Silent Hunter

What does the Greater London area have in terms of ground-based air defence?

Stan

do we have anything at all?

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VarSity

There must be something in place. Otherwise it wouldnt be hard to bomb any country... Or am I just being very silly?

Bob Jones

Couple of gangsta kids from da hood wiv magnums, well at least it would give them something else to shoot at instead of each other, serioulsy not sure if we have got anything actually sited in or around the London area, or come to think of it, any of the major cities, not counting all the disused WW2 sites, but then apart from some of the smaller countries, who has got Capital City air defence, think we would rely on those jolly old RAF types, failing that I have got a very strong catapult,

Recall back in the days of Northern Ireland when it was discovered that the IRA intended to use Helicopters or light aircraft to drop milk churns full of explosives, onto some target or other, we were told to mount an LMG onto the roof of all the outstations we used, but we had to get the mounts made locally first?????

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Stan

Vasity - we have very good radar and we do have airdefence squadrons based around the UK - you've seen pictures of them intercepting Bears.

Why would we have anti air batteries based around london - if someone wanted to harm us they would be doing it by ICBM.

VarSity

Not even Rapier dotted around? Seems somehow a bad idea not to have them. Especially now, I mean would they be able to intercept a hijacked plane from one of the London Airports before if hits the Palace of Westminster?

Stan

Well there arent any people know about thats for sure.

I by the time they knew a jet was high jacked they could evac the most important buildings in London. also with the busiest airspace in europe I wouldnt like them to get the wrong plane.

end of the day we dont face many threats from above in London

GAU-8

These guys did a great job last time they were needed:


Seriously though, in the wake of the 911 attack, I'm sure most major cities have assets and procedures in place.
Out of public sight, but in place and ready.

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bolo121

Sorry but as numerous doctor who episodes have demonstrated, there's nothing, nothing at all.

TopHatter

Tea and Trumpets.

TopHatter

I doubt there will be another successful 9-11 attack, as Flight 93 proved.

Those savages can hijack a plane. They can kill the passengers. But they'll never succeed in crashing it into a building. The passengers and crew will see to that.

HistoricalDavid

Better to have aircraft. They can do other stuff - like bomb - and can get visual ID.

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Tin Man

Rapier isn`t used to defend a City I am afraid. A few airfields had Rapier for defence after the last Bloodhound SAM units were sent to museums, way back when.
RAF regiment I think. I don`t know if Rapier units are still used in that role anymore.
AFAIK, we just rely on Southern and Northern Q` with F.3 and Typhoon.

As far as for dealing with hijacked airliners, procedures are in place but are secret, for obvious reasons. The decision to shoot down a civil airliner comes right from cabinet level, not for the pilots on scene to decide, they are probably very happy about that too!

As GAU said, anything juicy will remain in the shadows, not a good idea to telegraph our intentions or tell scumbags how to circumvent our/any defenses. One thing I worry about is the constant cut backs, smaller radar sites being closed over the years, along with bases, its the peace dividend you see, although you do get some mobile sites popping up in the country-side now and again, here and there I am told!

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Sinister

The UK would mostly use its airforce if they would have had a threat from the air more so than air defence.

Bob Jones

They ran a programme on TV here a while ago, that had three civilians taking the roles of senior members of the cabinet, making the decisions, as would COBRA, and they were presented with a scenario, with three possible outcomes, the people feeding the intel where real members of the Armed services, and Police, the intel fake, but they had to respond, one of the programmes I saw dealt with a proposed aerial attack on London from an unidentified passenger aircraft, the fail safe point was determined by a radius around the centre of London that was far enough away, to be able to bring the aircraft down over less poulated areas, they failed, as they could`nt agree on what to do, and by the time they did the House of Commons was a smouldering wreck, very interesting series of programmes