DEFENCE F-35 Lightning in UK service
UK Lightnings:
a decade on
This July, it will be ten years since the UK accepted its first Lockheed Martin F-35B Lightning. PETER FELSTEAD looks back at a decade of the fifth-generation stealth fighter in British service.
Three of the six UK F-35Bs deployed to RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus in May 2019. Later that year these aircraft flew armed reconnaissance sorties over Iraq and Syria as part of Operation ‘Shader’, constituting the type’s first operational missions in UK service. Crown Copyright/Cpl Tim Laurence
While an overall UK requirement for 138 F-35s, as laid down within the 2015 Strategic Defence and Security Review, remains and continues to be the subject of some debate, the RAF has, meanwhile, got on with the job of turning its Lightning force into an effective source of combat air power, projectable by both land and sea.
Beginnings
While the UK’s selection of the F-35 overall has always remained solid as the programme’s only Level 1 partner, the UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) has occasionally agonised over the type of F-35 to procure.
The UK formally announced its intention to acquire the B-variant short take-off and vertical landing (STOVL) version of the F-35 in 2002, but the MoD’s 2010 Strategic Defence and Security Review (SDSR) upended that plan. Instead, it was decided that the F-35C carrier variant (CV) would be procured along with the requisite conversion of one of the Royal Navy’s new Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carriers to a full-on ‘cats and traps’ carrier featuring the Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System (EMALS) used by the USS Gerald R Ford carrier programme (with the second UK carrier no longer becoming operational).
While such a plan would have maximised interoperability with the US Navy, the cost of fitting catapults and arrestor gear to second-in-build UK carrier Prince of Wales was by 2012 deemed to be £2bn – double the original estimate. Added to that would be the training and operational cost of maintaining CV operations and concerns remained about the wisdom of accepting the carrier strike capability gaps that would be inevitable with only one RN carrier operational.
On 10 May 2012, therefore, then UK Defence Secretary Philip Hammond announced the MoD’s second U-turn on the F-35 with the reversion back to the plan to buy the F-35B STOVL variant. The decision to order an initial batch of 48 F-35Bs was then made in July 2012.
THE CHALLENGE OF FLYING FROM A CARRIER BY DAY AND NIGHT HAS NOT GONE AWAY, BUT THE SAME ADVANCES MAKE THE F-35B A MORE STRAIGHTFORWARD AIRCRAFT TO FLY THAN THE HARRIER IN V/STOL
Meanwhile, plans to field a mixed fleet of F-35Bs and conventional take-off and landing (CTOL) F-35As that first emerged in mid-2010 as a cost-cutting measure were dismissed in September 2013.
The UK’s first F-35B, known as BK-1, was formally accepted at a ceremony at Lockheed Martin’s facility in Fort Worth, Texas, on 19 July 2012. This was the first of four pre-operational UK F-35Bs to be used for training and operational test and evaluation at Eglin Air Force Base (AFB) in Florida and Edwards AFB in California, where British pilots and maintainers were initially stood up.
April 2018 saw the RAF’s 617 Squadron – the legendary Dambusters of World War Two fame – reformed in preparation for the arrival of the first RAF F-35Bs to be permanently based in the UK. This event duly occurred two months later on 6 June 2018, when four F-35Bs arrived at RAF Marham, their home base, after a 6,500km journey from Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort in South Carolina, accompanied by Airbus Voyager aerial refuelling aircraft.
In November 2018 the RAF announced that the initial F-35s from 617 Sqn had taken part in their first international exercise, joining UK-based US Air Force (USAF) F-15 and French Air Force Rafale fighters for manoeuvres over East Anglia and the North Sea in Exercise ‘Point Blank’.
Initial Operational Capability – Land (IOC Land) was declared for the UK Lightning Force on 10 January 2019, meaning that British F-35Bs were cleared to carry the AIM-120 advanced mediumrange air-to-air missile (AMRAAM), the AIM-132 advanced short-range air-to-air missile (ASRAAM), and the Paveway IV laser-guided bomb. Although the F-35B is capable of carrying a Terma A/S multimission pod housing a 25mm GAU-22/A Gatling gun (only the F-35A has an internal cannon), there are currently no plans for British F-35Bs to receive this weapon.
At the time IOC Land was declared, there were nine F-35Bs with 617 Squadron at RAF Marham and eight aircraft in the US.
UK maritime operations with the F-35 got under way in October 2019, when British F-35Bs made their first landings on the Royal Navy aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth before mounting their first flights from the carrier in January 2020.
Deployments
In May 2019 617 Sqn deployed six of its F-35s to RAF Akrotiri on Cyprus for the type’s first overseas deployment. This subsequently led to British F-35s undertaking their first operational missions, when in late 2019 these Cyprus-based aircraft flew armed reconnaissance sorties over Iraq and Syria as part of Operation ‘Shader’ – the UK contribution to the war against the Islamic State group.
The deployment to Cyprus notwithstanding, RAF Lightnings mounted an even more challenging overseas deployment in January 2020 when five F-35Bs from 617 Sqn were deployed alongside RAF Typhoon fighters and a Voyager tanker to Nellis AFB in Nevada for Exercise ‘Red Flag 20-1’.
The foremost international air combat exercise, ‘Red Flag’ in January/February 2020 involved around 18 different aircraft types from the USAF, RAF and Royal Australian Air Force taking part in intensive and realistic air combat training. According to the RAF more than 250 tonnes of equipment were deployed to Nellis AFB to sustain and support the RAF contingent there.
Speaking to AEROSPACE in April, a source within the RAF’s Lightning Force confirmed that the range of operations covered by UK F-35Bs at ‘Red Flag 20-1’ included air-to-air missions (both defensive counterair (DCA) and offensive counter-air (OCA) sweep/ escort missions); air-to-surface missions (dynamic targeting and air interdiction); and also integration into combat search and rescue missions.
Asked what the greatest learning points were with regard to participating in ‘Red Flag 20-1’, the source replied, “An exercise of that size and range was a first for UK F-35s. The challenges included deploying F-35s to and operating from an austere (with regard to F-35 support) location and operating under real warfighting conditions, integrated with international partners and in constrained airspace with realistic peer-on-peer threat replication.”
With regard to UK F-35 attendance at future ‘Red Flags’, the source said, “‘Red Flag’ will continue to be a very important part of UK combat air training and we will attend as often as we can as it fits with operational commitments and other training activity in the UK and with our European and NATO partners.”
Carrier strike returns
Perhaps the most significant deployment for UK F-35s so far, however, came with the May to December 2021 deployment of eight 617 Squadron Lightnings on HMS Queen Elizabeth as part of UK Carrier Strike Group 21 (CSG21). Known as Operation ‘Fortis’, this resurrected the UK’s fixed-wing carrier strike capability, which was lost in December 2010 with the retirement of the UK’s Harrier GR7/9vertical/short take-off and landing (V/STOL) aircraft.
Asked to compare the F-35B with the Harrier, a source within the UK Lightning Force replied, “The technological advances of the F-35B make it and the Harrier almost incomparable. That said, the challenge of flying from a carrier by day and night has not gone away, but the same advances make the F-35B a more straightforward aircraft to fly than the Harrier in V/STOL. This same technology allows the pilot to focus their attention on maximising the mission systems without having to use spare capacity in flying the aircraft during operations.
“The synthetic training really plays a part where missions and tactical training are undertaken before flying in the live environment,” the source added. “Having the deployable mission rehearsal trainers on board the carrier during Op ‘Fortis’ was exceptional, as the use of synthetic training could continue throughout the deployment.”
Last year saw UK F-35Bs operate jointly with US Marine Corps Lightnings as part of CSG21 carrier strike group. Crown Copyright/
The 617 Sqn Lightnings spent seven-and-a-half months on board HMS Queen Elizabeth preparing for CSG21, taking part in UK-based exercises directly before the deployment. The Royal Navy officially declared IOC – Carrier Strike at the beginning of January 2021, with the UK MoD stating at the time that full operating capability for the CSG was expected by December 2023.
When the carrier strike group departed UK waters, also on board were 10 US Marine Corps F-35Bs from Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 211 (VMFA-211), which had also spent time on HMS Queen Elizabeth. From 19 October until 5 November 2020 the F-35Bs from both 617 Sqn and VMFA211 operated alongside each other during Exercise ‘Crimson Warrior’ – the largest exercise run by the RAF in more than a decade.
“This gave both squadrons time to learn each other’s processes and share knowledge ahead of the Op ‘Fortis’ deployment,” said a source from the UK Lightning Force. “The F-35s work to a common tactics’ manual and this was evident from the first time VMFA-211 and 617 Sqn flew together as they were talking the same tactical language in the sky, enabling straightforward interoperability.”
In a cruise that took CSG21 through the Atlantic, Mediterranean, Suez Canal, Indian Ocean and out into the Asia-Pacific region, one of the more interesting episodes occurred in the eastern Mediterranean when the strike group was supporting Operation ‘Shader’. This drew the attention of Russian combat aircraft from Syria, presumably flying out of Hmeimim Air Base. This necessitated high-tempo air interception sorties in addition to other missions, with a UK Lightning Force source stating of these events, “We continue to learn from our adversaries with each and every engagement. Such activity allows us to refine our tactics and procedures accordingly.”
The one downside to CSG21’s cruise occurred on 17 November 2021, when a British F-35B was lost during take-off from HMS Queen Elizabeth, with leaked footage of the incident appearing to show a loss of power as the cause. The pilot ejected and was rescued, while the UK MoD announced on 7 December that the ditched aircraft had been recovered. A source from the UK Lightning Force told AEROSPACE in April that the investigation into the crash ‘is still ongoing’.
Asked what the greatest challenges were during the CSG21 deployment, a source from the Lightning Force cited “operating in multiple environments during one deployment, from the cold weather off the north of Scotland, the heat of the Middle East to the tropical waters and storms, of the Indo-Pacific Region”. The source also cited “the length of the deployment, with personnel being away from their families for an extended period. Many service personnel are used to going away for periods of around six months, but this was the longest many had spent away from their families in many years.”
Asked about the serviceability rates of the British F-35s during CSG21, a Lightning Force source replied that these were “very good throughout the deployment”.
Meanwhile, on 4 March this year it was announced that British F-35Bs from RAF Marham would take part in NATO Enhanced Vigilance Activity over Eastern Europe, providing policing of NATO airspace in response to the Russian aggression against Ukraine. On 8 March it was announced that these aircraft had arrived at Ämari Air Base in Estonia.
Looking ahead
The UK is due to receive another six F-35s this year and seven next year. According to the RAF website, the last of the UK’s initial batch of 48 F-35s “is expected for delivery in January 2025, by which time a schedule for the remaining 90 aircraft, and the formation of further squadrons, is anticipated”. The UK plans to stand up 809 Naval Air Squadron at RAF Marham as the first Royal Navy F-35B unit next year.
Meanwhile, before the F-35B can move toward full operating capability (FOC) in both the land and maritime domains over the next few years, there is more work to be done on weapon integration, most obviously with the MBDA Meteor beyond-visual-range air-to-air missile but also with weapons like MBDA’s Selective Precision Effects At Range (SPEAR) 3 airto-ground missile.
“MBDA is committed to the earliest entry service date of Meteor and SPEAR on F-35 and we continue to jointly work with all stakeholders (industrial and user) to identify opportunities to bring integration dates forward,” a company spokesperson told AEROSPACE. “We have already begun delivery of Meteor test assets for the integration campaign, in case earlier platform trials windows become available.”