The British Carrier Strike Fleet. David Hobbs
Sydney leaving the UK for Australia with a large number of cocooned Sea Furies and Fireflies for the RAN’s new Fleet Air Arm on deck and in the hangar. (Author’s collection)
The second Australian carrier was Majestic herself, renamed as HMAS Melbourne, built by Vickers and suspended at Barrow-in-Furness after 1946. She was completed at a slower pace so that that the revolutionary new British carrier systems could be included. In the event she was virtually rebuilt to a much-improved design and when completed in November 1955 she was only the third carrier in the world to be completed with a steam catapult, angled deck and mirror landing aid fitted during build rather than retro-fitted later.21 She too was to have a long and productive life, remaining in operation until 1982. To cover the period before Melbourne was completed, some years later than originally planned because of the amount of reconstruction needed to bring her up to the latest standard, the light fleet carrier Vengeance was lent to the RAN from November 1952. She sailed for the UK in June 1955 with the ship’s company that would take over the new Melbourne and was returned to the RN in August. It would be difficult to imagine a closer relationship between two navies.
The light fleet carriers were undoubtedly a good choice for Australia. They were available, affordable, economical in operation and at the time of their completion both ships represented the current ‘state of the art’. The completion of the second ship on a slower timescale to incorporate new technology was also a sensible move which gave the Fleet Air Arm the chance to mature. Had Australia elected to buy one of the 1943 light fleet carriers it is doubtful whether it could have been completed before 1954, a considerable delay, and it would have had a much higher ‘price-tag’. It would also have been more expensive to man and operate. In an era when personnel were trained by, and interchangeable with their RN contemporaries the ships’ standardised British equipment was easy to absorb and presented few operating problems22 and this meant that attention could be focused on flying operations. The only viable alternative would have been surplus USN escort carriers of the Commencement Bay class and with their different machinery, systems and ammunition they might have been cheap to buy but would have been expensive to assimilate and operate. Sydney proved herself to be a better carrier than ships of this class such as the USS Rendova in operations off Korea. She was also more seaworthy and better able to adapt to subsequent development.
A ‘most original forgery’ on the flight deck of HMAS Vengeance when she escorted HM Queen Elizabeth II for part of her tour of the Commonwealth in the liner Gothic during 1954. (RAN)
The Indian Navy
India was the last Commonwealth navy to adopt aircraft carriers, although a small shore-based Fleet Air Arm had been operated since independence in 1947. In 1957 the Indian Government purchased the incomplete light fleet carrier Hercules, a sister-ship of the vessels procured and operated by Australia and Canada. She had been built by Vickers-Armstrong on the Tyne but laid up incomplete in the Gareloch after launch. After her purchase she was towed to Harland & Wolff in Belfast for completion, capitalising on the experience gained with the modernisation and completion of Bonaventure. She was completed in 1961 and commissioned as INS Vikrant, the last of the 1942 light fleet carriers to enter service, and fitted with a steam catapult, angled deck and mirror landing aid. Her air group comprised Hawker Sea Hawk FGA 6 fighters and Breguet Alizé anti-submarine/reconnaissance aircraft which were later joined by Westland Sea King helicopters. The IN had hoped to buy French Etendard fighters but accepted the obsolescent Sea Hawks as the RN was withdrawing them from service and offered them at a bargain price.23 A subsequent batch of surplus Sea Hawks was bought at low cost from the Federal German Government which was replacing them with F-104 Starfighters. Vikrant’s ship’s company and the squadrons were initially trained in the UK but, unlike Canada and Australia, India moved away from British technical management to adopt its own more nationally-centred support infrastructure. It obtained remarkable value for money from its purchases and the IN’s Sea Hawks were not finally withdrawn from service until the 1980s after proving effective in a number of regional conflicts. Indian naval air squadrons were never numbered in the RN sequence but were, instead, given numbers in the 300 range. In the 1980s India became the only export customer for the Sea Harrier which replaced the Sea Hawk at modest cost. They were able to operate from Vikrant which was fitted with a 12-degree ‘ski-jump’ and subsequently from Hermes, renamed Viraat, which was purchased from the RN in 1986, again at a bargain price which included a major refit in Devonport Dockyard. She is still active in 2015 with an air group of Sea Harriers and Sea King helicopters to which a small number of Russian-built Kamov Ka-31 airborne surveillance and control helicopters have been added.
HMAS Melbourne, seen here with a Gannet landing-on, was the only third aircraft carrier in the world to be completed with a steam catapult, angled deck and mirror landing aid rather than having them added later. (Author’s collection)
Russian influence grew significantly and in 1994 the Russian Navy offered one of its Kiev class aircraft carriers for sale. The offer was not immediately taken up but in 1999 the former Admiral Gorshkov was offered free of charge provided that the Indian Government paid for her to be modified to a revised design and refitted. Again this was seen as a bargain which was taken up with a contract signed in 2004 but, in this instance, the ‘bargain basement’ tactic proved unsuccessful. The original cost of the work was US$ 625 million but unforeseen problems and difficulties delayed the project and the ship, renamed Vikramaditya, was not delivered until 2013 at a cost well over $2 billion with several technical issues including boiler reliability unresolved. Like similar ships in the Russian and Chinese navies she uses a ‘ski-jump’ to operate fighters in the short take-off but arrested landing (STOBAR) mode. A new carrier built to an indigenous Indian design with Italian engineering support was launched in 2014 for planned completion in 2018. She is to be named Vikrant II and the Indian Navy hopes to build further carriers with catapults instead of the ‘ski-jump’ to give fighters greater load-carrying capability and flexibility.
INS Vikrant in 1962 shortly after her arrival in India. (Author’s collection)
The Royal New Zealand Navy
Despite the large number of New Zealand aircrew who flew with the RN in the Second World War, the post-war RNZN was not large enough to operate an aircraft carrier or form its own Fleet Air Arm and a number of New Zealanders have flown with the RN and RAN as pilots and observers. RNZN ships have operated helicopters since 1966, however, when the first Leander class frigate entered service. Westland Wasps were procured and flown by RNZN pilots trained in the UK with RNZAF maintenance technicians to support them. With the introduction of the ANZAC class frigates from 1997, Wasps were replaced by the Kaman SH-2G Seasprite. These too are flown by RNZN pilots and observers trained in New Zealand and supported by embarked RNZAF detachments. This arrangement is likely to continue for the foreseeable future as a further batch of Seasprites was ordered in 2014.
4 Invention, Innovation, New Aircraft and Rebuilt Ships
During the Second World War the Admiralty’s Directorate of Naval Air Warfare (DNAW) introduced a monthly journal called Flight Deck with the first edition appearing in August 1944. On its first page there was a message from the First Sea Lord Admiral of the Fleet Sir Andrew Cunningham who said that ‘the future of the Navy depends largely on a vigorous air arm and it is essential for all of us to acquire full understanding of its activities if the Navy is to maintain its great traditions of enterprise and efficiency’.1 Vice Admiral Sir Dennis Boyd, the Fifth Sea Lord and Board member responsible for air matters, endorsed this