Why is the Royal Navy sending HMS Dragon to the Strait of Hormuz?

0:02Sky News, the full story first.

0:11The UK is finally deploying to the Strait of Hormuz, and this is why.

0:22I'm Sam Coates from Sky News. And I'm Anne McElvoy from Politico. Downing Street drama, leadership battles and policy U-turns. We're on it before it breaks. We take you straight into the rooms where the real political conversations are happening. Smart Insight, clear analysis in your feeds by 7.45am. So you start your morning fully brief for the day ahead in British politics. Hit follow and listen to Politics at Sam & Anne's wherever you get your podcasts.

0:57Hi everyone, Neil here. And today we thought we'd focus on the contribution the UK is making to reopening the Strait of Hormuz. You all know the story by now. The US starts a wall with Iran. Iran stops oil tankers going through the Strait. The rest of the world watches as prices go skywards. But when, fingers crossed, a ceasefire is agreed, there will need to be some kind of system, some alliance in place to make sure the Strait stays open. This only makes sense if it's part of a multinational effort. But we're not sure how many nations will turn up with their hardware when it matters. We've now learned the detail of the British ship, planes and tech that will soon be in the region, if not already.

1:34But what can we actually do? Everything we have in military terms is technically very good, but it's all in the shop window. Take it out of the window, there's nothing in the storeroom behind. Professor Michael Clarke is Sky's defence analyst. Michael, great to see you again. And look, lots to talk about in terms of the stuff that we are going to send to the Gulf. But this does feel like quite a significant moment for the region, of course, but actually for our military as well. We're going to see what they can do. Yes, I mean, after some months of planning and potential coordination between a range of allies, I mean, almost 40 different allies have been involved in the conversations.

2:10Now some real ships are turning up. So the French have sent the Charles de Gaulle, the aircraft carrier, which is a very powerful ship, and HMS Dragon, the British destroyer, is on its way or will be there very shortly, and other ships are beginning to arrive. Now, this task force may not go into operation for some time because it's all based on the idea that if there is a ceasefire, if the Strait of Hummers are partially or completely open, there may be a role for other forces to play, non-American forces. And so, yes, there's a reality to all of this now that the hardware is beginning to assemble.

2:42And if you're listening to Donald Trump, I mean, that ceasefire could happen in the next five minutes or at some point in the next five years. Let's assume, though, it's going to be somewhere between the two of those and talk about what we have deployed. And as you say, HMS Dragon, Type 45 destroyer, already close by and speeding its way there. Yeah, I mean, the HMS Dragon was sent, you know, very controversially to Cyprus when it arrived some weeks late because it had to be got ready and it was sent. It took some time. And then it had to go to Crete because it had a maintenance problem, and it went to the base in Crete for repairs, and has now gone through the Suez Canal and down the Red Sea.

3:18I'm not sure where it is as of today, but it's certainly going to be in the area. If it isn't there already, it'll be there very soon. And the Type 45, it's a daring class destroyer. Now, we've got six of them. Five of them are not in the water. Dragon is the only one that's operational at the moment. Sorry, we've got six Type 45s, and five of them are what, knackered? They're all being under maintenance or in repair. And that's partly because our maintenance facility has been cut back. We've got ships queuing up for maintenance in very limited facilities. And so it sounds crazy when you say there are six really able Type 45s.

3:52Only one of them, one of them, HMS Dragon, is operational. And so there it is. And you can always tell the Daring Class destroyers. They're the ones with the big sort of pyramid on top. They look very futuristic. You can't really see the armaments. But what they do is they are very good anti-aircraft or drone or anti-missile missiles. So they can cope with lots of different threats. So if a ship has got, you know, six or eight different things coming at it simultaneously, the system will take them all out. So it's very effective. It's a good defensive structure. It's probably, you know, it's one of the one or two best destroyer types in the world doing what it does, which is air defence.

4:27So it will very specifically be in the straightforward moves to guard against Iranian drone attacks. Well, that's one thing it could do. So it's also an anti-submarine warfare ship. And so it has ASW capabilities that probably wouldn't be required in this case, but it might, in the sense that if a ship was in the Strait of Humboldt, it would have to worry about air attacks. But the Iranians are known to have some mini submarines and stealthy submarines, and nobody's entirely sure how many of the Americans may have destroyed, probably not all of them. So there may be a submarine threat as well.

4:56And again, a Type 45 should be able to cope with that. Another thing that we know that the Iranians have plenty of, or we're told at the very least, mines. Hence us sending what I'm told is autonomous mine hunting kit and abrasive specialists as well. What is this autonomous kit? Yeah, I mean, this is sixth generation warfare because, you know, we used to have mine countermeasure vessels. So we used to run the hunter class vessels and the sand down vessels. We used to have four of them in Bahrain. I mean, right where they needed to be. Funny that, eh? We had them right on call where we needed to be.

5:27Exactly. They would have been in the right place. HMS Bangor was one of them, the Chiddingford, the Middleton. The last one was the Middleton, and that came out at the beginning of this year. Now, those are old legacy systems of the old, the literally mind hunters with either wooden or plastic fiberglass hulls so they don't have much of a radar signature. And they used to do the job mind hunting in the old-fashioned way. The new sixth generation stuff is to use robotics and drones and sensors, the towed array sonars and so on. And all of this is based on the Lime Bay. Now, the Lime Bay is a Royal Fleet auxiliary ship that was sent to Gibraltar for extended maintenance to save money prior, we thought, to its being scrapped.

6:08Just for those who don't know what an RFE, a Royal Fleet auxiliary ship is, is it part of the Navy? It's sort of to the side. It's an auxiliary part of the Navy. But the people who man them are merchant seamen. Right. And so the Royal Fleet Auxiliary is critical to the performance of the Navy. It carries the oil, it carries the supply. It's the resupply, isn't it? Exactly. And whenever the Navy goes anywhere in force, then an RFA ship needs to be available or nearby or go with it or whatever. And the RFA is an intrinsically important part of the Navy, but that's been run down as well, and the RFA's got quite a problem.

6:38And the Lyme Bay was laid up in Gibraltar on extended maintenance to save money. prior, we all thought, to it being scrapped. Because of the crisis, it's been sent back to sea, and the Lime Bay is now acting as the mothership for all these robotic technologies. And that's the idea. So the Lime Bay, when it gets there, or when it operates there, if it operates there, will operate with these teams of people. They're not big teams. They're only about 25 people in the first tranche. So it's not as if we've got hundreds of people doing this, but we've got some dozens of people doing it. And they are able to operate with these robotic sensors.

7:11So the new way of dealing with mines, And it is the new way, and the Americans are working on it as well, but they haven't got much investment in it either. But the new way of working on countermines is to do it with robotic ships. And so we have this, what's called the beehive system. And that's what the Ministry of Defense is talking about. We will deploy the beehive system. And that's based on what's called Kraken technology, a series of Kraken drone boats. I know the Kraken from mythology. I'm not so sure I know it from a kit and equipment. Exactly. Well, it's Kraken technology. Right. were very good.

7:40And they produced these boats some time ago, actually, but they're literally little robotic boats. They're only about 12, 15 feet long. And the MOD placed an order, I think, in March, originally for 20 of them. But I think the problem needs more than that. If the Beehive system launches these drone boats, these drone boats can go into shallow waters, dangerous waters. They can survey what's there on the surface, below the surface, on the seabed. And then they can deploy all sorts of technologies to neutralize the mines as they discover them. So there's not one system. It's a series of systems pulled together called the Beehive.

8:12And, of course, it's called the Beehive because it's lots of busy things happening all at once. But, you know, we've got it. Nobody else has developed it quite to this level. We're probably ahead of the Americans on this. But we've only got the one system with relatively few people doing it and one RFA ship, the Lime Bay, acting as the mothership. We have got a little bit more when it comes to air support, a name that people may well be familiar with already. The Typhoon, I mean, are those already in the region? Are they not based at RAF Akrotiri? Akrotiri, yeah. We always have Typhoons at Akrotiri.

8:45And they're normally deployed in flights of four. So we normally keep four there and we opted to eight. I wouldn't be surprised there aren't 12 there now. But the other ones are in Al-Odid in Doha. And interestingly, with Qatar in Doha, we have a joint squadron. Number 12 squadron is a joint RAF-Qatari Air Force squadron flying typhoons. And it was developed because the Qataris bought Typhoon, we re-established 12 squadron as a joint training squadron. So RAF pilots and Qatari pilots worked together to train up on the typhoon. But it worked so well that when the training was completed, sensible idea, they kept the squadron going.

9:22My goodness, it's proved its worth. It's really handy. And the Qataris, when this war began in the end of February, the Qataris said, can we have all of the 12 Squadron Typhoons into Doha, please, rather than some of them in the UK? And of course, that's what they've done. And 12 Squadron, my understanding is, have been very, very busy. We have Typhoons that can go elsewhere. They go to other bases in the Middle East as well. But the two main centres are Akwateri and Al-Udid in Doha. Taken together then, how effective a force have we sent? Well, we won't know unless or until it operates. But the typhoons have been pretty effective insofar as aircraft can be effective against cruise missiles and drones.

10:00They're not very effective against ballistic missiles because ballistic missiles just come in too quickly. I mean, what we have is a competent force. But like everything else we deploy, until it's tested, we're not sure. But it's too small. You know, one Type 45, not two frigates and two Type 45s, one Type 45, one beehive system with 20-odd people. Maybe it's more than that now, but it was originally 20-odd people. And we don't have any backup. We don't have any sustainability in these forces. And that's the trouble. Everything we have in military terms is technically very good, but it's all in the shop window.

10:34And when you take it out of the window, there's nothing in the storeroom behind. Which is absolutely a fair point. But we're not doing this alone, are we? I mean, there are other nations who will be contributing. Absolutely, yeah. I mean, this only makes sense if it's part of a multinational effort. And as I say, I mean, about 40 nations were involved in the preliminary discussions going back, been held on an almost weekly basis between military professionals. But we're not sure how many nations will turn up with their hardware when it matters. But Britain and France, or I should say France and Britain, really.

11:01France has really taken the lead on this. France and Britain are making the running by saying, we will put our hardware on the line. We will create the structure. And Britain does have the headquartering abilities at Northwood. We've got a permanent joint, the PGHQ, permanent joint headquarters and the naval headquarters at Northwood. So we have the physical communication abilities to command and coordinate a multinational force of any number of nations. Very few nations can do that, but we can. I mean, the French have got one as well, but I think Northwood is probably regarded as the world's best outside Norfolk, Virginia, the American headquarters.

11:35But even with the assistance of France and a number of other nations, can we truly protect ships going through the Strait Reformers? This incredibly narrow stretch of water, you know, flanked on either side by mountains that tower over. I mean, it's a perfect spot if you want to ambush ships. Yeah, to death trap. Yeah. In a war, to death trap. No question. I mean, 33 kilometres at its narrowest point. You know, exactly the same width as the English Channel at its narrowest point. The presumption of all of this, and they've said this again and again and again, is that only in a ceasefire would this become feasible.

12:14We're not going to get involved while there is a shooting war going on for exactly that reason. You can't demine the Strait of Hormuz if the Iranians have got capacity to stop you and are determined to do so. And that's the great problem with this whole operation. If there is peace, then you don't really need a big force there. And if there isn't peace, then you're not going to put a big force there.

12:43I'm Sam Coates from Sky News. And I'm Anne McElvoy from Politico. Downing Street drama, leadership battles and policy U-turns. We're on it before it breaks. We take you straight into the rooms where the real political conversations are happening. Smart Insight, clear analysis in your feeds by 7.45am. so you start your morning fully brief for the day ahead in British politics. Hit follow and listen to Politics at Simon & Anne's wherever you get your podcasts.

13:19The fact that you and I have not mentioned the Americans up till now in anything but a tangential form seems strange to me, but this is very much an operation without the Americans. their war, but we're doing the job of clearing up after them. And at these planning meetings that have been going on for these weeks, the Americans were there only as observers. I mean, nobody wanted to freeze them out. No, of course not. We want you to know what's being done. But the US was there as an observer, is not a participant, because the Europeans are not part of the Americans' war. And they're very clear on that politically.

13:50You know, we have to deal with the consequences of this war. We have to look after our own interests. But we didn't launch the war. You didn't ask us about it. We're not trying to launch a war on Iran. And we will respond if the Iranians attack us. That's our problem, not your war, is what they're saying. That was going to be my point, because to be fair, it does look, even if we're not active participants in the current conflict, we're coming pretty close to it. And putting our assets into that part of the world risks the Iranians targeting us. And I don't know what we'd do if, for example, Shahed drone hits HMS Dragon, resulting in the deaths of British sailors.

14:25Well, that would be the risk. It's hard to say what you then do by way of retaliation unless you knew where the Shahid drone had come from and the chances are you won't. What you're pointing to, Neil, is this incredible paradox. And the paradox is that, you know, if this force is necessary, then it can't work because it's too dangerous. And if it's not necessary, why are we doing it? But in the middle of that, the reality will probably be messy. The political reality will probably be that, yes, there's a ceasefire. Yes, the straits are supposed to be open. Yes, this force will act as a reassurance.

14:56And there'll be some spoilers. Not everybody in the IRGC, the Islamic Republican Guard Corps, wants a peace to happen. There are any number of spoilers. And so you can't guarantee that there won't be rogue elements that will take potshots at any ships in the Strait of Humas. And that may be a role that this force might occupy. Not that they would be involved in a war with Iran, but they'd offer reassurance against rogue elements that might take pot shots at merchant ships. See, that's the thing that really concerns me, because it doesn't take much for what is ostensibly a maritime protection operation to very quickly metamorphose into a shooting gallery.

15:34Correct. Yeah, absolutely right. I mean, nobody pretends this is somehow risk-free, and it's all new territory for Western politics, because we're operating now, you know, not along with the Americans, as part of the Americans. I mean, you know, the Atlantic Alliance is in a terrible mess, and this Iran war has really split the United States from Europe in ways that I think was very predictable. You know, on the first day of the war, on the 28th of February, six o 'clock in the morning, I got the call from Sky says, this is happening, you better get up. And I literally, I got out of bed and I was stumbling to the bathroom.

16:05And my first thought as I stumbled to the bathroom is that this is going to be really bad for transatlantic relations. None of it is safe. All of it is insecure and dangerous. Well, you mentioned politics there, which gives me the opportunity to segue very quickly to what's been happening on the home front for a while. I mean, look, obviously you're a military man, a defence man, but you can't have failed to notice the schism that exists in British politics right now. What effect might that have on our ability to contribute to this mission? I think two things. One is we should keep it in perspective in the sense that all of the major political leaders in Europe are in similar sorts of situations of their own making.

16:44So Macron has been through these crises. He's a sort of lame duck president. Frederick Mertz in Germany is in deep, deep trouble, different to Starmer's trouble, but he's no less insecure than Starmer, I think, at the moment. Giorgio Maloney is having a really tough time in Italy. All of them are finding their domestic base is sort of evaporating. So in one sense, Starmer is joining the club. Par for the course. Exactly. With this big majority, suddenly he himself is in very desperate straits. But having said that, the fact that Britain is now seen as continuing its sort of cycle of political instability, that's obviously a bad thing.

17:18I mean, our allies, I think, had thought with its Labour government of 2024, OK, well, Britain is now the reliable country again, the stable partner. They've got a programme. The idea that we now throw ourselves back into this psychodrama of leadership diminishes anyone's faith in Britain to maintain a consistent policy. But there are practicalities as well, aren't there? I mean, you and I are speaking just minutes after the king finished addressing parliament. And as yet, no specific mention of the defence investment plan that you and I have spoken about a number of times on this podcast. I mean, if a government is atrophied at the top, if a government is navel gazing about its own internal domestic politics whatsoever, big picture stuff like getting on and buying all the new kit, we may need to fight wars in a handful of years.

18:07That doesn't seem to be the priority at the very least. That's the danger. The psychodrama of leadership actually gets in the way of real policy. The defence investment plan, it is said, is now going to come out next week. But I mean, the number of times it's been put back and put back. It was ready before Christmas in, I think, late November, early December. It was given to Downing Street as a completed plan. And Downing Street, presumably after showing it to the Treasury, threw it back. And people say they're working to complete it. Well, it was complete, but it's been rewritten and rewritten and rewritten.

18:37So we'll see, I hope next week, what it will come down to. I had hoped that there would be a specific mention of it in the King's speech. It doesn't sound as if there has been. But if the DIP comes out, then that's an important step forward. If it gets delayed again, then I think everybody in the defence business will just go back to banging their heads on the desk. Let's finish, Michael, where we started and with the British operation in the Strait of Hormuz. we cannot understate how potentially risky this is, can we? I mean, it could all go horribly, horribly wrong and very quickly. Yeah, it could.

19:10I mean, we've had personnel in the area for many years and we've got personnel at the air bases and at the naval base. Al Jafir in Bahrain is partly a naval base that we share. We've got personnel all over the place. But as of this week, we've now got the Dragon and the Lion Bay there and they're there to do a job. Whether they'll do that job, whether circumstances will arise, we just don't know. But yeah, you're right. I mean, suddenly we've got some hardware in harm's way. That's what it comes to. Michael, always a pleasure. Thanks very much. Thanks for listening. Now, if you want to know a lot more about HMS Dragon, we spoke to the defence analyst Tom Sharp a wee while back.

19:47He spent almost three decades in the Navy, and you can find the link to his insights in the notes attached to the episode. We're back again tomorrow.

20:04I'm Sam Coates from Sky News. And I'm Anne McElvoy from Politico. Downing Street drama, leadership battles and policy U-turns. We're on it before it breaks. We take you straight into the rooms where the real political conversations are happening. Smart Insight, clear analysis in your feeds by 7.45am. So you start your morning fully brief for the day ahead in British politics. Hit follow and listen to Politics at Sam & Anne's wherever you get your podcasts.