S2C2 ‘Pathfinder’ study concludes UK NAVAL PROGRAMMES
A
GROUNDBREAKING ‘Pathfinder ’ project initiated to establish a through-
life roadmap for sustaining the Royal Navy’s surface combatant capability, concluded its year-long study at the end of March 2007. Known as the Sustained Surface Combatant
Capability (S2C2), the rainbow team brought together representatives from across the Ministry of Defence, together with secondees from BAE Systems, BMT Defence Services, DML, QinetiQ, Thales Naval UK, and VT Shipbuilding. Designed to identify better ways for the MoD
to procure and support the Royal Navy’s surface combatant force out to at least 2035, the S2C2 programme was established in April 2006 with five core objectives in mind:
• Create a better understanding of the military capability the UK needs to sustain; how to manage it; and how to achieve it.
• Deliver by mid-2007 a roadmap on how future Joint Maritime Surface Combatant Capability should be procured and implemented.
• Ensure that these suggestions are workable and have the full support of MoD and industry.
• Ensure these solutions will result in reliable delivery to the front line, while delivering better value for money for taxpayers.
• Enable the creation of a better working culture between MoD and industry.
‘We need to identify a strategy to determine
the transition from the current to the future, and what investment [we should] make in our current ships vis-à-vis new ship replacements,’ said Commodore Steve Brunton RN, S2C2 team leader. ‘My scope is focused on the Type 22/Type 23/FSC transition issue but we also need to consider impacts from the Future Carrier and Type 45, and also the impact we may have on programmes like the Future Mine Countermeasures Capability.’ ‘The principal output from S2C2 will be a
single capability strategy, supported by a costed Capability Management Plan, coherent with all defence lines of development, which will address surface combatant sustainability out to the 2035-40 timeframe. But the Pathfinder approach will also look to develop and embed innovative processes and pioneering advancements in capability planning and management,’ Commodore Brunton explained. Another S2C2 goal has been ‘to find ways
of attacking the cost growth in new warship procurement programmes,’ according to Commodore Brunton. It has sought to ‘engineer better alignment between research, science, and
S2C2 focussed on the transition from the Royal Navy’s Type 22/Type 23 and FSC, but also considered impacts from the Future Carrier and Type 45.
The capability currently delivered by the Type 22s and Type 23s would be replaced by C1 and C2, while C3 would replace the capabilities of the Royal Navy’s dedicated mine countermeasures fleet, but also offer additional capability for maritime security tasks.
40 WARSHIP TECHNOLOGY MAY 2007
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