aviation_enthus
Member
This thread is to start a realistic discussion on what would or wouldn't work as possible "upgrades" to the current RAAF posture around Australia.
In particular I'd like to hear thoughts on the following ideas:
- Hardened Aircraft Shelters
In Western defence planning these have not normally been used. USAF in particular seems to be comfortable with dispersal areas as a primary defence measure. Soviet, Chinese and North Korean airfields have long had some "hardened elements" in their designs. Other countries currently using such measures include Singapore, Saudi Arabia, UAE, just to name a few I've actually seen.
The argument "against" these type of structures generally seems to centre around the first Gulf War and the apparent ease with which they were destroyed by the Coalition. They are also expensive to build and don't guarantee protection, a larger bomb or cruise missile can always be used. I would imagine they would also mainly be useful in the opening stages of a conflict, because once destroyed the would be hard to rebuild and the conflict may have moved to another location.
The argument "for" would be that a larger bomb or cruise missile has to be used to guarantee destruction of the facility and the aircraft inside. This leads to the need to use heavy bombers or precludes a surprise attack by submarine launched cruise missiles (because the warheads are too small to penetrate the structure). The smaller countries mentioned (Singapore etc) also are extremely vulnerable (in my opinion) to a surprise, short range attack destroying most of their aircraft on the ground. Another "for" argument I believe has come out of the conflict in Syria, the use of drones. The Russian bases came under attack from drone swarms multiple times, again having an aircraft in even a medium strength structure would preclude these attacks.
So in the Australian context, I see the threats coming from having a small, highly professional air force not being able to sustain even small losses on the ground. In particular a base such as RAAF Tindal would be vulnerable to special forces assault from a distance with man portable drones. Also the risk of submarine launched cruise missile attack from the Timor Sea. Given the size of Australia, its almost impossible to monitor the entire area. I guess the previous actions of the British SAS in North Africa against the Germans describes the style of threat for the RAAF.
Can anyone else provide any thoughts for upgrading at least Tindal to include this sort of protection? In the medium term I would expect similar facilities would be build at the bare bases, in particular Curtin and Learmonth.
- Logistics upgrades
In almost all the military history I've read, wars are won or lost on logistical support. Yes the weapons come into it, but the greatest gun in the world is useless without ammunition. So in the Australian context (of air defence) I find it hard to understand we built this great network of "bare bases" with no thoughts on how to resupply them. RAAF Scherger is a great example, until last year a large majority of the Peninsular Development Road was unsealed. Even now around 200km of the road remains unsealed and potentially impassable for months at a time (for heavy vehicles anyway).
On this topic I have a few thoughts.
- All weather roads capable of handling 53.5 metre road trains should be a minimum. In the example of RAAF Scherger, this would open up great opportunities for the people living on the Cape as well as Weipa. (link below shows what has been completed late last year)
Cape York Region Package | Department of Transport and Main Roads (tmr.qld.gov.au)
- Rail spur or pipeline to a rail depot for RAAF Tindal. The local government even proposed a joint civil/defence cargo depot for Katherine. This was rejected by the defence department. Given the future planned upgrades to Tindal, accessibility of fuel (and other materiel) should be of high importance, especially if able to be combined to provide benefits to the civil side.
Rail link to Tindal shot down by Defence | Katherine Times | Katherine, NT
New train station to be built in Katherine to cater for freight hub plans | Katherine Times | Katherine, NT
- Turning the Tanami Highway into an all weather road (for those of you unfamiliar it links Alice Springs with Halls Creek). This provides an alternate all weather route to northern WA. It also removes the risk (in my opinion) posed by the Victoria River bridge. If this bridge was damaged, heavy vehicles would be all but blocked from moving between the NT and northern WA. Again provides a civil benefit (although limited compared to the Scherger upgrades)
Floodwaters close Victoria Highway in Top End, stranding travellers - ABC News (even in the wet season the new bridge can be submerged for days)
There are other ideas I have thought would provide a dual civil/military benefit but in my opinion these provide the greatest benefit.
Air Force Reserve Force
I'm aware that for a relatively short period after WW2 Australia had a civil reserve air force that actually flew jet fighters. I've also tried researching how the Air National Guard works in the USA. There seems to be limited numbers of countries that run a part time reserve force for air combat.
As far as I see it there are significant issues with this idea:
- part time training means unable to be used in combat without significant training anyway
- additional cost when money is already restricted in defence budgets
However I believe some of the benefits outweigh the significant downsides:
- more airframes available when conflict starts
- a larger pool of personnel that can be trained to standard significantly faster than starting from scratch
- potential to retain talent. If full time personnel want to leave, the skill set can be transferred to the reserve forces and be kept current (albeit at a lower skill level)
Coming from a background in civil aviation, I know who many sets of crew would be required to "surge" the capacity of even the KC-30 tankers or even E-7A/P-8. This would quickly exhaust the RAAF crews and having a pool of part time KC-30 or E-7A crews would be a good starting point for an RAAF flying reserve. Considering the number of qualified pilots within Australia on the A330 and B737, I'd imagine this would be a relatively easy task to achieve.
Later on, perhaps reserve fighter squadrons could be formed out of later stage "washouts" from the RAAF fast jet training. I'd imagine a candidate who fails the training at a late stage (Hawk or F-35) could potentially still be useful as a fighter pilot with some additional training or practice provided by a reserve force. Additionally pilots and WSO's could be retained within the RAAF by allowing early "retirement" to the reserves for those pilots who seek employment in the civil world.
General Tactics:
My background is in civil aviation with a longstanding interest in history (especially military). So my knowledge of "how things work" regarding general tactics is very limited.
Given the range of ground and air threats faced by an airfield under combat conditions, I'd love to know how some of the above mentioned topics would tie in to improving Australia's air defence capabilities. Particular the following questions:
- are fighters generally "on alert" during a wartime scenario?
- are combat air patrols used for airfield defence? (or does this use a lot of resources)
- how is ground defence tackled? (RAAF airfield defence guards)
In particular I'd like to hear thoughts on the following ideas:
- Hardened Aircraft Shelters
In Western defence planning these have not normally been used. USAF in particular seems to be comfortable with dispersal areas as a primary defence measure. Soviet, Chinese and North Korean airfields have long had some "hardened elements" in their designs. Other countries currently using such measures include Singapore, Saudi Arabia, UAE, just to name a few I've actually seen.
The argument "against" these type of structures generally seems to centre around the first Gulf War and the apparent ease with which they were destroyed by the Coalition. They are also expensive to build and don't guarantee protection, a larger bomb or cruise missile can always be used. I would imagine they would also mainly be useful in the opening stages of a conflict, because once destroyed the would be hard to rebuild and the conflict may have moved to another location.
The argument "for" would be that a larger bomb or cruise missile has to be used to guarantee destruction of the facility and the aircraft inside. This leads to the need to use heavy bombers or precludes a surprise attack by submarine launched cruise missiles (because the warheads are too small to penetrate the structure). The smaller countries mentioned (Singapore etc) also are extremely vulnerable (in my opinion) to a surprise, short range attack destroying most of their aircraft on the ground. Another "for" argument I believe has come out of the conflict in Syria, the use of drones. The Russian bases came under attack from drone swarms multiple times, again having an aircraft in even a medium strength structure would preclude these attacks.
So in the Australian context, I see the threats coming from having a small, highly professional air force not being able to sustain even small losses on the ground. In particular a base such as RAAF Tindal would be vulnerable to special forces assault from a distance with man portable drones. Also the risk of submarine launched cruise missile attack from the Timor Sea. Given the size of Australia, its almost impossible to monitor the entire area. I guess the previous actions of the British SAS in North Africa against the Germans describes the style of threat for the RAAF.
Can anyone else provide any thoughts for upgrading at least Tindal to include this sort of protection? In the medium term I would expect similar facilities would be build at the bare bases, in particular Curtin and Learmonth.
- Logistics upgrades
In almost all the military history I've read, wars are won or lost on logistical support. Yes the weapons come into it, but the greatest gun in the world is useless without ammunition. So in the Australian context (of air defence) I find it hard to understand we built this great network of "bare bases" with no thoughts on how to resupply them. RAAF Scherger is a great example, until last year a large majority of the Peninsular Development Road was unsealed. Even now around 200km of the road remains unsealed and potentially impassable for months at a time (for heavy vehicles anyway).
On this topic I have a few thoughts.
- All weather roads capable of handling 53.5 metre road trains should be a minimum. In the example of RAAF Scherger, this would open up great opportunities for the people living on the Cape as well as Weipa. (link below shows what has been completed late last year)
Cape York Region Package | Department of Transport and Main Roads (tmr.qld.gov.au)
- Rail spur or pipeline to a rail depot for RAAF Tindal. The local government even proposed a joint civil/defence cargo depot for Katherine. This was rejected by the defence department. Given the future planned upgrades to Tindal, accessibility of fuel (and other materiel) should be of high importance, especially if able to be combined to provide benefits to the civil side.
Rail link to Tindal shot down by Defence | Katherine Times | Katherine, NT
New train station to be built in Katherine to cater for freight hub plans | Katherine Times | Katherine, NT
- Turning the Tanami Highway into an all weather road (for those of you unfamiliar it links Alice Springs with Halls Creek). This provides an alternate all weather route to northern WA. It also removes the risk (in my opinion) posed by the Victoria River bridge. If this bridge was damaged, heavy vehicles would be all but blocked from moving between the NT and northern WA. Again provides a civil benefit (although limited compared to the Scherger upgrades)
Floodwaters close Victoria Highway in Top End, stranding travellers - ABC News (even in the wet season the new bridge can be submerged for days)
There are other ideas I have thought would provide a dual civil/military benefit but in my opinion these provide the greatest benefit.
Air Force Reserve Force
I'm aware that for a relatively short period after WW2 Australia had a civil reserve air force that actually flew jet fighters. I've also tried researching how the Air National Guard works in the USA. There seems to be limited numbers of countries that run a part time reserve force for air combat.
As far as I see it there are significant issues with this idea:
- part time training means unable to be used in combat without significant training anyway
- additional cost when money is already restricted in defence budgets
However I believe some of the benefits outweigh the significant downsides:
- more airframes available when conflict starts
- a larger pool of personnel that can be trained to standard significantly faster than starting from scratch
- potential to retain talent. If full time personnel want to leave, the skill set can be transferred to the reserve forces and be kept current (albeit at a lower skill level)
Coming from a background in civil aviation, I know who many sets of crew would be required to "surge" the capacity of even the KC-30 tankers or even E-7A/P-8. This would quickly exhaust the RAAF crews and having a pool of part time KC-30 or E-7A crews would be a good starting point for an RAAF flying reserve. Considering the number of qualified pilots within Australia on the A330 and B737, I'd imagine this would be a relatively easy task to achieve.
Later on, perhaps reserve fighter squadrons could be formed out of later stage "washouts" from the RAAF fast jet training. I'd imagine a candidate who fails the training at a late stage (Hawk or F-35) could potentially still be useful as a fighter pilot with some additional training or practice provided by a reserve force. Additionally pilots and WSO's could be retained within the RAAF by allowing early "retirement" to the reserves for those pilots who seek employment in the civil world.
General Tactics:
My background is in civil aviation with a longstanding interest in history (especially military). So my knowledge of "how things work" regarding general tactics is very limited.
Given the range of ground and air threats faced by an airfield under combat conditions, I'd love to know how some of the above mentioned topics would tie in to improving Australia's air defence capabilities. Particular the following questions:
- are fighters generally "on alert" during a wartime scenario?
- are combat air patrols used for airfield defence? (or does this use a lot of resources)
- how is ground defence tackled? (RAAF airfield defence guards)