Well, it’s not only dumb amateur bloggers who don’t think much (see previous post) of the government’s contingency plan for the RAAF (purchase a couple of dozen of the F-18E Super Hornet as a stopgap), if the Joint Strike Fighter doesn’t arrive on time. <a HREF="According to today’s Age:
“It’s an old-generation fighter that can’t survive with existing aircraft in the region, let alone what’s coming in the future,” said retired air vice-marshal Peter Criss, Australia’s air commander during the East Timor campaign.
The article also points out that the unit price of the Joint Strike Fighter will also likely rise substantially, as the rate of production for the US military has just been halved.
So how did we get into this mess? That’s an interesting one. The defence procurement bureacracy doesn’t have a great track record (at an admittedly very hard job that nobody gets right all that often), and Carlo Kopp and Peter Goon at Aus Air Power have attributed policy decisions to individuals within it that were passed up the line to the government. But Brian Toohey writing in the Financial Review (and thus not online, unfortunately) had this to say recently:
There’s nothing unusual about a politician trying to buy votes. But Howard has taken a distinctly idiosyncratic approach to policymaking on global warming and two of the biggest national security issues to arise during his time in office – the invasion of Iraq and the choice of the Joint Strike Fighter for the air force. In each case, Howard has relied on his own counsel, with little or no input from his professional advisers within the public service.
…
Astonishingly, the decision to opt for the Lockheed Martin Joint Strike Fighter was taken three or four years before the Defence Department’s usual professional assessment of the contending planes was due for completion.
In June 2002, then defence minister Robert Hill announced, in effect, that Australia would buy the JSF even though it was still in development. The announcement came two weeks after Lockheed Martin briefed Howard while he was visiting US President George Bush in Washington.
The early decision stunned even Lockheed Martin. Its international programs director told a journalist from The Australian, Cameron Stewart, that he was “absolutely flabbergasted” the JSF had been chosen so quickly.
Yep, assuming Toohey’s got it right, the whole air combat acquisition policy is John Howard’s personal legacy.
It’s worse than that. The critics rightly point out that the Super Hornet will be outclassed, and the JSF matched, in the region by vastly cheaper planes – mainly Russian ones.
This raises the obvious question as to why we didn’t consider buying such cheap and effective planes. Old Cold War habits, or just Johnny spending billions sucking up to his mate?
“âItâs an old-generation fighter that canât survive with existing aircraft in the region, let alone whatâs coming in the future,â? said retired air vice-marshal Peter Criss, Australiaâs air commander during the East Timor campaign.”
So what does Gene Simmons think?
There are several problems with buying Russian hardware:
The claim that the JSF will be “matched” by the Sukhoi considerably simplifies things. Each aircraft would have distinct advantages and disadvantages (basically, the JSF has the best electronics and is very hard to detect on radar, the Sukhoi is faster, more manoeuverable, and has a longer range), and it would come down to the combat situation and the tactics chosen. If the JSF was used to best advantage, the Sukhoi would probably never even see the thing before it got shot out of the sky.
The Sukhois are not compatible with any of our other American hardware, meaning lots of integration costs, and extra difficulties because the Russians probably aren’t too keen on letting American defence manufacturers loose on their latest and greatest stuff.
Russian planes, particularly their engines, have a reputation for being hard to maintain and not particularly durable. The latest generation Su-30MKI that the Indians are building under licence is apparently a substantial improvement on this point.
Russia is considerably behind on smart-bomb technology – again, we’d probably want to fit American weaponry leading to considerable integration difficulties.
Russia’s ability to provide service and support for its aircraft is apparently not up to western standards.
Finally, there is the concern that a key plank of Australia’s defence would be dependant on continued Russian cooperation (though the existence of a manufacturing line in India does provide some insurance).
However, it would be at least worth running the ruler over the idea one more time.
Fantastic. So when we moved to America so my thrice-cursed father could work on the Super Hornet co-operative project, it was all for nothing because Australia’s buying the JSF in the end?
Wow, that really makes that three years of misery worth it. We were living in Missouri.
Everyone:
It will be interesting to see if Mr Howard’s politically naive outburst against Barack Obama will be translated into higher prices for, and restricted choices of military hardware from the United States even before Bush and Cheney get heaved.
For a glance into the future’
“that the unit price of the Joint Strike Fighter will also likely rise substantially”
For Joint Strike Fighter read Nuclear Reactor.
Having spoken to current F18 pilots who will actually be flying the Super Hornet – their professional opinion was that the Super Hornet buy is the correct one.
But what would they know, heh?? It’s only their lives that are on the line.
BillB: if the Australian government was committing to buy nuclear reactors (or a concentrating solar power station) without signing a fixed-price contract, I’d be happy to give them a bollocking about that too.
FDB: Gene Simmons thinks that his tongue can single-handedly defeat foriegn air forces.
Razor: Here we have a recently retired RAAF air vice-marshal who has gone on the record to criticise the proposal. Maybe I’m naive, but I would have thought that such a senior former RAAF officer might have quite a deal of knowledge on the topic.
Maybe your pilot buddies know better, but when a person with such self-evident qualifications on the matter ventures such an unambiguous opinion on the record, it is at least worth consideration.
Robert Merkel – probably the vast majority of the RAAF and ADF support the Super Hornet purchase, but find one well qualified and retired dissenter and suddenly it is plain that the rest are wrong? Is that how it works??
The same applies for the likely ALP Candidate for the seat of Stirling – Ex SASR Officer (Regimental 2IC I think) who has come out against Iraq. Funnily enough the vast majority of ADF members that I know that are still in (the SASR and the wider ADF) actually fully support our involvement. There are often disagreement with strategy, tactics, equipment and everything else soldiers (and Officers) bitch about, but they support the war in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere.
While you are in the ADF you are generally unable, for a variety of very good reasons, unable to publicly express your views on Government Policy. Even when members of the ADF do get to speak to the media about their opinions, they are often misquoted/misrepresented because journalists either do not understand the subject, the views of the member don’t gel with the story the journo wanted or the journo is plain lazy. I have seen it happen to others and had it done to me by journos many times.
Robert and Razor, both camps in this argument are right. Look at it this way: The currently operational F18 pilots are comparing the Super Hornet with the F18-A they currently fly. The Super Hornet wins this contest hands down – its a vastly redesigned aircraft – its longer, heavier, has a 25% larger wing, more powerful engines and electronics, and carries a heavier weapons load. It is an airframe which is somewhat more optomised for ground attack missions than the F18-A. The jet jockeys have seen the Super Hornet up close (its been flying since 1995) on various operations with the US Navy – so they know what they’re on about.
Peter Criss is making a different comparison – he is comparing the Super Hornet with the aircraft currently being fielded in our region, and those which will be deployed in the next couple of decades. On this measure, the Super Hornet is a generation behind its opposition. Clearly, the Super Hornet is a very short-term stop gap by this logic.
In the end, it just reinforces what a dumb decision the JSF was in the first place. It should have been the F22 if we were ever serious – its just gone into USAF service, and and its fly-away cost is likely to be not that much more than the JSF after the sums are done again following the latest round of cancellations. There is even some talk that the Americans may cancel the KSF and the Brits arent too keen on some of the technology transfer limitations the Yanks want to impose.
On the Russian planes, what Robert Merkel says may all be true. Yet even with those disadvantages the extra bang-for-buck was enough to make other erstwhile customers for Yank toys switch to Russian hardware – to the degree that we’re now worried that we can’t match their bang. If these problems were as severe as all that it’s hard to see why we would be worrying.
As someone elsewhere on this blog pointed out, we should at least have kept it as a viable option for as long as possible to screw a decent deal out of the Yanks.
“It will be interesting to see if Mr Howard’s politically naive outburst against Barack Obama will be translated into higher prices for, and restricted choices of military hardware from the United States even before Bush and Cheney get heaved.”
The rumour is after Howards little tirade, the yanks have cancelled the jets and are going to supply us with some old Sopwith Camels.
Plane on plane comparisons demonstrate a lack of understanding of the strategic debate.
Firstly, the Super Hornet is a stop gap measure which came about because pre- East Timor and Sep 11 there wasn’t the money in the defence vote to contemplate the timely replacement of the F111 and F/A18.
Secondly, plane v plane comparisons are not what count. Worst case scenario is that the Super Hornet (and JSF) will operate in an environment supported by Wedgetail AWACS, JORN, refuelers and whatever missile and electronic warfare packages are available. Best case is operating in a coalition environment with all the force multipliers that the US can bring to that.
All that said, I think we should have bought the F22 and JSF, but there is always a budget constraint.
Razor, plane on plane comparisons are EXACTLY what this is all about. One of the roles of combat aircraft in our air force is air superiority. The F18, Super Hornet are inferior to some types already deployed and likely to be deployed in our region. The JSF may likewise be inferior, particularly in the air superiority stakes and its range/payload is a limitation in its strike capacity. None of these airctaft come anywhere close to the strike capability offered by the F111 by the way. The strength of the JSF is its stealth technology, which the F18 and its derivatives lack, but the new Russian machines do not.
As to force multipliers, the point is made, however as a soldier I always have to plan on shits being trumps – its usually the case. I hope like hell we have enough to go around, because if we ever have to use any of this stuff in anger, we’ll bloody-well need it!
Robert Merkel,
Let’s be careful about making glib assessments about potential enemies’ capabilities. Two that come to mind are: Japanese pilots are no good because they all have poor eyesight, and Russians do not have any jets that can match our Shooting Stars (F-80) (Korea).
The main reason why Russian aircraft engines have got such a poor reputation is because the aircraft were/are sold to countries that simply do not have the depth of engineering expertise in the armed forces to properly maintain them. Quite the opposite is the case about Russian aircraft, they take an incredible amount of abuse – but there are limits. Just check out the vast majority of the transport helicopters used in Africa and Asia and China. The mechanical mistreatment those machines cop is incredible and they still fly every day.
The main drawback of Russian combat aircraft is their lack of stealth capability and electronics, especially in electronic counter measures (ECCM).
For ECCM the US employs special aircraft called “wild weasel” which weasel or ferret out opposition’s radar and AA batteries and jam them and destroy them with anti radiation ordnance (HARM).
But Australia does not have this capability. Yet it is inconceivable to operate in any seriosu conflict without it. Hence it must be clear that the RAAF is not designed to operate as an independent force but as a plug in to the US. We do not have an independent foreign policy and the aircraft procurement simply reflects this sad truth of us as a client, or vassal state totally dependent on the US and our purchase of aircraft is simply a tithe or tribute to our master’s military industrial complex.
Robert, the Russians DO have quite superb air to air missiles. Their latest version of the R-77 Vympel is superior to the US AIM 120 AMRAAM in every way – it can intercept anything up to 3700 km/h and maneuvre at 12G, which is far beyond what any human-piloted aircraft can do. It is not only incredibly maneuverable, it operates off the pilot’s eyeball movement and slung under a SUkhoi Flanker will kill a Super Hornet anytime any place. Such combos are in the hands of China, India, Vietnam, Malaysia and soon, Indonesia.
Here is the aforementioned Carlo Copp’s analysis:
From
http://www.sci.fi/~fta/python4.html
The Americans were not going let us have the F22 even if we asked. It has been marked as not-for-export; even to us. We might be the best ally the US has, but that doesn’t mean we get to buy their toys.
And buying Russian is not going to happen. For one thing, the manuals are in Russian….
“AA batteries”
My telly remote uses those.
Why are the Alternative Liberal Party keeping their powder so fucking dry on defence for? I thought they dropped the Bomber?
This criminally stupid Howard regime that so flatulently bellows its alleged ‘economic’ credentials can’t even run a simple audit on one of its biggest departments. And not just in one year either.
Our Rudd who art in heaven
Hallowed be thy name
Thy kingdom come
Thy will be done
On earth as it is in Canberra
Give us this day our daily bread
And forgive us our trespass’s
As we surveill those who trespass against us
Deliver us from evil
For thine is the power and the glory
Forever and ever – A-men
Sir Henry:
B.S. Fairman: I wouldn’t be so sure. No, we probably would not get the same plane the USAF gets, but I suspect that if push came to shove and the choice was us buying F-22′s, or not buying American at all, there might well be a bunch of US Congresscritters who might change their mind on the matter.
For what it’s worth, Greg Sheridan seems to think they’ll sell them to us if we asked nicely enough. While Sheridan’s strategic analysis skills are right up there with the average kindergarten class, he does seem to get fed the occasional juicy tidbit from the right of American politics.
Razor: the worst case scenario is that the Russians get around to building a very long range anti-AWACS, anti-tanker missile like they have on the drawing board. 737′s and A320′s are not exactly famous for their missile evasion ability; such a weapon would make our force multipliers very expensive sitting ducks. And such a weapon is not only possible, but quite likely, within the multi-decade lifetime of the defence procurements we’re talking about.
Sir Henry: The MiG-29′s engine is apparently known for its short life, which I was I was thinking of. The Su-30 is apparently much better, though the Indians are reportedly having teething trouble with them due to gunk being picked up from runways and differences in fuel quality between India and Russia.
“…the extra bang-for-buck was enough to make other erstwhile customers for Yank toys switch to Russian hardware – to the degree that we’re now worried that we can’t match their bang.”
Now that’s the free market at work! From the White Company to the Sukhoi Design Bureau.
“…will operate in an environment supported by Wedgetail AWACS, JORN, refuelers…”
Yes I’d agree with that ‘cept with the proviso that they are all part of an integrated and very expensive C4I and logistics value chain that’s very vulnerable to lateral and low cost infrastructure hits. Eg: one treehopping ultralight packing a couple of promixity-fuzed 20 kilo artillery shells remotely guided by an xbox interface would wreck JORN before anyone saw it coming. 10 minutes on Google and anyone who knows what they’re doing can hack that tech.
At that point, you’d then wanna hope your fighter was better designed, powered, sensored up, flown and maintained than his as your battlespace control started carring on like a headless chicken. Well yes, you might still be able to route around through the Wedgetails if only they weren’t sitting in a Seattle hanger while Boeing’s lawyers quibbled line by line through 2000 page contracts over cost overun disputes.
“…operating in a coalition environment with all the force multipliers that the US can bring to that.”
But what if a Democratic Prez got voted in? Shouldn’t we prepare for the worst?
“The main drawback of Russian combat aircraft is their lack of stealth capability and electronics, especially in electronic counter measures (ECCM).”
The Indians get round the second point nicely by treating their MiGs amd Sukhois as excellent and sturdy airframes that they can retrofit with homebrewed and otherwise acquired avionics and ECM voodoo. Take the lid off and have a poke around with a multitool I say.
And the advantage of running the same hardware also being flogged to yer dodgey neighbours is that you’re well aware of its technical and logistical strong and weak points. Then training, doctrine and supply lines make the difference and not the nasic tech.
“Their latest version of the R-77 Vympel is superior to the US AIM 120 AMRAAM.”
Damn right. I just ordered a couple off eBay for home defence. Whack a bunch of them along with decent networked avionics and target acquistion systems into a mob of Gippsland Aeronautics GA8s and ADI Bushmasters and you’ve got a treetop and below fleet of launch platforms that can take out strike aircraft and their air superiority cover at a very cost-effective attrition rate.
“Americans were not going let us have the F22 even if we asked.”
Oh yes, at least for not the next ten or so years. And in the meantime the F35s we’ve already put our hands up for will be full of hard and soft crippleware too.
“For one thing, the manuals are in Russian….”
Excellent point. Even in translation, you’ll still gonna ask a ten year old kid to make sense of where plug 3 goes into socket B and how to program the timer. It’s not like we’re only just acquiring WWII era big iron.
I’m thinking a bit of a bush mechanics vibe here. Like swarms of fast, very cheap and barely in control UAVs with nasty little payloads that are also constantly feeding situational data back into an asymetrical network that can switch at every level as needed from Wedgetails to locals with on the ground tactical awareness and big aerials and tyres. Like flying sten guns with wifi webcams.
Complemented by a nifty psych-out move or two. Like reminding others Australia mounted the two most successful biowarfare campigns ever. Seen a swarm of rabbits lately?
And as I’ve said before on related threads, just judiciously leak that we’ve got at least one “acquired” nuke gaffertaped to a tomahawk in a launch canister onboard a Collins out there somewhere and that we’ll use it if things get bad enough for the AFL Grand Final to be rescheduled. I doubt Jakarta, KL, Wellington or Perth will be keen to call that bluff.
“If they think you’re crude, go technical. If they think you’re technical, go crude.” This approach certainly worked on 911. And before the latest Mesopomatian caper, no one thought that anyone but drunken offspring and jilted wives could employ garage door remotes as destructive implements.
And I watched a Super Hornet stunting about at the 2005 Australian International Air Show. The loudest plane I have ever heard. Never mind its beefy radar signature, they’ll just hear it coming a 1000 kms away even before it’s left the tarmac at Tindall.
And I saw a Super Hornet stunting around at the 2005 Australian International Air Show. The loudest aircraft I have ever heard. People fell over during its afterburner assisted takeoff.
Never mind its beefy radar signiture, they’ll hear it coming 1000 kms away even before it’s left the tarmac at Tindall.
I think that Australian buying policy for military hardware only makes sense in the context of it being a force multiplier for the Yanks in their next adventure. Otherwise Skyhawks (fitted with the latest missiles) and Canberras (fitted with the big wings for 90,000 ft high reconnaissance) would do for defending Wyndham and Broome. New Zealand’s fighter aircraft purchasing policy has a lot going for it.
Sir Henry: that is actually not such a silly idea.
Nabakov – your scenario of UAVs against JORN demonstrates you haven’t got much idea about what JORN consists of and where JORN is located.
It also demonstrates a lack of understanding of how hard it would be for that type of attack to be launched on the Australian continent against well protected sites. Having personally been in a number of the old Kangaroo exercises in force protction roles in the NT, Pilbara, Kimberly and FNQ and controlled enemy operating both covertly and in SF roles in those environments my considered opinion is that the bad guys have more chance of winning Powerball than they do of doing enough damage to seriously disrupt operations. I’m not saying they couldn’t do any damage, just not as operationally significant as you think is possible.
And Nabby, the Wedgetail fitout is being done in Brisbane not Seattle.
Over the past few years, I’ve read article after article about how wrong-headed Paul Dibb’s 1987 “Defence of Australia” plan was, and how the Howard government has sensibly junked it.
Well, I’ll bet Dibb has a smile on his face now.
The Dibb plan revolved around control of the air-sea gap to the north. It is exactly that gap which the F-18Es are intended to protect. The chance of them being deployed outside Australia is one-eighth of bugger all.
The interesting thing is that the Government feels it needs these planes to cover the time gap between F-111 and JSF. How long can that gap be: 5 years, maybe 10 tops?
The security environment is benign. There is no regional hostility. And regional capabilities are only increasing slowly and incrementally. Look at the *number* of advanced aircraft that are being introduced, not just their one-on-one capability. And keep in mind the numerical superiority you need to wage an offensive air campaign. No one in the region is ordering 300 fighters, 100 landing craft, 5 aircraft carriers, and printing “South Irian” currency, are they?
Nonetheless, the Government is putting $4bn into shoring up the air-sea gap. More than 4 times what they’ve spent on the Iraq deployment. This is the vindication of Dibb.
Paulus – you over simplify Dibb. The problem with Dibb’s aproach was he was only interested in fighting three men and a dog on the mainland, ifthe air-sea gap was penetrated. This approach, while cheap, severely constrained the Army and hence the ADF in providing options to the Goverment of the day when trying do anything overseas. It also limited the Army severely in developing the capabiltiy to fight more than three men and a dog, which may be required in the future. History continually proves that assumed lead times are a load of bollocks and most conflicts are fought on a come as you are basis. Crap like have ships fitted for but not with is the outcome of this mentality. It is much safer and easier for a heavy force to figth down levels of conflict than it is for a light force to step up.
F/A18s have flown operationally off shore. Your assesment of the likelihood off the Super Hornets not being called on is comforting – are you suggesting that Australia just goes for a period without any recon, strike or air superiority capability??
Razor: I realise I was simplifying Dibb, and I know he was not Mr Popular as far as the Army was concerned. Still, force structure is all about choices, and every dollar can be spent only once. I admire Dibb for the fact that he proposed a clear choice, not just continuing with the old way of dishing out the same proportion of money to the three services.
And his plan was basically logical. If the RAAF and RAN did their job properly with the extra resources they received, the Army never would have had to deal with more than 3 men and their dog.
“F/A18s have flown operationally off shore.” I know they’ve flown in regional deployments and exercises; I just meant that it was unlikely that they’d be deployed into combat. You’ve seen how little the RAAF was used in Gulf Wars I and II, compared to the army and navy.
“Are you suggesting that Australia just goes for a period without any recon, strike or air superiority capability??” Nope. From what’s been reported, it seems the F-18As will last until JSF appears (F-18A retirement around 2015, compared to 2010 for the F-111s). We could go without long-range strike for a few years, but in a benign region, maybe that risk is worth taking.
P.S. What I’ve written probably seems incoherent in that I’m praising Dibb for spending more on the RAAF in the 80s and 90s, but criticising the Government spending $4bn on the RAAF now.
My point is that I agree with other commentators on this thread that there may be ways of spending the money on air capabilities of longer-term benefit, rather than just covering a strike gap of a few years.
I hasten to add that I no way support the typically irresponsible proposals of Nabokov, which is the sort of “Tiger Moth with a Sidewinder” craziness I used to hear from the more demented variety of DSTO scientist (usually after around half a bottle of vintage port). Nonetheless, it would be kinda interesting to set up an exercise with a smart ADF commander, some small-scale mixed forces, a few $mil, and instructions to go low-tech and sneaky.
Razor:
It might surprise you but I thought that Saddam Hussein should have been deposed – and a lot earlier than when G W Bush over-rode all the American experts and sent his forces into the world’s biggest potential death-trap without plans and with confused or absent war aims.
Everyone:
Events are overtaking your conversations here faster than you can talk.
[1]. American attitudes to US-Australia relations, which were far from perfect during the Clinton presidency, are deteriorating very rapidly – and not helped by Howard’s recent interference in US internal politics. [2]. The conditions for the export of US miltary technology are changing fast. [3] American concerns about defeat in Iraq are being openly expressed so just think of what the impact will be on their foreign policies and on trade. …..
So ….. how fast can you resurrect Australian manufacturing? How rapidly can you revive all the forgotten metal trades skills? How quickly can you design, test and build huge quantities of the interceptor aircraft and other essential military equipment we will suddenly need under an abruptly imposed Defence Self-Sufficiency regime? Training …. and getting that training up to speed? And just what do we have left to flog off so as to raise the money to do all this in a hell of a hurry? How speedily can you raise a loyal, fully-trained and well-organized army capable of defending the whole country as well as giving an enemy a very hard time? Protecting our coasts and sealanes – we’ll be able to sub-contract it all to unemployed fishermen armed with .303″ rifles, won’t we?
You could flee the country, of course, but where would you go …. and could your aircraft outfly the air-to-air missiles that are charging up its tail? Good luck folks, the situation is not hopeless but you had better start thinking very smartly about alternatives to buying pretty war-toys on the never-never.
“…craziness I used to hear from the more demented variety of DSTO scientist (usually after around half a bottle of vintage port).”
So have I although in my case it was more scotch than port. And that’s who I was sorta channelling the other the night albeit rather more tongue in cheek.
But I do think there’s a serious point there that both Paulus:
“…kinda interesting to set up an exercise with a smart ADF commander, some small-scale mixed forces, a few $mil, and instructions to go low-tech and sneaky.
(Which by the way I think is a very good idea)
and Graham:
“start thinking very smartly about alternatives to buying pretty war-toys on the never-never.”
are both coming at from other angles.
And that point is that the ADF for the future is more likely than not to find itself in egagements where smart, fast, flexible and robust tactics and equipment is more likely to be valued than large, very expensive, high-maintence, high technology systems often dogged by cost and timelines, bureaucratic bitchfights and geo-political exigencies.
Unless of course, we decide we’re up for the currently mooted Persian excursion.
“Persian excursion.”
The wheels on the tank go round and round…
Nabakov:
I really don’t know but I suspect that that is where the Iranians might be sitting right now. Spanish Armada anyone?
Paulus:
Tiger Moth with a Sidewinder? Or a tinny with a .50 cal. machine gun ["Boghammer"]? Or a truck with a few sheets of steel at just the right angles [Kaspar]? Or an IED? Or – for intelligence – a family pocket camera looking through a hole in a lady’s handbag … or a mobile phone? It’s what you do with what you’ve got that counts.
Remember when the US used to drop hi-tech sweat and urine sniffers along the Ho Chi Minh trail? The Vietnamese just went round them instead into Laos and Cambodia. So Nixon decided to bomb the shit out of Cambodia. With profoundly inimical results for everyone concerned.
And now it’s 21st century shit-smeared punji spikes.
It’s whole new ball game out there, where any bastard on the internet can borrow, adapt or add to these low tech hacks. Or if worried about Echelon, just download the plans into a datastick and walk or bike it across the Mesopotamia/Persia border and swap it for some juicy insurgent phonecam footage that’ll be up on inflammatory chat sites by midnight.
No one can win against the Americans in a modern conventional battlespace. And that’s their weakness. No one fights like that anymore except the Pentagon. Or a rhino dealing with burrowing wasps and infected gums by petulantly stamping on campfires.
Look I want modern secular pluralist capitalist western civilisation to prevail over crazed religious fundies that could blow me up as I’m jetting about abroad. But I fear the West’s frontline, quarterbacks and their cheerleaders are still playing gridiron in an empty stadium while the opposing team is into parkour in the carpark.
This whole thing needs to be completely rethought from the ground up. Never mind SAIC, Blackwater, Halliburton and General Dynamics, the US Administration needs to start outsourcing its strategic and tactical thinking to Google, Intel, Saatchi & Saatchi, Pixar and MacDonalds instead. Those guys consistently deliver creative and effective results on budget, on time and very adaptable in dealing with fast changing global environments too.
To paraphrase ole Klaus for the 21st century, war is the continuation of economics by other means. So let’s turn some of our best money and marketing brains onto the problem. I can’t see them doing any worse than the current crop of general politicos and political generals who wanna play highly organised, very costly and hopefully antiseptic away football games against blood and guts assymetrical networked players on their home ground in the region where chess was invented.
Oh and threadmaster, please delete my duplicate comment above and then this one, so we can it never happened.
Thankee.
Go to hell.
I get to pass Go first though don’t I?
Ask Cerberus.
I did and got three separate choices. I’m choosing hellhound number 2.
Who is this “threadmaster” anyway?
He’d better be careful not to run into a Moderatrix of Doom in a dark alley one night!
Nabakov:
Actually, people-sniffers, SLAR, etc., were great IF they were used wisely …. and not-so-hot if they weren’t. So it’s the way high-tech goodies are used that is important.
You said
and
Exactly!!! And that last applies to Australians too.
Kim:
Ooooo; are you in a bad mood?
Nabakov said – “needs to start outsourcing its strategic and tactical thinking to Google, Intel, Saatchi & Saatchi, Pixar and MacDonalds instead. Those guys consistently deliver creative and effective results on budget, on time and very adaptable in dealing with fast changing global environments too.”
What a complete load of bollocks – I’m not going to chase down the article but there was an intreresting one in the weekend papers two weeks ago about defence projects that had solid evidence that in the commercial world many complex projects failed, didn’t do what they are meant to do, were over time and over budget. It is just that Defence projects get a lot of parliamentary and media scrutiny (nothing wrong with that), and are much more difficult than what the commercial world tries. The Commcial world failures, cost over runs etc just don’t attract all the oprobrium that the defence projects do.
They say, on a still moonless night, you can hear the moans of John Roberts in the stands of Wembley stadium.
If you had actually read what I\’d written Razor, you see I said strategic and tactical thinking and not defence projects.
I\’m not talking about building stuff but about working out why and what stuff needs to built and how best to use it.
So you are saying that the members of the ADF are stupid.
Lovely.
I suppose you support the troops,
but still think they are idiots.
Gee, you’re getting really desperate to lay a glove on me Razor if you have to resort to such a ludicrious strawman.
Why don’t you actually read what I wrote in my second last comment. You’ll find no mention of the ADF but instead words like “Pentagon” and “US Administration”.
Boys, boys, please, do I have to get the wooden spoon? Now listen to Uncle Henry. Australian ingenuity and entrepreneurial spirit… well, I hate to break the news to you but ah, it’s a bit of a myth.
The only items of defence gear that originated in Australia and made it into series production were the Sentinel tank and the Owen submachine gun. Alas, Sentinel lacked an engine and gearbox as Australia didn’t even have machinery to cut gears. By the time we got around lashing a few Chrysler engines together and designing a primitive crash box, the Sherman appeared. The project died in the bum. The Owen was a good bit of gear but had to be machined rather than stamped and was thus slow and expensive to produce. In the end it proved ineffective in Korea against well padded troops.
As far as aircraft are concerned, only thanks to a persistent Polish migrant Henry Millicer, did the very excellent Victa Airtourer come into being. He wore out some shoeleather trying to get the project off the ground, ahem. Victor Richardson of the motor mower fame stumped up the dough. It was a fabulous littl kite, fully aerobatic and very easy to fly. We adopted it as our air force trainer. In the end we let it go and it went to NZ.
Apart from that, there is the GAF Nomad. (Period of embarassed silence here.)
BTW, Victa, sadly sources its mowers engines nowadays from Briggs and Stratton. We couldn’t even design a 4-stroke motor from scratch, it’s just easier to buy one off ther shelf, of course.
Have we ever built anything on any scale without Big Bro holding our hand?
Let’s see…
Irrigation? Thank you Chaffey Bros, from Canada.
Sydney Harbour Bridge? Dorman and Long of GB, structural calculations courtesy of Ralph Freeman ex Cleveland Bridge Co. USA. Imported engineers and labour, British steel.
Holden? Thank you Chevrolet – a 1937 model in 1948.
Snowy Mountains Scheme? Our idea but execution and management by US Bureau of Reclamation who trained most of the engineers (ca. 100). When the excavation started going pearshaped, a Yank overseer had to be brought in to meet time and budget constraints.
The Alice to Darwin rail link? Halliburton of the USA. And they brought in their own manager – Al Volpe, a texas oilman. I asked him, ‘hey Al, how come we don’t have an Australian project manager on this job? And he said, ‘you guys don’t have any big project experience, we jes caint take the chance.’
Sir Henry.
I was under the impression that the Collins class subs were initially an Oz product – until the software (which was being developed from scratch, and had problems) was ditched in favour of the Amerikan stuff ?
Just curious….
Also weren’t the Hartnett cars (all 13 protoypes) a completely Australian effort ?- my granny had one
Collins sub is a Swedish design.
Sweden: population 9.1 million.
Yes, Christine is correct Kokkums, a Swedish design was adopted and re-adapted – a stretch here, an extra capability there, all the while managed by Australians. With predictable results.
Pterosaur my feathered friend, Hartnett, was indeed another Australian success story as was Lightburn Zeta (Lightburn was a washing machine manufacturer).
An honorable mention should go to Buckle, a fibreglass sports car with a Ford Zephyr engine and Bolwell, ditto, with a Holden engine. None of them real volume sellers we should say. Not compared to say, Trabant or the British Reliant three-weeler.
Then there were Leyland P76 and the Ford Capri. The latter was actually Ford Laser running chassis with a soft top body, and the Laser itself was a badge engineered Mazda 323, a very successful design. Given all that, the Capri didn’t quite cut the mustard, either overseas or at home; it got killed by an original Mazda design, the MX5. Tssk, tsssk.
Thanks Christine and Sir Henry, I’d forgotten the Bolwell,
one of the physics PHd’s had one when I was at uni , I was quite impressed with it at the time, although said PHd’s antics with a ruby laser were more legendary.
Well… it looks like a lot has been said here. I wonder though….Just how ineffective you would think the F-18 Hornet/Super Hornet would be..if you were sitting in a hole in the ground in some god forsaken shithole somewhere while F-18′s lobbed thousand pound bombs at you…..I wonder.
Or an F-111 for that matter……..
Nabby – given that this general discussion is about the ADF decision to buy the Super Hornet and the fact that the quality of personnel in both the ADF and US Forces aren’t dissimilar your comments apply as much to the ADF as to US prsonnel.
Dear me Razor, you really are determined to defend an unsustainable position to the last man, arenât you?
Yes, this thread started about buying Super Hornets, a strategic decision involving politicians, defence strategists and senior ADF brass and one on which I didnât directly comment. How exactly does that indicate I am doubting the competence of service personnel?
Then, like many threads, it went in different directions which included some slightly tipsy musings by me on how US war planners donât seem to have grasped the changing nature of asymmetrical 21st century conflict. Again, in what way does that show me disparaging the troops themselves?
But look, never mind what I actually said, what would you like me to say so you can then shout âgotchaâ??
Good article in today’s AFR on this topic.
Let’s just cut to the chase here. We need multi-role aircraft. Here are the approximate unit costs in USD (I’m not including the Super Hornet)of the contenders, the Sukhoi not included:
F16 Block 52 $20m-$26m;
SAAB Gripen $45
Eurofighter $58m
F22 Raptor (if we could get one) $200m, approx.
F35 $155m (latest guesstimate)
The SAAB offers excellent value and prospect of top offsets if not complete CKD kit production. The engine is an upgrade of an F/A18′s.
The SAAB has excellent radar and electronics and is capable of launching the latest AMRAAMs, etc. It has a 1200 km range without refuelling. it can take off and land on ordinary roads requiring just 800m runway space. It is very easy to fly in combat with autopilot coupled gunsight.
Apart from the very old F16 design, this is the cheapest aircraft we could have had if there were no corrupt politics involved. We could afford about 200. The cost would come down if we made them here. it is a very practical, sensible choice. It could be deployed from Christmas and Cocos if need be, without preparation.
Anecdotal evidence from pilots I know say the Yanks have been putting up 5 or more F-15s against single F22s and still coming off very badly. So, just because an F-22 costs more doesn’t mean it isn’t cost effective.
The Super Hornet buy is the correct risk minimisation strategy. The F-35 buy is the right choice for a multi-role platform, but we should start leaning on the US of A for a couple of Squadrons of F-22.
Razor: Would you like to point out for the peanut gallery just how much your ideal air force would cost? And would you like to suggest how you’re going to pay for it?
I don’t follow the logic there, Razor. Why is purchasing the Super Hornets correct risk minimisation? They’re intended to replace the ageing F-111s, but don’t compare AT ALL in the strike role of the F-111. This is before we even get to the issue of whether the F-111s SHOULD be replaced. Yes, long-distance low-level bombing capability is nice to have, but not necessary for the defence of Australia. As someone else above noted, these fighters will be unnecessary once we buy the replacement anyway.
What I find fascinating in this debate about flying phalli is the assumption that the JSF is going to turn out to be materially cheaper than the F-22. I don’t think there’s any question the F-22 is superior to any available alternative before cost is considered, but I ‘m horrified by the cost escalation we’ve seen in the F-35.
We’re already paying in excess of US$100m a copy, and delivery won’t start until 2011 at the earliest. And it gets worse: because we’ve signed on for this project from near the start, we’re supposed to help shoulder the sunk costs of developing the thing before it even goes into production. If it were possible to convince the USA that we’re a trustworthy ally – apparently we’re not to be trusted with their magnificently baroque technology – it might actually turn out cheaper to buy the F-22 at known cost NOW.
Finally, I’d like to encourage Wingnut Commander Nabakov and all the other Armchair Air Marshals out there to think a little outside the box when it comes to air superiority.
The design of the F-22 itself points to three critical issues in dominating airspace:
- the radar & detection technology used to identify, track and target enemy platforms and missiles;
- the missiles used in destroying these objects; and
- the vulnerability of our own platforms to detection (e.g. “stealth”).
In theory (and, probably, in future practice) none of the above require aircraft piloted by human beings. CURRENT air-to-air missiles (e.g. the AMRAAM, the R-77 and the proposed Meteor) have the ability to outmanoeuvre and outpace any fighter. The reason why is that a missile can sustain g-forces that a human pilot cannot. People forget that the primary function of the F-22 is to keep its pilot alive, not to kill the enemy, and that a rocket has vastly improved performance when you don’t strap an ape to it.
Take the pilot out of the equation and the platform you’re looking at has vastly increased capability for payload, performance and stealth. Give it a decade or two and we may realise that BOTH the F-22 and F-35 are expensive anachronisms rendered obsolete by future rocketry and/or UCAV advances.
Robert – yep – lots. Where to start finding the money? – the ABC is worth a couple of F-22 a year, 10% GST on everything (like it was meant to be before the Democrats (good riddance) buggered it up) – no exceptions. Massive cost savings through federalising health and getting rid of ethnic doubling up of services (and a reduction in GST distribution to states to compensate for them no longer being responsible for health). . . I could go on . .
Despite recent increases, our defence spending is still woefully short of adequate. I believe we should be spending between 5% and 8% of GDP on Defence and at the moment we are well below 3%.
Squadron leader – the Super Hornet is never going to be a perfect replacement – I think we should also get longer range cruise missiles for the Collins Class subs and another longer range airl launched cruise missile.
Do you expect no cost escalation? Can you show me an cutting edge defence project thathas not increased in cost?
The early sign up on the F-35 has a number of positive outcomes for Australia. I’m not going to list them now, but there are very good reasons to be in it from the beginning. We didn’t sign up for the development work just because we like Bush’s aftershave.
Quite possibly, Spadroon Leader.
But the USAF and other air forces are all run by former fighter pilots. So, given the choice between the cheap, nasty, and effective solution, or the X-Wing Starfighter, which do you think they’ll choose?
Whoa there, Schhwing Commander. Before we all start getting horny for weaponised UAVs there’s the small matter of the MTCR, which includes Australia. I reckon we should junk it out of hand, but that’s yet another reason I’m not part of the Defence establishment.
Razor:
Sure. Take an old 155mm artillery shell, bury it underneath a road with a long wire attaching to the fuse to a 9V battery with a switch, wait until your target drives across it, and fire it. You’ve just constructed and operated the world’s most cutting-edge offensive technology. Best of all, thanks to the competitive marketplace, it’s getting cheaper and cheaper all the time.
Fiasco – mining has been a military tactic for centuries – hardly cutting edge technology.
It’s medieval, indeed, but the edge still works fine, and there’s precious little advanced technology can do about it. My point is this: do you want the ADF to be technologically advanced or successful in making war? The two aren’t necessarily synonymous.
Consider that in the field of riot control, the police forces of the world have regressed from the Easter 1916 tactics of machine-gunning demonstrators, to Roman tactics of slow advances with baton-and-shield flanked by cavalry. They’re all the more successful at controlling street disorder for it.
This denigrating of aussie ingenuity is, well, unAustralian.
Didn’t an Aussie invent the “black box”.
Our planes don’t fly the requisite distance between landing strips. But with the “black box” we know with absolute precision why not.
___________________
* And the Nomad. It gave persons with no fixed abode a bad name.
Thank Heavens we don’t have any countries within a cooee with the remotest level of military competence or force projection, otherwise Razor would be calling for us to spend at least 85% of GNP on defence!
Fiasco, it’s a false dichotomy to talk about defence as if we had to choose between hi-tech/expensive and low-tech/sneaky. The hi-tech equipment is still peerless for delivering large HE wallops precisely on target. Lo-tech can be surprisingly effective, as you point out. But you can have both hi- and low-tech in a flexible mix.
It would be interesting to know how much the current Defence establishment thinks about unorthodox low-tech. When I worked in Defence in the ’90s, I was involved with landmine policy, and met the Army Director of Engineers. He lamented once how he would have liked to have his boys plant simulated mines and booby-traps to spice up the major Defence exercises, but his suggestions were usually vetoed by the brass.
What I would like to see is an ADF exercise set against a low-tech, sneaky opponent force, who would have lots of freedom to act — and would have ABC camera crews following the “insurgents” around as they try to ambush the regular troops! Seriously. It would make a fascinating series, reality TV with guns and bombs! (Of course, the ABC would have to agree to edit anything that revealed gaping holes in our national security.) And it would be a great recruiting tool, reinforcing the point that ADF service isn’t just “Marchin’ up and down the square!” (to quote Monty Python).
Which is fantastic for force projection and diplomatic bluff, and for parading on trucks in front of Lenin’s mausoleum or flying-past the MCG doing dump-and-burns. Strategically, the most important targets the ADF is likely to face within the next generation of technology are frankly immune to superior firepower; ask the Israelis how much good it did them to have 100% air superiority and precise munitions in Southern Lebanon.
Agreed. I nominate the supporter squads of Sydney United and the Bonnyrigg White Eagles.
Paulus, your point about recruiting is very well made, it’s the most serious problem the ADF faces at the moment. They’re stuck (like every Western military) with a nineteenth-century aristocratic divide between officer-class and NCO, where one is supposed to specialise in ‘leadership’, whatever that is, and the other to get their hands dirty doing the trades apprenticeships, catering, truck-fixing and assorted gruntery. It discourages career soldiering at both levels; managers have every encouragment to leave and join the ranks of the professional uni-trained managerial class, and the best NCOs have nowhere to go but into cadetship if they want to advance. Unsurprisingly the ADF is at the same time vastly over-officered and under-staffed.
That class divide has to end. ‘Hardening and networking’ are one thing, meritocracy and skills are quite another.
“Wingnut Commander Nabakov and all the other Armchair Air Marshals out there to think a little outside the box when it comes to air superiority.”
You just want me talk dirty about amphetamine-spikied fruit straps again.
“Didnât an Aussie invent the âblack boxâ?.”
Yes, Dr David Warren at the ARL and everyone here rejected it. The RAAF said at the time it “would reveal more expletives than explainations.” It took an UK aviation bureaucrat to grasp its full potential and arranged to it have commercially developed in the Old Dart.
“But you can have both hi- and low-tech in a flexible mix.It would be interesting to know how much the current Defence establishment thinks about unorthodox low-tech.”
Precisely the point I was trying make before in my tipsy and “typically irresponsible” way.
“He lamented once how he would have liked to have his boys plant simulated mines and booby-traps to spice up the major Defence exercises, but his suggestions were usually vetoed by the brass.”
Not to worry, they can now observe at second hand now how directed mines and garage claymores are now working out in Iraq.
“So, given the choice between the cheap, nasty, and effective solution, or the X-Wing Starfighter, which do you think theyâll choose?”
Go for the F-22. Most expensive and exclusive hot rod on the block. Imagine supercruising down the China Straits, one arm out the window and the sound system thumping out a AC/DC Avalanches mashup. We’ll be the coolest kids in the region and also sending the message our big brother can beat up yours anytime.
But being loud and silly aside, we will need to, as Paulus and de Gama point out in different ways, find out how to get a new generation of sharp, creative and practical minds involved in creating a realistic, affordable and effective defence system for 21st century challenges.
Maybe a brillantly organised, truly massive, utterly lateral and totally unsignalled invasion exercise could get things moving here. Peter Jackson and New Zealand could probably be commissioned to do this for around the cost of a couple of F-22s. And I’m sure the ADF could negoiate some decent residuals out of the footage as well to defray expenses.
Yes, absolutely right about recruitment, Fiasco. I used to suggest that modern militaries (especially the air force and navy) will sooner or later have to abolish other ranks and NCOs, and bring in everyone as an officer. Like in Star Trek.* Or, for that matter, like the AFP do. People thought it was a strange suggestion, but I’ll be right eventually!
* Although as I’m sure people will point out, Star Trek confused the issue by having the occasional Chief Petty Officer turn up.
“Peter Jackson and New Zealand could probably be commissioned to do this for around the cost of a couple of F-22s.”
Heh. I have this vision of a vast horde of orcs surrounding Parliament House … John Howard as Denethor … Kevin Rudd as Frodo the hobbit …
Fiasco – your assertion about there being a class system in the ADF is an absolute crap. Officers are selected on leadership ability – not class.
Mine warfare and booby trap training is an essential part of any military training. The idea that it should be used to stop a whole exercise is pure arrogance ignoring the requirement to maximise training resources. Another show stopper is electronic jamminng etc. – fundamentally important to train for, but not worth buggering a whole exercise to prove its utility, which is not denied.
Well, you’ll notice that even though NZ got rid of its air force, no one anywhere thinks seriously about invading it, because:
a) you’d be met on the ground by orcs, Maoris and bikie gangs, probably all wearing the same colours;
b) any invader would have to climb over Aus first to get to those ANZUS freeloaders;
c) they’d whip up some brillant media propaganda to get the rest of the world coming to their rescue (“Save the highlight of your gap year in Queenstown!”; and
d) why?
The last is probably the ultimate defence against invasion. Why shoot when you can sign for it instead? I mean who the fuck would think physically taking over Australia by force of arms would be a cost effective exercise anyway? We’re generally undervalued and large swathes of us are easily purchased on the open market.
“Officers are selected on leadership ability – not class.”
Perhaps and yes the best are. But I’ve also got pissed with Duntroon graduates who exhibited a fairly sharp eye for how cutlery was used appropriately and for namedropping good wines and cool pubs at Portsea. There is still a bit of that Brit army officer and gentleman hangover there.
And I’m curious Razor. You’re clearly knowlegble and passionate about the ADF. Want to reveal anything about your service in it? I’m guessing infantry captain who resigned in disgust at the way some things were going.
You’ve misunderstood me, Razor. Officer entry (ie. at Duntroon) is of course open on the basis of merit but after that it’s anything but. A cadet just out of officer training, in their early twenties, is likely to be put in charge of a unit whose members are vastly more technically experienced than they are. Officers are arbitrarily given privileges of rank, in pay and conditions for starters, but also in chances for promotion: that’s what I meant by ‘class’ in the military.
The culture was outdated when second lieutenants led their commands over the top of trenches. As it stands the all of the military camp—saluting, shoe polishing, short hair and yessirnosir—is totally counterproductive.
Paulus, I’d prefer to abolish ‘officers’ and elevate what we now think of as NCO ranks right up into the levels of staff-officer duty. Once again the police forces of the world provide an example: every cozzer starts out on the footpath and, at least in theory, gains promotion on ability and further education. There’s no special ‘leadership’ entry.
Duntroon graduate, RAAC, 10 years – quit because the probability of reaching LTCOL and there being a Tank Regiment worth commanding was becomin very small. Out 6 years and making more than the CDF.
“As it stands the all of the military camp—saluting, shoe polishing, short hair and yessirnosir—is totally counterproductive.”
Or as Dr Norman Dixon, a former Sapper Colonel put it “bullshit” – and he singled out the Australian Army as being singularly free of this crap amongst first world western armies. However he did write that text well over a decade ago.
Nabby, I was a leader in introducing my cohort to Margaret River wines – does that mean I am not worthy to lead diggers.
Fiasco – the only reason there are second lieutenants is that there aren’t third lieutenants.
Young Officers aren’t necessarily expected to be wonderful platoon/troop leaders – they are being trained to be sub-unit and unit commanders.
NCOs are the backbone of the military. That said, few have the skills and attributes to become Unit Coomanders, staff officers, or Generals. The NCO/Officer system is a tried and proven system. Diggers and NCOs who are identified as having leadership potential and officer qualities are strongly recommended to apply for Officer training.
The Police don’t have Officer level entry and a number of higher ranks have expressed dissatisfaction with this. Most officer potential ttypes would be unsuited and would not want to be shit kickers for years before getting sub-unit command.
Ext. Establishing shot of US Office of Defense Cooperation and Procurement Clearance.
Ext. A limo with fluttering Australian pennants pulls up at the main entrance.
Cut to:
Int. MS. lift doors. Dr Bendan Nelson, an Australian flag badge in his lapel is flanked by two men in suits bearing briefcases.
Cut to long corridor with Nelson and his group walking.
Est. door. Door signs says Defence Cooperation and Procurement Clearance – Pacific Region. Air Force General (ret.) Bat Guano.
Cut to
Int. Waiting Room. A female office coordinator extends her hand to Dr Nelson.
FOC: Howdy Dr Nelson. Heard a lot about you, Jane Hathaway.
Nelson: Thank you, very nice to meet you. These are my staff…
Hathaway: I’m afraid they can’t come in with you, this is strictly one on one meeting. Very sensitive. There are countries that would give their eye teeth for this.
Nelson: But they are my…
Hathaway (her eyes narrowing): I’m afraid this is a non-negotiable type situation. General Guano said mano a mano.
Nelson (resigned, sits down to wait).
The door bursts open. A grey haired man bounds out.
Guano: Brendan! How yer doin’ buddy? Come right in.
Cut to
Int. Inside Guano’s office. It is dominated by a huge desk – the walls are festooned with model aeroplanes, photos, memorabilia, citations, honorary degrees and a glass case with firearms. Guano plops down on a leather settee and motions Nelson to sit in a red leather armchair opposite, between them is a coffee table.
Guano: What’s your poison?
Nelson: Pardon?
Guano: Rye? Tequila? Vodka?
Cut to a little while later. Laughter. They are both smoking cigars, tumblers in hand.
Guano: You bastard, Brendan. I’m tellin’ ya, this ain’t Cuban.Itr’s againsat the law. This is Jamaican. (More laughter).
Nelson looks at the paper collar on the cigar closely as he rolls it between his fingers. Reads slowly: Co-hi-ba Ma-gic-os. Sounds Cuban to me.
Guano laughs uproariously, slapping his thigh.
Guano: You’re one smart dude, you know that, Brendan? You basterd. Hey, I love you Aussies. Sharp as…
Nelson (cocky): So what about those aeroplanes, Bat. You speaking for Boeing on this as well?
Guano: Yep, yep. We’re handling everything through this office. Special relationship and all that. Nuther slug of rye?
Nelson: So, can you do us a good deal? I mean the price had been going up and up and…
Guano: Hey, hey, buddy. This is one heck of a plane. It is stealthy as a mo-fo. Fly up your ass and you wouldn’t even know it. It can pull 10 g but there’s no goddam pilot on this earth that could live through that, even Aussies. You stand dat thang on its tail and lean on the HOTAS and your intestine is liable to pop outta your sphincter like a jack in the box. He, he, goddamn it boy, this here’s one hot little hot rod. Yessiree. There ain’t nuthing that’s gonna touch that baby. You are king of the sky.
Nelson (confidentially): Has the price gone up again? You know my treasurer has put his foot down.
Guano: Don’t worry about that pussy, Brendan. Got his ass kicked by a commie cabdriver you know? Used to have long hair. Seriously, meit, is that how you say it? Meit? Anyways, let me let you in on a little secret here. This is a force multiplyer. You know what that means?
Nelson (defensively): Yeah, I…
Guano: Lissen to me, son. It’s 60 to one force multiplier. It does the job of 60 aircraft and then some. It’s like Superman fightin’ a gang of baddies, Brendan. Pow, pow, pow.
Nelson: About the price…
Guano: Don’t worry about the details. My people had some of your people and they’ve agreed on a fixed package, fly-away, turnkey operation, plus spares and training.
Nelson: My people?
Guano: Oh, yeah. They spent two weeks in Vegas nuttin’ out the fine print. You Aussies sure are hard folk to deal with. Anyways, they then went down to Florida whered I joined them and we signed and shook on it in Magic Kingdom.
Guano opens a folder and pulls out a sheet paper. Nelson examines it then looks up. Guano snatches it back into the folder and puts the folder into a safe.
Nelson (uncertaintly): It says the price isn’t fixed.
Guano: Tell you what I’ll do. I’ll fix the price right now and release airplane. Right now. Whaddya say? We’re can-do people, Brendan. How do you like that?
Nelson: That’s excellent. My prime minister will be pleased. What’s the final fly-away price if you don’t mind me asking?
Guano puts on a pair glasses, takes out a gold pen and writes something down on a pad, tears out the paper and pushes it across the coffee table towards Nelson.
Nelson looks at the paper incredulously.
Nelson: We have a budget of $13 billion for the New Combat Aircraft Capability procurement. You only have one aircraft here and you call it a package?
Guano: Yeah. That’s right. With this baby – it’s packed with all the fruit remember? Sure! It’s a package. You only had 24 F111s right? You then flew a few of them into the ground. So with a 60 multiplier factor you’re better off by some 40 aircraft. You got a bargain here.
Nelson: Now wait a minute. This is not what…
Guano: What’s that itsy bitty hole in your ear lobe Brendan?
Nelson: What?
Guano: You wear an earring? You some sort of fag? I think you’re some kind of deviated prevert Brendan!
Nelson: No, no. I assure you. I’m a married man.
Guano: Heard that one before (looks towards the gun cabinet).
Nelson: Look we’ll take the aircraft if you think it will do the job and if it’s as good as you say…
Guano: Hey, Brendan, would we lie to you?
“Nabby, I was a leader in introducing my cohort to Margaret River wines – does that mean I am not worthy to lead diggers.”
Au contaire. Showing the troops how to properly appreciate what they are fighting for is excellent command tactics. Not to mention very useful logistical intelligence when it comes to a bit of foraging. Bet you can’t reveal the best pick up joint on the Mornington Penisula though.
Yer still being a bit coy about revealing actual details of yer service though. Surely you must be able to give us something more without sacrificing strategic info?
Sorry, Nabby but as I make more than the CDF now and I rely on close client relationships, I prefer to remain anon in order to remain apolitical to current and future clients.
I will say that I didn’t deploy on operations because I submitted my resignation before East Timor and, despite volunteering, never got a UN job.
Tres amusent Sir Hank, except perhaps you could have cut the middle act by a good 60% and still retained most of the killer lines.
Also perhaps Turgidson and not Guano. But the overall point is taken. When it comes to defence procurement, the Yanks quite rightly take us for dim country cousins.
And to fire up this thread again, I reckon the only two major Australian defence procurements beyond the F/A-18s that are really working out for the long run so far are the Collins subs and the ANZAC frigates – both Euro designs where they cheerfully worked with us on local customisation and industry offsets and where both are now turning out to be serious long term terroritial control assets. Compare and contrast with the Kamen Sea Sprites.
“Sorry, Nabby but as I make more than the CDF now and I rely on close client relationships, I prefer to remain anon in order to remain apolitical to current and future clients.”
Reading through that again, it does not properly compute. I’m sure you’re not the only Australian Army officer to move to the private sector – so why still so coy about your rank and which branch you served in? I’m sure you could tickle us with bit more info without blowing your cover.
Also, what is the CDF? That YABA is new to me.
Now bothering to read this thread properly while sobering up and I see you were in the RAAC Razor. My apologies for not absorbing this data sooner.
A tankie? Leopard 1s I presume. I saw a few of them on manovures up north once. Damn they were fast and bouncy. Even though they weighed around 40 tonnes, they were being driven around like they were dirtbikes. Then they got put on the tank transporters and hosed down like excitable starlets.
Razor’s doing well to be out-earning the Chief of the Defence Force, N.
You might be right about the Euro-gear. We’ll see how the Tigers shape up, hoping that they’ll be a bit more hardy than the Americans’ chop-chops.
I read that it’ll be equipped with the Hellfire, a wonderful old reliable bit of missile, which (rocket geek alert) is beginning to be deployed on unpiloted aircraft like the Predator. That bitta trivia should stir the semi-robotic loins of the Schwing Commander.
Now, Sir Henry, gee I wish we had one of them doomsday machines…
Oh come on Nabakov! CDF is Verkhovnyi – Chief of the Defence Force. And so is his (as yet not her) office. Someone who works in the CDF is a pen pusher.
Buck Turgidson would be too old by now. In 1960 he was already running a theatre scenario so this would have been too much of a comedown. Bat Guano was then a colonel. In due course he would have been promoted to general and then retired to handle a procurement assitance bureau in concert with industry. And of course he was very much concerned with fluoridation and deviated preverts.
Stick to your day job. (My guess it’s running a dry cleaning establishment in Coburg, with a sideline of videos).
This thread is perking up nicely.
Nabs, I’m gobsmacked you didn’t know Razor was a tincanman. He’s been around for yonks (notably chez Quiggler) and has remarked upon it several times. I think he feels compelled to defend the ADF whenever smartarses comme nous take the piss out of our uniformed public servants.
Two questions for you, Razor:
1) You present the predictable (and traditional and reasonable) argument for the commissioned/NCO divide:
Now, leaving aside the issue of how you assess the leadership potential of an 18 yo YOYO, your experience shows only too well that the vast majority of officers are NOT expected to progress to field, let alone general, level. In FACT, they are only expected – and trained to – achieve company/squadron/battery level, and most officers drop out of the service by Captain or Major rank.
I submit it is highly arguable that a Captain or Major is fundamentally more skilled at tactics and leadership than a CSM or RSM. So why the distinction? That it’s a “tried and proven” system does not mean it’s the best. Why not force ALL soldiers to serve, say, a two-year term in the ranks before consideration for officer training, and commission down to Corporal level? And, while we’re at it, can we drop this obsession with officers having uni degrees?
2) In your reincarnation as a financial planner, what’s the vibe on the Howard Holiday for super? Any pickup yet in clients dropping $1m into their super ahead of 1 July?
P.S. I suppose relative to most people in Perth outside the mining industry the CDF’s on a fair whack ($200K or thereabouts, I gather), but it’s not that much relative to middle-management in an East coast corporation. Our servicemen don’t get paid what they deserve.
Herr Ober-unter-ober-unter-do-the-hokey-pokey, the day the top brass start getting paid like corporate directors, and are encouraged to behave like them, is the day the ADF starts ceasing to be so relatively egalitarian. Any guesses what happens to morale when you increase inequality, even relatively, between the top and bottom ranks? I mean, apart from encouraging nineteenth-century public goods like deference, knowledge of one’s place, and physical hazing of subalterns?
The problem (in the private world of bizness as for the post-Soviet command-economy of the Western military) isn’t fairness at the top, it’s justice at the bottom-middle levels. That’s where the knowledge squeeze is, not at the staff officer level.
Contra your assertion about degrees, university study—or some equivalent that involves wide reading in the humanities and social sciences, a grounding in science and most importantly of all, foreign languages—should be available and expected of every career soldier in a professional outfit like the ADF.
To return to my beloved example of police forces, probationary constables these days are both expected to do a few years of beat work and advance their qualifications at the same time. They’re encouraged to do useful things like get Science degrees with psych majors, Social Work degrees, and specialise as they advance. Policing isn’t just about belting little shits with truncheons and driving on the wrong side of the road (anymore), and nor should soldiering just be for boys who like guns but not books.
Funny story: a country boy I know went through the Police Academy in Goulburn (NSW) and at the time of choosing placements, chose “Lake Emba”. He liked the sound of it, and he loved fishing.
von Bazza – you are on the ball!! Well spotted!
As for your question “I submit it is highly arguable that a Captain or Major is fundamentally more skilled at tactics and leadership than a CSM or RSM. So why the distinction?” My answer is – About ten years in experience! You want your Regiment/Battalion Commanders to be old enough to have cred but young enough to keep up (not saying CSMs and RSMs are too old) so you want COs to be less than 40 years of age. You are correct that CSMs and RSMs could run the organisation on their ear for basic operations, but there is a suprising amount of politicking at Unit Command level and a diverse manangerial/academic skill set is required of a modern commander.
The idea of a couple of years service pre-officer training isn’t bad one. The Israelis have something like that I think. I did it in a small way by being in the ARES for 3 years while at UWA.
Uni degrees do develop both generalist and specific skills that Officers require. You can become and Officer without one but you won’t go past Major, if you make it that far. On the downside, I was rarely impressed by the products of ADFA, who arrived at Duntroon for their final years military training with a frustrating mix of elitist-couldn’t-give-a-fuck attitude. That said, they were some of the brightest individuals I have ever met.
As for the super thing – yep, already starting to flow in – industry estimates are for about $30 billion to come in.
p.s. the CDF makes about $330 k last time I looked. Every $1 mill I sign up is an extra $5,000 on my pre-tax income and I just (30 minutes ago) signed up another $500 k client. Beats sweating it out on Mt Bundy training range!
Nabby – yep, I’m a Tankie – best fun you can have with your pants on! A truck-wit dropped my Leo I off the side of his transporter on the Victoria Highway, NT, when he parked it on the shoulder to load and then guided it on on an angle – not much margin for error. Luckily it didn’t roll!!
You know, in other eras in other places, other very successful armies solved that problem by giving the job to political commissars, leaving the actual running of the units to professional commanders. I’m not saying that’s a viable solution—I’m just pointing out the comparison.
Another comparison, Razor: Sergeants-major at forty, presumably, have between fifteen and twenty years of active service experience. Most of our politicians start their careers at that age, and the tendency everywhere is for older workers to stay longer doing the things they’re good at. Why not the militaries?
As an example par excellence, presuming he wins the next Federal Election, our Prime Minister will be pushing seventy and still going strong tactically and managerially.
Ease back on the throttle there, Fresco. What “egalitarian” relativism are you on about? We’re talking about the most stratified organisation in the country. Outside of academia, anyhoo.
I wasn’t suggesting we corporatise the ADF [though I do think we should open up the ADF to market forces - I've got a bitchin' crew of Ninja Pirates that would make, like, totally awesome commando mercenaries if only the Dead Hand of the "gubermant" would just get. out. of. the. way.]. The brass can get off on the bizarre status rituals that presumably have kept them in so far. My throwaway line about pay WAS aimed at the people lower down who are paid public service salaries for handing control of their life over to the state.
As for your quaint notions about humanities degrees, I am fairly – nay, almost really completely – certain that a grounding in critical theory, epistemology and herstory is neither essential nor desirable for a profession primarily concerned with the facilitation of killing other people.
Call me old-fashioned if you will, but I’m inclined to believe that a capacity for carrying a rifle over long distances and then risking your life shooting it at another bloke is a fair way higher up the list of priorities than an accent parfait en Javanese. All that touchy-feely schmancy-pantsy stuff is best left to those pointy-headed experts in *cough* Intelligence*cough*. In the corporate-speak that I’m sure is close to your heart, let’s get the “core competencies” right before reaching for “peripheral capabilities”.
The plot thickens.
CSMs and RSMs are only that old because of the NCO/WO rank ceiling. I’m suggesting that if you broke the Comm/NCO distinction you’d create a stronger career path for NCOs and virtually guarantee that every platoon and company leader would be mature, experienced and tested. Given the growing importance of junior leadership on the modern battlefield, I simply don’t think it’s good enough to place a 21yo uni graduate in charge of 30-odd professionals.
There’s good reason to think that staff and field-level ranks require increasing levels of organisational skills and more rounded intellect, but the guys with the Right Stuff will move up the ranks regardless, provided they’re given the opportunity.
Implied in that statement is the admission that a degree probably isn’t necessary below the rank of LTC. That tells you the vast majority of army officers (at least – the RAN and RAAF are more technical) don’t need a degree, and the few that do are probably worth educating when necessary.
I’ve seen the estimates too and although I see the upside to flows I’m a little sceptical of the number. The industry is notoriously optimistic. Still, I guess you’ll be a busybee come June…
My estimate was a guess, but somehow I knew YOU’D know the number…
I must say you’re awfully sanguine about charging 50bps as a trail. I sometimes wonder when people are going to wake up to what they’re paying FPs. If you don’t mind me asking (and don’t answer if you’re at all uncomfortable), which platform(s) do you use?
PLG – I won’t take it as an insult as it is a common misconception that all FPs take trail commissions. I don’t – fee for service!! And because I don’t use fund managers – I am the fund manager – directly investing clients funds for them in individualised portfolios – I charge an annual management fee. I then have to pay my dealer group their cut and my staff etc and I keep what is left – which as you noted as about 50bp. I actually take responsibility for the investment performance and get paid for that plus the ongoing advice.
And because I’m watching the market most of the time, I also can keep a few windows open for a bit of intellectual stimulation.
And if my clients haven’t got their shit in one sock by June then I’m not doing my job.
WTF are we doing talking about this for????
Shits and giggles, mate. I was just curious, and definitely not intending to offend. Fee for service? You’re on the side of the angels – more power to you.
Good find, Nabs. The horribly misnamed Nelson is firming up as quite possibly our worst defence minister in history, and that’s up against some pretty stiff competition.
Carlo knows a dud when he sees one. (I don’t mean the Super F18).
OK, you’re old-fashioned. Also ignorant, and totally out of step with any sense of modern warmaking. Running and shooting, that’s it? That shit went out of date when I was sailing carracks up the far coast of Africa firing cannon into Muslim ports for Christ and spices. Making war is about understanding what your enemy is up to before you get into engagement with them. Running and shooting more important than learning the language and customs? That’s fantastic for insurgency warfare in Toowoomba or Townsville. Ask the Americans how runnning-and-shooting training is going from behind the stockade at Fort Apache, Baghdad.
In his grave, T.E. Lawrence is shaping to put a dozen sticks of dynamite up your clacker for being so flippant. And he knew a thing or two about dynamite and people’s clackers.
Perhaps you’d have him just go back to running and shooting?
Look, my fresh-baked Portuguese Tartelette, it’s been a long time since chaps of your ilk got to scare the natives with the New New Thing in boom-boom technology. Modern small unit weapons and tactics are vastly more difficult to master than your “running and shooting” description implies. It takes a good two years of training and experience to produce a competent infantryman, WITHOUT burdening the poor dears with classes in Malayo-Polynesian linguistics and historical relativism. If you should happen to chance upon a few thousand polymaths looking for a dangerous career on low pay who are willing to take on the task, please steer them to your nearest ADF recruitment office.
No, STRATEGY is about yadda yadda. The business end of making war involves high velocity sharp metal objects and vulnerable fleshy bodies. If you can’t get the running and shooting bit right, all that cultural sensitivity noiceness isn’t going to get you very far past the nearest MASH-up.
The jungle warfare (now Land Warfare) school at Canungra, QLD, produced some of the best counter-insurgency troops in the Malayan and Vietnam Wars.
It’s not the Australian Army that’s still hung up on fighting a cataclysmic mechanised war on the North German plain. As for Iraq, that’s a FUBAR clusterfuck for a variety of reasons – a dearth of CultStuds isn’t one of them. Here’s a general proposition:
never fight a land war in Asiaif your grunts need a humanities degree to win a counter-insurgency war, you probably shouldn’t be fighting that war.I don’t recall Lawrence attempting to teach Arab tribesmen comparative theology either. How many of those Bedouin blokes had BA’s, I wonder? In fact, IIRC, WWI involved quite a lot of that running and shooting stuff for the majority of the participants. I imagine quite a lot of those blokes are indignantly pushing up poppies at you right now.
F deG:
Recent running and shooting wars/theatres (not in chronological order): Falluja, Karbala, Mogadishu, Southern Lebanon, Falklands, Afghanistan, the Iraq-Syria border (SMU, see link . And that’s just the white chaps.
Your point being, Cadet Stiffler? Perhaps you oughto rearrange your list of those scuffles in the order of who started which, and who won.
Kommisar Cluedo:
Very very true. I’ll concede you that point, and give also my respect to the Australian Army’s specialty of long-range patrolling, outside the range of artillery and immediate close air support, that is.
Interesting you mention the Malayan and Vietnamese to-dos. You’ll remember that the British did so well in the Emergency because they had so much colonial knowledge about who hated who (Chinese diaspora vs. ethnic Malays, vs commos, vs etc.), and left so much of the massacre-work to the locals. Classical education did the toffs wonders in that case. You’ll remember the French and Americans did so poorly in their Indo-Chinese adventures because they weren’t willing to let each civil war be civil, the French imagining a peaceful Empire and the US imagining an anti-communist middle-class Massachussets on the Mekong.
Amen to the second part. On the first part, consider the forgotten major part of actually making an insurgency: educating and politicising your supporters. It’s the People’s War, stupid. Multilingual squaddies might be a hard ask, but would it be too much to expect junior commanders to have some idea of what’s in the Little Red Book?
No, when you think about it, not really. It’s exactly what Clinton was thinking when he dropped those Tomahawks on Sudan. I’d have loved to try blasting through a West Bank slum in a tank after ‘militants’ (heh), and some of the recent Yankee ‘strategists’ have had the distinct tincture of Inquisition about ‘em. The only difference is that these days, cabinet wars and adventurist invasions aren’t expected to be self-funding in slaves and spices.
War planners these days don’t know what it’s like to work in the private sector… they expect results.
Oh, and on cue, the editors of the very interesting Small Wars Journal have opened up a writing programme to uniformed readers, inspired by the US Army’s Centre for Lessons Learned (CALL).* But please, go ahead, keep strafing those straw targets marked ‘pomo’ and ‘cultstuds’ downrange with your anti-intellectual wunderwaffen.
*I find it pretty humorous too.
I’m glad you are amused Fiasco. Thomas Ricks reckons in his book – which he so appositely named after your good self – that Americans in Iraq didn’t seem to heed their own CALL. There’s a fair few PhDs in the US Army. And most of their theses seem to have been about learning from the Vietnam experience. What gives? Are they slow learners, or something?
“Contra your assertion about degrees, university study—or some equivalent that involves wide reading in the humanities and social sciences, a grounding in science and most importantly of all, foreign languages—should be available and expected of every career soldier in a professional outfit like the ADF.”
We already have units of soldiers just like that. They’re called ARes University Regiments.
Fine units. Held in high esteem by the rest of the Army. From what I hear, the university background gives every private the notion that he or she is as good as their officers, and this independent spirit is highly regarded.
Sir Hank and Fiasco, I suspect yer both ultimately on the same side but just getting carried away a bit by the heat of battle.
And as regards effective Anglo irregular force leaders, let’s remember too Ord Wingate, far less formally educated than T. E Lawrence (Oxon) and whose fluency in Arabic and Hebrew meant nothing in Burma, and yet he proved to be pretty much as effective military and publicitywise and even more crazy than Vaseline of Arabia.
OK, maybe referencing Wingate is going it a bit. How about General Bill Slim instead? A former primary school teacher and clerk with no tertiary education who rose through the ranks to utterly squash the Japanese Army. And I don’t remember Arthur Wellesley doing much fancy book-learnin’ beyond 18th century libel laws. I’m also struggling to recall whether Cetshwayo took out a double first at the other place.
And the blokes now steadily bleeding the Yanks in Mesopotamia I’m fairly certain didn’t spend much time at staff college either.
“They’re called ARes University Regiments.”
Now why does remind me of the Cambridge University Naval Training Squadron?
Don’t get me started on Orde Wingate, Nabakov. On a scale of English eccentrics from 1 to 10 Wingate was 12.5. Orde’s idea of a bath was to scrub himself with dry brushes (no water) for an hour. Handy in the field when the water was scarce. He also received his subalterns starkers in his tent. He tried to neck himself twice. Wingate had a very good education if mainly a religiously themed one. He was a renowned Bible scholar (he came from a fundy religious family of Plymouth Brethren) and was an anthropologist as well as a linguist. He was posted to Egypt as one of those Arabists that the Brits nurtured to very good purpose, Vaso Lawrence was one of course, Wilfred Thesiger was another. Indeed, Thesiger had as much to do with the capture of Ethiopia as Wingate (they served together in Egypt).
I have a cracking biography (now out of print) of Wingate that you are welcome to borrow.
There are many instances of brilliant military leaders without any formal education whatsoever, even in modern war. Buonaventura Durruti was one. Some had just military schooling mid career, like Zhukov, who was a trapper and fur trader to begin with – I’d say that’s as good grounding as a course in semiotics. On the other hand, there were many PhDs. Giap had a doctorate in Economics. Current commander of US forces in Iraq has a doctorate too. But I do not think it will do him much good.
Though presumably not the footsloggers of the the Royal Pomo Fusiliers and Special Arts Students Regiment. Again, you’re conflating the training of the rank and file with that of their strategoi.
PLEASE, I’m begging you, do NOT get started on Indochine.
Sure, why not? However, I gather the LRB’s rather short – does it really take an entire Arts degree to read one book these days? Anyhoo, as a work on strategy the LRB is obtusely derivative commie drivel. If it’s strategy with added MSG you’re after, you can’t go past Sun Tzu. You’d get more use out of Musashi’s Go Rin No Sho, and that’s full of fucking out-there mysticism.
Nah, I bet he was thinking, “Mmm, DOH-nuts…”
Actually, I believe the Catholic Lad is the authority on Clinton’s strategic thinking. No doubt Bubba was REALLY ruminating on how best to allow the future 9/11 perpetrators to escape capture, in between derelictions of his official and matrimonial duties.
And, really, it’s not what you’re thinking about. You show me a flying Portuguese carrack with GPS guidance and a high-explosive warhead and I might buy your argument. In the meantime, I’ll stick with my (reasonable, I thought) assumption that warfare’s moved on a bit since the 15th century.
Really? You mean you’re NOT one of those “blood4oil” types? Knock me down with a howitzer. Not that I’m seeing what this has to do with the argument.
Ouch. Please, tell me more about the superior results-driven management paradigm of our statist overlords.
Sure – they’re no doubt expecting results. The naivete of the US Army bureaucracy is often terrifying, when not amusing.
Wunderwaffen? Wirklich? Wieso und warum, Wasko? Seit wann ist würzen mit Sarkasmus wunderbar?
The defining features of a strawman, Fresco, are that it is an immobile, passive and, in all senses, unresponsive target of one’s own construction. However, you’re anything BUT phlegmatic in your response to my “anti-intellectual” teasing, which proves I’m hitting home ["Aargh! You heff sahnk my bettlesheeep!!!"] and that you’re probably a humanities graduate who’s had to put up with the zanier fruits of our over-specialised academia. Here: have a Purple Heart.
Show me one of those and I might have to go somewhere private and weigh anchor. Heave, there!
The word you’re looking for is strategoyim, referring in the case of Iraq to all of those of us not at the moment in the Department of Defence or on the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who aren’t at the moment let in on the secret of what on earth the point of the exercise is. Their opposition seem to have a great deal more understanding about their mission and the means of achieving it, and seem to be experiencing success: an object lesson, if ever there was one, about information sharing and education.
As for rank-and-file training, I understand the word US troops in Iraq most commonly use for the people they’re fighting is ‘hajji’: a made-up epithet to stand in for any meaningful description of the enemy. Up with military education!
I’m surprised you didn’t pick up the Ghostbusters reference. Yer losing your touch, Sidewinder Bob, perhaps you should think about continuing your cultural acclimatisation to the society you live in?
Consider me keelhauled, Keymaster. Though, in my defence, that’s not a startlingly obvious or particularly amusing line from the fillum, and did sound awfully like the platitude of a market skeptic.
Whatever do you mean by “continuing cultural acclimatisation”? Are you suggesting that I’m *gasp* out of touch with hoi polloi?
What we really need is an annoyingly cute cartoon character.
i dont think its fair to say that the super hornet will be outclassed by the flanker series……….Yes definitely in close range dogfight, but let us not forget the super hornet is a very agile fighter.
And in the BVR fight, where in this day and age most air-to-air combat will take place, the Block 2 Super Hornet is one of the best with the highly advanced AESA Radar. It is one of the only aircraft in the world equipped with a radar that advanced.
also….sent it 2 early there lol, the F-35 is not a fighter, its a fighter-bomber. It does not have the thrust :weight, wing load ratio to be classed as a true fighter and would also be no match for a Flanker in a close range dogfight.
Its stealth ability is what makes it a truly great aircraft……and with regards to the Super Hornet it has a lot to do with the pliots inside the cockpit. But it the aussies r tht worried they should invest in the Typhoon or Gripen. The Typhoon the best bet as its the best fighter in the world after the Raptor and cos of aussies close ties with the UK.
I like the way 4chan announced it. The page has probably been expired by now, but read and laugh/weep:
“Thick Aussies outwitted by American Accent… again Anonymous
10/29/07 (Mon) 08:12 http://orz.4chan.org/n/res/432433.html
American accents work wonders in the hallowed halls of Canberra, the Capital of Australia. Previously Aussies have been swindled by fast-talking American Defense Salesmen into buying helicopters that can’t fly, battle tanks they don’t need, rusted ships and believe it or not, torpedoes that don’t fit their submarines. (Sorry! No Refunds!) Aussies were even gullible to make an early advance payment on the ill-fated JSF strike fighter: Like trusting a car salesman with a blank check.
“Contrary to claims, it’s not a fifth generation fighter. It’s not stealthy. You can’t have a stealthy aeroplane when every bit of ordinance you carry has got to be carried externally. It’s not fast. It can’t carry a lot of weapons. It can’t run. It’s just vulnerable from the word go.”
That’s Air Vice-Marshal Peter Criss talking about the Super Hornet which the Aussie Government just pissed $6.6B up against the wall. Protip: It’s not really “Super”: The Manufacturers named it that to make it sound good, but Aussies are easily outfoxed by such cunning. According to experts interviewed on the show, the Russian-made Su-27 runs circles around it. The Su-27 has been purchased by China and by Australia’s supposedly third-world neighbor: Indonesia.
Oh Austrafailia! Will you ever learn?
http://www.abc.net.au/4corners/content/2007/s2073943.htm (Transcript)
http://www.abc.net.au/4corners/specials.htm (Video)
So here’s to those gullible Aussies. They even helped the US invade Iraq, only to be billed by the US for the bombs they “loaned” them to drop on Iraqi positions. Aussies being the slow-witted retards they are, even paid the bill. As reward after the invasion, Paul Bremer canceled the Aussies Wheat Contracts with the Iraqi Government. http://www.mambogani.com/forums/lofiversion/index.php/t1181.html
Has /n/ ever seen a more pathetic country than Austrafalia? Should America find smarter friends?”
Some Thoughts…
1. Unless the Sovs really, truly, improve their BVR capacity in the electro optical realm, it’s unlikely that they will be able to track F-35 FQ and JORN and Wedgetail should basically guarantee that. Problem: The F-35 export model is PLO not VLO. Better than the Hornet but probably still vulnerable to BARS or better PESAs.
2. If you want to do the Super Bug, you have to keep in mind that the U.S. armed forces long ago gave up on the traditional dogfight _knowing_ that they cannot beat the HOBS+Helmet capabilities now dominant. This might change with DIRCM but then you have an active laser threat against the pilot’s eyeballs as much as any 5″ seeker zigzagging across the sky in proportional LP. If the Bug Deux is not required to play above 20,000ft and Mach .9 it has a marginally sufficient energy reserve. What allows that option (when most combat is at 30K+ to energize the BVR poles _and always has been_) is the AIM-120D. Get it and you’re competitive with the basic RVV-AE which used to be the RusAF standard model but is now the export version. It won’t beat the Ks-172 or similar weapons but then again, what will. The answer of course is netcentric air and the Meteor ram-AAM. Wedgetail or an F-22 says “Okay, we’ve got the midcourse, turn away…” and because you are out of cone or too tiny a blip to be seen on either opticals or radar, you are free to do a split ess and exit the area.
3. The F/A-18E/F with a load of say six AIM-120D is the master of the Su-30 with R-27ER or R-77 basic. The F-35 with 2X AIM-120D is not. Even with datalink sorting, you will run out of shots before the enemy runs out of planes, particularly as the way you defeat the sneaky indian is to see his ARROWS coming in with MAKS or similar inbound missile detection.
4. Nothing wins the 800nm fight except drones. You can’t stay long enough to find worthwhile targets and you can’t generate enough daily raids to hit targets as they come up. This will become particularly critical as the transition to lightweight GBU-38/39 means more shots off of fewer aircraft, just like AMRAAM. Here, the JSF and F/A-18E/F both lose because they ultimately are costing the pilots 12-15 hour sortie lengths which will destroy the ops tempo. Guarding North Shelf petrogas fields will be even worse because their will be ZERO point targets that are not rigs + tankers on your side of the HVA debit loss.
5. In ten years, we should /finally/ be seeing the advent of hunting weapons (weapons able to motor up alongside, take a picture, compare to a signature database and decide in their own good time), along with the first HEL weapons. As such, the next best fighter is apt to weight 800,000lbs with a 1.2MW COIL on the nose. And the best strike aircraft something that you can afford to lose randomly in large numbers to ground/sea based THEL equivalents and turbo-SAM. People who fixate on the sky knights in gold plated lambourghinis comparisons forget that what destroyed the feudal system was the crossbow and the matchlock rifle. Cheap and Dirty and wielded by peasants in far greater numbers than any ‘aristocratic’ class of silver spoon fools could stand up to. The same is true of fighter pilots. They are only animals deserving of the cheapest kill possible. And we have had for the last 40 years the target and recce drone technology to wipe them from the sky with ease.
KPl.