NZDF General discussion thread

MrConservative

Super Moderator
Staff member
Your very generous.
$4 billion NZD implies a very different vessel, its whole of life cost and program cost for domestic construction. It is scary though that that is considered a serious enough commentary on defence that scoop is linking to it. But IADS?
Integrated Air Defense System.

Scoop as a site has a leftwing bias so it does not surprise me and is a repository for press releases from all sort of groups large and small.

The thing that amused me was that on one hand the authors were against an air combat capability and a frigate force on cost grounds and then on the other were advocating a series of medium range mobile air defence and anti-ship batteries around the NZ 15000km coastline.

You guys know as I do that is incredibly expensive. South Korea's first six KM-SAM mobile batteries are going to cost NZ$650m. For that the Koreans would sell us sixteen FA-50 Block 20's, which would also save money in having to invest in a land based surface to surface missile system. Being multirole they would do a heck of a lot more.
 

tongan_yam

New Member
Not sure if this is allowable (mods please remove if so).

National is seeking input for their International Affairs discussion paper - there are questions relating to defence that I thought we could add good input too.

One of the questions is to commit to significant modernisation and investment into the Defence Force that was their 2016 Defence White Paper.

The link is here:
International Affairs - Discussion Document

See Post 4754. Already posted Tongan-Yam but it would be good for people to give their input to it so they don't end up with nonsense.

Cheers MrC
 

ngatimozart

Super Moderator
Staff member
Verified Defense Pro
Okay not to cover to much of the same ground. So I this 42 group had posted a document titled "Independent Assessment of New Zealand's Defence Policy" to Scoop.co.nz so a decently read publication. Over all 42 group is advocating defensive capabilities over power projection. Although its obvious they're using the terms incorrectly and I'm an amateur defence enthusiasts but I think there's something not quite correct with this lot. That's obvious.
....
This a BZ - a well done for a good post. This doesn't mean that we agree with the contents of the post.

LOVERLY BOY.jpg
 

Todjaeger

Potstirrer
Hi everyone and yes it’s a long time between innings as I’ve had a few personal health issues and no it wasn’t me getting married either since the last I was here. But anyway I came across a an article on scoop.co.nz coming from a Defence focus group called 42 group and I’m wondering if anyone here has heard of it or you is being it?

The actual article from scoop.

An independent assessment of New Zealand defence policy | Scoop News

The link to there PDF file I haven’t read it yet and I hope to have read tomorrow in between doing the final fit out of man cave.

http://img.scoop.co.nz/media/pdfs/1...ence_Policy_Assessment_for_NZ__2018__v1.0.pdf
Took a quick read through of the PDF, and a few things came to mind which do not appear to have been raised by anyone yet.

Some of the content seems to have been either influenced by, or shares a common source with, one of the Green Party's central defence planks from the 2008 election IIRC. The Green Party had a central part of their defence policy as "passive non-compliance" in the event of invasion. Now this one seems to advocate for adopting guerrilla warfare in the event of invasion, but this hyper-focus on a theoretical invasion as a legitimate threat ignores the realities involved in projecting and sustaining power over the distances required.

Does the name, "Investigator" come to mind for anyone else?

Lastly, given the quality of the content, it is understandable that the 42 Group might wish to keep it's membership anonymous. Having said that though, I do wonder if there is an NZ venue (Scoop, Stuft, NZ Herald, etc. al.) which would be suitable for sharing both the recommendations of the 42 Group, as well as a point by point rebuttal of their assertions, flawed ideas/thinking, and issues with their sources.
 

ngatimozart

Super Moderator
Staff member
Verified Defense Pro
Artical on the NZ DCP from ASPI:

Capable for what? New Zealand’s 2019 defence capability plan | The Strategist

Think the first part of the title - "Capable for what?" - is a very good question. The NZDF does look increasingly constabulary/HADR only.

Odd the emphasis given on gender in the article as well - not saying it isn't important - just question the weight it is given in thie article in particular.

Regards,

Massive
The authors are a husband & wife team and both experts in the field. Peter Greener wrote the paper Timing is Everything about NZ procurement which is really a got to about the subject. I think the gender section of the article is outlining negative impacts that aspects of the DCP will have upon the current NZGs diversity policy, which is close to the heart of the NZLP & Greens. Not much, if any, real world experience in the current govt, resulting in govt by political and social theory.

I totally agree "Capable of what?" is a very good question.
 

Ocean1Curse

Member
I think diversity in NZDF is an interesting topic with one caveat. New Zealand does not have the population that the Soviet Union or Vietnam had to win the wars they got into respectively. With a population of 50 or 100 million people they could include woman in all sorts of military roles. New Zealand only has 4 million people. To get New Zealand's GDP in to the top 20 economies with such a relatively smaller population than the larger economies we had to build hydro electric dams during the period of "Think Big Projects" where a lot of New Zealand's modern infrastructure was built during the 70's and 80's.

As you all may know, and we could catch up to nations with larger populations than our own by being smarter. So basically 20 years of work in New Zealand was equivalent to about 40 years of work in the old soviet block, so you could have two careers in NZ or 3 careers when we compare it too 1980's Veitnam. Wonderful, the wife stayed at home and outsourced her problems to hubby.

Now that energy policy is in flux, by flux I mean oil exploration in New Zealand will be discontinued after the Maui gas fields run out, and legacy coal fired power plants (Huntly) are being phased out and new ways of harvesting energy brought in. It reminds me of that old socialist joke about the shops running out of stuff. The woman says to the store owner that there are no more sanitary pads on the shelves, the shop owner replies; no, this is the shop that ran out of oil.

So NZDF must be rebuilt around new contingencies. A New Zealand with out easy access to oil will be a terrible loss for NZDF, they are a diesel military, am I correct? In this way I am not talking about diversity in a way that can change the past, but in this counter factual way you can change the culture at the level of counterfactuals.

So let's take this one step further and let's say what if Ron Marks didn't write the DCP19, then some one would have to do it. That is counterfactual. It's the same as the grandfather paradox that says if Hitler was assassinated as a baby, then Stalin or who ever would have taken up the role.

So this is the standard left wing liberal arts degree ect ect, determination of diversity, to a logic that is counterfactual. That something happens to energy policy that requires a change in NZDF culture and operating procedure which thus far, is costing $20 billion in recapitalization plus annual budget costs just to catch up to what should have been in place 10 years ago. So the wars of the future will not be cheap by any stretch of the imagination.

Could you imagine this vast and very erotic joke on the whole place. A joke that you could repeat to your priest or a teacher and it goes like this.

So after a successful night out on the town, the guy says to the girl would you like to drive us to my place in my sports car. The girl replies yes but I'm to drunk to drive, and the guy says that's okay because my car is on empty. Could you imagine a more erotic joke because it has nothing to do with the destination.

So this is our hope. As long as we can get energy policy fixed up, then maybe there is a chance for us.
 

Exkiwiforces

New Member
Hi everyone and yes it’s a long time between innings as I’ve had a few personal health issues and no it wasn’t me getting married either since the last I was here. But anyway I came across a an article on scoop.co.nz coming from a Defence focus group called 42 group and I’m wondering if anyone here has heard of it or you is being it?

The actual article from scoop.

An independent assessment of New Zealand defence policy | Scoop News

The link to there PDF file I haven’t read it yet and I hope to have read tomorrow in between doing the final fit out of man cave.

http://img.scoop.co.nz/media/pdfs/1...ence_Policy_Assessment_for_NZ__2018__v1.0.pdf
Well the plot thickens IRT to this 42 Group? As I had a reply from one of NZ’ s highly regarded Security Analysts who has bloody good CV and now works in the private sector after he got on the wrong side my Aunty Helen. He said in an email, “I have not heard of the group before and cannot discern who the "loose" collection of security analysts may be. But from the tone I am gathering that it may be younger, more Left leaning analysts who are behind the endeavour”.

He is going to get to me with his view on that document and maybe some more information on 42 Group in due course.
 

Ocean1Curse

Member
Well the plot thickens IRT to this 42 Group? As I had a reply from one of NZ’ s highly regarded Security Analysts who has bloody good CV and now works in the private sector after he got on the wrong side my Aunty Helen. He said in an email, “I have not heard of the group before and cannot discern who the "loose" collection of security analysts may be. But from the tone I am gathering that it may be younger, more Left leaning analysts who are behind the endeavour”.

He is going to get to me with his view on that document and maybe some more information on 42 Group in due course.
To be honest I recognised a lot that was said in that independent analysis as things that I have said on some left wing blogs, which is why I made a comment as if to say I have nothing to do with that group. Their diagram of a layered defence can in my opinion be penatrated by Fiji and that's saying something.
 

Kiwigov

Member
Integrated Air Defense System.

The thing that amused me was that on one hand the authors were against an air combat capability and a frigate force on cost grounds and then on the other were advocating a series of medium range mobile air defence and anti-ship batteries around the NZ 15000km coastline.
.
I found it interesting that their (many) recommendations were based on a set of speculative scenarios, but no indication given of risk/likelihood or timeframe for the scenarios. So the 'full spectrum dominance' scenario implicitly assumes a large-scale invasion force with aircraft carriers, and amphibious capabilities with significant numbers of armoured vehicles and secure lines of resupply for munitions, replacements, etc. (historical analogy/counterfactual being a WW2 Japanese fleet after winning the Battle of the Coral Sea, and taking on NZ rather than New Guinea or Australia).
I note in passing that NZ's (professional) defence assessments have publicly assessed the risk of this scenario as being very low.
Be interesting to know the membership as it reads very much like a reheated version of the old 'Just Defence' polemics which the media lapped up in the late 1990s/early 2000s
 

Todjaeger

Potstirrer
I found it interesting that their (many) recommendations were based on a set of speculative scenarios, but no indication given of risk/likelihood or timeframe for the scenarios. So the 'full spectrum dominance' scenario implicitly assumes a large-scale invasion force with aircraft carriers, and amphibious capabilities with significant numbers of armoured vehicles and secure lines of resupply for munitions, replacements, etc. (historical analogy/counterfactual being a WW2 Japanese fleet after winning the Battle of the Coral Sea, and taking on NZ rather than New Guinea or Australia).
I note in passing that NZ's (professional) defence assessments have publicly assessed the risk of this scenario as being very low.
Be interesting to know the membership as it reads very much like a reheated version of the old 'Just Defence' polemics which the media lapped up in the late 1990s/early 2000s
The other thing which I noticed, which I suspect is related to their scenarios, is the issues taken with some of NZ's (unnamed) allies being a violators of the international rules based order. Between the two, I have the impression that the proposed defensive measures were primarily aimed at defending NZ from a hypothetical invasion by Australia and/or the US, as these are really the only two countries which currently could. A trend which is likely to continue for some time.
 

Exkiwiforces

New Member
I found it interesting that their (many) recommendations were based on a set of speculative scenarios, but no indication given of risk/likelihood or timeframe for the scenarios. So the 'full spectrum dominance' scenario implicitly assumes a large-scale invasion force with aircraft carriers, and amphibious capabilities with significant numbers of armoured vehicles and secure lines of resupply for munitions, replacements, etc. (historical analogy/counterfactual being a WW2 Japanese fleet after winning the Battle of the Coral Sea, and taking on NZ rather than New Guinea or Australia).
I note in passing that NZ's (professional) defence assessments have publicly assessed the risk of this scenario as being very low.
Be interesting to know the membership as it reads very much like a reheated version of the old 'Just Defence' polemics which the media lapped up in the late 1990s/early 2000s
Good old “Just Defence” is a blast from the past I must say lol . I remember a few names from old my young political days, Nicky Hagar, Larry Ross, Stan Hem what’s his name, the Locke’s (NZ’s version of the Aaron Family for our Oz members here and my NZ great grandparents had a run with the Locke’s and their mate Angus McLagan during the 30’s over on the West Coast) and old Muzz’a Hoots from CAFCA just to name a few. I had a run in with some of them in CHCH between 2000- 2002 while I was on leave back in NZ when I give a few briefs (which interfered with my hunting, fishing and other squaddie activities when you are cash up) on my time in ET during INTERFET and they still crap on about that we didn’t need F-16’s, Frigates, real Landing Ships. Anyway I brought them back down earth with an almighty thump especially after my mate Lenny was KIA in ET with Batt2 and “I said at the if you think INTERFET and along with the later day UN Peacekeeping Force is a walk in the park in Timor-Leste? The West Papua is going to whole different ball game as most of you so- called Communists/ socialists who support/ help Indonesia’s founding Father to boot out Dutch as the TNI won’t give up West Papua without fight either way. Also find it quite disgusting that you’ve now change sides when it’s suits you and especially after what the TNI did when they walked in after the Dutch left and as a fellow lefty I’m disgusting to be in the same room with you lot that supported Human Right Abuses on our door step”. Should’ve heard the mice having a wee and a giggle between the walls.

Anyway back to tropic, as I’m slowly reading their paper they come across as very anti west and there is no mention of any form of Peacekeeping/ Peace Enforcements Mission WTF? It’s just like the INTERFET/ UN Missions in Timor-Leste never ever existed nor any of the Peace Support Missions in the Sth Pacific.

Then we have their Nuclear scenario which is so laughable and who the hell wants to destroy the land of milk, butter and honey to prove a point? I would use 6-7 direct action teams hitting key installations, 6-7 bio warfare teams armed with TB, Foot and Mouth, PSA with other bad goodies to effect NZ’s PI’s, cyber warfare unit mainly to hit NZSX, power stations, the Railways CTC, for shits and giggles traffic lights and lifts just to piss off Paul and Mr C and finally a doz plus Subs with all orders if it floats sunk it with. H Hour will be Midnight on New Years Eve as everyone will be piss as chooks around the country as DNB, RNZAF Base Auckland, both ends of the Cook Strait HVC and the Hydro Cracker or whatever it’s called (its very important and vital piece to oil refining from crude oil to go juice for the car etc) and the tank farm at Marsden Pt go bang as everyone would think they are all getting on the juice/ or they are partaking with their favourite poison to bring the new yr.
 
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Donnzy

Member
MCU replacement announced in this months Army News, NZMTP its called, basically the british multicam variant with an NZ colour scheme, will be made on the old NZDPM fabric. PG 3 of army news for source.
rollout from 2020 till 2023
 

Attachments

MCU replacement announced in this months Army News, NZMTP its called, basically the british multicam variant with an NZ colour scheme, will be made on the old NZDPM fabric. PG 3 of army news for source.
rollout from 2020 till 2023
So, confirm the NZDF MCU pattern is being completely replaced......? I thought it was (relatively) recently introduced...
 

Donnzy

Member
Yeah only like 2 or 3 years old, sounds like that the material is no longer avail so they are taking the chance to change and match our allies more. Suprised it was MTP thou
 

Redlands18

Well-Known Member
Yeah only like 2 or 3 years old, sounds like that the material is no longer avail so they are taking the chance to change and match our allies more. Suprised it was MTP thou
If I remember correctly we had a few posts some months ago about the Manufacturer going out of business and they would no longer be available.
 
Yeah only like 2 or 3 years old, sounds like that the material is no longer avail so they are taking the chance to change and match our allies more. Suprised it was MTP thou
Rgr that.

I think it (MCU) was first introduced sometime around the 2013 timeframe (initially anyway) IIRC. It was developed by a company called Hyperstealth and selected with quite a bit of fanfare by the NZDF over a selection of other camo patterns (the main competition being multicam).

From an outsiders perspective, in my opinion it was a bit of a balls up because upper management wanted a camo that would perform well across a multitude of environments and I just think that this a bit unrealistic when perhaps compared with a uniform with more than one colourway (i.e. one woodland type plus one desert type etc etc).

Furthermore as with any govt department, there is only so much money in the kitty and the best option is invariably the most expensive option (so it’s immediately ruled out!)....so compromises have to be made - and therefore you get the second or third best option. Buy one pattern and hope it covers as many environments as possible, save some more money by getting a manufacturer who offers a great price (which translates to meaning “cuts corners”) and look where you end up.

I always thought that MCU was too light a shade for most of our country though I’m sure it was very good in a select number of places....

In my experience the original Crye Precision multicam performs very well in much of NZ bush and rural areas. Maybe if the NZDF had just gone with that in the first place, paid a bit more for them (as a quality / vetted manufacturer)...we wouldn’t be spending more now. Sometimes the “expensive “ option is actually the cheapest option.

Just my opinion....
 

CJohn

Active Member
I think this will be a good move from MCU to NZMPT for the NZDF.

MCU seemed to have a problem with colour fastness, and faded to a light tan/brown with no visible green.

The RNZAF are already wearing what looks like British multicam.
 
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