Brit’s Royal Air Force Faces “Total Wipeout” in the Event of Conflict with Russia

(DEFENCE SECURITY ASIA) – A British Parliamentary report critically concluded that the country’s air force has a “too small” number of combat aircraft, leaving it with no chance in case of an armed conflict with Russia.

The British’s Royal Air Force (RAF)  according to the report, faces “total wipeout” if it confronts the Russian Air Force,which is equipped with various combat aircrafts to perform a multitude of operations.

The Parliamentary report states that the number of Eurofighter Typhoon and F-35 fighter aircraft operated by the RAF is too small to face the estimated 1,500 combat aircraft of the Russian Air Force.

The RAF is reported to have only 169 combat aircraft, the smallest number since World War II due to cuts in defense budget by the British government.

In 1990, Britain was reported to have as many as 463 combat aircraft, but the number has been slowly declining due to the shrinking defense budget.

The report by the British Parliament also stated that Britain currently has the lowest number of combat aircraft compared to other European powers such as Germany and France.

At present, France has a total of 231 combat aircraft, Germany has 214 combat aircraft, and Italy has 199 combat aircraft.

“In a war with Russia, every combat aircraft is crucial. Britain’s defense planning will result in a continued defense capability gap until 2030.

“This is unacceptable. The Ministry of Defense and the RAF need to take immediate action to increase their number of combat aircraft,” according to the British Parliament report.

Despite facing a critical shortage of combat aircraft, Britain plans to retire about 30 Eurofighter Typhoon fighter aircraft in 2025, five years earlier than originally planned.

 

Members of the British Parliament have criticized their country’s Ministry of Defence for its decision to retire Eurofighter Typhoon fighter aircraft.

“Since the end of the Cold War, the RAF’s fleet has taken a nosedive in numbers, down to just a third of its previous size. Our report found that budget cuts — including those in the last defence command paper — have led to gaps in air capability that will persist into the next decade,” said the report.

“The RAF has prioritized quality at the expense of quantity, leaving us with a fleet of combat aircraft that are high-spec and expensive yet alarmingly low in number. Our current fleet fails to reach the mass necessary to survive the attrition of an all-out war with a peer adversary. Fixing this is a matter of urgency.”

The RAF and the British Ministry of Defense have been criticized for being slow in increasing their number of modern aircraft, particularly the F-35.

Currently, the RAF has only 31 F-35 fighter aircraft developed by Lockheed Martin, and this number is expected to increase to 48 by 2025.

In the end, the RAF is expected to have only 74 F-35 fighter aircraft compared to the originally planned 138 due to defense budget cuts by the government. — DSA