What this looks like is a shipbuilding tech transfer MoU, where it would appear some of the Ockers have been placed with the Araldite mafia - to indeed learn how not to do it.
What we can't afford is another twenty year long design period for T4X. It needs to be focussed, NOT based on T26 and with a good power architecture to enable fit of future weapons.
alas, T45 is an object lesson in how not to be clever with power architecture, and the perils of going too far off the reservation with lots of new systems, and.... we have no money.
while A T26 AAW variant might not be the ultimate mutts nuts able to shoot down a Death Star, it would be very capable, and we have both the Canadians and Australians doing the AAW work on the design.
we’re going to go back to US sourced missiles, we can’t afford to design a new all singing, all dancing Radar just for us in a realistic timefrane
we need to get out of the ‘unique operational requirements’ mindset and buy good enough for everyone else, good enough for us.
SM2/SM3/SM6/ESSM is good enough for everyone else, pick one or two, and pick a proven good enough for other tier 1 allies radar.
the 60 lotsawatts lasers are still blue sky, don’t build a ship around blue sky.