Royal Navy vs United States Navy (2018)

Despite the title, this post is not about a hypothetical battle between the United States Navy and the Royal. Instead, it is an attempt to analyze how accurate Britain’s common refrain about “punching above its weight” really is. While my thesis may prove unwelcome to the British, I am not trying to insult the RN. Rather, I am trying to disabuse a commonly held myth that I feel does far more harm than good.

First a comparison of the two nations. The UK has a population of 66m and a GDP of $2.9 trillion nominal or $3.0 trillion PPP, while the US population is 327m and its GDP is $20.4 trillion (nominal and PPP are the same for the US since PPP is calculated off the dollar). Supported by a population 1/5 the size and a GDP 1/6.8 times the size, it is obvious that the UK will be far weaker than the US in absolute terms. However, as will be shown, it is also far weaker in relative terms.

The FY2018, the British defense budget was £47.2 billion ($62.5 billion at the time of posting), while the American defense budget was $716 billion, for a ratio 11.5:1 instead of the 6.8:1 that one would expect comparing the two nations’ economies. While some may try to argue that the American budget is just atypically large, this is simply not the case. America’s defense spending is 3.5% of its GDP while British defense spending is 2.1%. Given that throughout the Cold War, the UK spent more than 3.5% of its GDP on defense (and the US spent more than 5%), it is only logical to conclude that, rather than punching above its weight, the UK is in fact doing far less than it is capable of.

But let us dig deeper into what these big picture numbers actually mean in terms of military strength. Both the UK and the US split their defense budgets fairly evenly between their armies, navies, and air forces. Therefore, confining our comparison to the United States Navy and the Royal Navy is not unreasonable. In October 2017, the Royal Navy had an active strength of 22,700 officers and ratings. In contrast, as of July 2018, the United States Navy had an active strength of 328,267. This is a personnel ratio of no less than 14.4:1 - an absolutely incredible figure given that manpower is actually significantly cheaper in the UK than it is in the US (the average weekly wage in the UK is £539 ($713) against $881 in the US)

However, the USN is known for overmanning its ships so in terms of hulls in the water the picture isn’t quite so bleak. Today, the two nations (including the United States Coast Guard, Military Sealift Command, and Royal Fleet Auxiliary as well as the USN and RN) operate the following ships (only counting vessels of over 100m in length):

As we can see, the final ratio is 6.8:1 - the exact ratio of the two economies. However, looking at the number of hulls hides the fact that across the board the American ships are far larger and more capable. To demonstrate this, let us look at the aggregate tonnage of the ships listed above.

Now we find that the final ratio has increased to 10.2:1 - very close to the 11.5:1 ratio between the two defense budgets. Only the submarine fleets continue to maintain the 6.8:1 ratio. However, that is a product of 40% of the British submarine fleet being large ballistic missile submarines while those vessels make up just 21% of the American fleet. Looking at tactical submarines alone, we will find that the British fleet displaces 42,000 tons against 478,000 for the Americans - an 11.4:1 ratio.

But tonnage is an imperfect approximation, so let us compare some key capabilities. Since the vast majority of warship losses since WWII have been inflicted by aircraft and missiles, let us start with air defense. The RN has a total of 6 air defense ships, each armed with 48 surface to air missiles. In contrast, the USN has 88 air defense ships, with the largest (the 22 Ticonderoga-class cruisers) capable of carrying up to 146 surface to air missiles (go to my missile loadouts page for an idea of what is actually carried in practice). Further, the USN's SM-6 missile has an estimated range of more than twice the British Aster 30 as well as a antiballistic missile capability (the French and Italians are developing an Aster 30 Block 1 NT that can engage ballistic missiles, but Britain currently has no plans to procure it).

The second area of interest is antisubmarine warfare. Here, the RN is widely regarded as the reigning experts. However, a look at their fleet will reveal several remarkable capability gaps. First, both the Type 45 and the Type 26 have only a medium frequency hull sonar instead of the powerful low frequency sonars found on all American cruisers and destroyers (except Zumwalt, which has a medium/high frequency shallow water sonar). While the British do have the excellent Sonar 2087 variable depth sonar, this is found on just 8 of their frigates. In contrast, the American TB-37 towed array is less capable, but is being fitted to every cruiser and destroyer in the fleet. Finally, the RN has no standoff antisubmarine weapon. If the helicopter is down for maintenance or bad weather (or even just too far away to respond in time), a British warship has to rely on the 10km Stingray torpedo, while American ships can employ the 30km ASROC.

Finally, when it comes to land attack, the RN surface fleet can contribute nothing more than 9 4.5" medium caliber guns. The submarine fleet can pitch in with Tomahawk missiles, but these must be fired from their torpedo tubes, limiting salvo size to 6 missiles. Further, the UK has only procured 214 of these missiles and has fired many of them. In contrast, the USN has 9896 Tomahawk-capable VLS cells on top of its submarine torpedo tubes and has procured well over 7000 of the missiles (current stockpiles are likely in the region of 5000 weapons). The USN also has 109 5" medium caliber guns (as well as 2 6" guns on Zumwalt that do not currently have ammunition), giving a 12.1:1 ratio in guns and something like a 30:1 ratio in missiles.

In terms of aircraft the RN is also far behind. Because the UK is just coming off of a particularly bad period for naval aviation, the following are projected numbers rather than current totals. For maritime patrol the UK is procuring 9 P-8 Poseidon’s, while the US is slated to receive 108 Poseidon’s as well as 68 Triton long range UAV’s for a final ratio of 19.6:1. When it comes to fighter aircraft, the Royal Navy has 48 F-35 Lightning’s on order, while the US Navy and Marines intend to operate a mix of 1197 Lightning’s and Super Hornet’s for a ratio of 24.9:1. Finally, for combat helicopters the RN is maintaining its fleet of 30 HM2 Merlin’s and 28 HMA2 Wildcat’s, while the USN plans for 566 MH-60 Seahawk’s and around 100 MQ-8 Firescout helicopter UAV's for a ratio of 11.5:1. But these numbers fail to include the contribution of the USAF. While the RAF's Typhoon and Tornado fighters currently have no antiship weapons, the USAF's 76 B-52 bombers can carry 12 Harpoon missiles each and its 62 supersonic B-1 bombers are currently being modified to carry up to 24 LRASM (a missile with twice the warhead weight of Harpoon) per plane.