January 4, Britain announced that the British Royal Navy’s “Queen Elizabeth” aircraft carrier battle group formed an initial combat capability (IOC) for the first time, and is expected to travel to the Middle East and Pacific waters this spring to participate in the global deployment of the British army.
This is the first time that the British navy has acquired initial combat capability in an aircraft carrier battle group after 38 years, and the first time that the British navy has an aircraft carrier that can be used for combat since 2014.
However, at present, there is only one squadron of F-35B fighters in Britain, and the United States Marines need to be stationed in an F-35 squadron before they can be deployed.
According to the USNI News on January 5, on January 4, the British government announced that the British Royal Navy’s “Queen Elizabeth” aircraft carrier battle group formed an initial combat capability (IOC) and was about to travel to the Atlantic, Middle East and Pacific this spring.
District, participate in the global deployment of the Royal Navy.
“IOC means all the elements of an aircraft carrier battle group: aircraft carriers, naval aviation, surface escorts, all officers and soldiers, and other combat systems have been integrated and successfully operated,” USNI said in the report.
The aircraft carrier Queen Elizabeth is expected to form full combat capability (FOC) by 2023.
This is also the first time in 38 years that the United Kingdom has the initial combat capability of forming a new aircraft carrier battle group.
At the same time, it also marks that the United Kingdom once again has available aircraft carrier combat power six and a half years after the retirement of the Excellent in 2014.
Jeremy Quinn, the British Secretary of State for Defence Procurement, said at a press conference: “[Forming the IOC capability] is a very important milestone for Queen Elizabeth, the Royal Navy and the whole of the UK.
This achievement proves the determination of our practitioners, who have delivered first-class military capabilities to the country, which only a few countries have. I wish the entire aircraft carrier battle group more progress ahead of the first operational deployment of this year.
Although the aircraft carrier has formed combat effectiveness, there is currently only one carrier-based aircraft squadron in Britain, the 809th Naval Carrier Aircraft Squadron, which is equipped with 12 F-35Bs and is operationally capable.
In the deployment this spring, the British navy will cooperate with the United States Marine Corps.
The United States Marine Corps will dispatch VMF-211 Squadron to the aircraft carrier Queen Elizabeth, and the two countries will cooperate to complete the first deployment.
The standard displacement of the aircraft carrier Queen Elizabeth is 65,000 tons. The cost is 3.1 billion pounds.
Adopt the unique two-ship island design. Because the ship mainly relies on the ejection take-off and landing fighter of friendly aircraft carriers to deal with high-intensity air threats, it chose the U.S.-made F-35B (vertical take-off and landing) fighter as the carrier-based aircraft.
On 8 July 2014, the Queen Elizabeth was launched, and on 7 December 2017, the Royal Navy announced that Queen Elizabeth was in service.
After six years, Britain has a useful aircraft carrier.Currently, the Queen Elizabeth II ship Prince of Wales has entered service in December 2019.
It is expected that the ship will form an initial combat capability in the next few years.
