Newsdesk – Military Aviation

Sorry About That, Comrade:

It could have happened to anyone.

The Soviet Army newspaper Red Star has revealed that during the infamous incident in May 1960 when a US Lockheed U-2 spy- plane piloted by Francis Gary Powers was shot down by an SA-2 SAM over the Ural Mountains, a similar missile also shot down a Russian fighter. The MiG-19 had been scrambled to intercept and if necessary ram the U-2 but had failed to do so.

An SA-2 launched at the U-2 in fact destroyed the intercepting MIG, killing its pilot. Another missile exploded near the U-2. damaging it and forcing Powers to eject, sparking a major rift between the two already unfriendly superpowers.

Centrespread

In its combat livery, this Macchi almost looks like a ‘real’ fighter.

Levity aside, No. 76 Squadron’s William- town based MB-326Hs have been performing the fighter lead-in training role admirably now for more than two years. As most Macchi trainer functions will be fully taken over by the Pilatus PC-9 over the coming few years, it may well reach a point where the only RAAF unit flying the Italian jet will be No. 76.

Australia placed into service the first of 87 326Hs in 1966 with the RAN also flying 10 during the period when they had a fixed wing carrier air group. With the PC-9 performing better than initially expected and a limited airframe life left in the surviving RAAF Macchis, it is expected that they will ultimately be replaced in No. 76 Squadron service by a small number of dedicated lead-in aircraft such as the BAe Hawk 100/200

B-2 Suffers in Us Cuts:

As expected, the Northrop B-2 ‘stealth’ bomber program has been considerably cut following the release of US Defence Secretary Richard Cheney’s proposed procurement program. Instead of the 132 B-2s requested by the USAF, the number will be cut to just 75 if the program is accepted, the minimum required to equip two wings. Even though this will save $US14. 4bn over the next seven years, it could push the unit price of the aircraft up by some 50% to a staggering $US800m. Even this nearly halving of the B-2 program might not be enough for its many critics in the US congress.

Other forthcoming aviation programs affected by Mr Cheney’s proposals include reduction of the McDonnell Douglas C-17 transport aircraft purchase from 210 to 120, cutting of the US Navy’s A-12 attack aircraft buy from 858 to 620, postponement of the USAF’s version of the A-12 from 1993 to 1997, and deferment of production of the Advanced Tactical Fighter (ATF) from 1994 to 1996 and then spreading production of the 750 required over a longer period. The joint Lockheed/Boeing/General Dynamics entry in the ATF contest, the F-22, is scheduled to make its first flight on June 30.

Guided Missile Decoy Tested:

ERL’S Electronic Warfare Division has successfully tested a low cost radar decoy which is towed behind a military aircraft to seduce incoming radar guided missiles away from the aircraft itself.

Research and trials to date indicate that the concept is viable and although there has been no survey there is an obvious world defence market for such a product. Registrations of interest were sought recently from industry to participate in the establishment of an industry capability in radar electronic countermeasures (ECM) and, more specifically, the development and production of an offboard countermeasures system to protect military aircraft against radar guided missiles.

The project will comprise a project definition study (PDS) as Phase 1, to be undertaken during 1990-91. Phase 2 will concentrate on advanced engineering development comprising the design, development and supply of the various engineering systems.

Civil Links for Defence Technology:

This is probably as good a sign of the times as anything and indeed it’s happening all over the world as ‘peace’ breaks out almost everywhere. The Australian Trade Commission (Austrade) has indicated there is an increasing demand throughout South East Asia for defence technologies which have civil or commercial applications. Bud- get conscious governments are now looking for technologies which have a civil or commercial application and the demand for highly sophisticated weaponry is diminishing. Austrade believes Australian companies operating in defence related markets are well placed to take advantage of this trend.

 F-111 Ate Teams Take Shape:

It is now clear that at least four groups of primes and their subcontractors will be tendering for the F-111 automatic test equipment replacement (ATE-R) project which closed on 31 May, reports Tom Muir in the Australian Defence Intelligencer Westinghouse with BABA have been in the running to replace original Westinghouse equipment at Amberley since they first put in an unsolicited proposal (at a rumoured price in excess of $A100m) years before the release of the RFT in February 1990.

Emerson has also confirmed that it will be bidding for the project and has signed up a subcontractor. Harris will also be tendering for the project with Mintech as its subcontractor. Melbourne based software developer Mintech has the distinction of supplying a commercial grade replacement central processor and control (CENPAC) system for the F-111 ATE three years ago, on time and below budget cost, which has been working without fault ever since.

The fourth known contender is Litton of Canada, which supplied the ATE system for the F-18. Ansett Technologies, which has been developing an independent ATE capability, will not be tendering as a prime.

There was also a sudden, if belated, flurry of interest from the European aerospace consortium, Aeritalia/Casa/MBB/BAe, but it is understood that they have since been persuaded not to tender at this late stage.

Meanwhile, the Rockwell-led consortium has been announced as the preferred tenderer for the F-111 avionics upgrade project (refer Defence Update, p42, for full story). Some of the project’s funding difficulties have been overcome by a windfall underspend in the F-18 program due to the Australian dollar holding up against its US counterpart better than expected. It is understood that an additional $A140m has been allocated for the AUP.

 Jorn Project Drags Its Heels:

The JORN (Jindalee) project office earlier appeared to be working towards having a final recommendation on source selection on the Defence Minister’s desk soon after the March Federal Election, reports Tom Muir in the Australian Defence Intelligencer. However subsequent, unexpected developments have included dropping BHP/ Raytheon from contention and extending the evaluation process for the remaining two, AWA/GE and Telecom/Marconi, for at least another three months in order to try to resolve outstanding issues in both tenders. This will involve the reworking of bids in areas which have yet to be specified including some clarification of non-compliant aspects with the possibility of some recosting.

Target date for submission of the revised bids is the end of June, presumably to be followed by contract negotiations in parallel. This suggests that an announcement on source selection is now unlikely before September and the longer the delay the better things look for Telecom/Marconi. While the AWA tender for this $A600m project is currently favoured ahead of Telecom’s on price — and presumably the suitability of its technical solution — there has been some (unofficial) suggestion from the Telecom camp that they must have the better technology – otherwise why would they still be in the running? “There is a feeling too that with time on its side — and there seems to be plenty of that – the Telecom group can refine its tender, attuning it more closely perhaps to those aspects which have put AWA ahead. It is believed that Marconi (UK) is prepared to come down in price in order to shoehorn itself into a program with very large follow-on export opportunities.

It appears that at this stage there is no absolute certainty over the of US technology which GE plans to bring to the project, whereas the UK Government is said to have given assurances at the highest level that there will be no bar to the transfer of Marconi’s technology. However, whether this equates to a written guarantee, which will be required, remains to be seen.

All Is Forgiven, Obviously:

One bit of US- Sino cooperation which ground toa halt following the Beijing massacre last year was the installation of modern US electronic equipment in the Chinese F-8 Il twin engined fighter by Grumman. The program has now resumed, and the first two F-8 Il airframes are at Grumman’s Bethpage factory (along with Chinese engineers) receiving their look down/shoot down weapons system based around the Westinghouse APG-66 pulse doppler radar, a head up display, Litton inertial navigation system, mission and air data computers, digital databus and electrical generating system. Some 50 F-8 IIs are being modified under the $US500m ‘Peace Pearl’ update program. Another cooperative project, the assembly of McDonnell Douglas MD-82 airliners in China from US supplied subassemblies, has also been extended. The initial agreement covered 25 aircraft and this has now been extended to 50.

The Tornado/Efa Gap:

With production of the joint British/German/Italian Panavia Tornado multi-role combat aircraft now beginning to run down, some concern is being shown that as things stand, there will be a gap between the end of that program and the start of the still not fully committed four nation European Fighter Aircraft (EFA) program. Tornado orders currently stand at 959 aircraft with about 820 delivered, meaning that current orders will be fulfilled well before the EFA is due to enter service in 1996. By this date the EFA will be in only very small scale production and will not fully build up until the year 2000. The Panavia consortium needs another 60 or so orders for the Tornado to maintain a minimally economical production rate of 35 per annum to 1996.

The EFA consortium’s partners are Britain (33%), West Germany (33%), Italy (21%) and Spain (13%). Between them, the four member nations have indicated a requirement for 765 aircraft, although this could reduce with defence spending cuts. Indeed, current planning reveals a need for only 550 EFA’s (assuming one for one replacement), the RAF saying it will replace four squadrons of Phan- toms and three of Jaguars with the new fighter, West Germany needs four wings to replace Phantoms, Italy seven squadrons of F-104 Starfighters and Spain three squadrons of Mirage F1s. Also, the proportions of ownership of the program could change. On the other side of the coin is a possibly strong export market for the EFA, particularly in Europe.

But all is not entirely well within the consortium. West Germany’s parliamentary budget committee recently called for a report outlining the cost of withdrawing from the EFA program, although this has been seen as mainly a political gesture as the cost of withdrawal is likely to be higher than the cost of staying in. The prospect of a unified Germany does raise the point of wondering if East Germany’s MiG-29s would end up in service with a unified Luftwaffe, thus negating some need for the EFA.

Woomera Responses In:

As expected, there were only two responses to the request for proposals for the commercialisation of the Woomera Instrumented Range (WIR) in the 50,000sq mile Woomera Prohibited Area, South Australia, reports Tom Muir in the Australian Defence Intelligencer.

The respondees are the Woomera Range Development Group (WRDG) comprising ASTA (45%), Ansett Technologies (40%) and the South Australian Government (15%), and the more recent entrant, Australian Flight Test Services (AFTS) teamed with Hawker de Havilland (Vic).

It is understood that among the reasons for AFTS breaking away from the large group of local and overseas companies supporting WRDG was its lack of competitiveness in their company. It is believed that AFTS sought guarantees of work from the WRDG which were not forthcoming – before announcing its separate bid with HdH. For its part the WRDG points out that it has given none of its supporters any assurances of work should the group’s proposal be accepted.

WRDG’s supporters, comprising 20 Australian and 10 overseas companies, include such industry majors as British Aerospace, Contraves, Thomson-CSF, Kaiser, AWA, BHP A&E, Auspace and such overseas specialists as Kollsman, Metric, Cubic, Whittaker and Interstate Electronics.

As the only commercial developer and operator of an air combat the BAe Air Combat Training Range in the North Sea – British Aerospace can be expected to play an important role in this project. With many of its staff drawn from the RAAF’s Aircraft Research and Development Unit (ARDU) at Edinburgh, including several flight test engineers and test pilots, AFTS has a special interest in fight testing/engineering.

At its simplest the requirement set out in the ITR is for the commercial operation of a test and evaluation facility, as is currently provided by DSTO’s Woomera Management Branch. But recognising that such usage is presently too limited to provide long term workload, the viability of the project rests on: a substantial increase in ADF workload, particularly that of the RAAF, including the redirection to the WIR of test and evaluations currently performed at overseas facilities; and the export of Woomera range services to overseas customers.

The latter would be expected to be the main source of income for the project and it is here that a major difficulty has emerged. While the WRDG found there was consider able interest by potential overseas customers in a fully developed range, such interest was wholly dependent upon announced support by the Australian Government for the project.

But the Australian Government is not prepared to give assurances for access to the range by other countries or organisations other than on a case by case basis. At this stage it is interested only in examining proposals for the commercialisation of the WIR – not in unconditional support for the project. Part of the problem is that the development of Woomera is not dependent on government funding. If it were, greater interest might be shown by the Ministers concerned.