SDSR - The True Costs of the Libyan Campaign

UK operations in Libya : the full costs are now becoming clear

This website has in the recent past carried estimates of the cost of the Campaign especially the high levels of costs associated with flying aircraft from Italian airbases or the UK and even accommodating personnel in hotels on the italian coast when accommodation ships could have been used. Indeed air operations from sea would have been infinitely cheaper and the United Staes, France and Italy all used air power from the sea during the campaign. Only in the final stages was the helicopter carrier HMS Ocean brought into use with Army Air Corps short-range Apache helicopters.

Remember the statement directed at those who correctly raised the issues - "You do the fighting and I'll do the talking!"

In terms of using accommodation ships rather then 5* hotels a letter from the Secretary of State advised that no ports were available for such a facility. The Italian airbase used by UK ground based fixed wing aircraft was some 35 miles north of the huge harbour at Taranto (where the Italians kept their battleships in the Second World War).

The Navy Campaign has provided a copy of the costs of the Libyan Campaign as set out by the Guardian.

The E-Address for the full item is at the end of the article.

As well as the graphic (atteched) click on also to pdf for the actual breakdown of the expenditure.

This website has in the recent past carried estimates of the cost of the Campaign especially the high levels of costs associated with flying aircraft from Italian airbases whilst accommodating personnel in hotels on the italian coast when accommodation ships could have been used and indeed when air operations from sea would have been infinitely cheaper. Remember the statement directed at those who raised the issues - "You do the fighting and I'll do the talking!"

The Guardian reports:

How much are UK operations in Libya really costing?

Francis Tusa would be the first to admit that his calculations are not definitive.

How could they be? The government has avoided setting out in any detail the costs of the Libya operation - and now that the country is (mostly) in the control of anti-Gaddafi forces, ministers are under less pressure to do so.

However, cost remains an issue, and the bills continue to mount. Tusa has used themilitary's own figures to add up estimates of the sums spent so far.

He has had to guess some figures, such as the number of munitions used, because none have been provided thus far.

But where he has had to guess, he has rounded down rather than up. There are huge variations in the upper and lower limits of the figures - but one constant.

They are all much higher than the government's official cost of the operation.

Tusa is no mug. He is an expert in his field. He also has the ear of very senior people in all three services. They respect him, even if he can be a pain in the rear admiral sometimes.

So, what are the key numbers?

- "Officially", as of late August, the UK 's operation has cost some £230-260-million for the 25 weeks since March 19. The new calculations put the cost of UK operations at well over £600-million, and arguably into the £1.25-billion-plus range. This has to come out of existing MoD reserves

- A fascinating breakdown of the costs of mounting an air operation: £35,000 per Tornado GR4 mission, £45,000 per Typhoon Eurofighter active mission

- Bombs and missiles are more expensive: £183,000 for a Brimstone missile, £50,000 per Paveway guided bomb

- An single extra mission involving cruise missiles cost £11m

- Use of the Italian base at Gioia del Colle has cost the UK at least £10m

- Up until the end of May, Tusa estimated missions had cost around £512m

- Since then, the estimates are of another £377m - taking to it to a max figure of £950m, for air and sea operations alone.

Will they like his sums? Not a bit. But until the Treasury provides a convincing, detailed breakdown of the cost of Libya , they will find it hard to criticise them with any authority.

In fact, the costs of the whole war are swathed in mystery - we had to contact each defence ministry individually to calculate which Nato partner was doing what back in May.

© 2011 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved.

Libya conflict may cost UK £1.75bn

Research suggests defence bill may be seven times government estimate, prompting calls for full spending breakdown - By Nick Hopkins guardian.co.uk, Sunday 25 September 2011

Libya's conflict had led to 1,600 missions by UK combat aircraft.

The true cost of the UK 's involvement in the Libya conflict could be as high as £1.75bn – almost seven times more than government estimates, according to a new study. Research by a respected defence analyst suggests that the government has given a misleading picture of the costs of supporting the military operation, now in its seventh month, leading to demands for a proper spending breakdown.

Although Muammar Gaddafi's regime has crumbled in recent weeks, RAF airstrikes against forces remaining loyal to him have continued at an exceptionally high rate, depleting stockpiles of expensive precision weapons the Ministry of Defence will want to replace. That will add to the overall bill, which is still rising and which the Treasury has promised to meet from its special reserves.

Concern over funding for the operation has been mounting as government departments, including the MoD, have to cope with deep spending cuts cause of the fragility of the economy.

Reacting to the latest analysis, Labour yesterday renewed its call for ministers to provide more details of military costs and promise that there will be no knock-on effect for the MoD budget, which is under huge strain. "It is vital we have transparency on this," said Jim Murphy, the shadow defence secretary.

The Treasury has still not paid the MoD for the "wear and tear" costs of equipment used in Iraq , raising further concerns within the military about the long-term consequences of the Libya deployment.

This month the MoD revealed that UK combat aircraft had flown more than 1,600 missions over Libya – around one fifth of all Nato strike sorties – and destroyed or damaged about 900 targets. Those figures will have risen significantly in the last fortnight. The UK has also deployed 32 aircraft, Apache attack helicopters, warships, a helicopter carrier, a submarine and anti-mine vessels.

Using data provided in answers to parliamentary questions, and figures provided by the RAF since the campaign started, the defence expert Francis Tusa, editor of Defence Analysis, was able to make two sets of detailed calculations about the costs of the Libya operation in the first six months.

Using one method, he estimated the cumulative cost of the operation to the end of August at between £1.38bn and £1.58bn. Using a second method, the costs were potentially even higher – between £850m and £1.75bn.

In June, the government said the overall costs of the Libya campaign were in the region of £260m. An earlier estimate by the chancellor, George Osborne, put the operation in the "tens of millions."

Tusa did not include the cost of the most recent sorties, which have included several RAF Tornados flying on numerous occasions from the UK to Libya, or the "start-up" costs that were incurred when, in the early weeks of the mission, the MoD hired fleets of Eddie Stobart trucks and trailers to take equipment from here to the military base in Gioia del Colle, Italy.

"Where there has been any doubt, I have underestimated rather than overestimated in my calculations," Tusa said. "With the number of missions the RAF has flown in the last fortnight, I am sure the cost of the campaign has gone up considerably." Tusa's detailed calculations and analysis by him, are available on the Guardian's Datablog.

Murphy said the government needed to be open about the costs, and challenged the way ministers had appeared to deliberately downplay the money spent so far.

"Labour supported the conflict in Libya . £1bn is much higher than the initial estimate and if it is correct we will want to see detailed breakdowns. We will also want to know why Danny Alexander [chief secretary to the Treasury] was so wrong when he said the conflict would cost 'hundreds of millions'."

He added: "It is vital we have transparency on this, as the British people will want to know that our military strategy balances advanced kit and equipment with cost-effective decisions. Many have questioned whether the decisions made in the rushed defence review left our forces stretched and may have cost the country more in this unforeseen conflict. It is up to ministers to answer that charge.

"At a time when redundancies are being made and cuts to equipment are biting, it is important that the core defence budget is protected as much as is possible. Replenishments of munitions used in Libya , therefore, must come out of the Treasury reserve."

Rear Admiral Chris Parry, a former director of development at the MoD, said the department had to look out for being charged for "hidden costs" that would further erode its budget.

"Despite government assurances, every operation has hidden costs that are never recovered," he said. "Although a substantial proportion of the costs of the Libya operation will come out of the Treasury reserves, this does not take into account the 'wear and tear' on ships, airframes and equipment caused by a higher tempo and intensity of activity.

"These hidden costs include the extra provision required for missed training and exercising, the depletion of munitions and spares stocks, which are not always replaced on the basis of like-for-like, and the extra loading placed on those units not directly involved in the conflict. These usually have to cover for deployed units, or have to give up manpower and equipment to support it."

Parry said that mandarins had, in the past, used "opaque, complex accounting practices" to conceal the true costs of military operations. This meant that "the full impact of a conflict on the armed forces in operational capability terms is obscured in the short term, but over time results in a progressive hollowing-out of effective capability."

When the government said Libya would cost taxpayers £260m, it gave limited information about how it had reached the figure. It said that £120m was needed to cover the cost of day-to-day running, over and above the money already set aside for training and exercises. The other £140m represented the cost of the munitions used so far. Neither the Treasury or the MoD said it had anything further to add at this stage.

In evidence to the defence select committee in June, the MoD's chief of defence materiel, Bernard Gray, was asked whether the Treasury had yet paid for the wear and tear costs from the war in Iraq . When asked if it was true the MoD had received "nothing so far", he replied: "Yes."

© 2011 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved.

Libya conflict may cost UK £1.75bn

Research suggests defence bill may be seven times government estimate, prompting calls for full spending breakdown.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/sep/25/libya-conflict-uk-defence-bill?newsfeed=true