Royal Navy: Harpoon Anti-ship Missiles

Lord Touhig Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd November 2016 Lords Chamber

[Earl Howe]

It is important to understand the context in which a weapon such as Harpoon would be used. Harpoon would be likely to be used only in open ocean against frigates and above in a state-on-state conflict when our naval assets would most likely be operating within a coalition task group with a range of offensive systems at its disposal. There are ways other than Harpoon of delivering that offensive capability.

[Lord Touhig (Lab)]

My Lords, one press report described Harpoon as obsolete, but better than having nothing at all; another said that the Royal Navy without Harpoon was less capable of fighting an enemy vessel than our Navy in the 19th century; and a third likened it to Nelson at the Battle of Trafalgar getting rid of his cannon and relying on muskets. That may be, but if we are engaged in a possible conflict, as my noble friend Lord West mentioned, how will the Royal Navy respond effectively without anti-ship missiles?

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, Royal Navy ships habitually work in task groups with a range of offensive and defensive assets. A task group can be made up of a number of different platforms, including submarines, surface ships, helicopters and, from 2021, our new Queen Elizabeth carriers. In turn, those platforms host a variety of complementary capabilities, such as anti-surface warfare, air defence, intelligence and so on. It is important to look at the overall context.