By Kris Osborn, Warrior

The UK Royal Navy operates two Queen-Elizabeth-class aircraft carriers, ships armed with a collection of vertical take-off and landing F-35Bs in position to project 5th-generation air power far from Britain’s shores. The current existence of two operational carriers is welcome news and quite reassuring for many in the UK Ministry of Defence, in large measure due to the problems the carriers have experienced in recent years. 

At one point, it seemed possible that the UK might cancel or “sell” its second Queen-Elizabeth-class carrier, the HMS Prince of Wales, due to mechanical challenges and developmental problems Both British carriers have experienced maintenance problems and funding shortages in recent years, leading some to question the ongoing utility of carriers for the UK. 

 However, while maintenance and funding challenges still exist, Britain’s carrier fleet has since rebounded and surged into successfully deployed, F-35B-armed warships.  The HMS Prince of Wales recently transited through areas of the South China Sea, projecting power with F-35Bs forward operating in the Pacific. 

The two UK carriers, emerging in 2014 and 2017, enabled the UK to form its own Carrier Strike Groups able to project power and, if needed, launch air attacks from locations throughout the world. 

UK & US Carriers

The UK ships are listed as operating at 80,600 tons, roughly 20-tons lighter or smaller than 100-ton US Navy Ford class carriers. A major reason for the weight difference relates to carrier deck length and width, as the Ford-class carriers stretch 1,092 ft and the Queen Elizabeth ships are 932 ft long. Width, hangar space for storage and electric elevators enable the Ford to move and launch a much greater number of aircraft. 

US Navy Ford-class carriers, for example, can easily launch and operate as many as 50 or more F-35Cs, whereas the UK Queen Elizabeth class can carry a maximum of 36 F-35Bs in wartime and typically averages 12-24 F-35Bs under normal deployment conditions.

British Carriers Launch F-35Bs

 The Queen Elizabeth carriers incorporate a slight “ski-jump” configuration, as opposed to a large flat deck, in large measure because they do not operate with a catapult. The absence of a catapult, which enables massive F-35C launch from a carrier deck in the case of the USS Ford, means the Queen Elizabeth can only launch vertical-take-off-and-landing F-35Bs. 

However, this maritime 5th-generation power projection capability is massively fortified by a growing ability to interoperate with US F-35B-capable ships such as amphibious assault ships. With both ships configured to operate F-35Bs, US Marine Corps amphibs and a UK Queen Elizabeth carrier have been able to take off and land F-35Bs on each other’s ships. Such an ability, strengthened by the F-35’s common, multi-national Multi-Function Data Link (MADL) connecting US and UK F-35s, massively expands mobility and air power projection capability. 

The US Marine Corps and UK Royal Navy practiced this as far back as 2020 during a three-day joint exercise in the North Sea. This training exercise was explained in detail in a 2020 essay by Kris Osborn in The National Interest. 

“During the attack operations, planes from both countries dropped 500lb Paveway IV bombs onto a dedicated range. Former Commander Mark Sparrow Royal Navy,  former commanding officer of 617 Squadron, said the exercise began with high optempo deck operations on board the carrier,” the National Interest states in 2020. 

An essay in the UK Royal Navy report from 2020 talks about the maturation of this US Marine Corps - UK connectivity with the F-35, as it described the exercise as a “springboard” for the next phase of loading live weapons onto the aircraft. 

“That was a springboard for the next phase, which was to load live weapons on the aircraft, which we had not done from HMS Queen Elizabeth before. It was an opportunity to end-to-end test all the systems within the ship and the squadron, from building and loading the weapons all the way through to successfully releasing them on target,” Sparrow said in the UK Royal Navy report.

Kris Osborn is the President of Warrior Maven – Center for Military Modernization. Osborn previously served at the Pentagon as a highly qualified expert in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army—Acquisition, Logistics & Technology. Osborn has also worked as an anchor and on-air military specialist at national TV networks. He has appeared as a guest military expert on Fox News, MSNBC, The Military Channel, and The History Channel. He also has a Masters Degree in Comparative Literature from Columbia University