The Royal Navy's Batch 1 OPVs have been in service since 2003 and mainly tasked with patrolling UK waters. The post Does it make sense for the UK to sell its Batch 1 OPVs? appeared first on Naval Technology.
Reports suggest the UK is considering selling its OPVs used to patrol UK waters, further reducing Royal Navy presence at sea.
Most recently seen ‘intercepting’ Russian warships transiting through the English Channel, the Royal Navy’s Batch 1 River-class OPVs could be on the verge of being sold to Uruguay, if reports are accurate.
Information published by Merco Press, citing the El Observador news outlet, revealed that the Uruguay Government is giving consideration to a UK proposal to sell three Batch 1 River-class patrol vessels for around $20m per vessel.
The Batch 1 River OPVs in question are HMS Tyne, HMS Mersey, and HMS Severn, which have been in service since 2003 and coming towards the end of their expected service life.
Another Batch 1 OPV, HMS Clyde, was transferred to the Royal Bahrain Naval Force in 2019.
However, in 2021, the UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) revealed that the intended out-of-service date of the three remaining Batch 1 vessels had pushed back to 2028. This would see the trio complete 25 years of operational service mainly around UK waters.
A single Batch 1 River-class OPV costs in the region of £3-4m ($4-5.3m) per year to run, with a 2023 contract confirming a £68.7m, five-year support deal for HMS Tyne, HMS Mersey, and HMS Severn.
A guideline cost to keep the three vessels operational for the next two years is around £26m, offering savings and even potential profit, if the 2023 deal is able to be exited.
In purely financial terms, depending on the MoD’s priorities, it could make fiscal sense to sell the Batch 1 OPVs and reinvest into wider defence capabilities. For example, ordering Batch 3 OPVs in a like-for-like replacement.
This is where the problems would begin, should the UK opt to sell the Batch 1 OPVs, as the River class maintain high operational availability. The type have in recent months been used as a de-facto Fleet Ready Escort to monitor Russian vessels transiting the English Channel, in absence of a Royal Navy frigate.
A reduction in OPV numbers would have a significant impact on the physical presence of Royal Navy ships at sea. This in turn could see the return of some or all of the more modern Batch 2 OPVs, which are forward deployed into regions of UK interest, such as the Mediterranean, South Atlantic, and Asia-Pacific.
The need to maintain presence in UK waters remains critical, as Russia’s shadow fleet operate with near impunity in proximity to the UK’s subsurface critical national infrastructure, such as communications and power links on the seabed.
Should financial arguments trump operational requirements, the loss of the Batch 1 Rivers would deepen a trough that the Royal Navy is sliding into, where ship losses (Type 23 frigates and OPVs) are not immediately replaced.
The next 12-18 months will see the Royal Navy’s frigate force reduce to that of a second-rank European power, potentially as low as five hulls, before gradually rebuilding with the incoming Type 26 and Type 31 vessels.
The Japanese Ministry of Defense has announced that the JS Chōkai (DDG-176) has completed crew training and ship modification, enabling the employment of RGM-109 Tomahawk land attack cruise missiles. The Chōkai, a Kongō-class destroyer, has been present at the home port of the U.S. Navy’s Paci
Rheinmetall and Boeing Australia have entered into a strategic partnership to offer the MQ-28 Ghost Bat as a collaborative combat aircraft solution for the Bundeswehr. The agreement centers on Germany’s emerging requirement for collaborative combat aircraft (CCA), a class of autonomous unmanned syst
The United States Joint Task Force–Southern Border (JTF-SB) is expanding the role of autonomous systems along the U.S.-Mexico border, using unmanned aircraft not only for surveillance and resupply, but also to help emplace physical border obstacles, including concertina wire. The shift turns the sou
New satellite imagery published by Dnipro OSINT indicates that an overnight Ukrainian strike on a Russian explosives production facility in Chapayevsk on March 28 failed to directly hit the main production workshops. The target was identified as the JSC Promsintez plant, a site involved in the manuf