What alternative in France for the New Generation Aircraft Carrier?

For several days, a background noise has been becoming more and more audible in the French defense ecosphere: faced with the budgetary constraints governing the next Military Programming Law currently being prepared, the New Generation Aircraft Carrier program, or PANG , which was the undisputed star of the Euronaval 2022 show a few weeks ago, would be threatened. Even with a significant budgetary increase, with €100 billion more between 2024 and 2030 compared to the 2018-2025 period, around €400 billion or €57 billion per year on average, the available resources would in fact not be not sufficient to finance the expansion of the forces, including the recruitment of 40 to 60.000 additional reservists, the financing of current programs (SSN Suffren, FDI, Rafale F4/F5, H160M Guépard Helicopters, SCORPION program, CAESAR NG etc.), and the development of new programs, such as the SSBN 3G replacement for the Triomphant class nuclear ballistic missile submarines, the combat aircraft FCAS developed jointly with Germany and Spain, or the new generation Franco-German battle tank program MGCS.

With a development cost that would now reach or even exceed €8 billion, which would be at least half consumed on the LPM to come, the financing of the PANG as envisaged today would require difficult arbitrations concerning other major programs. , and the Minister of the Armed Forces, Sebastien Lecornu, hinted that a reflection was now being carried out not only to evaluate a possible postponement of the program, but also to cancel it purely and simply, to be, or not, replaced by a solution alternative. In this article, we will study the 4 possible alternatives: renouncing the aircraft carrier for the French Navy, postponing the program, designing a less imposing nuclear aircraft carrier or one or more light hybrid aircraft carriers.

Giving up the power of the aircraft carrier would be a historic mistake.

Each time the hypothesis of the construction of an aircraft carrier is discussed in France, there are voices to question the effectiveness of this type of ship. For its detractors, the aircraft carrier would today be an obsolete tool, too expensive for its effective effectiveness, depriving other forces of additional means capable, too, of striking at long distance. Above all, it would now be too vulnerable to evolve in a context of modern warfare. While some of these arguments can be heard, especially regarding the deprivation of credits for other needs, the arguments made regarding the lack of efficiency or the supposed vulnerability of the aircraft carrier do not carry more weight, today , than they had each time they were advanced in the past: in the 50s following the arrival of nuclear weapons, the Korean and then Vietnam wars showed how much this type of ship was critical; in the 70s and 80s with the arrival of Soviet long-range bombers armed with very capable anti-ship missiles, against which the couple F-14 Tomcat / air-to-air missile AIM-54A Phoenix and the anti-shipping system aerial AEGIS were developed, and in recent news, as the United States returns to a fleet of 11 heavy aircraft carriers and develops the concept of Lightning Carrier, China is making immense efforts to quickly acquire a fleet of heavy aircraft carriers, and that several countries, such as Italy, Japan, India and South Korea, are also making major efforts to acquire them.

To paraphrase the Chief of Staff of the French Navy in front of the French deputies, if the aircraft carrier were outdated, too vulnerable or ineffective, the majority of the world's major navies would not make such efforts to acquire it or to strengthen their fleets. In this field, France acts as a world exception, being the only country, apart from the United States, to be equipped with a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier and equipped with catapults, a considerable advantage from the operational point of view. vis-à-vis aircraft carriers that do not have them, in particular by allowing fighters to take to the air with maximum armament and fuel, but also by allowing certain devices, such as the advanced air watch aircraft E-2 Hawkeye, to accompany the embarked air group. Beyond the means themselves, the French Navy has the skills inherited from decades of effort and operational use, to implement this tool. To deprive him of it, even temporarily, would result in a loss of skill that would take many years to recover, as was the case with the Briton.

It is precisely these skills, and this tool, which today constitute one of the greatest added values ​​of the French armed forces, particularly in Europe and within NATO, and which, like its sub- nuclear-powered marine vessels, and its submarine, aerial and naval air deterrent components, constitute the country's international legitimacy, particularly with regard to its seat as a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council. In other words, renouncing the on-board fighter component of French naval aviation would be a strategic renouncement with very significant consequences on the international scene, but also on the attractiveness of France as a defense partner and as an equipment supplier. military.

Postponement of PANG and extension of Charles de Gaulle

Beyond an unthinkable renunciation of the French aircraft carrier, the simplest alternative, at first glance, would be none other than the shift of the program by a few years, so in particular that the investments required to rebuild the Armies French companies to meet the challenge of high intensity, are not constrained by the development of the ship. However, such an assumption is not devoid of risks, and even high risks. First, to achieve this, it would be essential to extend the operational life of the Charles de Gaulle by a few years. Launched in 1994 and admitted to service in 2001, the ship will indeed have "only" 37 years of service in 2038, whereas, for example, the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier Nimitz, the first ship of the eponymous class, is still in service after 48 years of service, and that the USS Enterprise, the first American nuclear aircraft carrier, remained in service for 51 years, and served as a reserve aircraft carrier for another 6 years after that.

However, to date, engineers from Naval Group, the DGA and Framatome, are unable to determine whether the Charles de Gaulle could see its operational life extended. Indeed, this extension of service is constrained by the state of wear of the reactor and the containment vessel, and cannot be definitively confirmed, or invalidated, until the beginning of the next decade. It is therefore understandable that this solution would run a very real risk for the maintenance of the operational skills of the French naval aviation, because it would be very difficult, if not impossible, to design and build a successor to the Charles de Gaulle capable of taking service in 2038 from 2030, if life extension were not possible. Moreover, and this is far from being anecdotal, the recent history of industrial defense programs shows that a majority of programs having been “postponed”, ended up, a few years later, by simply being cancelled. In fact, postponing the design and construction of the successor to the Charles de Gaulle, relying on the extension of the life of the ship, would represent an unacceptable risk for this capacity, and cannot be envisaged, at least in this way.

Can the dimensions of the PANG be reduced to make it more economical?

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