THE ABOLITION OF BRITAIN: How the Royal Navy shrank to its smallest ‘since English Civil War.’

In the mid-1990s, Royal Navy officers at staff college in Shrivenham were asked to map out their predictions for what the service would look like in 30 years. One submariner said the navy would have 30 of the American Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers, the same number of frigates and 20 attack submarines.

More than a decade earlier, the navy had deployed 127 ships for the Falklands conflict, including 43 warships. The British nuclear submarine HMS Conqueror had sunk the Argentine cruiser ARA General Belgrano, killing 323 sailors onboard.

The submariner, who recently retired, cannot believe the size of the navy now. “Nobody wrote down that you would have six Type 45s [destroyers] that never work, two aircraft carriers we can’t man because we don’t have enough people, and seven frigates, many alongside. Nobody wanted this navy.”

Or the lack thereof, based on the numbers:

America’s Newspaper of Record posits that Iran’s numbers may be shrinking quite rapidly in the coming weeks:

America Graciously Converts 20 Iranian Warships Into New Submarines https://t.co/5GxYYZuEFR pic.twitter.com/JQCvxkJgvv

— The Babylon Bee (@TheBabylonBee) March 4, 2026