TUESDAY 14 JULY 1998

GENERAL SIR CHARLES GUTHRIE, GCB, LVO, OBE, ADC

  1780. The Apache, which is a machine which I am sure every Member of this Committee shares your enthusiasm for, which all of us welcome coming into service, does have an enormous logistic tail. The Americans with their huge strategic air lift capability, even they have some difficulty getting them out as quickly with their airborne troops. Realistically this will mean, will it not, that we cannot deploy a brigade fast anywhere in any guise? There will not be a brigade within the British armed forces which can be deployed really fast anywhere unless it is a relatively short sea time on a coast line?
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) You said yourself about the airborne division that it could only hold ground for a very short time before somebody else came and helped them. I think the same applies—different scale—to us. I think that one of the reasons why we need wide bodied jets is so that we can put Apache helicopters in the battlefield.

  1781. We gave up on the refuelling package for the Apache because we realised it would take so long.
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) Refuelling is something we are actively looking at and I am hoping we will be able to get air to air refuelling in some of our helicopters quite soon. You are quite right it is a very important thing to do. I go back to this point, there is not much point putting a light force on the ground unless it can be reinforced with something appropriate very soon.

  1782. We all agree on that. CDS, we went from a configuration with five armoured/mechanised brigades and two air manoeuvre brigades, albeit the air mobile one was with wings, in effect helicopters, to six armoured brigades and one air manoeuvre brigade.
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) Armoured and mechanised brigades.

  1783. Absolutely. The thing that some of us find rather curious is trying to push these two rather different organisations into one brigade.
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) First of all, I do not think they are very different. They are different but they are both air minded and both look to the future at the cutting edge of the British army. I thought it was entirely appropriate to put them together. A lot of people in the military, certainly when I was Chief of General Staff, wondered why we had not done it in the first place.

  1784. There is still a huge difference in readiness levels. One is a high punch, medium readiness, the other is a low punch very fast readiness.
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) Readiness is not quite the right term, it is getting on the ground, it is a bit different.

  1785. Just to come back for a moment to your point on parachuting. Last year we had airborne forces stood by for the rescue from Central Africa, and in the end they were able to be stood down, an earlier option opened itself up. Could you tell the Committee was 1 Battalion Group stood up or 2 Battalion Group stood up?
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) I cannot remember.

  1786. Could we have an answer in writing on that?
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) Yes.

  Mr Brazier: It does seem rather strange, purely from a political angle as much as a military one, the idea that you could deploy your only parachute force and not be able to reinforce them for example if they were to fail to capture the air head or for example if it involved a larger engineer requirement. Thank you.

  1787. The question I have is about the Royal Air Force. There has been some comment that the Chief of the Air Staff's message to the air force was perhaps a little bit less sanguine than his colleagues. He said: "I very much regret the need to remove 36 fast jets from the front line." He said that the SDR has involved some difficult decisions. When the Committee went to RAF Brugen recently we met airmen who had been serving as part of the 6th operational tours that the RAF were supporting at the beginning of this year. There was concern from the airmen that we met about the sustainability of those people and to a degree the aircraft because they had virtually no spare serviceable aircraft, they were right at flying duty in Germany. The whole thing was being used to sustain operations abroad. They were sceptical to us about whether the reduction of a squadron of aircraft—as they anticipated I think it is two and 36 aircraft in the White Paper—was going to make their task more difficult, leaving aside the people issues on the other side. I wonder whether CAS is giving the air force a coded message about that there is an operational difficulty arising out of the SDR?
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) I know you are going to have an opportunity to ask him. I think the point I would make would be that it was debated and clearly he would have preferred to have kept them. We are actually keeping the majority of the people and that will make a lot of difference to the fellow at Brugen because he will have his burden shared by additional people who have been thrown up by having these aircraft taken out, that will be an advantage to him. As far as spares are concerned, I am not quite sure exactly what he was talking about. I am sure you are right.

  1788. Your operational judgment is that we will be able to sustain the current operational posture?
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) Yes.

  1789. Can I ask then, looking forward to Eurofighter, Eurofighter is one of the biggest defence programmes ever. It was protected before the Defence Review began. What contributions do Eurofighters bring to the new concept of joint operations?
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) It is an enormously effective aircraft which will be able to support the new concept better than it is supported now. As you know, it is a very great improvement so having them will make it easier for us to operate it on the ground. Was there something more?

  1790. Whether because the Eurofighter is primarily an air defence aircraft, whether the fact that we choose to protect 232 of them in a programme at a cost of £15 billion and given the difficulty of sustaining the programme as it is, if there are significant appreciations in that procurement programme it is going to punch on a budget which is already stretched, whether the value of Eurofighter itself should indeed be questioned in the SDR because of the expeditionary nature it is going through?
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) It was discussed and debated and we came up with the conclusion that 232 was the number we wanted. That was part of this balanced package which I have talked about.

  1791. Some people might think if one was going to have an air package with it one might want more joint strike fighters than Eurofighters.
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) We debated it and it seemed a sensible way forward.

  1792. The Joint Helicopter Command and the fact that all Harriers are now going to be brought under one command in Joint Force 2000, a heavy lift, you are looking at private finance initiatives and the question of possibly even civilian operation of some part of the heavy lift capability. The air defence element is being brought into the joint arrangement with the army. The MBC regiment is going to be joint army and Royal Air Force. What exactly will be the remaining functions of the Royal Air Force?
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) Is that a serious question?

  Mr Blunt: Yes, it is.

  Chairman: It is a very good debating point.

  1793. So many of the functions of the Royal Air Force are capable of being made joint. In your judgment do you think we have now arrived at the point that these joint initiatives with the Royal Air Force are really about as far as they can go without getting into the strategic air element?
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) I think there are certain things we will be able to do rather better, certain aspects of training we might be able to make more joint. As I said before, to answer another question, there is a very important point and that is that the single service ethos, the way our pilots fight, I still believe although we may not be the biggest air force in the world, we are the best air force in the world. One of the reasons is because of the way they go about their business. I think it is very important not to throw that away and we will not throw it away. I think the Secretary of State, as somebody said, was very robust on this when he was asked this question yesterday and I would be.

  1794. Final question to ask you to send a note on the budget details of the Royal Air Force and the army, as you have promised on the navy.
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) Certainly.

  Mr Blunt: The last figures we have from the 1996 White Paper which lay out the budget speech, top level budget holder, perhaps we can have an updated version of that?

  1795. We have been persuaded there was a degree of logic in the navy losing SSMs and frigates, the Tornadoes being put in storage, it would be helpful if we could have it costed. In other words what is the country going to save from losing what I think many of us would still see as a very important capability? Whilst it could not be answered now, General, before our inquiry is over I would like that information.
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) Chairman, certainly.

  1796. For my part, Sir Charles, the debate about whether the Royal Air Force should remain a strategic force or should somehow become a support service, the fact that debate appears to have been resolved in the first alternative is a matter of some satisfaction. Can I ask you about Eurofighter. I think I am right the Germans are proposing to take some multi role version rather than for air defence. Of the 232 that the United Kingdom propose to order, has any consideration been given to using them in a multi role version or buying them in a multi role version?
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) They are in a multi role version. We have two squadrons who are.

  Mr Campbell: Of the 232, what is that, 14 in a squad, 16 in a squad?

  Mr Blunt: 12.

  1797. How many?
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) 16.

  1798. Yes, I think the old days of 12 to a squadron have been overtaken.
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) Yes.

  1799. Something like 32 will be available.
  (Sir Charles Guthrie) Yes, at least in the front line for training.