"Strategic failure": HMS Lancaster to leave the Middle East and be "scrapped" in "backward step" for fleet
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A Royal Navy warship is due to leave the Middle East and leave a dwindling presence in her place, reports said.
The Daily Telegraph reports that HMS Lancaster will be returning to the UK and “be scrapped at the end of the year”. This will leave HMS Middleton, a Portsmouth-based mine countermeasure vessel, as the only forward deployed ship at the Royal Navy base in Bahrain.
Lieutenant General Sir Simon Mayall KBE, a retired British Army officer and current Middle East advisor to the Ministry of Defence (MoD), described the move as a “strategic failure”. He told the national publication: “The withdrawal of HMS Lancaster, with no dedicated replacement, is a huge backward step in our global posture and a shocking reflection on the current combat readiness and strength of the Royal Navy."
Royal Navy and the Middle East
HMS Lancaster has patrolled the Middle East and surrounding area since 2022, playing a central role in Operation Kipion. The Royal Navy has had a permanent frigate or destroyer in the region since re-establishing the base in 2018. The region has been known to house various threats, including Iranian-backed Houthi rebels who regularly attack merchant vessels in the Red Sea. Militants attacked the Eternity C and Magic Seas, sinking both and leaving many sailors dead.
HMS Montrose, a former Duke-class frigate which was decommissioned in Portsmouth in 2023, was forward deployed there in 2019. Many of her duties included escorting British vessels through the Strait of Hormuz and intercepting drug smugglers. She had to go on the offensive when Tehran captured the British flagged tanker Stena Impero - following accusations it collided with a fishing boat. The merchant ship was recovered weeks later.
The Royal Fleet Auxiliary (RFA) used to maintain a presence alongside the Royal Navy with RFA Lyme Bay, an 16,000 tonne supply ship. She returned to British waters in 2022 and is currently shackled amid a period of “planned maintenance”.
The UK completes various security drills alongside the US Fifth Fleet and the Combined Maritime Forces (CMF), a 46-nation unit that patrols 3.2m square metres of ocean. Various drug busts have been undertaken by HMS Lancaster and the CMF, with the most recent operation seizing 1,000kg of heroin, 660kg of hashish, and 6kg of amphetamine - all with a street value of £30m. Missions such as this in the Middle East will prove difficult without a dedicated warship.
An MoD spokesperson said the Royal Navy “continues to conduct complex operations around the globe”, citing the current Carrier Strike Group deployment with HMS Prince of Wales as an example. They added: “The UK has a long-standing maritime presence in the Gulf, and the UK Maritime Component Command in Bahrain continues to be central to the UK’s military operations across the Middle East.”