Memorandum from BMT Defence Services Ltd
THE FUTURE OF THE STRATEGIC NUCLEAR DETERRENT:
THE UK MANUFACTURING AND SKILLS BASE
A SUBMISSION TO
THE HOUSE
OF COMMONS
DEFENCE COMMITTEE
BY BMT DEFENCE
BACKGROUND
1. This short paper is submitted to the
House of Commons Defence Committee as evidence for the inquiry
(advertised via news release No 61) into The Future of the Strategic
Nuclear Deterrent: the UK manufacturing and skills base.
2. The paper is prepared by BMT Defence
Services Ltd, an independent maritime consultancy, and part of
the BMT Defence division, with much experience in nuclear submarine
design and in-service support. For example, we designed for GEC-Marconi
the winning design that was to become the Astute Class; and for
several years we have been providing Design Authority services
for the in-service support of the Vanguard, Trafalgar and Swiftsure
Classes, teamed with Devonport Management Ltd and Systems Engineering
and Assessment Ltd.
3. BMT Defence is a division of BMT Ltd,
an international design, engineering and risk management consultancy
working principally in the defence, energy, environment, marine
technical services and transport sectors. The company's assets
are held in beneficial ownership for its staff, reinforcing our
complete and enduring independence from manufacturing interests,
allowing us to be an impartial advisor to the UK MoD and other
government departments.
THE SUBMARINE
DESIGN CONTEXT
4. BMT can offer views on many aspects of
the design, construction and in-service support of nuclear submarines
but we choose here, for our evidence to the Defence Committee,
to focus solely on the design elements of the skills base. We
are in a position to offer insight and advice on an impartial
basis.
5. A nuclear submarine is the most complex
piece of engineering known to man. Thus nuclear submarine design
is complex, of course, and it embraces many disciplines requiring
specialist skill and experience. It is particularly challenging
because of the vast range of interdependent elements that on the
one hand must be closely integrated, while on the other must be
balanced through careful compromise to achieve an optimum solution.
The solution must satisfy the competing demands (and motivations)
of the prospective owner, the builder, the user and the in-service
maintainer. Furthermore, design proceeds through many overlapping
phases: from the small team of system engineers and naval architects
who establish the fundamental "architecture" of the
solution and lock-in the characteristics that will define overall
performance, cost and timescale; through the production designers
who are looking for the optimum way of fabrication and assembly;
to the very large numbers of manufacturing draftsmen and women
who determine and detail each and every "nut and bolt".
6. Yet successful submarine design is not
a serial process and it is certainly not one that starts with
a completely blank sheet. Designers need to be able to call upon
and integrate many unique technologies that are not found in the
commercial market. These technologies exist (and survive) through
continuous research and development to both further their understanding
and to be ready when designers need to call on them. Furthermore,
whole platform design integration skills are necessary to bring
together all of these specialist skills and technologies to deliver
a successful submarine design.
THE CHALLENGES
7. Not only is a nuclear submarine itself
a very significant design challenge but a nuclear submarine-based
strategic deterrent has the added complication of requiring low
engineering risk to assure excellent submarine availability and
thereby Continuous at Sea Deterrence. This was very much the philosophy
for the Vanguard Class and the preceding Resolution Class. Low
risk solutions require reliance on as much proven technology as
possible yet with the ability to survive the in-service challenge
of obsolescence.
8. Furthermore, in the current climate the
UK would be seeking a low cost solution against an industrial
cost base that today is far from fully understood. One lesson
from the Astute procurement is that the attempted "transfer"
of risk to industry has cost government dear and the full cost
remains uncertain, in part because so many of the suppliers have
suffered from lack of investment since Vanguard.
9. Finally, we are clear that much of the
skill and experience that existed to allow the Vanguard Class
to be such a success has perished and worse, the investment needed
to sustain knowledge, skill or keep technology moving has been
ad hoc at best.
THE CRITICAL
SUCCESS FACTORS
10. With respect to any future campaign,
it is instructive to remind ourselves what history tells us, ie
what were the Critical Success Factors for the Vanguard Class?
From our perspective the following are relevant:
(a) The MoD took the key risks of the project
onto their own shoulders at the outset, particularly the major
design architecture and hence the major performance parameters.
Key contractors were then employed for their proven strengths,
avoiding unnecessary stretch or risk transfer (and hence cost).
(b) The skills inside the MoD had been nurtured
for many years with a selection, training and active career development
that gave confidence to take and manage the major risks. There
was accessible and cost-effective expertise at all levels, from
research and development, through design, construction oversight
to in-service support.
(c) In addition, these MoD skills had been
continually exercised through a well-paced, steady programme of
nuclear submarine design and construction. For the rarer, front-end
concept design skills, the MoD had kept these exercised through
a continuous programme of design and technology exploration, developing
many new concepts on paper. That they were never built was not
the point; a full new design sees fruition every 10 years or so,
however the core design skills need to be kept cycled more regularly
than this to ensure they are refreshed and available when needed.
(d) This constant design exploration did
expose the technological weaknesses and defined the investment
needed in development programmes that had long lead times, for
example in propulsion technology. Many relatively small, but long-lead,
developments were taken forward by specialist contractors, driven
by the MoD's leadership and investment. This in-turn kept many
specialists in industry alive, stimulated and continuing to develop
their experience.
(e) At initiation of the Vanguard project,
many factors were already in place thanks to years of prior investment.
The MoD's own people were ready to provide professional leadership
and ownership of the major risks. Many of the critical technologies
were already well advanced, understood and of low enough risk.
The many specialist industrial suppliers were well-stimulated
by the build of the Trafalgar class, and those involved in design
and development had benefited from several years' prior investment.
(f) From a design point of view the Vanguard
jigsaw puzzle was relatively easy: most of the pieces were well
under development through foresight that was not necessarily anticipating
the Vanguard Class per se. This foresight was driven simply by
the belief that to stay in the business of nuclear submarines,
one had to keep submarine technology moving for an inevitable
new design at some stage. The propulsion system had started development
years earlier and would be sufficiently well proven in its shore
test facilities; the strategic weapon system was a choice of systems
developed or developing in the US; and the "tactical"
weapon system and other platform systems were taken from the Trafalgar
class which continued to benefit from investment, improvement
and the avoidance of obsolescence in its systems.
THE CRITICAL
SUCCESS FACTORS
FOR THE
FUTURE
11. While we would never have been able
to repeat that formula exactly for a new system, the comparison
between the foundations of the successful Vanguard project and
where we are today are stark.
12. We would suggest that there are two
key questions for government to address as it shapes the way forward
for the skills it needs:
(a) Where are the project's main risks to
be owned and managed? If in industry, then there will be a substantial
and presently unquantifiable premium of money and time involved,
but industry needs early investment to recruit and train. If in-house,
then there needs to be a very rapid investment in skills and a
conscious effort to re-brigade those skills where they do still
exist in other projects, to enable the technical and project leadership
to be undertaken in a similar fashion to the successful Vanguard
project.
(b) Are we ready to invest early in the rapid
development and de-risking of the new technologies needed? If
yes, then the associated specialist skills can still be preserved,
stimulated and readied for the eventual overall design activity;
and those more fragile specialist suppliers can be helped to survive,
ready to play their part.
13. In short, nuclear submarine designers
and submarine design technology exist for only one customer, the
government. This is not a competitive market and there are no
other customers for these specialist skills. That single customer
has to preserve and nurture the skills it needs—directly
through investment that allows recruitment and training, and indirectly
through sponsoring the essential design and development activity
that is needed to keep that skill current and available, as well
as readying the technology that we will need.
14. Recognising the lessons we should be
learning from Vanguard and Astute and given the likely in-service
date of a new submarine-based deterrent, we may already be too
late. But that should not deter the simple decision that is needed
now. Nuclear submarine ownership is not about discrete projects
that arrive from time to time, it is about a continuum of activity.
If the UK wishes to remain a nuclear submarine owning and operating
nation then we should stop trying to switch the skills on and
off like a tap—we must invest now and be ready to sustain
that investment. We can, of course at any time, turn the tap off—but
that should only be on the basis that the UK is certainly pulling
out of an indigenous nuclear submarine business.
CONTACT DETAILS
15. BMT Defence remains happy to help further
the Committee's inquiry in any way it can.
2 October 2006
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