Hopefully Their Army Works Better Than Their Navy

In response to apparent Russian provocation, the Brits are beefing up their military presence in Estonia.

British troops began a long-term deployment to Estonia on Saturday as Germany’s intelligence chief warned Russia had doubled its military presence on its Western border.

An advanced contingent of 120 British soldiers landed at Estonia’s Amari airbase late on Friday night as part of a new Nato deployment designed to deter Russia from attempting a repeat of its invasions of Crimea and Eastern Ukraine in the Baltic.

Eight hundred British troops with Challenger 2 tanks, AS90 self-propelled guns, and Warrior armoured vehicles, will be based in the town of Tapa, 80 miles from the Russian border, from next month.

This is part of a planned exercise with French and other NATO forces in Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland. Additional British troops will be sent to Poland to augment American forces already stationed there.

Story here.

As far as the readiness of the best warships in Her Majesty's Navy, go here.  Unfortunately our own navy apparently isn't in much better shape.

Britain's Nuclear Deterrant At Risk

A serious fault has been reported in the reactor of a British submarine. Over half of the Brit's nuclear subs are out of commission now.

Experts warned the fault in the reactor of HMS Trenchant was so serious that the Trafalgar fleet may never sail again. The fracture is being treated as an “irreparable generic fault” that will prevent it from being able to carry out normal duties.

It means Britain may be forced to beg for international support in protecting our four Vanguard submarines, which carry Britain’s Trident nuclear deterrent. 

Britain deploys seven SSN nuclear-powered hunter-killers. Last week it was revealed that the four older Trafalgar-class submarines, Trenchant, Torbay, Triumph and Talent, were out of action due to repairs and maintenance.

Story here.

Russian Show Of Force

Disabled Russian Warships - 1905

Anyone have an idea of the condition of Russia's navy? I'm wondering if Putin's navy is anything like the hollow shell that Russia threw against the Japanese Navy in 1905.

From the UK Daily Mail:

Cutting through the English Channel, the looming bulk of the Russian navy’s flagship passes the White Cliffs of Dover.

Belching black smoke, the ageing aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov sailed menacingly close to Britain yesterday in a provocative manoeuvre.

              Russian Aircraft Carrier - Admiral Kuznetsov - commissioned 1995

The Soviet-era vessel, leading a flotilla of eight naval vessels, is on its way to the eastern Mediterranean to bolster the Syrian bombing campaign.

[...]Putin's flagship was accompanied by the nuclear-powered missile cruiser Peter the Great and six other surface vessels including the world's biggest ocean going tug, the Nicolay Chiker.

The Kuznetsov never travels far from its home port in Severomorsk, outside Murmansk without the tug in case the vessel's unreliable diesel engines pack up.

The Russian flee is being shadowed by a British destroyer, the HMS Dragon. This Type 45 destroyer has it's own power plant problems:

The turbines are of a sound design but have an intercooler-recuperator that recovers heat from the exhaust and recycles it into the engine, making it more fuel-efficient and reducing the ship’s thermal signature. Unfortunately the intercooler unit has a major design flaw and causes the GTs to fail occasionally. When this happens, the electrical load on the diesel generators can become too great and they ‘trip out’, leaving the ship with no source of power or propulsion.

The Brits could have installed a more mature, reliable power plant produced by General Electric but chose Rolls Royce instead.

British Navy Type 45 Destroyer, HMS Dragon (D35) - commissioned 2008

This Russian warship may also be a sitting duck for the Type 45's modern  armaments and electronic counter measures.

 Russian Guided Missile Destroyer - Peter the Great - commissioned 1985

Sinking Of The HMS Barham

Dramatic Newsreel footage captured the sinking of the Queen Elizabeth Battleship. A salvo of torpedoes from a German submarine struck from close range on HMS Barham on November 25, 1941 in the Mediterranean. Within four minutes, the battleship had listed over to Port and the ships magazines had exploded, sinking the battleship and killing 863 men. The terrifying explosion was caught on film by Pathe cameraman John Turner who was on an adjacent ship.