A general-purpose Type 45 and nine escort groups

With no cost constraint, which current warships and how many would you order for the Royal Navy?

Eighteen general-purpose Type 45 variants and eighteen Type 26 frigates, organized as nine balanced four-escort groups.

The preferred design is the unbuilt general-purpose Type 45 concept, including the fixes later required by the class, towed-array capability, and a mixed missile battery. The recalled 96-cell arrangement divided 64 Sylver cells from 32 strike-length Mark 41 cells. A notional order of eighteen such destroyers and eighteen Type 26 frigates would form nine surface groups. Each group would combine two air-defence ships with two anti-submarine frigates around five aviation capital ships. The ship numbers follow from deployable group structure rather than from each preferred design in isolation.