MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 27th June, 2020) The UK's Ministry of Defense (MoD) might not have counted all future costs of operating its two aircraft carriers in the upcoming budgets, a report by a public spending watchdog has concluded.
The National Audit Office (NAO) said in a 61-page report published Friday that the MoD did not know how much its aircraft carrier project would cost over time and identified this lack of clarity as an obstacle to the ships achieving their full operational capability.
"The MoD... needs to get a firmer grip on the future costs of Carrier Strike. By failing to understand their full extent, it risks adding to the financial strain on a defence budget that is already unaffordable," NAO chief Gareth Davies was quoted as saying.
Davies said that MoD had made good progress with "big-ticket" items like the carriers and the first squadron of F-35 fighter jets, "but it must pay much greater attention to the supporting capabilities needed to make full use of Carrier Strike."
Both HMS Queen Elizabeth and HMS Prince of Wales are conducting sea trials and are set for the first deployment in 2021. But the Crowsnest airborne radar system, a key part of the ships' protection, is 18 months behind the schedule and there is only one resupply ship available, while three new ones will not be available until the late 2020s.
