What about the Orao? Any news on how long these aircraft will stay in service?

The armed British Forces have close to 800 helicopters in their inventories. (When still correct, datas a little bit dated!)
How much of those are deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan?!

That’s a bit of a simplistic view. You have to discount helicopters that are tasked and modified to other roles (e.g. Lynx HMA.8 – ship borne ASW/ASuW or RAF Sea Kings – UK based SAR).

And then there’s all the helicopters that are not operational and are too worn out to be returned to service. AFM stated that the number of AAC Gazelles and Lynx’s operational are only a bit over 100 helicopters out of about 400 airframes. There appears to be a lack of spares while many of these helicopters would be worn out.

There’s also the issue of the suitability of some of the UK’s helicopters to the extreme conditions in Afghanistan or even Iraq. I don’t know if a Gazelle would be appropriate in Afghanistan’s high altitude climate. And such a helicopter might be more vulnerable to small arms fire than what is normally acceptable.

So even though 800 helicopters might be listed on the inventory, many of them are not operational. have different taskings/equipment fits or are simply innappropriate for deployment into conflict zones.

But I agree that the MoD seems to be still living in a Cold War mentality.

If they cut the Tranche 3 Eurofighter buy or cut the 2 massive aircraft carriers and associated JSF buy then there would be increased resources for a recapitalisation of the helicopter fleets.

Dubya,

I can see your point but dont necessarily agree with it. The F-22/F-35 split may offer the best future-proofing and longevity to the RAAF but I think the JSF is a poor choice for the strike optimised role that it would take in partnership with the F-22. IMO you need something bigger, two-seated and with far superior payload/range figures.

As has been said, something like the Su-34 would be ideal but its never going to happen, next best is a variant of -15E. This is because your priincipal threats are aerial and naval – the aerial threat the F-22 will cope with happily any day of the week – I personally think that a combined air-dominance team of Raptors and (perhaps) Meteor-equipped Strike Ozgles could be extremely effective in conjunction with OTH, AWACS and LINK16.

The Naval threat requires range, endurance, a bloody great SAR-moded radar and competent EO fit (plus a guy-in-back to push the buttons, read the map etc), and a heavy payload carrying capability for as many medium antiship missiles as the airframe will take. The reasons for this are obvious so I wont insult you by stating them!.

Suffice it to say, with that description, the first aircraft fitting it into your mind is never going to be F-35 is it?!

The -15E on the other hand has all those qualities and is in theatre, with other nations, for the projected timespan of the F111 replacement requirement. Other nations possessing similar aircraft could also mean a local maintenance facility in Australia, or very much cheaper deployments to US, Singapore, SKorea or Israel -15E bases!..

I actually agree that the F-15E is a very capable aircraft. IMO an acquisition of just F-15E’s would be a good buy too, as the F-15E still has better A2A capabilities than most aircraft.

However current ADF policy sees the ADF fighting in Allied operations, offering niche capabilities such as the SAS. Defending Australia is obviously still an important role as it would be with any military. But that’s a “what if” scenario and the government is dedicated to fighting in Allied style operations and regional peacekeeping ops. This is the current operational policy of the ADF.

The F-15E or currently F-111 do not fall under these sort of operations because they are viewed as purely offensive systems (i.e. bombers). As I have said before, there is no real political opposition to the deployment of F/A-18’s because they are primarily viewed as a defensive system (i.e. fighter plane). The public fails to discern the difference between a fighter bomber, interceptor etc. To them it is a fighter plane (i.e. Camel, Spitfire, Mirage, F/A-18) or a bomber (Lancaster, Canberra, F-111).

The F-35 fits into these allied operations from a both operational and political perspective.

Lastly the age of the airframe design would not be an issue for me – the MiG-21 is a 50 year old design and, anecdotally, the latest upgrades to the type like the IAF’s Bison have kept the package competent. Likewise the F-4, nearly 50 years since first flight yet still dangerous in the BVR arena air-air and as capable of hauling large amounts of ordnance as it ever was.

The MiG-21 and F-4 are no longer top of the line fighters. If simply upgrading an F-4 or MiG-21 would make them comparable to modern fighters, then no-one would buy a modern fighter, they would merely upgrade.

I was also talking about logistics. The F-15 pure interceptor (i.e. A/B/C/D models) is close to the twilight of its career in the USAF. It is being replaced by the F-22. Many of the other users operate aircraft that are also approaching the middle of their lives (i.e. Japan, Israel, Saudi Arabia). ‘

Acquirig this aircraft so late in its career does not seem like an intelligent idea. Indeed I even think that the South Korean and Singaporean deals were purely political and probably not based so much on what their airforces wanted and more on what was politically safe. The same may also be said of continued acquisition of the F-16 by many airforces.

It really should be UH-72 if memory serves (the Arapaho is ARH-70, with Merlin being VH-71), though out of sequence numbers are not uncommon nowadays. Personally, I think they should have gone for the AW-139, which would have been better for some missions, including SAR (hurricane season being a good reason to emphasize SAR capability), due to the larger cabin.

Lets hope they do give it a standardised designation. Things such as KC-767, CC-130J, HC-235 seem totally idiotic. Why have a standardised system when no-one follows it?

The F-15 has a couple of disadvantages:

1.) Old(er) airframe. This means that supply of new spares could whittle down especially if the USA starts replacing it’s F-15E’s with another platform. Remember that any aircraft acquired now will probably be flying close to 30-40 years if current trends are taken into account.

2.) Greater need for aircrew. You still need navigators and the RAAF struggles to attract recruits capable of becomnig fast jet crew (at least from the last source I read).

Good ol’ Kim “Bomber” Beazley is as always clueless. Lil Johnny may suck big time, but he is still better than the little lost retard that is Beazley.

I actually think the problem is Defence Department procurement. Look at the the failed SH-2G program. the Collins class subs, the undergunned ANZAC Frigates.

They usually ask for something radically different to meet our “needs,” and this almost universally fails due to the complexity of the project and lack of economies of scale.

How come Australia, a developped country with 20 millions people, couldn’t train 100 more pilots ? It may be expensive, but nothing compared to a few planes price.
I think the issue is indeed to not consider Rafale, and especially EF.

Pilots earn more flying for a civilian airline and most Australians would never consider serving in the military. The Australian military has an establishment of roughly 50,000 personnel and they struggle to recruit even this number.

Most young people in Australia want to have fun and live life to the fullest. Serving in some god foresaken hell hole does not really plug into this lifestyle.