News, Articles and Comment

Ed. By situating the contemporary naval transformation in terms of strategic continuity, the author argues that the Hybrid Navy concept will require organisational transformation and leadership as much as technological innovation. A 30 minute read.

Ed. The author, Naval Tutor at BRNC, makes the case for expanded Professional Defence and Security Education (PDSE) in the RN as an interservice imperative. A 10 minute read.

Ed. If a cyber-attack paralyses a dockyard or a disrupted supply chain prevents a critical repair, the resulting loss of fleet availability constitutes a military defeat achieved by civilian means. The era of the homeland as a sanctuary is over. This article, by the NR’s Chairman, challenges the unhurried pace of current government resilience planning, arguing that the Royal Navy must adopt a National Support Base mindset and apply the same rigorous, FOST-style testing to its civilian dependencies as to its warships. A 20 minute read.

Ed. With the Royal Navy declaredly pushing towards a ‘Hybrid’ fleet utilising several classes of complex ‘ship-like’ uncrewed vessels, the author, Associate Professor of International Security and Strategy at the University of Exeter, identifies key limitations of such autonomous naval systems and proposes that a lean-crewed model may instead offer distinctive advantages. A 25 minute read.

Ed. The independent researcher provides a unique and comprehensive, based on open-source intelligence and source-audited, order of battle and assessment of deployability for the Russian Submarine Service. Now available in the NR‘s Briefing Room.

Ed. Britain’s maritime rise and fall holds urgent lessons for a United States losing ground to China at sea and in the shipyard. Originally published in the USNI’s Proceedings, August 2026. A 15 minute read.

Ed. The vast population of this ‘sceptred isle’ is ‘sea blind’ or, if you prefer, ‘maritime illiterate’. We should acknowledge this as the steady state and the only thing that could change one’s appreciation would be total war.

Ed. This article explores some of the undiscussed issues and challenges facing the introduction of large-scale autonomous vessels under the ‘hybrid navy’ plan. The aim of this article is not to nay say and stick one’s head in the sand, but rather to identify the very real challenges facing implementation, their limits, and the importance of maintaining capable crewed warships to restore the RN fleet as a capable naval force. A 20 minute read.

Ed. With historical and contemporary examples in mind, the author reconsiders naval strike as an indirect method of pursuing sea control. A 20 minute read.