Britain had just 19 destroyers and frigates-and no aircraft carriers-after parliamentarians took a scalpel to the defense budget in the mid-2010s.
After years of seeing ship numbers dwindle, the Royal Navy is trying to prove it is back on the uproll, parking its flagship carrier in New York Harbor last week for the world to see.
ABOARD HMS QUEEN ELIZABETH-It wasn’t your father’s decrepit, old Royal Navy.
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