“You’ll remember the quality…”

Striking the balance between quality and quantity in air training

The French couturier Pierre Cardin reportedly dismissed criticisms that his fashions were too expensive with the response, “You’ll remember the quality long after you’ve forgotten the cost”. Cardin’s attitude could equally serve as a guiding principle for training air force pilots. The aphorism that ‘quantity has a quality all of its own’ applies to armies, not to air forces. Most nations and interest groups can cobble together dangerous land forces, even with limited resources – think Viet Cong, the Taliban, the Libyan militia and so on. Very few, however, can raise and sustain a first-class air power.

Cardin’s philosophy is especially germane as discussions continue over the contract for project AIR 5428 to provide basic flying training for the Australian Defence Force. No activity is more important to the effectiveness of advanced air power than the training of its foremost warrior class.