Well gawd damn!
I bitch and whine about the state of Marine Armor but Marine Air is sitting in high cotton!
We have the CH-53K waiting in the wings for production to start, we have the AH-1Z/UH-1Y beating expectations (which were high) and we have the Israeli's about to give us a price break on the MV-22 by virtue of them about to buy the airplane.
And now this.
The Navy League of Australia practically begs their country to buy Cobras instead of Tiger Attack Helicopters.
Read about it here.
This guy used wrong arguments...
ReplyDeleteThe Tiger is maritimized : France use it on his BPC Ships since several years...
Half of Tiger in service now can fire Mistral AA missile...since several years too.
I don't know where the guy is finding his documents : it's just the choice of australian army to get this version of the tiger : there is no doubt that's that eurocopter can do these modifications..
the version they bought was with the thinking that it would be used aboard ship from the very beginning. also remember that the AH-64 is considered marinized by the Brits but isn't to the same standards as the AH-1Z that the USMC flies. i don't think the Tiger even meets US standards for marinization (or to be classified as such). time will tell, but i notice that US Army helos don't spend much time aboard our ships because corrosion is a beast that doesn't take a day off. i think the same will apply to the Australian Army.,
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DeleteCouple of thoughts:
DeleteThe Tiger that can fire Mistral is the HAP. Australia bought the ARH version, which may mount Stinger, kind of a mixed bag there. In any case, AH-1Z can use Sidewinder, which is much more powerful.
One of the unexpected benefits of full marinization, ala AH-1Z is operations in sand. It turns out that all those drains and holes that let water flow out also work quite well in letting sand drain out during desert ops. Cobras have been less affected than other US helos in that environment
Eurotiger's air frame is partially stealthy, dunno if that makes any difference. Cobra is a fine machine, it just looks so retro, not COOL enough.
ReplyDeletethe tiger might be stealthy but its also tiny. i've noticed that when it comes to helicopters in the attack role bigger is generally better. the MI-24 looks like a dinosaur but its a terror on the battlefield and can transport a squad of troops.
DeleteIt's all about the money. For instance, recently, Australian Navy did a contest to build three AWD. One was from Spain (if memory serves me correct) and one was the Burke class with all the bells-and-whistles.
ReplyDeletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hobart-class_destroyer
The navy brass wants the Burke because it's a battle proven technology (SPY-1) but the Defense Minister said, "No you're not. You're getting the Spanish model. Because we can afford THAT and we can buy MORE of that." Don't even think about can Australian Navy recruit enough people to man these AWD when then come online? I mean AU Navy is already having difficulty crewing their assets.
Same with the Tiger. Australia does not have adequate budget to acquire the Cobra because it costs more than the Tiger. Another thing is the space. The new AWD will not have the space to store the Cobra but can store the Tiger.
Unfortunately, one must read the actual article in the magazine; hard to get for some. In it, we see things about the Tiger than sane people knew (this excludes the Tiger camp). That is, that the Tiger has bad hot/high performance, reliability problems and so on. Also that, for any other money right now, AH-1Zs could be purchased and the whole Tiger program in Australis dumped and it would be a win. The article in the stated magazine is less about the dummies that started the program on hope and more about...today. There is little money left in the Oz fed budget. With a little money, we could have real (salty) attack helos that work and are already joint with allies. As a side-bar... add that and the USMC UH-1Y (Yankee) and you have another win. Also a by-product of getting the Romeo for the Navy is that it uses the same motor as the Zulu Cobra. And we also know about Zulu and Yankee commonality. The three greatest aircraft programs the USMC has (that others could learn from) are the Yankee, Zulu and KC-130J Harvest Hawk.
ReplyDeleteBut guess what, foreign customers almost always pick latest (and more expensive) models over old horse. Just recently AH-1Z lost to AH-64E in South Korea's AH-X competition. European firms tend to offer more up to date stuff than their American counterparts. That's how they are able to gradually stealing third country market away from US companies. Some of those markets are traditionally locked by US vendors. S. Korea is good example. This is evident in the helicopter sector: NH90/AW101 vs Blackhawk, Tiger vs Apache/Cobra. Due to the inability of US based defense contractor efforts to development and field next generation weapons, they are increasingly relying upon existing proven platforms. Missile business is another good example. You keep seeing new stuff out of Europe and in the US we stuck with 1970/1980 era products. Hellfire is no match for Brimstone, AMRAAM is obsolete when comparing to Meteor AAM.
ReplyDeletethe helicopter issues are a bit more fuzzy than that. the NH-90 is a disgrace of a helicopter and the Blackhawk is still market leader while that airplane limps into service. the S. Koreans aren't a good example of anything. they have Russian helicopters in service, a new hybrid model and now they're after something else. Brimstone is nice but it really doesn't impress me. its just a hellfire with a smaller warhead a different guidance system. ground breaking it is not. the Meteor is ok but again its just making up for a deficiency in another sector. to keep the Typhoon competitive it desperately needs a new missile and if we're being honest the Meteor should be compared to the AIM-120D.
Deleteso long story short the US is still leading in many of these areas, we're moving toward a new generation of tilt rotors, the sikorsky CH-53K will be the biggest heavy lifter and the CH-47 will remain popular. we're doing ok.
AH-64 is ubiquitous and has great PR (deserved or not). So much so, that nowadays whenever it's in a competition it's reached the point that the selecting officials almost have to, instead of justifying picking it, have to justify Not picking it. Also, there are lots of earlier versions of Apache in service, whereas AH-1Z (which is a significant change from earlier models) is only just entering service. Apache seems like it will be in production for some time, especially with each contract it wins, whereas AH-1Z doesn't yet have a track record. That makes Apache the "safe" choice. That's why, I suspect, S. Korea went with Apache, despite it being an over 38% more expensive solution than the AH-1Z. Some wags might also say that -1"Z" sounds like the end of the line, while with "E" there are 20 letters to go (we don't use "I")! :)
ReplyDeleteNotwithstanding that, all that, I'd be willing to put the Zulu Cobra up against any of its European or Russian rivals.