Australia's defence discussion

[Bogan]

There is only one group of men in Australia really qualified to give an honest opinion about whether women or poo pushers should be allowed to be front line combat soldiers. That are the former officers who let men into battle in WW2 where soldiers were being killed all around them in very large numbers and dead soldiers were being stacked like cordwood logs. If they say "no!", then you had better listen to your front line leaders of soldiers. History is awash with failed military campaigns led by political appointees, aristocrats, and careerists who allowed themselves to be told how to fight by shamans, political officers, and astrologers. We in the west now want to add Feminists and self appointed spokes things from the LGBDHSMSYRAWA community to those giving their military advice to professionals.

Brian Ross will disagree with me because if the west ever needs to fight for it's survival again, he hopes we will lose.

[Outlaw Yogi]

You don't like it when I correctly identify a person's argument and give it the correct name, ...

I'm yet to see you get anything correct.
So far all I've seen from you is projection of your bigotry onto others.

[brian ross]

Have you ever left a poppy at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Canberra?

Well, there's a strong chance it's being put to good use by a resident pigeon at the Australian War Memorial.

The pigeon has been flying down to the tomb to steal poppies to carefully craft a nest in an alcove above the stained-glass window of a wounded Australian soldier.

It's one of the busiest times of the year as we head up to Remembrance Day, and the memorial said the nest of poppies was a poignant reminder of the powerful bond between man and beast on the battlefield.

From the ABC's FacePalm page.

[brian ross]

Chief of Army: Army's Contribution to Defence Strategy

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?time_conti ... I_bCBbKNTI[/youtube]

[Bogan]

Australia is finally purchasing IFV's, fifty years after they were introduced into Soviet, US, and European armies, and you think that shows how up to date we are, Brian? And we are finally replacing our 60 year old, Vietnam War era M113 APC's? And that is supposed to show how up to date our single division "Army" is?

Meanwhile, if the lamentable and over expensive "Tiger" attack helicopters have now been scrapped, we must be the only "army" in a modern state , other than New Zealand, that does not possess modern attack helicopters. To say nothing about SP medium artillery, SP AAA, SP AA missiles, SP MLRS, or a host of other weapon systems that serious armies have as a matter of routine.

I have to hand it to you for being a staunch defender of the public service. No matter how inept and insane their policies.

They may have fluffed the sale of the C-130A's, waited for 13 years for our "drawing board only" F-111's to turn up, purchased the wrong aircraft when the bought the poor performing F-18's, which even Soviet Mig 29's can beat, paid $13 million dollars more for the problem ridden Tiger than the combat proven and magnificent Apache , scrapped perfectly serviceable FFG-7 warships, and purchased 12 obsolete DE submarines when we can't find the crews to man out present 6 DE obsolete deathtraps, but you will never admit that the public service could get anything wrong.

You would have made a good "Modern Soviet Man", Briney. The Sovs would have been proud of you.

No wonder the USSR fell.

f50.png

[Bogan]

SBS NEWS

The Seasprite naval helicopter, first flown in the 1950s, is now a museum piece in the United States. It was phased out of service from the early '90s and by 2001 the US had put its few remaining Seasprites into storage. But remarkably, the Royal Australian Navy has spent over $1 billion on these museum pieces. It bought 11 of the ageing helicopters and has spent the last seven years trying to convert them into state-of-the-art war machines. Most are older than the Seasprite on display in the US and some even flew in the Vietnam War.

The Australian Defence Department has a long history of embarrassing blunders on major projects, but the story of the Seasprite helicopter is possibly the most shocking to emerge so far.

[Black Orchid]

SBS NEWS

The Seasprite naval helicopter, first flown in the 1950s, is now a museum piece in the United States. It was phased out of service from the early '90s and by 2001 the US had put its few remaining Seasprites into storage. But remarkably, the Royal Australian Navy has spent over $1 billion on these museum pieces. It bought 11 of the ageing helicopters and has spent the last seven years trying to convert them into state-of-the-art war machines. Most are older than the Seasprite on display in the US and some even flew in the Vietnam War.

The Australian Defence Department has a long history of embarrassing blunders on major projects, but the story of the Seasprite helicopter is possibly the most shocking to emerge so far.

Utter stupidity!

[brian ross]

This discussion really doesn't belong in a thread about nuclear weapons. So I've moved it here.

Brian, we pay our top defence bureaucrats a shitload of money to not make these mistakes. If they can't handle the job then sack them and replace them with their tea ladies. Their tea ladies would have more common sense than our present officials, who seem to be down in the garden dancing with the fairies. It is not just a matter of a few mistakes, it is something that just keeps happening, over and over, and over again, costing the taxpayer tens of billions, and weakening out already miserable defence capability.

Exactly! These people need to lose their positions and NEVER be anywhere near tax payer funds ever again. Someone needs to be held accountable for these continuing very expensive mistakes.

It's not the sort of thing you can brush aside and say "Oh well, better luck next time".

I also think that anyone in charge of Defence spending needs to have served in recent ACTIVE duty. Not just a pencil pusher. Everyone in charge of either operations or appropriation should have first hand experience or stuff ups occur and people get killed.

Most of Bogan's "mistakes" were made over 30 or more years ago. They were made on the basis of information which was available to the officials and government at the time. More often than not, they were made by politicians, not bureaucrats.

As I keep pointing out, you cannot apply 100% hindsight to decisions which were made in good faith, at the time.

The F-111 is a case in point. From Wikipedia:

Replacing the Canberra

The Menzies government first publicly discussed the need for replacing the English Electric Canberra in 1954, only a year after the RAAF began receiving the bomber.[18] The non-supersonic Canberra lacked radar and electronic countermeasures, all disadvantages based on Korean War experience. The RAAF believed that it needed a new strategic bomber to fulfill the nation's obligations to the Commonwealth Strategic Reserve in Malaysia, ANZUS, and SEATO. Air Staff Requirement 36 that year mandated an all-weather attack aircraft by 1959 capable of delivering a variety of bombs and missiles. A study recommended one of the British V bombers, but Prime Minister Robert Menzies' Minister of Defence Frederick Shedden decided in 1956 that at £1 million each they were too expensive.[19]

Air Marshal Valston Hancock, Chief of the Air Staff, stated in April 1960 that Australia needed a replacement for the Canberra.[20] Although in mid-1962 the Menzies government again decided to not replace the Canberra, Indonesia's increasingly aggressive statements regarding Malaysia soon caused Australia to reevaluate the decision.[21] The Sydney Morning Herald reported in October 1962 that the Indonesian Air Force's Soviet Tupolev Tu-16 bombers could reach Sydney or any other Australian city with a light bomb load, while the Canberras could not fly in all weather and had a range of 900 miles (1,400 km), insufficient to reach Jakarta.[20] The opposition Labor Party, led by Arthur Calwell, used the report to criticize Menzies. The government denied that the Tu-16 could reach Sydney,[22] but Minister for Air Frederick Osborne acknowledged that the Canberras were "the weakest link in our armoury at the present moment". He stated, however, that the available foreign bombers were unsuitable for the RAAF. The American Boeing B-52 Stratofortress and Convair B-58 Hustler, for example, were too large for existing Australian runways. More suitable aircraft such as the British BAC TSR-2 and the American TFX (later the F-111) would soon be available, Osborne said.[20]

Hancock study

In May 1963 Menzies announced an A£200 million increase in defence spending over the next five years, and proposed to send a team led by Hancock overseas to evaluate Canberra replacements.[22] Early candidates were the French Dassault Mirage IV, the TSR-2, and the U.S. North American A-5 Vigilante, McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom II and the TFX.[17][23] From June to August, Hancock's team visited France, Britain and the United States to evaluate the competitors, and determined that the TFX would be the aircraft best suited for the role.[24] The Mirage IV had insufficient range and the A£108 million price was too expensive. The F-4 and the A-5 were immediately available, but the less expensive F-4 would need air-to-air refueling to reach Indonesia from Australia. The TSR-2 was behind schedule and over budget, was the most expensive at A£122 million for 24 aircraft, and British government support for the program was uncertain. While the TFX was also controversial in the United States, its promised performance specifications and per-aircraft cost were superior to that of the TSR-2. As he did not expect TFX to be available before 1970, however, Hancock recommended buying 36 A-5 aircraft for A£88 million to counteract the perceived imminent threat from Indonesia.[20][25]

The Menzies government was reluctant to choose as interim replacement the A-5 or the F-4, which could not be deployed until 1966 and would cost A$120–180 million. Waiting for the TSR-2 or TFX in 1969 or 1970 seemed to pose great risk,[20] but when considering Hancock's findings in September 1963 it wanted to be able to offer a substantial response to the Labor party's criticism of its defence strategy.[26] The British and American governments competed on behalf of their nations' unbuilt bombers, as both believed that export sales would increase domestic support for the aircraft. The Menzies government viewed the British promise to deploy a squadron of V bombers in Australia for interim defense until the TSR-2 was ready as unacceptable for both technical and political reasons. Beyond its cost, the Royal Air Force had not ordered the TSR-2; the Chief of the Defence Staff Lord Louis Mountbatten, who opposed it, advised the Australians against buying the aircraft and the RAAF feared being the only customer.[20][27]

Decision

The government determined that it did not need to go ahead with an immediate replacement for the Canberra and preferred Hancock's original choice of the TFX as a long-term solution, leading to the Menzies government's announcement on 24 October that it was ordering 24 F-111s[28] for US$125 million, enough for two squadrons.[29] The announcement came during the campaigning for the 1963 general election. Calwell's Labor party had on 22 October reiterated its pre-campaign promise that it would replace the Canberras as soon as it formed a government. The government's announcement, and the consequent improvement of its chances against Labor, likely also benefited the United States; the purchase helped rebut American critics of the TFX,[20] and the Kennedy administration preferred Menzies' defence policies to the opposition's.[30] The contract was signed the following year through the U.S. Department of Defense.[31] The British government's cancellation of the TSR-2 in April 1965 showed that Australia's decision to not order it was correct.[32]

Procurement, delays, and renaming

The U.S. offered two squadrons of Boeing B-47 Stratojets for free lease pending the delivery of the F-111; Australia declined the offer in June 1964[33]—despite the aircraft having been demonstrated around the country just before the 1963 election as an interim Canberra replacement, likely another sign of the American preference for Menzies—[34] because the B-47 did not offer significant improvements over the Canberra and, like the V bombers, would require longer runways.[20]

The immensely complex and ambitious F-111 design and construction process forced the Australian government to quickly adopt sophisticated American procurement and project management methods. Although Australia originally planned to buy the American F-111A design, RAAF liaison officers requested country-specific changes such as a long-distance radio, Aeronautical Research Laboratories in Melbourne participated in an intake redesign and provided metal fatigue expertise, and an Australian test pilot evaluated the Australian version's longer wings and performance in tropical conditions. The differences from the F-111A caused it to be designated the F-111C in 1966.[35]

Delivery

The first F-111C was officially delivered in 1968,[36] finally giving Australia an aircraft that could fly to Jakarta, drop bombs, and return without refueling. (The RAAF only acquired air-to-air refueling for the F/A-18, possibly to avoid causing difficulties with other Asian countries by increasing the F-111C's already great range.) Training began in 1967, with RAAF personnel seeing terrain-following radar and other sophisticated equipment for the first time.[37] However, development delays and structural problems delayed acceptance of aircraft by the RAAF until 1973.[36] These issues were mainly to do with the wing attach points, and the redesign of the F-111 engine intakes. Completion of contractual requirements to the satisfaction of Australia also took time,[38] damaging the morale of the hundreds of trained RAAF personnel who had little to do.[39] The program costs, during 1963–1967, grew at an alarming rate; estimates by the USAF at the start of the program was placed at US$124.5 million, but by April 1967 had risen to $237.75 million.[40] While the initial price of US$5.21 million per aircraft was capped at US$5.95 million, R&D, labor, and other costs were not.[41] The rising price, three unexplained losses of USAF F-111As in Vietnam during their first month of deployment, and the British and U.S. Navy's orders' cancellations caused further controversy in Australia during 1968.[42] By 1973, however, when the F-111A had accumulated 250,000 flight hours, it had the best safety record among contemporary aircraft, which presaged the F-111C's own excellent record.[43]

[Source]

So, we have a combination of Service people, bureaucrats and politics and the technical problems which were not known at the time. What isn't related here is how the RAAF were warned off the TSR-2 by Lord Mountbatten at the time of their visit to ascertain it's capabilities. When you have politicians mixing their own political views into such matters, it becomes very murky indeed.

Today, looking back, the F-111 is looked upon within defence circles as a very successful programme. Their retirement wasn't without controversy. Their role was better fulfilled by the F/A-18E/F/Gs we are presently leasing until the F-35 arrives. They were outmoded and no longer useful. The world of war has changed since the late 1950s when the TFX was first thought of.

I'm actually surprised Bogan hasn't attempted to attack the RAAF for the decision to retire them, rather than the decision to purchase them. What did he think we should have purchased instead?

[billy the kid]

SBS NEWS

The Seasprite naval helicopter, first flown in the 1950s, is now a museum piece in the United States. It was phased out of service from the early '90s and by 2001 the US had put its few remaining Seasprites into storage. But remarkably, the Royal Australian Navy has spent over $1 billion on these museum pieces. It bought 11 of the ageing helicopters and has spent the last seven years trying to convert them into state-of-the-art war machines. Most are older than the Seasprite on display in the US and some even flew in the Vietnam War.

The Australian Defence Department has a long history of embarrassing blunders on major projects, but the story of the Seasprite helicopter is possibly the most shocking to emerge so far.

The phrase "economic hitman" comes to mind.....how many of these monumental fuckups have been caused over decades
in the past due to not only our bureaucratic incompetence, but due also to the "brilliance" of the economic hitman that have
been sent to Australia to "sell" their crap to our muppet governments......the mind boggles...….
Confessions of an Economic Hitman is a must read for all...
It exposes how the "system" works and how easy it is to sign countries up for endless debts....

[brian ross]

Again, this does not belong in a thread about nuclear weapons IMO so I have moved it here, where it belongs.

Briney wrote

Such as the non-existent helicopter crash into Sydney Harbour?

Oh, it crashed all right. I remembered it because it was so funny. And also because I am always concerned about how incompetent the Australians defence procurement mob are. But I knew that DoD could not be so stupid as to purchase a helicopter which crashed on it's demonstration flight, right in front of them. I should have known better.

But there is no record of this crash into Sydney Harbour, Bogan.

Briney wrote
I have never suggested that the Department of Defence is not without failure.

Brian, you spent seven pages denying that the numerous examples I gave of defence acquisition fiascos was in any way a problem. Now, you seem to be moderating your position. Did my examples become so glaring that you finally had to admit I was at least partially right? That is not like you, Brian. Usually, you will deny to the death that your position could ever be wrong, no matter how many undeniable facts and reasoned arguments I throw at you. Score one for Bogan.

What I did was point out that the decisions made on the information available, AT THE TIME, was more than adequate, Bogan. Something you refuse to accept, applying 100% perfect hindsight to the problem. I am unsure why you assume that every decision made by everyone has to be 100% correct, all the time.

Briney wrote.

It is not perfect but as I have demonstrated, it is only as bad and often better than what has occurred overseas in our enemies' and our allies' own defence procurement decision making. Do I need to recount them again?

No need. I completely reject the argument that it is OK for the Australian defence procurement officials to be totally incompetent and waste tens of billions of taxpayer funds, jeopardising the defence of the realm, just because their overpaid public service counterparts overseas are arguably just as stupid.

Reject what you like, Bogan. All it proves is that your views are so entrenched there is no point in continue to discuss the matter with you. Your head is so far up your arse that it will never see daylight.