IMO NH90 isn't a great replacement for the seasprites.
I agree the NH90 wouldn't be a great replacement for the Seasprites, for reasons I gave in my earlier post, plus we'd have to pay for the integration of US weapons and systems and that wouldn't be cheap. I would also avoid the AW159 Wildcat for the same reason, plus we would be the only operator in the region. The Romeo ticks all the boxes and is the logical option.
The Canterbury is ok at the moment and it is capable of carrying extra NH90. The first Enhanced Sealift Vessel was originally planned for the late 2020s with the second one replacing Canterbury in the early to mid 2030s. Our rotary lift fleet is definitely on the short side so taking opportunity of the MRH-90 fleet disbandment would certainly be a wise option.
If dreams were allowed, what about working to two San Gorigo class ships, ~10000t. Full flat deck. Embark 4 NH90's on deck, tigers below. Landing craft etc. Or something like that.
Yep definitely. Comes from being a part timer and not being on top of his job. He's another Mark Burton who was Defence Minister under Helen Clark from December 1999 - October 2005. Until 2020 Burton was the worst Defence Minister NZ ever had; now he's the second worst.
Sometimes I get the impression that Australia wants to be the US, but in reality it can't be. The biggest problem I see with Australian defence procurement is what I call the Pommy-Canuck disease. That's when you take a perfectly good piece of kit and decide to "improve" and / - or "indigenise" it. The Seasprite, Tiger and MRH-90 sagas are case in point, and in each case our cousins blamed the OEM, when in fact a fair whack of the blame can be sheeted home to poor program management, impatience, excessive ambition, and lack of adequate forward by the Australian side. Don't worry us Kiwis have had some absolute howlers as well so you're not special. But a long expensive litany of our howlers finally lead to a change in our procurement practices and to a professionalisation of them.
The San Giorgio class are a tad small I think. We really require something in the 15,000 - 18,000 tonne full load displacement class capable of transporting a battalion and its equipment in austere accommodation. It requires hangarage for both the vehicles and the aircraft. I have also been thinking that maybe the NZLAV should possibly be replaced by the BAE ACV that the USMC are introducing. That takes the pressure off the landing craft and they can be used for moving other important stuff ashore. Just a thought.
I personally think they are a to small as well, other than the obvious, the well dock, and can take more troops (Not necessarily equipment)... they aren't many advantages over what HMNZS Canterbury can carry. And reading between the lines of the DCP2019 they are wanting to be able to do more...
www.aspistrategist.org.au
The problem the NH90 has is that it is very expensive to operate and this would be a telling factor and as for the C27, they could be useful, but what I think we really need is a transport with greater payload/range first. The C27 would be useful, taking some of the load off the C130's. The other problem would be finding enough aircrew and ground crew to operate additional aircraft. Our training ability in both areas are not overly generous.
Na, Burton is still worst, he has the following happen on his watch.
Agree with everything. Especially Burton. He was sinister.
I don't believe that the RNZAF CPFH are anything like that. I think that I may have a figure for that somewhere; I shall try and dig it out. If they were there would be hell to pay. One would have to wonder why the Australian Army CPFH are so high.I would await showers of gold bricks from the sky before expecting anything from this nz govt or the ministries behind it.
The bushmasters are only coming at the expense of other capability and in order tlo remove the embarassment of armoured pini and some trailers that never touched the road before being cut up.
Also in this article they mention mrh90 flight costs at the bottom. I wont spoil it.
Dumping the ADF’s MRH-90 helicopters is the right call, but why now? | The Strategist
The sad saga of the MRH-90 Taipan helicopter has been running for a long time. Back when I worked in the Department of Defence, we used to occupy ourselves from time to time calculating how ...
Worst i heard was $24000 pfh but was at $18000 with expectations to fall very shortly after that to something twice that of a blackhawk.
Not nearly as bad as the Lady pulling the strings from the back, that controlled him. He was just the front and fall guy so the string puller could dodge the fall out if there was any.
www.rnz.co.nz
www.newsroom.co.nz
I agree that acknowledgement of the risk and possible threat is a start. However the GOTD doesn't have the temporal luxury of talking its time to think about it a lot.Nothing in here that we haven't already discussed at length, but at least it looks like the political establishment in NZ is finally waking up to the new reality. No talk of capabilities, but acknowledging the risk is only the first step of course.
Stuff
www.stuff.co.nz
Whilst we would love to have all the bells and whistles yesterday, with the current government that isn't going to happen. We all know that. Even if by some magical thought they did rearm completely, it will take a minimum of seven years to achieve IOC and ten to reach FOC. The cost would be around $45 billion of which $20 billion has so far been set aside. That's just the acquisition cost. Then there is the annual operational costs so we would be looking at a NZDF budget of approximately $6 - 7 billion per annum,plus the increase in numbers of personnel. We would have to also poach, ahem I mean recruit, qualified personnel from the other FVEY partners to build up the required skills, especially in the technical branches and more so in the ACF 2.0.New Zealand's Defence Assessment and its Pacific future
Analysis - Victoria University Professor of Strategic Studies Robert Ayson breaks down the Pacific trends informing New Zealand's 2021 Defence Assessment.
An interesting article/opinion piece on RNZ/News about last weeks NZ Defence Assessment 2021.
"... while the Assessment begins with climate change and strategic competition as the top two problem generators, it's the second of these which does most of the work. And "strategic competition" is a euphemism. A one sentence summary of the 36-page public version of the Assessment could easily read: China is threatening New Zealand's interests in the South Pacific.
Excuse my astonishment with respect to:
1. RNZ actually publishing this National Security centric piece
2. Vic Uni actually having a person like Prof Ayson - who is he and can I have his babies?
I remain entirely unconvinced that NZG will do anything despite this release of their official assessment and my new mantra "China is threatening New Zealand's interests in the South Pacific".
So that instead we glibly are discussing the possibilities of second-hand Australian transport helicopters while the war fighting navy and AIr Force are ignored and our NZDF personnel are quickly disappearing into modern, war-fighting, irrelevance.
As ex RNZIR, I know how good we are as a nation and how easy it is to generate Cannon Fodder but is that really an intelligent, 'kind', 21st Century strategy for a first world nation?
Merry Christmas
Nagti. I think you are being a little optimistic in regard to the time and price for getting the armed forces up to a level that they could at least provide a decent deterrent an some coverage of our area responsibilities to friends and neighbours. The big time takers are the restoration of lost capabilities, which require a huge investment in personnel to relearn the structures and leadership required to make everything work. It can be likened to a brain surgeon. you cannot take a doctor strait out of med school and train him as a brain surgeon and the same applies to military leadership. for example the captain of a warship. The air force calculated, when the strike wing was disbanded that it would take at least 15 years to restore the capability to the standard it was. If you try to quickly and wind up in a combat situation you are likely to wind up with a lot of dead young men and women. This is one of the reasons that NZ suffered the second highest casualty rate of the allied nations in WW2 beaten only by the USSR.
I don't think that I am being overly optimistic. When the RNZAF considered the costs of standing up the ACF again they would've done it in the same old way. However the way that I would do is different and offers a quicker path with the help of our FVEY partners and two, possibly three, other countries. The LIFT would be done offshore in the medium term. FVEY air arms plus a particular non FVEY air arm would be requested to offer guidance and leadership instruction in standing up of the ACF 2.0 especially at the Sqn level WRT tactics and strategy. Some partner air arm LIFT QFI could be seconded to the RNZAF and undertake the basic LIFT training and student assessment using the T-6C Texan platform before students transfer to the partner air arms LIFT schemes. That way any poor performers are chopped before they leave the country. It reduces the chop rate overseas. So ten years is viable. This is something that I have been working on with others for about four years.
I know the report I read was some 20 years ago and I am relying on memory, but the 15 years was assuming that they got all the help that you have suggested and the dollar value quoted then was $3B and that assumed second hand F16's Or F18's, this would be a lot higher now, probably nearer $8 to $12B or even more for a bigger fleet. of new aircraft as you need additional T6's and a new fleet of advanced combat trainers, plus your main strike aircraft and time. I use to write a lot to MP's at that stage and got a lot of material that I have since lost, due to moves etc., which included the said report. I did watch the SAF starting up their strike ability from the late 1960's until the mid 1980's and could see the struggles that they went through. What I could see was that with the help they got from other air forces. that even after over a decade they still had some way to go. they have now turned into a very good top line Air Force, but it took a lot of time. The problem is the people and taking the strike wing as an example, it takes up to 3 years for a pilot to graduate as a strike pilot , (wing man ) after another 3 to 4 years of experience and training he can make it as a section leader. Give him another 3 to 4 years of the same and he can become a flight leader. then after an additional similar period of time and training you get someone who can lead a squadron in combat. It is that experience build up over time that just training even with expert tuition cannot provide, just like the brain surgeon I mentioned. The same applies to the captain of a ship. Promoting a junior officer and putting in command of a combat ship without the necessary additional training and experience will not make for a good outcome. It is the time, training and experience that matters, particularly the experience, which only comes with time. The problem I see is that we have a lot of catching up to do in a lot of area's across all sectors of the armed forces in the combat functions of those forces.