The HMS Queen Elizabeth battle group will set sail for Asia on Saturday, local time. HMS Queen Elizabeth II will be on board the ship at Portsmouth to visit her officers and men.
The Queen Elizabeth II will lead several destroyers, patrol ships and supply ships on a 28-week voyage to visit more than 40 countries, including India, South Korea and Japan, for a total of 26,000 nautical miles. A U.S. Navy destroyer and a Dutch Navy patrol ship will also accompany the trip.
The Queen Elizabeth is equipped with 10 British F-35B vertical takeoff and landing fighters and 10 U.S. F-35s, and the ship’s crew of more than 1,700 includes 250 U.S. Marines.
HMS Queen Elizabeth cost 3 billion pounds and was named after Queen Elizabeth I, the “wise queen” under whose rule Britain defeated the invincible Spanish Armada.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who also inspected HMS Queen Elizabeth on Friday, said the trip to Asia was not intended to antagonize anyone, but was a way for Britain to express the importance of international maritime law. “One of the things we want to do is to take a confident but non-confrontational stance and show our Chinese friends that we believe in the international law of the sea, and we will prove it.”
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