Forum: Program and politics

The latest F-15E variants are great airplanes and better all around than the Super Hornet in most respects. Faster, greater range/payload, bigger more powerful AESA. I have no idea how their RCS compares. I assume the SH's is better. I have to think the ruggedness of the carrier designed F-18 has something to do with Australia's decision. The ability to upgrade to the Growler was obviously built into the deal as well. And as Conan said, the RAAF's familiarity and working relationship with the USN is well established. It appears that the Ausie's made a similar decision as the USN to replace their legacy and difficult to maintain swing-wing aircraft with the Super Hornet as a 20 year stop gap. If they end up buying F-35s, the SH's simply replace some of their older F/A-18s. If they do not buy the F-35, at least they have a more reliable and cheaper to maintain aircraft than the F-111/F-14 had become.

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Conan wrote:

The size, depth, difficulties that would-be contractors (who had never attempted anything like this) hadn't even contemplated, cost, the extended timeframe that would have seen our strategic strike capability reduced to virtually nothing for a decade or more while the re-build was on-going.

Much the way the RAAF had to scramble to find an interim solution in the super hornets after it became apparent that the JSF was going to be late you mean? How does the situation you describe differ from what actually occurred with the "sanctioned" AIR6000 winner?

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On top of which we had the issues with the plethora of similarly massive upgrade projects going on in ADF at that time, most or all of which were facing significant difficulties, schedule delays and cost blow-outs that these contractors "promised" wouldn't occur to F-111 because they were "essentially off the shelf".

Just like the ESSM/Mk 41 and "off the shelf" radar upgrades on our Adelaide frigates. Like the "off the shelf" AP-3C Orion upgrade. Like the "off the shelf" M113 upgrade and so on.

So in this regard they were no different from a number of other "well managed" defence programs already underway at the time.

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Defence were right. It couldn't be done. Not in the way it was proposed, not for the cost and estimated time it would take and there was no way the cost could be amortised across the fleet we were and would have operated. We would likely have ended up spending far in excess of $100m per aircraft for this upgrade, for an aircraft that still needed something else to do all the "heavy lifting" first and constant fighter escort when it could be deployed. Something RAAF finds fairly difficult as an airforce authorised to run a maximum of 72 combat coded aircraft...

Given what you've already stated above, that Defence are unable to accurately predict the course of projects that actually were direct 'off-the-shelf' upgrades, how could Defence have possibly claimed any ability to make accurate predictions in regard to the proposal as put forward by the 'would-be contractors'? You seem to claim/assume that defence has 20-20 vision when it comes to determining the viability of these projects but then with the same breath admit that they do not. Even the JSF project, lead by allegedly the best project leaders and managers in the Western world could not stop the program from sliding off to the right. In that light, why is it that the 'would-be contractors' were held to different/higher standards than every other project being managed/overseen by the department of defence at the time and even Lockheed Martin?

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Furthermore we could get no help on the issues from a "parent" airforce as we could with the Hornet upgrade (USN) if anything went significantly wrong.

If something went significantly wrong we'd have been no better or worse off than we were in reality anyway and not entering into projects unless we've got somebody to hold our hands points to a Australian defence engineering capacity that could be best described only as 'brittle'.

No disrespect but, all-in-all it certainly doesn't paint a very flattering picture of Defence senior management.

To be fair, the F-15SE weren't available when Australia got approval for the SHs in Feb 2007. Export clearance for the F-15SE was only obtained in Aug 2010 and actual production could be years away. Can't blame Australia for not considering a version that only materialised 3 years later. The SG version as pointed out is the non-stealthy version although Boeing has suggested that the SE features can be retroactively installed (at some cost).

I think the -15 intakes are movable (possibly some adjustment to a greater degree to reduce RCS?). However, one of the 2 biggest change in the SE will be the CWB which will eliminate rcs from weapons and pylons. Something that the F-18 can't avoid without CFTs of its own. Boeing is looking at CFTs for the F-18s. The other change being the canted tail which may not happen.

The decision to go with interim SH for AUS was made when they decided to ditch the F-111 for the F-35. They know in the beggining that teh F-35 would not be available in large numbers till the late 2010's/early 2020's.

The F-35 being late has nothing to do with AUS buying the SH.

jeffb wrote:

Much the way the RAAF had to scramble to find an interim solution in the super hornets after it became apparent that the JSF was going to be late you mean? How does the situation you describe differ from what actually occurred with the "sanctioned" AIR6000 winner?

On the contrary, I think you are forgetting some of the very things you are talking about. If you'll recall the existing Hornet squadrons with the addition of JDAM, JDAM-ER, JASSM, Litening and the rest of the HUG upgrade were actually the chosen replacement strike capability. The decision to retire F-111 had already been made, years before the Super Hornet decision was made.

The Super Hornets came along to provide extra combat capability overall as a bridge to F-35, when it appeared the intended 2012 entry to service would not be met. This was the reason for the "haste" in acquiring them, even though RAAF had in fact conducted scoping studies on an interim aircraft at the request of the Minister as far back as 2005.

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So in this regard they were no different from a number of other "well managed" defence programs already underway at the time.

Indeed and it would have been every bit as big a cluster as those programs were, coming in over the top of them and placing even more of a strain on the precious few aeronautical engineering resources within Australia.

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Given what you've already stated above, that Defence are unable to accurately predict the course of projects that actually were direct 'off-the-shelf' upgrades, how could Defence have possibly claimed any ability to make accurate predictions in regard to the proposal as put forward by the 'would-be contractors'? You seem to claim/assume that defence has 20-20 vision when it comes to determining the viability of these projects but then with the same breath admit that they do not. Even the JSF project, lead by allegedly the best project leaders and managers in the Western world could not stop the program from sliding off to the right. In that light, why is it that the 'would-be contractors' were held to different/higher standards than every other project being managed/overseen by the department of defence at the time and even Lockheed Martin?

I didn't claim Defence had 20/20 vision of anything. Those are entirely your words. So let's clear the air a bit, seeing as "you" are having comprehension issues again.

1. A large number of legacy (90's era) upgrade projects WERE in existence at the time AFTS pitched the F-111S upgrade to the Australian Government. These included but were not limited to the Hornet Upgrade project, AP-3C Orion upgrade Project, FFG Upgrade project, M113 upgrade project and the HF radio network modernisation project.

2. From a "timing is everything" point of view, the pitch (IMHO) couldn't have come at a worse time for 2 reasons. A - those aforementioned upgrade programs (and others) were all stuck in "developmental hell" and were going nowhere. All were massively over budget, massively over-schedule and were causing the government of the day as well as defence significant grief.

One might have taken a "strategic" view at that time, that an even more costly, complex and risky upgrade of a legacy platform might not be the best pitch at that particular time, however that isn't what happened and wasn't ever going to happen, from an ADF point of view.

B - we were in the middle of multiple simultaneous operational deployments (Timor, Iraq, Afghanistan and Solomans). Out of all those deployments, the priority need we had for airpower, was airlift, rotary wing, maritime patrol and a very limited use of TACAIR, for a small short duration deployment or 2. The political focus wasn't on strategic strike, it was on coalition operations. Any platform that was likely to be different to what we envisaged we would be contributing to coalition warfare was again, unlikely to happen.

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If something went significantly wrong we'd have been no better or worse off than we were in reality anyway and not entering into projects unless we've got somebody to hold our hands points to a Australian defence engineering capacity that could be best described only as 'brittle'.

Again on the contrary. If something went truly wrong with the platform or the development of the upgrade, we'd have been stuck for years without an effective strike capability. You're absolutely right we've a "brittle" local defence industry though. So why you'd want to stress it with a massively expensive and complicated re-design and build of an ancient platform is beyond me. Has it escaped your attention that the bulk of the structural modification work on the Hornet was done in Canada? That wasn't done just because we're friendly with Canada. It was because it couldn't be done here.

At least AFTS was cogent enough to recognise this and recommend the use of "sub-contractors" like Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman who could actually perform the work they couldn't.

The way that defence chose was a smoother, less risky program. You might argue that it's delivered less capability, but that's your opinion only and one not shared by others.

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No disrespect but, all-in-all it certainly doesn't paint a very flattering picture of Defence senior management.

Actually I think this is the best decision they've made in the last 10 years. We dodged a bullet by not embarking on yet another risky, drawn-out upgrade program and it rid us of a platform that sucked up enormous amounts of Defence's support and training budget and delivered us very limited capability for the amount of investment they required to maintain.

I wasn't being sarcastic earlier. The fleet of 17 F-111C's we maintained gave us the ability to generate about 7 aircraft a day. The rest of the fleet had no PGM capability whatosever. Wartime surge operations might have seen us get 12 of those ready at any one time, but you could count on 2-3 of those to fail before they even took off. The best take off rate I ever saw in the last 10 years of their service was 9 aircraft ready in a single day.

The capability on paper might have been great. But after 37 years of service they WERE tired had to go.

SpudmanWP wrote:

The decision to go with interim SH for AUS was made when they decided to ditch the F-111 for the F-35. They know in the beggining that teh F-35 would not be available in large numbers till the late 2010's/early 2020's.

The F-35 being late has nothing to do with AUS buying the SH.

Close, the decision to ditch F-111 was made in 2004. The replacement was to be the existing Hornet squadrons, supplemented by Wedgetail, KC-30A MRTT refuellers, acquisition of JASSM, JDAM, JDAM-ER and other networking and force multiplying assets (HF Mod and Project Vigilaire for example).

The Super Hornets were chosen to provide additional combat capability in May 2007, some 3 years after the decision to retire F-111 had been made.

Thanks for the clarification

btw, I personally think they should have gone with a F-15E+ type instead of the SH (better range [especially when armed], firepower, radar, etc).

SpudmanWP wrote:

Thanks for the clarification

btw, I personally think they should have gone with a F-15E+ type instead of the SH (better range [especially when armed], firepower, radar, etc).

I think they should have gone for that as well, but not as an interim aircraft and the decision was about 10 years too late.

RAAF should have opted for an F-15E fleet to replace the F-111 in the same timeframe as the USAF did (late 90's) and many of it's current schedule problems with JSF etc would not have eventuated.

The Hornet upgrade could have been less extensive (essentially air to air and sensor/EW only with maybe JDAM) and plenty of $$$ would have been saved in the process (no need for F-111 AUP, AGM-142 onto F-111 etc).

But it didn't happen and this is all just history now.

Unlike Canada, Australia's choice (SH/JSF) went thru both sides of the political aisle (2008 air combat capability review). That's why the end-game will be a lot cleaner than what the Canadians are experiencing. The 18F shares commonality with the 18A (and the blk II package). For a bridging capability, to introduce a relatively new type (F-15 = different engines/avionics etc) would seem a bridge too far. Only 1 country in the world operates both -18s and -15s and that country is big enough to do that in different services. Good decision by the RAAF imho.

@Conan
I'm not really going to hash the whole thing out again as it is, as you point out, all history now anyway.

I'll just state that I disagree with your analysis of many of the points especially those relating to the revamp project becoming an expensive mess. This seems to be an assumption on your part based on the progress or lack thereof of a number of similar legacy defence managed projects from the same period. Needless to say, those assumptions can't really apply to a management team from outside that community.

I'll simply close by saying that, as the B-1s and B-52s have shown, there is still a lot of use to be had from airframes which have no current analogue and which have quite special capabilities. I think that the retirement of these aircraft in particular represents a major opportunity lost.

jeffb wrote:

@Conan
I'm not really going to hash the whole thing out again as it is, as you point out, all history now anyway.

I'll just state that I disagree with your analysis of many of the points especially those relating to the revamp project becoming an expensive mess. This seems to be an assumption on your part based on the progress or lack thereof of a number of similar legacy defence managed projects from the same period. Needless to say, those assumptions can't really apply to a management team from outside that community.

Fair enough, though I think you are considerably under-estimating the difficulty and complexity that the proposed F-111 upgrade entailed, I think you considerably underestimate the effect that such would have had on RAAF capability during the upgrade process and you overstate the author's of the proposal, ability to deliver such an enormous program, given neither of them had done anything of the sort in their entire professional lives.

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I'll simply close by saying that, as the B-1s and B-52s have shown, there is still a lot of use to be had from airframes which have no current analogue and which have quite special capabilities. I think that the retirement of these aircraft in particular represents a major opportunity lost.

Indeed though B-52 and B-1B capability cannot be replicated by tactical fighters, the F-111's capability demonstrably can be as we've seen with the F-15E Strike Eagle and now, arguably, the Super Hornet.

There seems to be some misconception about the F-111, it was not, nor ever intended to be a strategic bomber. It was a long range strike aircraft. The strategic weight it was given by some of it's more enthusiastic proponents, do the aircraft itself a disservice IMHO.

It was great at what it did, in it's time, but that time has gone. Let it rest in peace and let's not pretend it was a capability of the scale of the B-52 and B-1B...

The combat loss rate for F-111 against a low/mid tier opponent like Libya was 5.5% per mission during a surprise attack night mission.
That isn't theory, that is history.
Granted the defenses would degrade as your strikes against them continued in a sustained campaign, but you would still end up going home with half your inventory in about 30 missions, and that was back in the 80s.

I still don't understand why these countries that are debating the F-35 want to continue to stay stuck in the previous generation. By purchasing 4th gen aircraft when they can afford 5th gen it shows that they want to remain secondary on the world stage and stay behind the curve.

The Super Hornet is not really a step forward, it is a temporary fix while the F-35 is the future (and in reality the present) and is a quantum leap in capability. Yes its obviously far more expensive, but for the combat ability it brings to the table it is a far better investment than purchasing nonstealthy, F/A-18Fs with previous generation avionics.

The fact is, as most of you know, there is no alternative for the Lightning II and if countries don't start buying them now, by the time they realize its time to upgrade to 5th gen they will likely be facing fully matured T-50 and J-20 type threats.

archeman wrote:

The combat loss rate for F-111 against a low/mid tier opponent like Libya was 5.5% per mission during a surprise attack night mission.
That isn't theory, that is history.

Utter bull. F-111's participated in actions post-Lybia without a loss facing more intimidating defenses. The lone loss you speak of was a result of Murphy's Law. The F-117 faced similar losses in its modern era track record.

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Utter bull. F-111's participated in actions post-Lybia without a loss facing more intimidating defenses. The lone loss you speak of was a result of Murphy's Law.

I can't vote with you on that one mrat.
losers claim luck, winners claim skill --- in the end A kill is a kill
Why would you need luck anyway? Radar directed gun systems, non-stealthy aircraft at low altitude well within range -- bang bang bang.

The F-111s that were being discussed here were a fictitious band of surviving 'dero' AZ birds who will not have the luxury of the massive battle order that Chuck Horner had at his disposal. They may have a US carrier group and some F-18 squadrons, or no other support at all.

Forum: Program and politics

Australian opinion piece on JSF