Soon after the next British government takes office, it must take an important decision: whether to approve full-scale development of the Tempest sixth-generation combat aircraft. Right now, the go-ahead looks like a foregone conclusion. It shouldn’t be.
BAE Systems has done a great job of boosting what is now called the Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP), after Italy and Japan joined in. In their public statements, government defence ministers enthusiastically endorse it. The media has been captured: “Stage is set for Tempest Production” is a typical recent headline. And BAE has played the jobs card for all it’s worth.
Tempest is supposed to be part of a wider effort to create a Future Combat Air System (FCAS). Key elements of this include uncrewed combat aerial vehicles (UCAVs) to operate in conjunction with the big combat jet, and a step-change in networking capabilities, notably Multi-Domain Integration (MDI). But have you noticed how little publicity has been put out on FCAS, especially by BAE Systems? Last year, a senior civil servant in the MoD gave me two reasons for this. Firstly, airframes are sexy, and easy for the public to understand and support. Secondly, the RAF had not yet defined what it wants from FCAS, and how to go about it.
That is about to change. Two weeks ago, the RAF completed work on its Autonomous Collaborative Platform (ACP) strategy. A senior RAF officer told me that an unclassified version of this document will be released in the new year.
To be fair, the RAF’s Rapid Capability Office (RCO) launched a programme named the Lightweight Affordable Novel Combat Aircraft (LANCA) eight years ago. One of the outputs was a small UCAV demonstrator named Mosquito. It was designed but never flew. The senior officer told me that enough was learnt from this effort to halt it before first flight, “because we didn’t want to go that way, and wanted to save taxpayer’s money.” The original three-year contract for Mosquito was worth £30 million.
More recently, the RCO has sponsored the build and test by BAE Systems of a lightweight 3D-printed, jet-powered UAS named Pizookie. Quite why it is named after a dessert made from a large cookie which is usually topped with ice cream, is not clear to this writer.
One of the key points in the ACP strategy is that technology is advancing at such a pace, that this aspect of FCAS cannot possibly wait for the fielding of Tempest. “So much could change by the mid-thirties,” the senior officer noted. And although some (possibly most) of these novel air vehicles will be ground-launched, they can also be integrated with the F-35s and Typhoons that the RAF flies today. The ACP may suggest various different sizes and missions for these UCAVs, and explore which ones should be returnable, versus attritable.
More than two years ago on this website, I suggested exactly that. The terminology has changed: the RAF now calls them “adjuncts” rather than “loyal wingmen”. In the US, they are known as Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCAs).
“So much could change”. Surely this also applies to development of Tempest. In my first article on this subject in 2018, I suggested that it was not a good idea to launch development in 2025 when the jet really isn’t needed in service until at least 2040. Team Tempest argues that spiral development will take care of that, including the easier insertion of new avionics and weapons thanks to an open architecture. But there are some fundamentals such as the size, weight, outer mold line, engine and power requirements of the platform and its sensors, that must surely be decided quite early in the development phase.
In written evidence to a new enquiry by the House of Commons Defence Committee into future aircraft procurement, the former chief executive officer of Eurofighter Brian Phillipson says of combat aircraft development that “it is absolutely key that the parties reach very detailed agreement before programme launch on technical details such as requirements and acceptance standards…change in the middle of a programme is very disruptive and very expensive.”
On these pages, I previously wondered why it would take 18 years to conceive, assess the concept and then develop this aircraft. When Team Tempest was launched in 2018, we were told that it would be a high-paced, lean and efficient development, thanks to digital design, model-based engineering (MBE) and so on. Timescales and cost would be halved compared with previous combat aircraft (although the comparison is with the Eurofighter Typhoon, the worst possible example in that regard).
Then in 2021 the Concept and Assessment Phase was launched. Now we know that this four-year effort is already employing 3,000 people and costing £2 billion for the UK alone. This phase will significantly de-risk the programme, we are told. In that case, why will it take more than a decade to get the first jet delivered to the RAF, and why did Richard Berthon, the MoD’s Director, Future Combat Air, describe the in-service-date of 2035 as “hugely challenging” at a Royal Aeronautical Society conference earlier this year?
The rationale for that 2035 ISD still puzzles me. In mid-2022, a £2.35 billion upgrade to the Typhoon was announced, to include the ECRS2 active array radar, new software, and new weapons integration. Then-Chief of the Air Staff Sir Mike Wigston said this would be “the biggest capability boost since the Typhoon came into service.” He also said that the upgrade would push the Typhoon’s out-of-service date to “beyond 2040”.
Then there is the F-35 Lightning II. We have already spent £6 billion to acquire and introduce to service 48 of these fifth-generation, stealthy jets. The plan is to acquire another 26 to arrive by the early 2030s. I reckon that will cost well over £2 billion. The plan is supposedly funded, but the order has not yet been placed. The MoD told the House of Commons Defence Committee earlier this year that it was “dependent on the F-35 (programme) demonstrating support cost improvements, and progress on fitting British weapons.” A definitive judgement on the final size of the fleet will be made by 2025,” the MoD continued. It looks like there won’t be any more F-35s ordered beyond 74, perhaps even 48, if Tempest development is approved. So much for the original ambition to acquire 138.
Whatever, it hardly seems good value to the taxpayer for the RAF to be spending so much money on new F-35s and on Typhoon upgrades, as well at least £12 billion on the development of the Tempest (the MoD’s recent estimate, not mine). Note that Sweden was thinking of joining Team Tempest, but could not justify the timescale in view of its investment in the Gripen E upgrade.
How will Tempest be funded? According to last month’s report from the National Audit Office (NAO), “the MoD Equipment Plan for the next decade is unaffordable.” Yes, the defence budget was increased in a much-hyped announcement by former PM Boris Johnson. But forecast procurement costs have increased by 27% thanks to inflation, the NAO says. Last June, the government’s own Infrastructure and Projects Authority (IPA) rated FCAS as red, meaning that “successful delivery appears to be unachievable.”
The NAO said that there were emerging priorities in the MoD for which there was little or no funding at all. In particular, it noted the need for an integrated air-missile defence against aircraft, cruise missiles and ballistic missiles. In a speech at the Freeman Institute last month, ACM Sir Richard Knighton agreed. Fact is, the MoD has no medium-long range ground-to-air missile systems to defend the UK, such as Patriot. If President Putin really had been serious about hitting 10 Downing Street with a ballistic missile, there’s nothing we could have done about it. Except, possibly, if we had pre-positioned one of the Navy’s Type 45 destroyers in the Thames Estuary.
Moreover, the RAF is part of a British partnership that is exploring the technical practicalities of developing a reusable hypersonic air vehicle. It has not yet publicly suggested that this work might also lead to hypersonic missiles being developed. But they are now a priority in the US, after China and Russia made a head start. How expensive would that be?
The respected RUSI airpower analyst Justin Bronk has suggested that the GCAP might cost £50 billion to develop and procure, with the UK and Japan providing 40% each and Italy 20%. Bronk says that “either GCAP must be funded properly, radically downscaled in ambition, or not done at all”. He thinks that the RAF should consider developing a much cheaper fleet of UCAVs.
About 10 years ago, the MoD spent some £200 million on the Taranis UCAV demonstrator and an Anglo-French feasibility study for a UCAV-driven FCAS. Why have we heard so little from the MoD and the RAF about this class of UCAVs since? It’s worth noting that, notwithstanding its participation in the European equivalent to GCAP/FCAS, France has approved the reactivation by Dassault, of the pan-European Neuron UCAV demonstrator programme.
BAE Systems argues that the current pace of the Tempest programme is vital for preserving air system design skills, and developing the next generation of aerospace engineers. But there are plenty of other opportunities for such people within BAE, let alone elsewhere in Britain’s high-tech industries. Two years ago, BAE produced an impressive brochure titled “Innovations”. It described all sorts of dual-use activities within the company, from augmented reality to quantum sensing, and from remote maintenance support to energy efficiency. The same is true for some other partners in Team Tempest: such as Leonardo and Rolls Royce, and certainly within the wider supply chain.
Moreover, BAE Systems is already under contract to produce a “Next-Generation Combat Air Demonstrator.” It is due to fly “within the next four years” and will test various Tempest technologies such as stealthy engine ducts and auto-coded flight control systems. Leonardo is under contract to flight-test sensors for Tempest on a converted Boeing 757. To quote Brian Phillipson again: “skills in disciplines such as airframe design, flight controls, or even manufacturing…need to be kept alive and carefully selected technology demonstrators are the best answer.”
Those demonstrator projects should go ahead, but full-scale development of Tempest should be delayed, with some of the funds diverted to wider FCAS elements such multi-domain integration, and the autonomous collaborative platforms that can be integrated with the F-35 and Typhoon. Other funding planned for Tempest in the mid-late twenties should be reallocated to higher-priorities, notably missile defence, but also including more F-35s.
“So much could change”…
Chris Pocock Makes Aerosense 