ADBR MAY-JUNE 2019

DEFENCE | INDUSTRY | INTEGRATED

ARH NEXT What comes after Tiger?

MAY-JUN 2019 Volume 38 No. 03

STRATEGIC IMPORTANCE LAND 19 PHASE 7B

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Contents

18

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Volume 38 No. 3 MAY-JUL 2019

FEATURES & ANALYSIS

50

16

New CAF handover

18

The Battle Tanker decommissioned

20 RAAF C-130Js networked

34

21

LAND 19 Ph 7B contract signed

22

Big Guns - SPH project revived

24

NZ Defence Capability Plan

26

ARH Next - Replacing the Tiger

34

An Army in Motion - LTGEN Rick Burr

42

Hanwha Redback for LAND 400 Ph 3

46

LAND 8120 - Army machinery

50

Army targets and simulation

56

Joint Capabilities Group

62

Forward Mounting Bases

68

MATV Sycamore

74

Indo-Pacific Endeavour 2019

80

Big War EW

REGULARS 4

Initial Point - Editorial

4

Upcoming Events

6

Battlespace - News

82

On Target - Williams Foundation

COVER

DEFENCE | INDUSTRY | INTEGRATED

Despite recent success, Army seems set on replacing the Tiger ARH by 2026.

DEFENCE

ARH NEXT What comes after Tiger?

MAY-JUN 2019

ADBR is published by: Felix Advantage 7 Finlay Rd Eumundi QLD 4562 adbr.com.au adbr@felix.net.au +61 (0)2 6232 7474 Twitter: @DefenceBusiness Facebook: @ADBRonline

Managing Editor Andrew McLaughlin andrew@felix.net.au

Publisher John Conway jc@felix.net.au

Senior Contributor Max Blenkin

Art Director Daniel Frawley

Contributors this issue Owen Zupp, Jyri Raitasalo, John Conway, Brian Weston

Editorial Assistant Bruce McLaughlin

MAY-JUN 2019 Volume 38 No. 03

Felix Advantage 2019. All material published in Australian Defence Business Review is copyright and may not be used without the express permission of the publisher.

ISSN 1033-2898

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INITIAL POINT

Initial Point

LEADERSHIP MATTERS ANDREW McLAUGHLIN

W

hile Air Force’s Plan Jericho has been the highest profile capability and cultural change program in the ADF, the ‘Army in Motion’ initiative is no less ambitious or important.

Both plans seek to achieve revolutionary increases in capability through the acquisition of new platforms that are survivable and highly integrated, but both also recognise that a major element of this revolution will come from cultural and structural changes right across the services in order to realise the maximum effect.

As anyone who has been through professional organisational change processes would know, they rarely happen without some pain. That pain can manifest itself in additional costs to the organisation, the inconsistent application of standards and policies, and/or a higher than normal staff turnover – all of which can result in only partial success, or worse – failure.

Arguably the major factor in implementing organisation change is leadership, not just at the highest levels, but at the middle and lower management levels as well.

Good leaders know how to get the best out of their people. They trust that subject matter experts know their jobs well enough to not interfere. Rather than pointing towards the horizon and saying ‘go there’ they walk alongside their people on the journey, and they listen to and act on constructive feedback.

In the late 1980s I worked for a hotel general manager who was an inspiring leader. We once had a VIP group arrive at the hotel which came with a truck load of luggage for which I was in charge of a team to sort and deliver it to the rooms as quickly as possible.

After greeting the VIPs, the manager rolled up his sleeves, asked me what I needed, and started taking luggage to the rooms. He trusted that I knew my job, and he recognised that what wasn’t needed was more leadership.

While leaders’ careers live and die on their teams’ successes and failures, good leaders deftly walk that difficult fine line between trusting their people to do their jobs within clear and accountable guidelines, while they themselves are ultimately accountable for the outcomes.

Fortunately for the ADF, the organisational change currently underway appears to be in the hands of some very good leadership. Air Force’s Plan Jericho was established in 2015 under Chief of Air Force

AIRMSHL Geoff Brown, before being handed off to Leo Davies. New CAF Mel Hupfeld (see page 16 this issue) is incredibly well regarded across the ADF and the wider defence community, and will no doubt maintain the momentum built up by his predecessors.

Similarly, Army in Motion seeks to take the service to the next level of capability after the significant restructure of the service conducted since 2011 under Plan Beersheba. Again, the leadership of previous Chiefs of Army LTGENs David Morrison and Angus Campbell have laid a solid foundation of structural, cultural and physical change for Army.

And after spending time with LTGEN Rick Burr for a feature story (page 34) he and his team appear to be more than capable of successfully bringing a number of new capabilities into service during his four year tenure.

Like Air Force’s Jericho team, LTGEN Burr realises the importance of bringing the community and, through it, the politicians along for the ride as he implements the program.

It absolutely is an Army in Motion!

NEW MINISTERS

In the meantime, the federal election has been run and won, and the Liberal National Coalition government has a new Defence ministerial team in place.

New Defence Minister Senator Linda Reynolds was promoted to the junior position of Defence Industry Minister prior to the election after the resignation of Steve Ciobo, and was subsequently pre-anointed

by Prime Minister Scott Morrison as the successor to the senior ministry held by the energetic and highly regarded Christopher Pyne who retired at the election.

As I said last issue, Senator Reynolds has big shoes to fill, but she has an impressive service record and extensive parliamentary committee experience in Defence, and has on face value performed well so far.

Moving across from the Environment portfolio to the Defence Industry Minister role is Melissa Price. Minister Price is less well known, especially after being effectively benched during the election campaign after a couple of embarrassing media appearances.

Whereas previously Ministers Marise Payne and Christopher Pyne appeared to jointly share the responsibilities of the Defence portfolio, Minister Price likely to stay very much in Senator Reynolds’ shadow while she comes up to speed.

COMING EVENTS 24 JULY 2019 MARITIME ENVIRONMENT WORKING GROUP (MEWG) Canberra, ACT www.business.gov.au 31 JULY - 1 AUG 2019 DEFENCE+INDUSTRY CONFERENCE Canberra, ACT www.defence.gov.au 22-23 AUG 2019 HUNTER DEFENCE CONFERENCE 2019 Hunter Valley, NSW www.trybooking.com/ book/event?eid=503298 6 SEP 2019 SYNTHETIC ENVIRONMENT WORKING GROUP Gold Coast, QLD www.defence.gov.au 7-9 OCT 2019 AUST CYBER CONFERENCE Melbourne, VIC cyberconference.com.au 8 - 10 OCT 2019 PACIFIC 2019 Sydney, NSW www.pacificexpo.com.au 9 - 10 NOV 2019 RAAF EDINBURGH AIR SHOW RAAF Edinburgh, SA www.airforce.gov.au 13 - 15 NOV 2019 MilCIS 2019 Canberra, ACT www.milcis.com.au

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To learn more, email: Leidos-Australia-Communications@leidos.com

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BATTLESPACE ADBR DEFENCE NEWS ROUNDUP

Battlespace DEFENCE NE WS ROUNDUP

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RAAF’s 10SQN AP-3C(EW) Orions transferred to 42WG

The RAAF’s remaining two AP-3C Orions and their operating 10SQN have been transferred from 92 Wing (WG) to 42WG to better reflect their realignment as a specialist Electronic Warfare Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (EWISR) unit.

The two remaining Orions (as well as two RAAF C-130H Hercules) were upgraded with advanced electronic warfare systems by L3 in the late 1990s and early 2000s under Project Peacemate, but until recently the AP-3C(EW) s have not been publicly acknowledged by Defence.

But in the wake of the retirement of the rest of the AP-3C fleet in favour of the new P-8A Poseidon, retaining the two airframes until they are replaced by four Gulfstream G550-based MC-55A Peregrines in 2023 has become harder to justify. The P-3 celebrated 50 years in RAAF service in December 2018, although the AP-3Cs were delivered as new P-3Cs in 1984-86.

Officer Commanding (OC) 42WG GPCAPT Hinton Tayloe welcomed 10SQN into 42WG. “42WG is honoured to command 10SQN and its proven team of EW professionals,” he said.

“Ironically, the Orion, given its 50 years of RAAF Service, still leads the way in our understanding of the deciding factor in air combat - electronic

warfare.

“With the addition of 10SQN AP-3C(EW), 42WG now has two squadrons under its command – joining 2SQN, operating the E-7A Wedgetail based at RAAF Base Williamtown.”

Despite 42WG and 2SQN being based at RAAF Williamtown, the AP-3C(EW)s and 10SQN’s personnel will remain at RAAF Edinburgh where the aircraft’s reduced sustainment footprint is located.

All 12 of the RAAF’s 12 P-8A – eight of which have now been delivered – will be operated by 11SQN and 92WG at Edinburgh. It is yet to be announced what unit will operate the new MC-55As, the Northrop Grumman MQ-4C Tritons or the MQ-9B Predator-B/Reaper unmanned systems.

Leidos engages OPEC Systems for LAND 2110/1B

Leidos Australia and OPEC Systems have signed a $23 million contract to partner on the Commonwealth’s Project LAND 2110 Phase 1B Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear Defence (CBRND) requirement.

Leidos was awarded the $243 million LAND 2110 Phase 1B contract last September to provide force protection to deployed ADF personnel against extant and emerging CBRN threats including environmental hazards, as well as an initial five years of sustainment.

Under the contract with Leidos, OPEC Systems will provide Kestrel medium weight protective CBRN suits, collapsible waste water containment bunds for capturing liquid contamination, collapsible liquid storage drum for containment of potable and waste water, and decontamination mitts for rapid chemical decontamination.

“We are a proud Australian company and an experienced supplier of CBRN capability,” OPEC Systems’ Managing Director, Pete Murphy said in a statement. “This contract represents an exciting long term program of CBRN enablement for our company, and an important opportunity to support Australian servicemen and women through the supply of superior CBRN protective equipment.

“The opportunity to work with defence primes like Leidos Australia illustrates the benefits of collaboration between a multinational and a smaller Australian company, and provides us with a valuable platform for representation on both the local and international stage.”

Chief Executive for Leidos Australia, Christine

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with the RAN on achieving all the goals of the project, while simultaneously preparing for the upcoming tenders for LAND and SEA 129,” a company statement reads.

The Australian Army has also contractually leased the S-100 to conduct a series of advanced payload evaluations. “The Army testing focuses on multiple payloads, including the L3 Wescam MX-10, ELTA Systems’ state-of-the-art ELK-7065 Compact Airborne HF COMINT/DF 3D System, Overwatch’s Multi Spectrum Imaging TK-5 and Leonardo’s PicoSAR radar,” the Schiebel statement said.

AVALON 2021 dates announced Zeitz added, “Working with local industry is critical for Leidos to deliver our project commitments which support our customers to meet their mission. OPEC Systems has over 20 years of experience delivering CBRN equipment and services in Australia and joins us to deliver capability to the Australian Defence Force through the Land 2110 project.”

The initial rollout of the project is expected to start in early 2020.

Schiebel signs MoU with Air Affairs The Australian subsidiary of Austrian company Schiebel has signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with aviation and engineering firm Air Affairs Australia (AAA) covering remotely piloted aerial systems (RPAS).

The MOU between Schiebel Pacific Ltd (SPL) and Air Affairs included an agreement to “collaborate on the compilation and submission of Request for Tender (RfT) responses for Remotely Piloted Aerial System (RPAS) opportunities in Australia and the Pacific region, as well as the subsequent close cooperation in contract delivery, support and services”.

“Building on our current contracts, we see enormous potential in Australia for Schiebel and our unrivalled CAMCOPTER S-100 RPAS due to several significant upcoming programmes and working with established Australian companies will be key to success,” Schiebel Group chairman Hans Georg Schiebel said in a statement on June 25.

“A strong physical presence through SPL and a MoU with a strong partner are logical steps in preparing for the tremendous opportunities in Australia, a nation at the forefront of embracing robotic technology and modernising its defence force.”

The MOU was signed on the same day Schiebel Pacific opened the doors on its new facility at Albatross Aviation Technical Park close

to where Air Affairs Australia is based, as well as the Royal Australian Navy’s HMAS Albatross.

Featuring a carbon fibre and titanium fuselage, the S-100 has a maximum takeoff weight of 200kg and a maximum payload capacity of 50kg. It has a maximum airspeed of about 130kt and is powered by a 50hp rotary engine.

In late 2017, Schieber Group supplied its Camcopter S-100 unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) to meet the RAN’s interim vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) unmanned aerial system (UAS) requirement. It also included three years of support services.

Further, the contract fulfilled a request for tender (RFT) for Navy Minor Project (NMP) 1942, which sought to procure a “proven” VTOL Maritime Tactical Unmanned Aircraft System – Interim Capability (MTUAS-IC) and associated engineering and logistics support for the Navy.

Schiebel Group said the evaluation program aimed to develop the RAN’s understanding of the capabilities of an advanced VTOL Tactical Unmanned Air System. “SPL is working closely

The dates for the 2021 Australian International Airshow and Aerospace & Defence Exposition (AVALON 2021) have been announced.

The show will take place at Avalon Airport southwest of Melbourne from Tuesday February 23 to Sunday February 28, 2021.

Organisers are again expecting record attendance for the 2021 show which will coincide with the 100th anniversary celebrations for the Royal Australian Air Force, and for Qantas.

“As an international aerospace industry exposition, AVALON 2019 was a record-breaker in both exhibitor numbers and trade day attendances, with a host of major industry announcements and significant international participation from a total of 37 countries,” AVALON 2021 CEO Ian Honnery said in a statement.

“AVALON 2021 will be the largest single event in the Air Force 2021 Centenary calendar, and will come just three months after the November 2020 Centenary of Qantas,” he added. “AVALON 2021 will be a celebration of a hundred years of Australian innovation and leadership in military and civil aviation and aerospace.

“That combination of civil and defence is

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is a close NATO ally and our military-to-military relationship is strong.”

The first S-400 elements were reportedly delivered to Turkey on July 11.

Raytheon and United Technologies to merge

already proving a magnet for industry, with both Australian and international companies committing to the event to display their contributions to this world-class Australian aviation heritage.”

AVALON 2019 which ran from February 27 to March 3 of this year saw 698 participating companies displayed at the show, and 161 official industry and government delegations and 38,952 trade and industry attendees visited the show on the Tuesday to Thursday industry days.

Total attendance including the three public days totalled 171,830, a remarkable achievement considering the extreme weather experienced on the public days.

Visiting delegations and guests included 15 service chiefs, 9 National Armament Directors and 24 Chief of Air Force representatives, from 30 countries. There were 94 military aircraft in attendance from six nations, and a total of 371 aircraft participated in the flying and static display which is also a new record.

Pentagon starts to remove Turkey from F-35 program

Turkey, one of the original Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) partner nations looks set to be expelled in the next few months.

The US Government’s threat to expel Turkey from the program looks set to be carried out after Turkey refused to cancel its planned acquisition of the Russian Almaz-Antey S-400 Triumf long-range surface-to-air missile system, known as the SA-21 Growler in NATO parlance.

The US’s concern over Turkey operating both the S-400 and the F-35 lies in the advanced capabilities of the S-400’s 92N6A and 96L6E2 radars, and the potential that sensitive radar crosssection data about the F-35 could find its way back to Russia.

The US government says it will end Turkish industry contracts on the JSF program in 2020, while the commander of the F-35 training wing at Luke AFB in Arizona has immediately suspended the training of Turkish pilots and maintainers and has revoked their access to the base, ahead of a directed July 31 shut down of the Turkish training

program.

“If Turkey procures the S-400...our two countries must develop a plan to discontinue Turkey’s participation in the F-35 program,” acting US Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan reportedly wrote in a June 6 letter to his Turkish counterpart. “While we seek to maintain our valued relationship, Turkey will not receive the F-35 if Turkey takes delivery of the S-400.”

Turkey has plans to acquire 100 F-35As, and to date has taken delivery of four jets which are at Luke AFB for training, but the US says it has the power to keep the jets from being flown to Turkey.

Turkish industry also manufactures 937 separate components for the F-35, 400 of which are sole-sourced. US Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment Ellen Lord has said she will aim to achieve a “disciplined and graceful wind down” of Turkish industry participation in order to find alternative suppliers and thus prevent production delays at the F-35 final assembly facilities in Ft Worth, Japan and Italy.

“If we can work to our timelines with the Turks, we would have no major disruptions and very few delays,” she said, adding, “Turkey still has the option to change course. If Turkey does not accept delivery of the S-400, we will enable Turkey to return to normal F-35 program activities. Turkey

Defence contractor Raytheon and aerospace supplier United Technologies have announced plans to merge, creating a mega company with annual sales of about US$74bn (A$106bn).

The two firms said in a joint statement the new company, to be called Raytheon Technologies, would create a premier systems provider with advanced technologies to address rapidly growing segments within the aerospace and defence industries.

“Today is an exciting and transformational day for our companies, and one that brings with it tremendous opportunity for our future success,” Raytheon chief executive Tom Kennedy said in the statement. “Raytheon Technologies will continue a legacy of innovation with an expanded aerospace and defense portfolio supported by the world’s most dedicated workforce.

“With our enhanced capabilities, we will deliver value to our customers by anticipating and addressing their most complex challenges, while delivering significant value to shareowners.”

Apart from Raytheon’s key defence business in sensors, missiles, and systems integration, the company also does some work in the commercial aerospace sector, such as in air traffic control and autonomy, artificial intelligence and machine learning.

Meanwhile United Technologies two main businesses are engine maker Pratt & Whitney, and Collins Aerospace (formerly Rockwell Collins) which manufactures avionics, aircraft interiors, landing gear, and sensors.

“The combination of United Technologies and Raytheon will define the future of aerospace and defense,” United Technologies chief executive

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Greg Hayes said in the statement. “Our two companies have iconic brands that share a long history of innovation, customer focus and proven execution.

“By joining forces, we will have unsurpassed technology and expanded R&D capabilities that will allow us to invest through business cycles and address our customers’ highest priorities.

Merging our portfolios will also deliver cost and revenue synergies that will create long-term value for our customers and shareowners.”

The joint statement said the merged company would comprise a balanced and diversified aerospace and defence portfolio that was resilient across business cycles. Further, the two companies had a highly complementary technology and research and development platform.

The new company, which will be led by Kennedy as executive chairman and Hayes as chief executive, would have four business units.

Two are from United Technologies – Collins Aerospace and Pratt & Whitney, while the other two will come from Raytheon – intelligence, space & airborne systems, and integrated defense & missile systems.

The all-stock deal was expected to close in the first half of calendar 2020. Raytheon shareowners would receive 2.3348 shares in the combined company for each Raytheon share. Meanwhile United Technologies shareowners would own about 57 per cent and Raytheon shareowners would own approximately 43 per cent of the combined company on a fully diluted basis.

The combined company’s board would have 15 directors – eight from United Technologies and seven. from Raytheon.

US Navy awards additional NGJ development contracts

The US Navy has awarded additional contracts to Northrop Grumman and L3 Technologies to expand the development scope of the service’s AN/ALQ-249 Next Generation Jammer – low band (NGJ-LB) program.

The three-phased NGJ is being developed to replace the ageing podded AN/ALQ-99 Tactical Jamming System (TJS) currently employed by the Boeing EA-18G Growler operated by the US Navy and the RAAF (left). The NGJ-mid band (MB) is being developed by Raytheon and is the most advanced of the three versions, and is due to achieve an initial operational capability (IOC) in 2021. The NGJ-LB is scheduled to follow in 2023, and the NGJ-high band (HB) two to three years after that.

The US Navy awarded Northrop Grumman and L3 Technologies contracts valued at US$35.2 and US$35.7m respectively in October 2018 to conduct NGJ-LB development and demonstration work, and the new contracts valued at US$13.5m and US$13.7m respectively

have been awarded to address schedule risks and to fund the development of more operationallyrepresentative designs to be available for testing.

The contract awards say the companies were awarded a contract “modification to a previously awarded cost-plus-fixed-fee contract to expand the analysis and design of the Next Generation Jammer Low-Band (NGJ LB) controller, receiver, exciter, and power generation subsystems.”

The RAAF is a cooperative development partner with the US Navy on the NGJ program.

BAE Systems Australia establishes JORN development lab

BAE Systems Australia has announced the establishment of a new laboratory to develop

high frequency (HF) radar technologies to support Australia’s Jindalee Over the Horizon Radar (JORN) system and future developments.

JORN was developed in the 1980s and, after a protracted and troubled development, has become a world-leading capability that provides a ‘tripwire’ early warning of airborne and marine surface threats to the Australian Defence Force at ranges exceeding 3,000km from Australia’s north coast.

The system has three HF transmit and receive arrays at Alice Springs in the NT, Laverton in Western Australia, and Longreach in Queensland which bounce HF energy off the ionosphere to ‘see’ over the horizon, and a control centre at RAAF Edinburgh near Adelaide.

Under the $1.2 billion Project AIR 2025 Phase 6, BAE Systems has been engaged to modernise

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JORN by changing the software architecture to an app based system and adding a digital hardware backbone which will significantly enhance the system’s range capability and the fidelity of the data it gathers.

BAE Systems says the new purpose-built lab at Edinburgh Parks in Adelaide will have up to 80 specialist and graduate engineers to evolve the “DNA” of JORN and the new HF technologies to be integrated in the upgrade.

“Our investment in this laboratory will ensure that we can significantly improve the radar’s capability and better support this critically important defence asset,” BAE Systems Australia Chief Executive Gabby Costigan said in a statement. “This is a unique facility that will allow the development and testing of specialist equipment to ensure that the decade-long upgrade realises the full potential of JORN beyond 2042.

“The next generation of engineers working on this program have the opportunity to bring new insight and innovation to JORN that will ensure it continue to play a key role in protecting the

nation.”

AIR 6000 Phase 3 weapons project announced Former Defence Minister Christopher Pyne and Minister for Defence Industry Linda Reynolds announced in April the approval of Project AIR 6000 Phase 3 to provide new weapons and countermeasures for the RAAF’s F-35A Lightning II and F/A-18F Super Hornets.

The project is a key enabling capability that will ensure the F-35A can successfully achieve IOC in late 2020.

The weapons approved include the 120kg GBU-39 Small Diameter Bomb (SDB) I, GBU-53 SDB II, additional 240kg GBU-12 Laser Guided Bomb (LGB) rounds, 1,000kg GBU-31v1 and v3 Joint Direct Attack Munitions (JDAM), 250kg GBU38 JDAM, and 25mm PGU-47 Armour Piercing Explosive (APEX) Ammunition for the F-35’s GAU-25 gun.

“Aircraft self-protection countermeasures and

weapons are essential elements of Australia’s air combat capability,” Mr Pyne said in an April 6 statement. “This latest investment will ensure weapons and decoys are available as Australia’s air combat fleet transitions to the F-35A and Super Hornet.

“A range of complementary weapons and countermeasures will be acquired to provide comprehensive options for use in densely contested environments.”

Ms Reynolds added, “The Australian Government is investing over $110 million into this phase of the Joint Strike Fighter program, sustaining more jobs in the Australian defence industry. Thales Australia will supply weapon components, and Chemring Australia, will supply countermeasures for the project.”

A Defence spokesman told ADBR that, “When Australia’s F-35A Joint Strike Fighter project reaches initial operating capability in 2020, the weapons suite will include the AIM-120D variant of the advanced medium range air-to-air missile, the AIM-9X sidewinder air-to-air missile, guided bombs, small diameter bombs and the internal gun.

“Of the aforementioned weapons, the F/A-18F Super Hornet can also employ GBU-12, GBU-31v1, GBU31v3 and GBU-38.”

Boeing accredited for local Chinook blade repairs

Boeing Australia Component Repairs (BACR) has announced it has received accreditation to conduct overhaul work on the rotor blades of CH-47 Chinooks.

The capability of performing the work, which previously had to be shipped offshore, will allow a much quicker turnaround time and greater efficiency and flexibility for the Australian Army’s fleet of 10 CH-47F Chinooks.

“Until now, rotor blades have been shipped to the US for overhaul work,” Boeing Defence Australia (BDA) director sustainment operations, Darryn Fletcher said in a statement. “BACR’s accreditation provides customers with faster turnaround, enabling them to better maintain and restore airworthiness of these robust, multimission rotorcraft.

“Developing in-country capability also supplements BACR’s extensive portfolio of maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) services and provides another practical means for Boeing to minimise costs and deliver improved value-formoney solutions to our customers.”

Apart from Australia’s CH-47Fs, there are a number of other Chinook operators in the region, including Japan, South Korea, Singapore and India, all of which could utilise the Australian operation as a primary or second source capability.

“While the Commonwealth of Australia will be the initial customer, this unique Australian MRO capability will enable BACR to service international CH-47 customers,” Fletcher said.

31 JULY – 1 AUGUST 2019 CANBERRA, AUSTRALIA

DEFENCE + INDUSTRY GALA AWARDS The Defence + Industry Gala Awards will return to the National Convention Centre, Canberra, on Wednesday 31 July 2019. Featuring the Essington Lewis Awards recognising excellence in defence projects.

The event is limited to the first 1000 attendees wishing to network and interact with Defence and defence industry leaders, celebrate the achievements of their peers and be entertained by our celebrity MCs. This gala event is not to be missed!

Interested in supporting this premier annual defence awards night? Corporate support packages will be availble soon. To register your interest please email defenceandindustry.conference@defence.gov.au.

DEFENCE + INDUSTRY CONFERENCE The Defence + Industry Conference is the premier Defence and industry conference held in the national capital.

Consistently attracting in excess of 1100 delegates to hear from Defence and industry leaders, discussing collaboration in the acquisition and sustainment space.

Thursday, 1 August 2019 will see Canberra’s National Convention Centre come alive with informative, thoughtprovoking presentations from Defence decision makers and industry leaders, along with interactive Q&A sessions and networking opportunities.

REGISTER NOW Visit www.defence.gov.au/casg/dplusi and follow the event page links to register for both of these fantastic events – registrations will close COB Wednesday 18 July. Enquiries about either event can be directed to defenceandindustry.conference@defence.gov.au

Defending Australia and its National Interests www.defence.gov.au

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A rotor blade overhaul comprises composite structure repairs for damage ranging from lightning to bird strikes, and adds to Boeing Defence Australia’s existing CH-47 Integrated Support Services Contract (ISSC) which delivers training, engineering and maintenance support to the Australian Army.

RAF F-35Bs fly first operational missions

The UK’s Royal Air Force has flown the first operational missions with its new F-35B Lightning II. The first mission was flown over Syria on June 16 by 617Sqn ‘Dambusters’ from RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus where they have been deployed since late May. The first sorties were operated in company with RAF Eurofighter Typhoon fighters (above right), and the RAF has acknowledged the F-35Bs have flown at least 12 sorties since then.

UK MoD images on Twitter show the F-35Bs being loaded with two laser guided bombs and two AMRAAMs in the aircraft’ internal weapons bay, and no external weapons, although it says no weapons have been employed.

“The pilots, crew and aircraft have exceeded all training objectives since deploying to Cyprus, so it was only right that they made the next step on their journey,” the UK Air Commander for the Middle East, Air Cdre Justin Reuter said in a statement.

“The UK has played a vital role in liberating swathes of territory once subjected to Daesh’s cruel regime, and the deployment of our newest and most advanced jets signals our commitment to the enduring defeat Daesh in Iraq and Syria.”

The RAF has received 17 of a total requirement for up to 138 F-35Bs. The aircraft will be jointly flown by RAF and Royal navy pilots, and are scheduled to embark upon the RN’s HMS Queen Elizabeth for the first time later this year.

“This first operational mission for the UK’s F-35 Lightning confirms the impressive progress which

we have made in introducing this formidable new capability into service,” Chief of the Air Staff, Air Chief Marshal Sir Stephen Hillier said. “It is testament to the outstanding abilities of our dedicated and highly trained air and ground crew that 617 Squadron has achieved this important milestone so quickly and so effectively.

The RAF is the third F-35 operator to fly operational missions with the aircraft, after Israel and the US. In other F-35 news, the Royal Netherlands Air Force (RNLAF) has conducted a 9,000km rapid reaction deployment training mission from Edwards AFB in California to a range in the Netherlands.

The June 13 strike mission was conducted RNLAF pilots and two F-35As based with the joint 323rd Test and Evaluation Squadron (323rd TES) at Edwards AFB, and was supported by a RNLAF KDC-10 tanker. The mission was a key element of the Dutch operational testing and evaluation (OT&E) program.

“The approach of Rapid Reaction Deployment is that a number of F-35s can be deployed within 24 hours, self-supporting, flexible and worldwide to carry out missions, with support from tanker and transport devices,” a RNLAF release reads.

“This can be carried out in an environment with

a high threat, day and night and in all weather conditions.”

The two aircraft were delayed on the mission after the first tanker experienced refuelling problems. But after a replacement joined the mission in Canada, they crossed the Atlantic and dropped two GBU-49 GPS and laser-guided and two GBU-12 laser-guided bombs on a target of four containers on the Vlieland range with support from Dutch ground-based Joint Terminal Air Controllers (JTACs).

After the mission, the two aircraft landed at Volkel Air Base in The Netherlands where they took part in an open days event on June 14 and 15. The mission was supported by a single USAF C-17A with 18 personnel to provide all maintenance, armament, life support and spares support.

ANAO releases report on LAND 200

The Australian National Audit Office, (ANAO) has handed down a report on the ADF’s troubled Project LAND 200 battle management system (BMS) and tactical communications program.

The $3 billion LAND 200 program was commenced 2005 but did not begin being fielded until 2013, and is comprised of three major tranches. The completed Tranche 1 effort successfully integrated new software, computers and tactical radios with about 2,000 vehicles including armoured vehicles, Tiger armed reconnaissance helicopters (ARH), and RAN landing craft, as well as with dismounted soldiers.

Tranche 2 commenced in September 2017 and will provide portable tablets, an enhanced BMS simulated software program to provide situational awareness data for training, technology insertions to provide faster target and enemy action data and greater networking between platforms, and enhanced Tranche 1 battle management software to provide greater planning requirements and cyber security.

Tranche 3 was due to achieve a Gate 0

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milestone in 2018, and will provide a further technology refresh, complete the tactical communications network, and complete the integration of the BMS into combat platforms and remote weapon stations.

The enhanced BMS is being supplied

by Elbit Systems of Australia, while Harris Communications Australia will deliver the tactical communications network and encrypted radios.

The audit was initiated after a two year delay in the delivery of Tranche 1 and an associate escalation in program costs. The ANAO report says, “The objective of the audit was to assess the effectiveness and value for money of Defence’s acquisition of a Battle Management System and a Tactical Communications Network through LAND 200 Tranche 2 Work Packages B–D. “To form a conclusion against the audit objective, the ANAO adopted the following highlevel criteria: Defence conducted effective and value-for-money acquisition processes. Defence established effective project governance and contracting arrangements.”

The ANAO found that Defence did not “conduct fully effective acquisition processes for LAND 200 Tranche 2 Work Packages B–D, but may ultimately achieve value-for-money outcomes if the contracted quality and quantity of goods and services are delivered according to the agreed schedule and successfully integrated by Defence.”

It also found it failed to establish “an appropriate review framework for the acquisition projects, but its effectiveness was undermined by a failure of governance.” It said there was “inadequate requirements definition and poor coordination between the two responsible project offices,” which “contributed to an ineffective 2015 procurement for the Army’s Tactical Communications Network, which required a lengthy post-tender refinement process to bring the acquisition within the approved budget.”

On the positive side, it said the decision to in 2015 to go with a sole-source procure process for the BMS “was ultimately effective”, but added that “procurement was delayed pending resolution of affordability issues affecting LAND 200 Tranche 2 as a whole.”

It attributed many of the problems the program has experienced to Defence not establishing “fully effective project governance arrangements.”

It said, “Defence established an appropriate review framework, with successive reviews identifying project coordination risks from 2013,” but that “Defence management’s

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failure to implement the recommendations of these reviews until 2017 constitutes a failure of governance that negatively affected the 2015 tender outcomes.”

The report’s conclusion noted that, “the difficulties encountered in LAND 200 Tranche 2 stem in large measure from one project office’s release of a Request for Tender with a scope that exceeded the approved cost and did not fully assess the budget consequences or governance and coordination arrangements at a program level.

“The desired outcome shifted from the procurement of radios to the procurement of a complex digital communications solution, as Army developed its understanding of how it would operate in a digital environment.”

In closing, the report made the following recommendation. “That Defence assess whether it has the capability to adequately perform the role of Prime Systems Integrator, and provide assurance on this matter to the Capability Manager, Chief of Army,” and that the department agrees with the recommendation.

Bisalloy armour qualifies for Boxer CRV

Bisalloy Steels has announced its BISALLOY Armour Steel has passed an initial series of qualification trials for the Rheinmetall Boxer 8x8 combat reconnaissance vehicle.

Bisalloy was selected to provide armour steel for the Boxer CRV as part of Rheinmetall’s successful bid for the Australian Army’s Project LAND 400 Phase 2 program, and developed a new grade of armour steel in order to meet the required protection levels of the vehicle. The new armour grade has passed a series of blast box trials held in conjunction with Germany’s government testing authority (BAAINBw) at Rheinmetall’s test facilities in Germany.

“Achieving German Government qualification

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will reconfirm Bisalloy’s emergence as a world class supplier of armour grade steel,” Bisalloy Steels Business Manager, Justin Suwart said in a statement. “Apart from ensuring supply to the LAND 400 Phase 2 vehicles, it will also qualify Bisalloy to work globally with Rheinmetall on future projects, including Land 400 Phase 3 and other offshore defence programs.”

Rheinmetall is building 211 Boxer CRVs for LAND 400 Phase 2, with production of the first vehicles underway in Germany before production switches to the new military vehicle centre of excellence (MILVECOE) near Ipswich in Queensland.

HMAS Arunta undergoes post-AMCAP stability tests

HMAS Arunta, the first ANZAC class frigate to undergo the Project SEA 1448 Phase 4/4B ANZAC Midlife Capability Assurance Program (AMCAP) has undergone stability testing at the Henderson Shipyard in WA. Improvements integrated with the vessel under AMCAP include the replacement of the ageing air search radar capability with the new CEA CEAFAR L-band long-range system, updated communications, upgraded ventilation and sewage systems, improvements to the control and monitoring system, and engine modifications to improve power and efficiency.

The addition of the CEAFAR-L and a new mast has meant the changes to the vessel’s centre of gravity, lightship weight and stability have to be measured by reading draughts and conducting inclining experiments, before being compared to the previously-known hydrostatic properties of the design. Data from the tests will be used as the basis for updating the known trim and stability properties of the ANZAC design, and will applied

to the remainder of the class as they undergo their AMCAP upgrades.

“The inclining experiment, while being a standard practice after a significant upgrade, has provided good data that will support all the ships that come after us on the AMCAP,” Arunta’s Marine Engineer Officer, LTCDR Leonard Woodman told Navy Daily. “The inclining experiment is a key component in getting the ship ready to sail later in the year, and marks a key milestone of the postproduction process.”

The AMCAP upgrade is being conducted by the Warship Asset Management Agreement (WAMA), an alliance comprised of CASG, BAE Systems Australia, Saab Australia and Naval Ship Management Australia.

Keel laid for first RAN Arafura class OPV

The first Arafura class Offshore Patrol Vessel had its keel laid at a ceremony Osborne Naval Shipyard in Adelaide on May 10.

The ceremony was attended by the Chief of Navy, VADM Mike Noonan who placed a coin in the keel along with the two youngest members of the build program (above). The ceremonial keel laying comes after production of hull blocks commenced late last year.

“The keel laying ceremony represents a great naval tradition and I am honoured to be joined today by the two youngest shipbuilders in the Osborne shipyard in placing the commemorative coin under the keel,” VADM Noonan said in a statement. “I would like to thank our defence industry counterparts and Defence’s Capability Acquisition & Sustainment Group for their collective efforts to get us to this point on time and budget.”

The first two of the planned 12 SEA 1180 OPVs are being built by prime contractor Luerssen in Adelaide and will be launched in 2021 and 2022, before production switches to the Henderson Maritime Precinct near Fremantle in Western Australia to make way for the SEA 5000 future frigate program in Adelaide. Production of the third vessel will commence at Henderson in 2020.

Boeing signs DHFCS sustainment extension

Boeing Defence Australia has signed a threeyear $62m contract extension to its operation and sustainment program of the Defence High Frequency Communications System (DHFCS).

The DHFCS is an advanced, software-enabled, long-range high-frequency communications system that provides critical communications redundancy in satellite-denied or -degraded environments. Boeing manages the system on behalf of the ADF through its Support Services Contract (SSC) and Network Operations Support Contract (NOSC).

“These contract extensions evidence our track-record of providing enduring value, anticipating customer needs and continually raising the bar on providing reliable, efficient and contemporary operation of the DHFCS,” Boeing Joint Systems Director, Murray Brabrook said in a statement. “Boeing has been a trusted partner in the evolution of DHFCS over the past 20 years and remains steadfastly committed to delivering the future of high frequency communication in Australia.”

The DHFCS has fixed network high frequency stations in Exmouth, Darwin, Townsville and the NSW Riverina, while the Network Management Facilities are located in Canberra.

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NEW CAF

NEW CAF The RAAF welcomes a new leadership team

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ir Marshal Mel Hupfeld officially took command of the RAAF from outgoing CAF, AIRMSHL Gavin ‘Leo’ Davies on July 3.

The change of command parade was held at ADF Headquarters at Russell Hill in Canberra, and featured flypasts from an EA18G Growler, F-35A Lightning II, P-8A Poseidon, Falcon 7X, and a brace of PC-21s, all types which entered service during AIRMSHAL Davies’ four-year tenure as CAF. In a moving farewell speech, AIRMSHL Davies thanked all of his commanders, peers, mentors and staff throughout his career for teaching him leadership, humility and accountability.

“I did not expect or set out to be CAF,” he told the assembled crowd. “I thought Wing Commander would be awesome, and a tactical command a bit of a stretch.

People got me here – our air men, our air women, public service officers and industry partners shape me, and they shape us every day.

“I learned that this generation – that’s you, folks – you’re really good. And I learned that this generation should be given just a little bit more space. I feel a genuine respect for your values no matter how you label them; for your future focus and your risk model, because it’s got agility built in; your collegiate approach where diversity is accepted without question; and for your growing appreciation of the part that Australia can play in our region and in the world.”

AIRMSHL Davies joined the RAAF in 1979 and served as a navigator on P-3B and P-3C Orions. He completed pilot training in 1987 and in 1988 was posted to Amberley to fly the F-111C. He flew an exchange tour on USAF F-111Ds from 1990 to 1992, and served as Executive Officer (XO) of 1SQN from 1997, Commanding Officer (CO) of 1SQN from 2002, and as Officer Commanding (OC) 82WG from 2004.

In 2006 AIRMSHL Davies worked as Director Combat Capability at Air Force Headquarters, before deploying to the Middle East Area of Operations to work in the Combined Air Operations Centre (CAOC) there. In 2008 he returned to serve as Director General Capability Planning at Air Force Headquarters before being posted as Australia’s Air Attaché to Washington in 2010.

He returned from the US and assumed the role of Deputy Chief of Air Force in January 2012, before he was

BY ANDREW McLAUGHLIN

promoted to the role of CAF in July 2015.

AIRMSHL Hupfeld moves across to CAF from the position of Chief of Joint Operations (CJOPS), a position he has held since July 2018. Upon assuming the position of CAF, AIRMSHL Hupfeld paid tribute to the work of his predecessor, and warned of uncertain times ahead.

“I’d like to take this opportunity to publicly thank Leo for his exceptional stewardship and leadership over the last four years,” he said. “Where he has continued to deliver on the work, the vision and the intent that previous chiefs have brought forward for our Air Force, and he’s carried that forward in such a strong way; tirelessly, with energy, with discipline and with continued focus. And he’s taken our Air Force, well and truly, on an irreversible path towards a fifth generation Air Force.

“We’re in the midst of one of the most significant transitions in our history – in the history of our times.

And we’re facing some quite turbulent and uncertain strategic circumstances. We need to ensure that we’re able to meet the challenges that will come. To do that, we’ll ensure that we continue to reform, we’ll still focus and aim for continuous improvement, and we must always aim to be as efficient as we can in order to ensure that we can deliver effectively within the boundaries of the resources that we have. We’ve got great kit, there’s no doubt and what a wonderful fly pass to see some of

AIRMSHL Mel Hupfeld speaks at the July 3 handover parade in Canberra. DEFENCE

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TOP: AIRMSHL Mel Hupfeld (left) takes the Sir Richard Williams sword signifying the change of command from AIRMSHL Leo Davies. DEFENCE ABOVE: LTGEN Greg Bilton takes command of Joint Operations Command from AIRMSHL Mel Hupfeld. DEFENCE

RIGHT: AVM Steve Meredith (above) has taken over as DCAF from AVM Gavin Turnbull. DEFENCE

the most recent additions.

“But the heart of our capabilities still remains our people. That’s where we get our true capability advantage. We need the right people, doing the right things, professional skilled, passionate and trusted and I make a key point that we’re not alone in this endeavour.

“We need to be and are part of a joint integrated and multi domain force. An Air Force poses capabilities that are inherently joint. Whether we’re supporting, whether we’re being supported or whether when necessary we’re leading, we need to focus and look at our capabilities across the whole of our defence force.”

AIRMSHL Hupfeld joined the RAAF in 1980, graduating with a Bachelor of Science degree in 1983 from the RAAF Academy. During his flying career he has flown the Mirage III0 and the F/A-18A/B Hornet, and qualified as a Fighter Combat Instructor (FCI) in 1989.

AIRMSHL Hupfeld has held command positions including CO 75SQN including on Operations Bastille and Falconer in 2003, OC 81WG, Director of the Combined Air and Space Operations Centre in the Middle East Area of Operations, Commander Air Combat Group (ACG) and Air Commander Australia (ACAUST).

He has also served as Deputy Director and Director Aerospace Combat Development, Head Capability Systems Division, acting Chief Capability Development Group (CDG) and Head Force Design in Vice Chief of Defence Force (VCDF) Group.

In 2015 Air Marshal Hupfeld was appointed as an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO) for distinguished service to the Australian Defence Force in senior command and staff appointments.

The RAAF also welcomed a new Deputy Chief of Air Force, with AVM Gavin Turnbull handing over to AVM Steve Meredith on July 1. AVM Meredith comes to DCAF from his previous role as the Head of Force Integration.

He joined the RAAF in 1986 and graduated from the School of Air Navigation in 1987. AVM Meredith was initially posted to 37SQN at RAAF Richmond on the C-130E Hercules, before converting to the F-111C and serving with 1SQN at RAAF Amberley.

He has held the positions of XO of 6SQN, Staff Officer to DCAF in Canberra, Deputy Director of Combat Enablers in CDG, XO of 82WG, CO of 6SQN, and OC 42WG. He also served as Battle Director US Air Forces CENTCOM Combined Air Operations Centre (CAOC), Chief of Staff to the CDF, Deputy ACAUST, Commander Aerospace Operational Support Group (AOSG), and was the inaugural Commander of the Air Warfare Centre (AWC) before returning to CENTCOM as the Director of

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the CAOC. In January 2016 AVM Meredith was appointed as a Member of the Order of Australia for his contribution to Air Force Capability sustainment.

AVM Turnbull retires from the RAAF after 35 years of service. During his career he has flown the UH-1H Iroquois, MB 326 Macchi and F/A-18A/B Hornet, and has held the positions of flight commander at 75SQN, CO of 77SQN, Director Airworthiness Coordination and Policy Agency, and Chief of Staff Australian National Headquarters in Baghdad.

He also served as OC 81WG, Director Military Strategic Commitments, Director of the CENTCOM CAOC, Director General Air Command Operations and Director General Air, and ACAUST. He was appointed as DCAF in May 2017.

In the 2016 Australia day honours AVM Turnbull was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for exceptional service to the ADF in air combat capability development and support to military operations.

Succeeding AIRMSHL Hupfeld as CJOPS is LTGEN Greg Bilton who assumed the role on June 19 after a brief tour as Commander Forces Command.

LTGEN Bilton graduated from the Royal Military College in 1986 and joined the Royal Australian Artillery Regiment. He has held command appointments as Battery Commander 104th Field Battery, Commanding Officer 4th Field Regiment, Commander 7th Brigade, Deputy Commanding General United States Army Pacific and Deputy Chief of Joint Operations.

In addition, he has served in staff appointments in the Directorate of Officer Career Management, the Directorate of Force Structure, and as Director General Development and Plans. He has also been an instructor at the Australian Command and Staff College.

LTGEN Bilton was appointed a member of the Order of Australia in 2014 in recognition of his work as Director General Development and Plans at Army Headquarters and as Commander 7 Brigade.

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BATTLE TANKER

BATTLE TANKER The Royal Australian Navy decommissions its First Lady of the Fleet

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he Royal Australian Navy’s HMAS Success has returned home to Sydney’s Fleet Base East at Garden Island after its final operational cruise, and was decommissioned from the RAN on June 29.

Success is affectionately known as the ‘Battle Tanker’ in recognition of operational tours to the Persian Gulf in 1990/91 and 2014/15, and Timor Leste in 1999-2000, as well as the ‘First Lady of the Fleet’ as the oldest vessel in the RAN. She returned to Sydney on June 16 flying her white ‘paying off’ pennant from a four-month deployment to Asia as an element of the Indo-Pacific Endeavour 2019 Joint Task Force 661, as well as other activities in the region.

“HMAS Success has been an indispensable part of Navy operations since she was launched in 1984, and she has worked tirelessly to support our maritime operations,” Commander Australian Fleet, RADM Jonathan Mead said in a statement. “HMAS Success has quietly operated behind the scenes to help our frontline assets achieve mission success. Simply put, Success kept other ships at sea longer, thereby increasing maritime security for Australia and our allies.”

An 18,000 tonne auxiliary oiler, HMAS Success’s design was based on the French Durance class, and it was the last vessel to be built at Sydney’s Cockatoo Island. She was laid down in August 1980, launched on 3 March 1984, handed over to the RAN on 15 April 1986, and commissioned on 23 April 1986. The vessel had a typical complement of 220, and could embark a single helicopter.

Shakedown and workup exercises and defect rectification work was conducted over the next few months. These included the first replenishment underway trials, vertical replenishment operations using Wessex and Sea King helicopters, and extended operability exercises to Jervis Bay, Melbourne, Fremantle, and Darwin.

Further rectification work kept Success in dry dock and alongside at Cockatoo Island until March 1987, and after further sea trials, she was accepted into full Navy service on 10 April.

BY ANDREW McLAUGHLIN

On 9 August 1990, Success was recalled to Sydney from a port visit in Melbourne to prepare to deploy to the Persian Gulf as an element of Operation DAMASK I, Australia’s contribution to a coalition response to Iraq’s 3 August invasion of Kuwait. She departed Sydney on 15 August with HMA Ships Adelaide and Darwin, and together they formed Task Group (TG) 627.4.

En route to the Middle East the vessels conducted intensive anti-air warfare, damage control, and nuclear, biological and chemical weapons defence workups under the supervision of Navy’s Sea Training Group.

At a stop in Fremantle, Success embarked eight Army soldiers and two RBS70 mobile missile systems from 16 Air Defence Regiment to bolster its short range air defence capabilities, and with TG627.4 commander CDRE Don Chalmers on board, became the task group flagship.

TG627.4 arrived in the Middle East on 3 September, and became an element of the multi-national naval force (MNNF) which comprised warships from 15 coalition partner nations to conduct interrogation of merchant vessels entering and leaving the region.

Success was also given a commercial pseudonym, Al Fatigue for its use as a training platform for boarding parties, and she also conducted replenishment and patrol operations.

By the end of 1990, Success had conducted 356 replenishments at sea, and was awarded the Duke of Gloucester’s Cup as the RAN unit displaying the highest level of overall proficiency that year, an award she won two more times in her service life, in 1999 and 2014.

When Operation DESERT STORM commenced on 17

HMAS Success was the oldest commissioned vessel in the RAN, earning her the ‘First Lady of the Fleet’ moniker. DEFENCE

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HMAS Success will replaced in service by a Cantabria class vessel in 2020. She is seen here sailing in company with ESPS Cantabria in 2012.

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January 1991, Success was on station in the southern Persian Gulf. She was relieved on station on 22 January, and returned to Sydney on 8 March where she entered a leave, maintenance and refit cycle which lasted nearly a year.

In late August 1999 Success was detached from exercises in Southeast Asia and directed to Darwin to prepare for possible operations in Timor Leste after violence erupted following that country’s independence referendum. She conducted patrol and replenishment operations north of Darwin in support of RAN, RNZN and US Navy operations supporting the evacuation of civilians, before deploying to Timor under Operations WARDEN and STABILISE with a Hydrographic Survey Unit and Clearance Diving Team embarked, and in company with HMA Ships Adelaide and Anzac.

Success’s main role in Timor Leste was he provision of logistic support to forces ashore in the Dili, Com and Oecussi areas, and to act as a command post for the Naval Component Commander, CDRE James Stapleton.

She departed Timor Leste on 28 October, and returned to Sydney on 8 November.

In 2006, HMAS Success was diverted from exercises near the Philippines to Timor Leste under Operation ASTUTE after another upsurge in violence there, and on 26 May was tasked to provide support to RAN surface combatants which were supporting ADF operations ashore.

Later in 2006, Success was tasked to support peacekeeping operations, joining Task Group 636.1 under Operation QUICKSTEP on 8 November to support the ADF’s possible intervention in Fiji following a military coup there, and civil unrest in nearby Tonga.

In 2014 Success was again tasked to support ADF operations overseas, and on 23 November, she departed Sydney for the Middle East to support military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and ongoing anti-piracy and anti-contraband operations under Operation MANITOU, arriving in the area of operations via Fremantle on 14 December.

As with her 1990/91 deployment to the region, Success was tasked with fleet support, patrol, surveillance and boarding, logistics, and replenishment operations in the Middle East area of operations (MEAO) until 14 May 2015, and arrived back in Sydney on 3 June.

Success has had a number of upgrades through its service life, including the installation of a dual Phalanx close-in weapons systems (CIWS) in 1996. But the biggest upgrade was the double hull conversion

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to comply with International Maritime Organization (IMO) regulations. This involved a six month period in Singapore from late-2010 to mid-2011 to complete the conversion, followed by a further 12 months alongside in Sydney to repair defects from the conversion, and a prolonged workup period into late 2012.

During her 33 years of service, Success sailed more than one million nautical miles, has conducted more than 3,500 replenishments of RAN and allied vessels, participated in 11 RIMPAC exercises, numerous Operation RESOLUTE border patrol missions, and contributed to the search for MH370 in the Indian Ocean off Western Australia.

“For other ships, Success has always been a welcome symbol of help and support; not just for the supplies she carries, but equally importantly for the mail and other packages she delivers from loved ones back home,” the final commanding officer of HMAS Success, CAPT Darren Grogan said. “Success will be missed. She has been such an integral part of Navy over the past 33 years that most of our people today will not know the fleet without her.”

Under Project SEA 1654 Phase 3, Success and the Fleet Base West-based HMAS Sirius will be replaced by two Cantabria class auxiliary oiler replenishment (AOR) vessels currently under construction by Navantia in Spain.

A $640m contract was awarded to Navantia for two AOR vessels in May 2016, and the company was also engaged to provide maintenance and support services for the two ships in service for an initial period of five years. The new vessels will displace 19,500 tonnes, and will each have a crew complement of 122.

The RAN gained considerable exposure to the ESPS Cantabria of the Royal Spanish Navy when that vessel was seconded to Australia in 2011 to cover for Success which was unavailable during its double hull conversion and subsequent defect work.

RAN sailors gained considerable experience on the Cantabria, and their reports no doubt went a long way towards the subsequent order for two vessels of the same class.

But with the first of these vessels – to be named Supply and Stalwart in RAN service – not due to be delivered until the end of 2019 and not likely to enter service until mid-next year, the RAN’s east coast fleet will not have its own dedicated AOR for at least 12 months. Stalwart will follow in late 2020, and will replace HMAS Sirius in service.

No decision has been announced about Success’s fate after her decommissioning, although sadly, it is likely she will be broken up and scrapped.

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RAAF C-130J SATCOM

R A A F C -13 0 J S AT C O M

NETWORKED

SATCOM to be rolled out to additional RAAF C-130Js

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BY ANDREW McLAUGHLIN

he RAAF has announced it will roll out its Ka-Band satellite communications (ASATCOM) system to an additional five C-130J-30 Hercules transports following a successful trial.

The first aircraft was fitted with SATCOM for a six-month trial in 2017. At the time, the ADF said the trial was to be conducted with the support of industry partners Airbus Australia Pacific, Inmarsat, Honeywell, L-3 Communications and the Capability Acquisition and Sustainment Group (CASG).

The system uses the Inmarsat Global Xpress Network to provide broadband 4mb/s internet connectivity for high-definition video and is able to support complex mission planning while in flight. The new system is in addition to the L-Band SATCOM voice and data system fitted to all 12 C-130Js. “Our Hercules crews and passengers are often first on the scene in times of crisis, and require timely information at their destination,” Commander of the RAAF’s Air Mobility Group (AMG) AIRCDRE Bill Kourelakos said in a statement. “Already, we’ve demonstrated the utility of this system on one Hercules, streaming video from missions in the Pacific and allowing basic Command and Control functions to be carried out from the aircraft.

“Even after 60 years, a RAAF Hercules is often one of the first aircraft on the scene during a crisis, and up-to-date information is critical for our people when they step off the ramp,” he added. “Crews and passengers can undertake complex mission planning enroute to their destination, stream video of their mission back to a headquarters, or receive it from another node.”

“There’s significant potential for the Hercules to serve as a tactical Command and Control platform, combining its range and loiter with its ability to airdrop or operate from austere airstrips.”

Installation of the Honeywell JetWave KaBand SATCOM antennas and associated systems will be completed during scheduled maintenance periods by Airbus Australia Pacific at RAAF Richmond, and all five aircraft are expected to be completed by 2022.

The rollout of high-speed communications is one of a number of mission enhancements to the C-130J fleet that have been announced recently.

In February, it was reported the RAAF was also considering the integration of the Northrop Grumman AN/AAQ-28 Litening AT

targeting and EO/IR pod to the C-130J, and this was confirmed by the RAAF at Avalon later that month.

The Litening AT pods are not compatible with the larger F/A-18F Super Hornets and EA-18G Growlers, both of which employ the Raytheon AN/ASQ-228 ATFLIR pod instead. Therefore, the still-capable Litening pods will be surplus to RAAF requirements as the final F/A-18A/B classic Hornets are withdrawn from service before 2022, and are therefore ideal for integration with the C-130J. The addition of Litening AT will enhance the C-130J’s ability to provide ISR overwatch for forces on the ground, to ensure a designated landing or extraction zone is clear of threats, to geolocate targets of interest or precision airdrop locations, or to even provide fires support to off-board shooters. For peacetime missions, a highperformance EO/IR pod could provide accurate imagery and data to support the HADR or search and rescue roles.

And in November 2018, it was announced that two C-130Js had been equipped with auxiliary external fuel tanks, each of which has a four-tonne fuel capacity. One of those aircraft was deployed to Guam for the joint Operation Christmas Drop exercise conducted with US forces where food, clothing and toys are delivered to outlying communities in the Marshall Islands as part of a trial.

The additional capacity also increases the amount of fuel the aircraft can offload to vehicles, helicopters or generators at forward air refuelling points (FARPs) without compromising its own reserves.

‘Our Hercules crews and passengers are often first on the scene in times of crisis...’

LAND 17 PH 7B

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LAND 19 PH 7B

LAND 19/7B SIGNED LAND 19 Ph 7B contracts signed as new missiles expand NASAMS capabilies

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BY ANDREW McLAUGHLIN

he Commonwealth has signed a contract with prime contractor Raytheon Australia for the Enhanced NASAMS system for the Australian Army’s Project LAND 19 Phase 7B short range ground based air defence (SRGBAD) requirement.

The contract signature follows the April 2017 selection of NASAMS under the Commonwealth’s Smart Buyer initiative, and the March 2019 Gate 2 milestone for the selected Enhanced NASAMS system.

“Raytheon Australia will act as the prime systems integrator for the new air defence capability, which combines world-leading Australian radar technology with a highly effective air defence system,” new Defence Minister Senator Linda Reynolds said in a June 20 statement.

“This capability will contribute to the protection of our servicemen and women from modern airborne threats and be based on the proven Raytheon/KONGSBERG National Advanced Surface to Air Missile System (NASAMS).”

The Enhanced system combines the launch canister, AMRAAM missile and KONGSBERG Fire Distribution Centre (FDC) elements of the baseline NASAMS, and adds advanced CEA phased array sensors, a Raytheon MTS-A EO/IR sensor, Raytheon’s high mobility launcher (HML) ,and Australian Army Thales protected mobility vehicles and Rheinmetall trucks.

“Due to the Government’s decision in 2017 to procure this capability through the smart buyer model, we have dedicated the past two years to advance the technical solution and programmatic aspects in close collaboration with our Army, CASG and KONGSBERG partners,” Raytheon Australian Managing Director Michael Ward said at the contract signature.

“During this time, we finessed an already good system to make it arguably the world’s best NASAMS capability tailored to meet Army’s unique requirements.

The ADF will initially acquire two NASAMS batteries under LAND 19 Phase 7B, and the capability will be operated by Army’s 16 Regiment at Woodside near Adelaide. First delivery is scheduled for 2022 for an initial operational capability (IOC) in 2023, and full operational capability (FOC) is scheduled for 2025.

Integration work and production of the system will be conducted at Raytheon’s new Centre for Joint Integration (CJI) at Mawson Lakes in Adelaide.

Also announced was the NOK1.6bn (A$269m) contract signature between KONGSBERG Defence & Space and Raytheon Australia for the Enhanced NASAMS system.

“We are pleased that Australia has chosen NASAMS,” President KONGSBERG Defence & Aerospace AS, Erik Lie said in a statement. “The continuous technical evolution of the system and addition of users confirms that NASAMS is the most modern and advanced air defense system in the world. NASAMS, produced by KONGSBERG and Raytheon, is the backbone air defence system for many nations in decades to come.”

The contract milestones come shortly after KONGSBERG successfully fired a Raytheon AIM-9X Block II infrared missile from a NASAMS cannister launcher and destroyed a target in flight for the first time at the Royal Norwegian Air Force’s Andoya Test Centre in Norway in May. “This flight test opened the door for NASAMS customers to add a vital, short-range layer to their ground-based air defense,” vice president of Raytheon Air Warfare Systems, Kim Ernzen said in a June 19 statement. “Pairing Sidewinder with AMRAAM means forces can have complementary interceptors with a mix of sensors to better engage and destroy threats that may attempt to overwhelm a defense system.”

Executive vice president of KONGSBERG Defence & Aerospace AS, Kjetil Myhra added, “The NASAMS path of evolution continues by demonstrating yet another capability from the Raytheon family of missiles in the system, giving customers a true missile mix with AMRAAM, AMRAAM-ER (Extended Range) and AIM-9X.” The AIM-9X option is under consideration by the Australian Army as a future capability enhancement for the Enhanced NASAMS system being acquired under LAND 19 Phase 7B, as is the Raytheon AMRAAMER. And on July 10 it was announced that Qatar had acquired the NASAMS system through a US$2.2bn contract with Raytheon, making it the eleventh customer for the system. The other nations with NASAMS on order or in service are the US, Norway, Finland, Spain, the Netherlands, Oman, Lithuania, Indonesia, Australia, and an undisclosed customer.

The Qatar announcement also noted that Qatar would be the lead customer for the integration of the AMRAAM-ER missile with the system which will give NASAMS a true medium-range ground-based air defence (MRGBAD) capability.

L-R: Army’s Head Land Systems MAJGEN Andrew Bottrell, Managing Director Raytheon Australia Michael Ward, and KONGSBERG Executive VP Integrated Defence Systems Kjetil Myhra sign the LAND 19 Phase 7B contract. DEFENCE

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BIG GUNS

BIG GUNS Govt to revive self-propelled artillery project

BY ANDREW McLAUGHLIN

T

he Morrison Coalition Government used May’s federal election campaign to announce a revival of the previously cancelled LAND 17 Phase 2 self-propelled artillery project for Army.

The project was originally described by the Howard Coalition government in the 2006 Defence Capability Plan (DCP), before being delayed and then cancelled by the Gillard Labor government in 2012 due to defence funding cuts.

The requirement has been given the new designation, Project LAND 8112 Protected Mobile Fires, and ADBR understands government is looking to acquire it as a sole-source acquisition through Defence’s new Smart Buyer initiative.

Army has reportedly shown a renewed interest in a self-propelled howitzer (SPH) capability in recent years after studying the results of recent campaigns including that in eastern Ukraine where Russianbacked separatists were able to triangulate and direct counter-fires onto fixed Ukrainian artillery positions. In addition, a SPH has a much smaller footprint than the towed BAE Systems M777 gun, making it easier to deploy aboard the Canberra class LHDs if required.

A Prime Ministerial release says the resurrected project will see 30 SPHs plus ammunition supply vehicles acquired, and that the manufacturing and sustainment will be centred around Geelong in Victoria with work expected to commence at a greenfields site in 2022-23.

The southern half of Geelong is the main population centre of the federal seat of Corangamite which, before the election was held by the Liberal Party and was the most marginal seat in the country, although it was considered notionally Labor after a redistribution since the last election.

Labor’s shadow Defence minister, Richard Marles held the neighbouring seat of Corio which includes the northern half of Geelong. Corangamite was subsequently narrowly won by Labor in May’s election, while Marles retained Corio with a slightly increased margin.

“By reviving this project – which was cancelled under Labor – we will deliver the Army the capability it needs,” Prime Minister Scott Morrison said in a May 14 statement. “By building it in Australia, we will create up to 350 jobs, as part of growing our defence industry across the nation.

“This important Defence capability project was one of the casualties of Labor’s budget mismanagement when they were last in government,” it adds. “Under my government, defence capability is back on track and Australia’s defence industry is growing, creating a high-skilled workforce.”

For the previous LAND 17 Phase 2 requirement, the Samsung K9 tracked vehicle that was offered

Hanwha says the K9 has been enhanced since the cancelled AS-9 bid in 2012, and is now in service with seven nations.

HANWHA

ADBR

The K10 ammuniation supply vehicle shares a common chassis and drivetrain with the K9. HANWHA

by a teaming of Raytheon Australian and Samsung was down-selected by Army before the project was cancelled. Now manufactured and reportedly substantially enhanced by Hanwha, ADBR understands the K9 remains the favoured option for Army.

“When the acquisition process for self-propelled artillery was cancelled in 2012 Raytheon Australia had successfully led a team offering an Australianised version of the Korean K-9 self-propelled howitzer which became known as the AS-9 ‘Aussie Thunder’,” a Raytheon Australia spokesman told ADBR on May 14. “As preferred tenderer, the company had won the competition, completed a risk-mitigation process in collaboration with the Commonwealth, finalised the solution and negotiated contracts.

“Following the cancellation announcement, Raytheon Australia formally advised the Commonwealth that, although the company was disappointed with the decision, we would resume the acquisition process should the Commonwealth decide to reconsider acquiring self-propelled artillery. This advice was provided to rapidly deliver a world-class capability for the Australian Army. That offer remains on the table.

“The self-propelled artillery solution agreed upon in 2012 remains as relevant today as it did seven years ago.

Should the acquisition process be resumed Raytheon Australia would refresh our offer and seek the involvement of capable Australian small businesses as part of our team.

“Raytheon Australia will respond to the requirement that this work be undertaken in Geelong by working with its partners to establish a new assembly and integration facility that has the potential to create hundreds on local jobs in the region.”

But following Raytheon’s statement, Hanwha Defence Australia quickly issued a statement of its own to assert its credentials as

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a prime for LAND 8112.

On May 15 the company announced it intended to develop its own manufacturing presence in Australia, not only for its K9 SPH for LAND 8112 but also for other projects such as LAND 400 Phase 3 for which it has pitched its Redback IFV and which is currently in the critical tender assessment phase (see article page XX this issue).

“As the original equipment manufacturer (OEM) of the K9 Thunder, Hanwha is ready to build and assemble 30 K9 Thunder SPHs and supporting systems in Australia,” the company said in a statement. “Hanwha Defence Australia looks forward to the responsibility of being the Australian prime contractor and OEM for the Protected Mobile Fires program and other major combat vehicle programs to support the Australian Army.

“Hanwha Defence Australia is excited at the prospect of developing a significant advanced manufacturing hub and centre of excellence to build and sustain tracked armoured vehicles in the greater Geelong region of Victoria, thus contributing to Australia’s defence self-reliance, manufacturing capacity and industrial skills base.”

The company has stressed the commonality of key dynamic components of the K9 and the Redback, which it says includes “the powerful MTU 1000 hp engine, transmission and suspension system,” and which should provide “significant cross platform synergies and logistics efficiencies.”

Although there is no mention of a self-propelled artillery/howitzer or similar project in the publicly available Integrated Investment Plan (IIP) published in early 2016, Army’s requirement for a SPH never went away, and a watching brief was maintained on developments in the field.

To this end, Hanwha reengaged with Army to update it on developments with the K9. In 2012 the K9 had been in service with South Korea and Turkey, but since that time it has been selected by or entered service with Poland, Norway, Finland, Estonia, and India.

The Hanwha statement says it has been engaging with the Commonwealth since “…2018 for the provision of 30 K9 Thunder SPHs and 15 K10 ammunition supply vehicles,” which it says was “the catalyst for this government announcement and will be the basis moving forward directly with the Commonwealth as an Australian prime.” That said, the first formal notification Hanwha had of the project’s revival was the Prime Minister’s May 14 announcement.

Despite losing the election, a pre-election statement from Labor was supportive of the announcement. The statement from Mr Marles and then Shadow Minister for Defence Industry and Support Dr Mike Kelly said, “A Shorten Labor Government will work with Army on the decision to acquire 30 self-propelled howitzers to make sure it gets the capability it needs, when it needs it. We will seek Army’s advice on this decision to make sure it meets its needs, not a desperate government’s political need.”

‘Hanwha is ready to build and assemble 30 K9 Thunder SPHs and supporting systems in Australia’

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NZ DEFENCE CAPABILITY PLAN

NZ DCP

New Zealand releases its 2019 Defence Capability Plan

BY ANDREW McLAUGHLIN

N

ew Zealand Defence Minister Ron Mark released that country’s Defence Capability Plan 2019 in early June, the first such document of the Ardern-led coalition government.

Following up from the Strategic Defence Policy Statement 2018, the Plan is designed to highlight the capabilities New Zealand will acquire over the next decade to address New Zealand’s strategic environment out to 2030, while identifying requirements and potential investments post 2030.

“The release of this Plan concludes a series of foundational reviews which align defence policy and planned investments with the Coalition government’s priorities, including the Pacific Reset, and its commitment to safeguarding and providing resilience for the nation’s wellbeing,” the Minister says in the Plan’s forward.

In the Maritime domain, New Zealand plans to spend up to NZ$3bn (A$2.8bn) out to 2030; • This includes the immediate withdrawal of two of the RNZN’s four Lake class Inshore Patrol vessels; • An RFT in 2022 for an NZ$300-$600m project to acquire a new Southern Ocean Patrol vessel built to commercial specifications to patrol NZ’s southern exclusive economic zones from 2027; • An RFT in 2024 for at least NZ$1bn to replace the five SH-2G(I) Super Seasprite maritime helicopter fleet from 2027; • NZ$1bn to acquire two new Enhanced Sealift Vessels to initially supplement HMNZS Canterbury from 2029, and then replace that vessel from the early 2030s; • An enhanced service and maintenance package to allow the extension of the two ANZAC frigates expected service lives beyond 2030; • Beyond 2030, budget provision will be made to replace the RNZN’s two Protector class Offshore Patrol Vessels with an RFT due to be released in 2027, and the two ANZAC class frigates in the mid-2030s.

In the Land domain, the New Zealand Army will: • Introduce Tranche One of a new deployable C4ISR capability under the NZ$300-$600m Network Enabled Army (NEA) program; • The progressive rollout of follow-on tranches of NEA which will include expanded networks, improved ISR capabilities, and the integration of these with the Tranche One capabilities; • Release an RFT in 2021 to acquire a NZ$100-300m fleet of garrison and training vehicles from 2022; • New NZ$300-600m staged Protected Mobility Vehicle capability acquisition to replace Army’s Pinzgauer vehicles from 2023; • In 2025 an RFT will be released to replace the New Zealand Army’s GDLS NZLAV 8×8 armoured vehicles from 2033; • Funding will continue to be provided to bolster overall Army personnel numbers to 6,000 from 2035.

In the Air domain, New Zealand will acquire: • NZ$100-300m of Navigation and Communications systems upgrades from 2022;

NZDF LAVs being loaded aboard HMNZS Canterbury in preparation for Exercise Talisman Saber 2019. NZ ARMY

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The RNZAF’s C-130Hs will be replaced by at least five C-130J-30s from 2023.

DEFENCE

• At least five new Lockheed Martin C-130J-30 Hercules to replace the current C-130H capability from 2023; • An RFT in 2020 for the acquisition of unmanned, satellite or lower-tier fixed-wing maritime surveillance systems for civilian tasks from 2023 under the Enhanced Maritime Air Surveillance program to supplement the four P-8A Poseidons currently on order; • An RFT in 2026 for a replacement of the leased King Air 350-based aircrew training system with a platform to better prepare crews for the modern C-130J-30, P-8A, and 757 replacement; • An RFT in 2024 for a new Strategic Air Mobility transport capability to replace two Boeing 757-200s from 2028; • Post 2030, a new long-range unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) capability to support land and maritime forces with improved and continuous ISR. In the Information domain, the Plan outlines requirements for: • Enhanced cyber capability from 2021 to improve interoperability with close partners and keep pace with evolving threats, and to be able to generate effects, and to be able to exploit ISR data gleaned from new

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surveillance capabilities such as the P-8A Poseidon; • A Tactical Remotely Piloted Aircraft from 2025; • A maritime satellite surveillance capability from 2025; • A high frequency (HF) radio network requirement from 2026; • Post 2030, a wideband global satellite communications capability.

The announcement to acquire the C-130J came just a day after the DCP was released, and will see the government request detailed pricing for five stretched fuselage C-130J-30 models to replace the C-130H, the requirement for which was considered the highest priority project in the document.

“The current Hercules have served us well since the 1960s, but they have reached the end of the road, and suitable and proven replacement aircraft will need to be sourced,” Minister Mark said in a statement. “The current fleet is increasing in cost to maintain, and is taking longer to put through maintenance.”

The C-130J-30 was up against the Airbus A400M and the Embraer KC-390, including a corporate proposal for a service contract with wet-leased KC-390s. Japan’s Kawasaki had also confirmed at this year’s Avalon Airshow that it would offer its C-2 transport to New Zealand, while Northrop Grumman and Leonardo said they would jointly offer the C-27J Spartan.

ARH NEXT Replacing the Australian Army’s Tiger Armed Reconnaissance Helicopter

BY ANDREW McLAUGHLIN

ADBR

A

fter a protracted development and troubled service entry, the Australian Army’s Airbus EC665 Tiger Armed Reconnaissance Helicopter (ARH) has at last started hitting its straps and providing its promised capability, one which has been nearly two decades in the making.

But the success the capability is finally realising appears to be short-lived, with a Request for Information (RFI) for the replacement of the Tiger released to industry on July 1, for a planned initial operational capability (IOC) in 2026.

BACKGROUND

Selected in December 2001 to fulfil Army’s AIR 87 requirement under a then TY$1.1bn acquisition contract, the first two Tigers were accepted by the Commonwealth in December 2004, and the last of 22 aircraft were delivered in late 2011.

The first four Tigers were manufactured by (then) Eurocopter at the company’s Marignane factory in southern France, while the remaining 18 were assembled at the company’s Pinkenba facility at Brisbane Airport.

Much has been written about the delays and capability shortfalls experienced by the ARH program, with developmental issues, groundings, spares shortages and sustainment gaps, and capability and performance shortfalls variously attributed to the program, some of which will be described below.

The Australian Army currently operates two squadrons – 161 and 162 SQN – each with eight aircraft plus an additional aircraft to cover deep maintenance under the 1st Aviation Brigade (1Avn) at the Robertson Barracks in Darwin, and a training detachment of four aircraft based at Oakey in southern Queensland. In addition, one instrumented aircraft is assigned to Oakey for development work and to supplement the training fleet.

In April 2016 the Tiger ARH finally achieved a full operational capability (FOC), some seven years later than planned.

But a 2016 Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) report found the FOC milestone lacked definition, due in part to Army amending its Acceptance into Operational Service Plan to accommodate nine caveats. These include the aircraft’s lower than expected rate-of-effort and delays to its Canberra class LHD integration, as well as its EW self-protection system, IFF, datalinks, and mission planning system, all of which were still considered developmental or incompatible with other ADF systems.

The ANAO report also found that the helicopter continued to suffer from lower than expected serviceability rates, and that it faced growing obsolescence issues.

Interestingly, the ANAO report referred to a 2013 report by Defence’s Rapid Prototyping,

35

Development and Evaluation (RPDE) organisation which found that upgrading the Tiger was a “high-risk activity” and that replacement alternatives should be considered.

One of the key recommendations of the ANAO report was, “that Defence assesses, and advises government, on the value-for-money in investing further in the Tiger aircraft fleet for only a short period of improved performance, against other alternatives. This assessment should take into account the associated technical risks of upgrading an aircraft which has not fully delivered the level of capability originally expected by government.

“The 2016 Defence White Paper allocated $500-750 million to address the current capability requirements of the Tiger platform with a view to replacing the platform mid next decade, at a cost of some $5-6 billion,” the ANAO report noted.

“In effect, an upgrade is scheduled for consideration less than 12 months after the Tiger achieved final operational capability.

Defence should conduct a thorough analysis of the value-for-money of investing further in the Tiger, pending the introduction of a replacement capability.”

In response to the ANAO’s recommendation which it accepted, Defence said it would “assess the best value for money and most effective capability for both the Tiger CAP (capability assurance program) and Tiger replacement.

Recommendations on the timings for both programs will be considered at Gate Zero.”

‘Our Tiger pilots now fly more than their peers overseas.’

WORLD CLASS

But despite the aircraft’s disappointing development delays and ongoing issues with its sustainment, its operators view the platform including its handling qualities and overall capabilities very favourably. And despite having never been operationally deployed unlike its French and German counterparts, the Australian ARH Tiger fleet is considered to be the global fleet leader in terms of systems maturity and flight hours.

In July 2018, then Commander of Army’s 16th Aviation Brigade BRIG Steve Jobson wrote that he considered the Tiger a “truly world-class platform”.

“We have driven health into our Tiger organisations, with improved facilities, maintenance processes, reorganised workforce and collaborative operations,” he said. “Our Tiger pilots now fly more than their peers overseas. Our Tigers deliver precision lethal effects in training to more soldiers of more battalions and regiments of our own and other friendly nations Armies and Marine forces than ever before.

“Our Tigers now deliver reliability and performance that is the envy of the world – Proven reliability. Proven performance. No more conjecture. No more wishing. It’s happening.”

This is high praise indeed, particularly in light

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ARH NEXT

of the adverse ANAO findings from just two years previously.

“This is no longer the system we acquired,” he added. “It is now modernised with next generation weapons, digitised connectivity, revolutionary tactics with Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, and interoperability with the Royal Australian Navy, Royal Australian Air Force and our allies.

“The Tiger no longer just delivers tactical transactions. It has pulled the entire Army aviation capability into delivering theatre enabling, network centric, joint effects for the Joint Force Commander.

Our reach and versatility now extends across all domains and components in ways you can only imagine.”

FATE SEALED

Whether BRIG Jobson was pushing the case to retain the Tiger beyond the 2025 timeframe, or whether he just wanted to publicly reassure the rest of the ADF that Tiger will retain a relevant capability right up until that time, is unclear. But this is largely irrelevant anyway, as it appears the Tiger’s fate in ADF service has been sealed.

The RFI calls for submissions from industry for Project LAND 4503 which is seeking a total of 29 airframes to replace the 22 Tigers. It specifies that 24 aircraft will be operational at a single location and five airframes will be assigned to training.

Designed to “deliver armed reconnaissance efforts in close and deep contested battlespace”, the RFI calls for an IOC of one squadron of 12 aircraft in 2026, and a fully operational capability (FOC) to follow just two years later in 2028. It states that, at IOC Army will be able to operationally deploy a troop of four aircraft, and that at FOC, will be capable of generating 12 aircraft for deployment while maintaining a training

‘The specific details and ambitious timings outlined in the RFI suggest Army is seeking a near one-for-one replacement of Tiger’

system of five aircraft.

The specific details and ambitious timings outlined in the RFI suggest Army is seeking a near one-for-one replacement of Tiger with what it says will be a “proven and mature, offthe-shelf” capability, but essentially removes the possibility of nextgeneration capabilities such as those being developed under the US Army’s Future Attack Reconnaissance Aircraft (FARA) program being considered.

Clearly, things appear to be moving fast, although what is less clear is whether the timelines outlined in the RFI are being driven by government policy or by a capability requirement.

When asked on the sidelines of the 2019 Avalon Airshow about these

The ARH is now enjoying higher rates of availability and Army is confident it could be deployed if required. DEFENCE

ADBR

The deployment of four ARHs to Indo-Pacific Endeavour 2019 aboard HMAS Canberra in April and May proved the type’s amphibious capability.

DEFENCE

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positive statements and the encouraging direction in which the Tiger capability had been heading in recent years, Army’s Director General Aviation BRIG John Fenwick told ADBR, “The White Paper is very clear, we need to start preparing to replace the aircraft in the mid-2020s.

“Clearly, we are still watching the platform very closely and we are seeing improvements in it,” BRIG Fenwick said. “But at the end of the day, government has given us very clear direction – we need to manage the aircraft to its full potential to 2025. So really our opinion is a moot point, it’s all about government direction.

Now, if government tells us to change direction, we will comply accordingly.”

An interesting point to note in the timing of LAND 4503 is a potential underspend looming in the 20232026 period which may be influencing the project’s timing more than any actual or perceived capability shortfalls by Tiger.

The RAAF’s Project AIR 6000 budget for 72 F-35As and associated capital works will be mostly spent by then, while funding profiles for Navy’s SEA 1000 Attack

systems, and the replacement of the aircraft’s fuel tanks which have suffered from corrosion.

In the meantime, Army has also addressed several of the FOC caveats, including the communications and IFF issues, and the adoption of a suitable EWSP system.

In addition, after a second round of First of Class trials late last year and a successful deployment in April 2019 of four aircraft to join the LHD HMAS Canberra for the second half of the ADF’s Indo-Pacific Endeavour 2019 activity, the aircraft has been cleared to support amphibious and maritime operations from these vessels.

The Indo-Pacific 2019 deployment was by all reports a major success. Four ARHs were deployed by C-17 to Butterworth in Malaysia where they joined the task force, and spend nearly two months aboard while HMAS Canberra sailed to Vietnam and Singapore via the South China Sea before returning the aircraft to Darwin.

“The key attribute the ARH brings to the joint environment is security,” Commanding Officer of 1st Aviation Regiment, LTCOL Daniel Bartle said in a defence release. “We are capable of performing a full range of

class submarine and SEA 5000 Hunter class frigate programs won’t have ramped up yet. In terms of capital equipment expenditure, Army’s LAND 400 Phase 2 and Phase 3 armoured vehicle programs appear to be the only two big-ticket items on the books during that period.

reconnaissance, security and attack missions to provide a security bubble that the Joint Task Force can operate under. This is the last step in reaching final operational capability for the Australian Defence Force in achieving its amphibious deployment and sustainment system objectives in the maritime environment.”

ARH pilot CAPT Daniel Tidd added, “We are capable of performing a full range of reconnaissance, security and attack missions to provide a security bubble.

Exercising with the Navy enables 1st Aviation Regiment the opportunity to work together to integrate the aviation and maritime assets.

“It also allows our ground crew aviation support, maintainers and aircrew the opportunity to live, work and train on board in order to understand how we conduct sorties from the ship. This is the first significant deployment for the ARH and 1st Aviation Regiment onto a maritime platform. It’s a big step that offers a lot more choices, broadens our capability and offers commanders options. The ADF’s amphibious capability with air-mobile and air-assault operations from a maritime platform is now a possibility.”

ARH CAP

In the meantime, under current Defence planning, the Tiger is due to be upgraded under the $500-750m LAND 9000 ARH CAP which will see the helicopter’s various obsolescence issues managed until the type’s replacement in 2026.

This is a significant watering down of the previous $1-2bn AIR 87 Phase 3 ARH CAP plan which had envisioned more extensive capability and performance enhancements, as well as life-extension measures for a projected life-of-type into the 2030s.

A couple of immediate items to be addressed under ARH CAP is the addition of newer Collins ARC-210 radios to replace older systems which will soon no longer be supported and to better integrate with ADF and allied

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ARH NEXT

And later this year, two aircraft are scheduled to be deployed to the US Navy’s electronic warfare training range at Yuma in Arizona to participate in Marine Aviation Weapons and Tactics (MAWTS) program to help develop a baseline for the aircraft’s electronic warfare system against high-fidelity threat systems in a joint environment with US assets. The US Marine Corps’ MAWTS-1 is a unit dedicated to the development of aviation tactics, and has an electronic warfare Spectrum Warfare Department to fold EW into the Marines’ biannual Weapons and Tactics Instructor course.

Co-operation, or OCCAR) with member nations France, Germany and Spain. OCCAR had tried in vain throughout 2016 and 2017 to get a commitment from Australia to join the Mark III development effort.

While the definition of the Mark III upgrade is yet to be finalised, the program is working with Thales and MDBA to enhance the Tiger’s avionics and mission systems, and to develop a new common air-to-surface missile to replace the current AGM-114 Hellfire and Rafael Spike systems.

WHAT COULD HAVE BEEN

Without wanting to pre-empt any replacement decisions, the ANAO quoted the RPDE report as saying, “Alternate platform options should be considered. One option is the [Apache], although it is acknowledged that there may be other cost-competitive platforms.”

The ANAO report then notes that in 2013 the then Defence Material Organisation (now CASG) advised the then Defence Minister that, while “no in-depth analysis of the costs of acquiring the Apache had been undertaken since the initial tender process for AIR 87 Phase 2 in 2001; [and that] the figures identified in the 2013 [RPDE] report were ‘not considered reliable’; … that further analysis would be undertaken to develop options in the lead up to Gate Zero for the Tiger mid-life upgrade.”

Regardless of that analysis, initially it seemed a like-for-like replacement of the Tiger by another attack

Despite a comprehensive upgrade of Australia’s Tiger seemingly now off the table following the ANAO report, White Paper and IIP language, and more recently the release of the LAND 4503 RFI, Airbus Helicopters has continued to develop the aircraft and has proposed a number of capability and performance enhancements.

The company is currently implementing Tiger Mark II upgrades for the French Army’s HAP Tiger, the version most common to Australia’s ARH variant. The Mark II will see the addition of new Thales-developed laser-guided rockets, as well as upgrades to the helicopter’s GPS receiver and CRPA antenna system.

Meanwhile, a more comprehensive Tiger Mark III upgrade program was launched through the European Organisation Conjointe de Coopération en Matière d’Armement (Organisation for Joint Armament

TIGER REPLACEMENTS

Tiger ARHs on HMAS Canberra’s deck during Indo-Pacific Endeavour 2019.

DEFENCE

ADBR

or armed reconnaissance helicopter may not have been the end result of Defence’s deliberations, with the IIP proposing that “Defence will invest in a future armed reconnaissance capability to replace the Tiger, which could include manned or unmanned systems or a combination of both, to be introduced from the mid2020s.”

But industry insiders tell ADBR that the LAND 4503 RFI points straight at a one-for-one armed reconnaissance helicopter replacement program with a mature, in-service capability, and precludes other options such as unmanned systems, or future capabilities.

So with Defence looking at replacing the Tiger with another manned helicopter by 2026, there are really only two options available – the Boeing AH-64E Apache Guardian, and the Bell AH-1Z Zulu Cobra, or ‘Viper’.

Both of these aircraft are the latest developments of very mature systems, with many hundreds of each type in service with the US and other allied nations, including in our immediate region.

The latest AH-64E Apache Guardian is currently being manufactured as new-build airframes for the US Army and international customers, as well as remanufactured from AH-64Ds for the US Army.

Originally designed as a heavy attack helicopter to defeat Soviet heavy armour in Europe, the Apache’s latest iteration adds improved endurance, interoperability with unmanned systems, marinised dynamic components for maritime operations, and the insertion of maritime modes in its Longbow radar and optical sensors.

AH-64E development started in 2012, and adds more powerful GE T700GE-701D turboshafts and an upgraded transmission, and new composite blades that provide a top speed of about 170kts and nearly 50 percent greater endurance than the AH-64D. Other improvements include longer-stroke hydraulic shock strut landing gear for improved crash-worthiness, and a manned-unmanned teaming (MUM-T) datalink which allows the AH64E’s co-pilot to remotely control and receive data from unmanned systems such as the US Army’s MQ-1C Grey Eagle, a development of the MQ-1A Predator.

This is an important point in the light that LAND 4503 will place value on the successful system being able to integrate and operate with unmanned systems such as that to be acquired under LAND 129 Phase 3 to replace Army’s Shadow 200, and the GA-

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ASI Predator/Reaper being acquired under the RAAF’s AIR 7003 program.

Other improvements include enhanced fire-control systems with maritime modes to identify and target vessels at sea or in the littorals, Link-16 datalinks, and a new ground-fire acquisition system which can identify muzzle flashes from small arms, cannons and rocketpropelled grenades, and automatically direct return fire from the aircraft’s onboard 30mm cannon.

Boeing is also working on an advanced development of the AH-64E which will have wider span stub wings and a compound ‘pusher’ tail rotor. The concept emerged amid ongoing delays to the US Army’s Future Vertical Lift plan and a requirement to keep the AH-64 capable well into the 2030s and possibly beyond the type’s current planned withdrawal by 2040.

Dubbed the AH-64E Block 2 Compound, the development features enlarged and permanently attached wings, a new engine exhaust arrangement, a larger vertical tail fin, and a rear-mounted ‘pusher’ propeller, all of which are designed to give the Apache greater speed and range compared to conventional models.

Boeing estimates the Compound development will provide 50 per cent more speed. Concept testing was due to have been completed earlier this year and, if successful, Boeing is expected to pitch it as an alternative to more radical designs for the US Army’s Future Attack Reconnaissance Aircraft (FARA) competitive program.

The Bell AH-1Z lineage dates right back to the mid-1960s when the company adapted the familiar

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ARH NEXT

The Bell AH-1Z Viper is an advanced development of the original AH-1 Cobra.. US NAVY

UH-1D ‘Huey’s driveline and dynamic components to a lighter and slimmer tandem fuselage with stub wings to provide dedicated airborne fire-support support to troops in Vietnam.

Many iterations later, the AH-1Z still shares the dynamic components of the latest UH-1Y ‘Yankee’ or Venom, both of which were developed in the late 90s for the US Marine Corps initially as remanufactured in-service AH-1W and UH-1N models, but ultimately as new-build aircraft.

The AH-1Z features a four-bladed composite rotor system and upgraded transmission, a four-bladed tail rotor, upgraded landing skids and a new fully-integrated glass cockpit, and shares about 85 per cent systems commonality with the UH-1Y. Viper crew members use the same Thales Top Owl helmet-mounted sight and display system as used in the Australian Army’s MHR 90.

The helicopter itself has a fully-marinised airframe and dynamic components, and features greater survivability through the adoption of a hover infrared suppression system (HIRSS) to mask the engine exhaust, countermeasures dispensers, radar warning receivers (RWRs), incoming/on-way missile warning, and onfuselage laser spot warning systems.

The AH-1Z also features a Lockheed Martin target sight system (TSS) with a FLIR sensor for targeting in day,

night and adverse weather conditions. Weapons include precision-guided APKWS and Hellfire missiles, and an integral 20mm cannon.

Army currently has another manned aviation program underway – the LAND 2097 Phase 4 light special forces support helicopter which is planned to enter service shortly before the planned Tiger replacement, and which may inform an elegant and economical option for LAND 4503.

LAND 2097 Phase 4 is seeking at least 16 helicopters for urban special forces (SF) operations, four of which can be deployed at a time rapidly via RAAF C-17A transport and made ready to fly within 30 minutes. The new helicopter will complement the larger machines currently operated by Army’s 6 Aviation Regiment (6Avn) at Holsworthy in Sydney, which is currently transitioning from the S-70A-9 Black Hawk to the Airbus MRH 90 Taipan.

Several of the likely LAND 2097 Phase 4 contenders – Bell with its 407GX/GT or 429, Airbus with the H145M, and Boeing with its AH-6i Little Bird – offer armed versions of these aircraft with missionised systems, high performance sensors, and stub wings or pylons with forward-firing precision-guided weapons.

While a military derivative of a commercial platform obviously wouldn’t offer the same levels of performance,

The Boeing Apache is currently in production for the US Army and international customers as the AH-64E Guardian. DEFENCE

ADBR

The Sikorsky S-97 Raider is expected to be a leading contender for the US Army’s FARA requirement. LOCKHEED MARTIN

survivability and capability as a dedicated ARH or attack helicopter, a Tiger replacement based on the successful SF support helicopter could offer massive operational savings and flexibility to the ADF, with little risk.

OPPORTUNITIES FOR INNOVATION

RIGHT: The Airbus H145M is a likely contender for Army’s LAND 2097 Phase 4 light special operations support requirement, and could be adapted to a light armed reconnaissance role. AIRBUS

The Bell V-247 unmanned tiltrotor is being developed for the US Marine Corps’ MUX program. BELL

Both the AH-64E and the AH-1Z are available now, and neatly fit LAND 4503’s published schedule. They are known and proven capabilities, and are fully interoperable with US and other forces in the region. But both offer little in terms of innovation, capability co-development and Australian industry participation, and anecdotal reports suggest neither can match Tiger’s agility and endurance.

But if Defence were to consider a more extensive upgrade to Tiger to allow it to service into the 2030s, then more advanced and innovative replacement options may come into play.

Most visible of these are the new generation systems that are under development for the US Army’s FARA competitive program to replace the Bell OH-58D Kiowa Warrior armed scout helicopter which was retired in 2017, a key element of that service’s all-encompassing Future Vertical Lift (FVL) program.

In late April the US Army Combat Capabilities Development Command Aviation & Missile Center’s Aviation Development Directorate advised that the

41

FARA program was tracking a few months ahead of schedule, and that prototype agreements had been reached with industry.

The five agreements were awarded to a teaming of AVX Aircraft Co and L3 Communications Integrated Systems with a derivative of AVX’s Joint Multi-Role (JMR) aircraft; Bell Helicopter with a solution based on its conventional 525 Relentless; Sikorsky with a development of the S-97 Raider; Boeing with an as-yet undeclared contender but thought to be the AH-64E Block 2 Compound; and Karem Aircraft with a mystery design.

Since then, Karem has announced it has teamed with Northrop Grumman and Raytheon to offer a design based on Karem’s Optimum Speed Tiltrotor (OSTR) technology.

The US Army plans to have FARA prototypes flying in 2023, and to make a production decision in 2028, although this seems to be overly ambitious for such a developmental program.

The US Marine Corps is running a similar program, the Marine Air-Ground Task Force (MAGTF) Unmanned Aerial System (UAS) Expeditionary, or MUX. Designed to support manned aircraft such as the V-22 Osprey,

the MUX will likely be unmanned, and will have an endurance of up to eight hours and a maximum speed well above 200kts.

The USMC aims to issue a request for information to industry early next year, and ambitiously, to be able to trial an early operational capability as early as 2026.

Possible contenders for MUX include the Bell V-247 Vigilant concept which resembles a slightly smaller and sleeker V-22 tiltrotor, and the Northrop Grumman/ DARPA Tactically Exploited Reconnaissance Node (TERN) tail-sitter concept.

While MUX on paper appears to far exceed the ARH specifications of the Tiger and other manned helicopters, it provides significant capability and flexibility that manned aircraft cannot match now or in the near future.

Like FARA, MUX is likely to be at least a decade or more away from entering service, let alone being available for export. Thus there is a potentially a six or more year gap where no dedicated manned armed reconnaissance or attack platform of US origin is available to the ADF if the 2026 Tiger replacement date is adhered to.

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LTGEN RICK BURR - AN ARMY IN MOTION

LIEUTENANT GENERAL RICK BURR

AN ARMY IN MOTION Lieutenant General Rick Burr has been in the Chief of Army position for just on a year, and has not taken a backward step in continuing his predecessors’ programs to modernise the Australian Army

BY ANDREW McLAUGHLIN

A

fter working as Deputy to the previous Chief of Army, now Chief of Defence Force (CDF) GEN Angus Campbell, LTGEN Burr was already deeply involved in Army’s transformation, and also had time to develop his own philosophy, one of the Army in Motion.

“It remains a great privilege to lead our Army of amazing men and women,” LTGEN Burr told ADBR on the eve of his first anniversary as Chief of Army. “I’m very proud of our people, and getting out and about seeing them is inspirational. As you know, General Campbell built on the work of his predecessors, and has left the Army in great shape. We are now ready for the next stage of transformation.”

LTGEN Burr is warm and affable, has a great memory for names and faces. On face value he appears comfortable talking and listening to people of all ranks and standing.

These are important traits for a leader who is not only charged with introducing a whole raft of new equipment, but also one prepared to lead a massive

cultural shift in what is typically a very conservative and traditional organisation.

“I have started my tenure by describing our future operating environment through the Accelerated Warfare concept,” he explained. “I think that has been really powerful in defining the unique challenges that we all face, and what we need to do to respond to them.

“The release of Army in Motion has, I think, been very important in describing an Army that needs to be continuously moving, in perpetual motion, adapting to that future environment, embracing the opportunities of technology, and thinking about new concepts and ways of doing things.”

LTGEN Burr describes Accelerated Warfare as both the operating environment and “how we respond”.

He says it provides the concept for how Army thinks, equips, trains, educates, organises and prepares for war in order to become “future ready”.

“I’m very pleased with where we are at in terms of thinking about the future, preparing the ground to embrace that future, as well as building concurrent

‘I’m very pleased with where we are at in terms of thinking about the future...’

LIEUTENANT GENERAL RICK BURR

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LIEUTENANT GENERAL RICK BURR

energy,” he said. “As a concept, it’s forcing us to intellectually engage in these challenges to think about all of the domains – land, maritime, and air – our traditional domains, but also increasingly in space and in the cyber domain.

“And if you consider the human domain, then obviously we’re always in that domain as well,” he added. “But those geographic and functional domains are important in providing context when we think about the different way we might need to operate now and into the future. The overall effect is important for the joint force. Army’s contribution to the joint force, and what we can do in each of those domains, is significant.

We do more than we probably give ourselves credit for.”

But LTGEN Burr is also cognisant of the operational obligations Army maintains, and is looking for opportunities to apply the lessons learned on operations into his philosophy and to the Accelerated Warfare concept.

“The Army continues with its current commitments operationally,” he said. “We remain in the Middle East and in the Philippines helping with the mission there. “We’ve always been engaged in our own region as you know with very strong regional cooperation, but we’ve also really stepped up in response to the Government’s commitment to the Pacific in places like Fiji, Vanuatu and Papua New Guinea.

“And I’m very pleased. We bring those lessons home, and it allows us to grow our junior leaders in a great way, to build on those existing partnerships

and alliances, and strengthens our world view. It’s really important for our leaders.

“Applying those lessons on operations and dealing with increased demands through the spectrum of cooperation, competition and conflict, has been the other important development. We’re thinking about how we best leverage the Army’s unique value proposition as part of the joint force during the various phases of cooperation, competition and conflict across multiple domains.

“We could be in different stages and different domains all at the same time, and that requires a much more integrated, much more sophisticated approach to how we operate. This lends itself to new principles of design for our forces. We are not just joint by design, but integrated by design. This allows our teams to be more coherent, more organised, and more responsive to meet that Accelerated Warfare challenge. And of course, domain convergence is a key part of that.”

While culture and intellectual engagement are major parts of the Accelerated Warfare concept, they would be all for nought if they weren’t supported by significant investment in new equipment and training through the various projects in the Defence Integrated Investment Plan (IIP).

In this regard, Army has prospered in recent years, with major projects to recapitalise and significantly upgrade the capabilities of almost every Army vehicle, to the incorporation of new resilient communications systems, to the integration

‘As a concept, it’s forcing us to intellectually engage in these challenges to think about all of the domains...’

The amphibious training initially provided to 2RAR will now be rolled out across all Army units. DEFENCE

ADBR

LTGEN Burr is leading the cultural change in Army from the front. DEFENCE

of Army’s key land elements with Navy’s new amphibious ships, to the acquisition of a new shortrange ground-based air defence (SRGBAD) system.

The contract for the acquisition of Enhanced NASAMS SRGBAD system being acquired under Project LAND 19 Phase 7B was signed in Canberra on June 20, less than three months after passing its Gate 2 approval milestone, and barely two years after Gate 1.

“That air defence capability inside Army is very much needed,” LTGEN Burr explains. “It really developed a stronger, more coherent air defence capability that is integrated across Army, Navy and Air Force, particularly with AIR 6500 coming along.

“That really elevates our thinking and our intellectual engagement with the battlespace,” he added. “To me, while that is another important way of satisfying the air defence capability need, it allows us to think more broadly about how we employ lethal fires in the battlespace, and the integration of sensors and effectors. This then leads into the broader modernisation priority that I have around lethality and the need for long-range fires.

“If we start to build the DNA, we start to develop the capacity and capability inside Army to be a much stronger contributor to the joint force across all of those domains.”

LTGEN Burr comes to senior leadership not only from a strong operational and leadership background with the SAS and Special Operations Task Group (SOTG) in Afghanistan and Iraq, but also an equally strong instructional and training background through leadership stints at both the

37

Australian Defence Force Warfare Training Centre (ADFWTC) at RAAF Base Williamtown, and at Royal Military College Duntroon.

“I think it’s progressive,” he said. “Like all people or leaders, you keep building on lessons and experiences and observations. And for me, and certainly with my own background, the power of teams is essential. Those teams can be anyone and anything that contributes to the problem at hand, but the focus on connectivity and enterprise level thinking is really powerful in this regard.

“We need to be working together, helping each other.” he added. “Certainly for the land force, what we can do to better enable maritime and air forces is an area that I know can be enhanced. An Army is not just a beneficiary of a Navy and an Air Force, but I think the same is also true in reverse.

“It’s the interdependency in all of those domains – we all bring different capabilities to the table, and we need to be able to leverage each other’s strengths and unique capabilities in a more coherent way, from cooperation, competition and conflict.

“To me, that sophistication of thinking, that cultural maturity if you like is a real coming of age, and it’s a pleasure to be able to lead the Army at this time.”

To take advantage of the next generation of weapons systems and their enabling capabilities, all three ADF services have embarked on cultural change programs to best position themselves in the future. Air Force has led the way with Plan Jericho, followed closely by Navy with Plan Pelorus.

Army had previously embarked on Plan Beersheba which was essentially a restructure

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LTGEN RICK BURR - AN ARMY IN MOTION

which saw three multirole manoeuvre Brigades created – the 1st, 3rd and 7th Brigades (1, 3, 7Bde) – to better integrate infantry, armour, artillery, engineers, logistics and communications components.

The restructure also included the establishment of 2nd Battalion Royal Australian Regiment (2RAR) as a specialised amphibious force, and a greater integration of the Army Reserve into the regular Army for deployments on stabilisation operations.

As part of the amphibious component of 2RAR, a key element of Beersheba was a commitment to work closer with Navy and Air Force on enhancing the interoperability between the three services, particularly with the Project JP 2048 Phase 4A/B Canberra class Landing Helicopter Docks (LHD) and other amphibious platforms. This has since been expanded with the training and lessons learned by 2RAR to be rolled out across all Army units.

LTGEN Burr’s Army in Motion message in many ways takes Beersheba to the next level. With the structural and training elements now in place, and many of the key capabilities either in service or deep into their project cycles, the next step is to bring Army’s people along through ongoing engagement.

“Through development of Army in Motion and Accelerated Warfare, and a very active engagement program, we’ve got out to visit all the Brigades and the different parts of the Army,” LTGEN Burr explained. “But also across the joint force and where our people serve, just to build that understanding and support for what

we are trying to do.

“And I think my view is that logic wins every time,” he added. “If you can explain the logic and it’s sufficiently compelling, then people will support it. My big focus has been on understanding the challenges around transitioning from being ‘ready now’ to being ‘future-ready’, including accepting that some things have to change in order to accommodate those new requirements.

“That’s the bit that often gets glossed over – how do you get from here to there? What tradeoffs, what risks are you willing to accept? Are you going to reinforce your workforce, or stop doing things here, or take people offline to reskill them in order to do something? Like any change management, that’s the hard bit, and that’s why we are doing this active engagement program, socialising the idea, and then developing action plans to get after each part of this challenge.”

Part of Army’s action plan is the development of training transformation teams. “Training, because our training system is obviously fundamental to all of the services, and our genuine strength is our training system,” LTGEN Burr said. “We are very focused on modernising our training system – the way we approach and deliver learning in our Army, but also making sure we’ve got the capacity to deliver these new requirements for a new generation of workforce as well as reskilling those who are already qualified or trained in existing systems.

‘If you can explain the logic and it’s sufficiently compelling, then people will support it.’

Army’s equipment is becoming heavier, better protected, better armed, more flexible, and longer ranging. DEFENCE

ADBR

“The workforce is absolutely ready for that in my view – they’re excited by it,” he continued. “They know that it’s needed, and they know that that’s where the advantage is accrued.

“But the other part of the broader cultural challenge is why. Earlier this year, we reissued an updated version of Good Soldiering which is essentially our cultural optimisation initiative which talks to the power of high performing teams, and how we build high performing teams within our organisation.

“I’m not just talking about the more advanced parts of their organisation, but wherever we are, we work best in teams, and the best way to optimise the performance of that team is by understanding the principles that go into that. These principles are generally around culture and leadership and I put a big focus on that across the Army, and that’s already paying dividends. That just speaks to Army’s strengths – I think naturally that’s what we do, we’re a teaming organisation.”

And as a result of that engagement and the rollout of these changes, LTGEN Burr said there may be more structural changes and an increase in overall manning to come.

“We are working on some initiatives around the future of 6 Brigade , which is the Brigade that develops a lot of our information warfare capabilities, as well as our air defence and UAS capabilities. How can we better organise to deliver against those future challenges? We might see some changes there,” he said. “And I think there will probably be a greater focus on our training institutions to make sure we’ve got that sufficiently resourced to achieve the transformation

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that we seek.”

LTGEN Burr also said he has been pleased with the response he has had from the other services, CASG, Headquarters Joint Operations Command, other government organisations, and Industry, to his goals.

“We’re pushing on an open door,” he said. “People recognise the need and the opportunity, and where there’s a joint interdependency, that would obviously only occur once we’re all happy. But a lot of these are internal, and we’re certainly well engaged with all the stakeholders and the partners.

“I have five ‘Ps’ – people, preparedness, the profession, achieving our potential, and partnerships – and I think partnerships is where there’s real opportunity as we recognise Industry as a fundamental input to capability. So, what does that mean? How do we better work together? How do we better collaborate? We need Industry to know that we’re open for business, that our challenges are recognised, and that people should feel comfortable coming to help share what some of those solutions might be.”

As part of its transformation and in an effort to stay aligned with the other services, apart from the obvious ADF senior leadership team exchanges, LTGEN Burr’s teams also stay engaged with Air Force’s Jericho and Navy’s Pelorus teams at the middle management and rank level.

“The concepts, capital acquisition, and development community, that’s very tight now,” he said. “I think we all learn from each other and, the approach is that we’re all in this together. I’m very pleased with that level of collaboration, sharing and

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LTGEN RICK BURR - AN ARMY IN MOTION

transparency that says, ‘We all want to get better because we all know that Army benefits from a stronger, more capable Navy and Air Force’. And the same is true for those services and for the joint enterprise, so that’s a real sign of maturity in our organisation now.”

With many of Army’s new capabilities either here or due to soon start coming online, LTGEN Burr is acutely aware of Army’s need to evolve its thinking and its way of doing business in parallel with the upgrading of equipment. Almost without exception, much of that equipment to be acquired under LAND 400, LAND 8120, LAND 8112, LAND 19 Phase 7B and others will be much heavier, offer greater levels of protection, have greater fire power, and will be of a whole new generation of complexity than the capabilities it will replace.

“It’s all very exciting, but it’s not all happening overnight of course – the plans to acquire and introduce into service these capabilities all have their own plans and pathways,” he said. “Most importantly, considering all the fundamental input to capability implications, and making sure that they’re all addressed so that, ahead of time, we are preparing the ground so that we can start operating them effectively when they turn up.

“So that’s what we’re trying to achieve, whether it is through simulation, or through attachments to armies that are already operating these systems, for example,” he added. “And it’s building expertise and being engaged with the original equipment manufacturer or the industry partner to really progressively build understanding of these capabilities before they come into service.

“And then, of course, there is the synergy between

all of them. It’s the links between all these capabilities so that we’re developing our concepts and our operating procedures as early as we can, noting that there are obviously some things we won’t really know until we start operating them.

“That discovery learning, what’s actually possible – one of the most exciting parts of Army and the joint force is we learn by doing, and how our intelligent people see better ways of doing things – things that others may not have seen. They say, ‘why don’t we try this, now that we can do that?’ And then you’ve got a capability advantage which is what our ADF is always in search of.”

But not only does the Army need to learn to operate and to fight with all this new equipment, it needs to be able to move it quickly, to deploy it effectively, and to sustain it on operations.

“In terms of moving this equipment, we currently rely on Navy or Air Force to move Army around,” he said. “And once we’re in a location we have our own organic vehicle transport and aviation support. But I’ve also become increasingly focused on our own watercraft capability to make sure that we have sufficient, organic maritime manoeuvre, and to support these new capabilities.

“I think there’s a real opportunity there as we think about the (JP 2048 Phase 5) future watercraft project to make sure that it accommodates both Army’s needs, but also provides opportunities in the region to better collaborate with our regional partners as we think about inter and intra-island movements.

“So there is a project in the IIP for watercraft replacement, and we’re focused on what that might look like to meet these needs,” he added. “Army has operated heavy landing craft in our past prior to Navy

‘It’s all very exciting, but it’s not all happening overnight of course...’

The LCHs which were retired in 2012 will eventually be replaced under Project JP 2048 Phase 5 future watercraft program. DEFENCE

Chief of Army will be the ADF’s land-worthiness authority, aligning him with the Chief of Navy’s and Chief of Air Force’s sea-worthiness and airworthiness responsibilities.

DEFENCE

taking on the role. And as you know, we have recently provided some of these vessels to our Pacific island neighbours.

“So we’ve been there before, and we still operate the smaller LCM8 as well. That’s an old but reliable capability that does need to be replaced, so as we think about what that future holds, the medium and heavy landing craft concept is certainly an area that we are actively looking at. And I think that will allow us to be much more effective in our own region and make our Army more deployable and more self-contained with little extra overhead.”

As the complexity and cost of Army’s new systems rises, so too does the need to maintain a cohesive and accountable development and sustainment system in order to safely and effectively use these capabilities.

To this end, much as Air Force and Navy are focused on structured, documented and accountable airworthiness and sea-worthiness systems respectively, so too Army has a renewed focus on assuring its

systems are ‘land-worthy’.

“Land-worthiness has always been there, but not defined within a single framework,” LTGEN Burr explained. “So over the last couple of years we’ve been drilling into what are the other components of land-worthiness, how are they done? How do they all come together? And so forth. And what we’ve developed is a more coherent framework starting with appointment of Chief of Army as the authority accountable for land-worthiness, much like Chief of Air Force and Navy for air and sea-worthiness respectively.

“I think just is a natural extension of where we go to with air and sea-worthiness,” he added. “It’s arguably much more complex in the land space, because there is so much more equipment, and greater variety of types and fleets. This is even more reason to develop the land-worthiness framework.

So over the next six months we will work through in more detail what our model will be to bring assurance and fidelity to those accountabilities.

And then we’ll brief the CDF and the Secretary towards the end of the year.

“It’s not like we haven’t done it before, but it can be clearer and more joined up with accountabilities that are more defined. So to me, this is important. It gives us much more assurance and confidence in the safety and availability, and the effectiveness of the equipment and systems.

“I think it’s about making sure that we have good accountability and good governance around landworthiness. I think we owe that to our people and to our leadership.

And so to me this just needed to be done. The benefits will be the ability to manage with confidence more sophisticated, heavier, and arguably more complex equipment, and that makes us all better.”

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REDBACK

REDBACK!

Hanwha offers a compelling choice for LAND 400 Phase 3

T

here once was a time when Victoria could boast factories for Ford, Toyota, Holden and Nissan cars. These all are now all gone, with the last vehicle manufactured in the state being at Toyota Camry at Altona in October 2017.

But Victoria could recover part of its automotive glory through the manufacture of armoured vehicles.

The massive South Korean company Hanwha Defence is proposing to build AS21 Redback Infantry Fighting Vehicles (IFVs), K9 Thunder self-propelled howitzer (SPH) artillery systems, and K10 ammunition supply vehicles for the Australian Army at a new plant to be constructed at a green fields site near Geelong.

Richard Cho, Hanwha Defense Australia managing director, said there were very specific reasons why they had chosen Victoria.

But one of them wasn’t politics, despite agitation by the Victorian state government for something, anything, to replace the auto industry, especially considering other major defence projects,

BY MAX BLENKIN

particularly shipbuilding, had gone to South Australia.

“The capability and infrastructure of land systems in Australia drove us to Victoria. This was more efficiency driven rather than politics,” he told ADBR. That includes the Army School of Armour, the Defence trials centre at Monegeetta, and the Thales plant at Bendigo where Bushmaster and Hawkei protected mobility vehicles are made.

But most important for Hanwha is the skilled workforce base from the auto industry. “That is the biggest thing,” Cho said. “We recognise that there is a STEM issue here in Australia. We recognise that in the coming years the lack of an engineering pool presenting itself to industry base is quite a serious situation.

“We have plans to improve STEM by engaging with academic institutions to bring them on board in training with Hanwha and try to go a strong baseline for engineering capability in Australia.”

The company would be looking to the Victorian government for some help along the way. “Certainly

ADBR

we are talking to the Victoria government to lessen the burden in establishing the capability in Victoria,” Cho said. But equally certainly – the mid-2020s are a fair way off – there are some big hurdles along the way.

Vehicles proposed for construction come under two Army procurement projects – LAND 400 Phase 3 (IFVs) and LAND 8112 (SPH and ammunition vehicles).

LAND 400 Phase 3 is the main prize, and will replace the Army’s large ageing fleet of M113A2 and AS4 armoured personnel carriers with up to 450 modern IFVs. This is the largest ever single investment in new Army capability, although it remains modest when compared with the acquisition the Attack class submarines for the Navy.

The Defence Integrated Investment Program (IIP) cites a total cost of $10-15 billion over the period 2019-2032. Vehicles will be mostly constructed in Australia, so much of the money will remain in-country.

The LAND 400 Phase 3 request for tender closed on March 1, and the next step is scheduled for the third quarter of this year with the announcement of a shortlist, with the four known bidders – Hanwha, Rheinmetall, GDLS and BAE Systems – to be reduced to two.

Following the shortlist, there will be a lengthy period of evaluation of three vehicles from each contender. The government will announce a decision in 2022, with initial operating capability (IOC) scheduled to be achieved in 2024-25, and final operating capability (FOC) in 2030.

Each of the different vehicles appears capable of meeting Australia’s requirements for a modern mature tracked vehicle with manned turret, transportable aboard RAAF C-17A aircraft and Navy Canberra-class LHDs, and able to carry six fully equipped dismounts in addition to the crew.

The new vehicles will be acquired in a number of variants, the majority of which will be in IFV configuration. Other variants are likely to include command and control, joint fires, engineer and reconnaissance, ambulance, repair, recovery and

combat engineers.

Defence has also invited proposals for specialist manoeuvre support vehicles, mortar carrier and amphibious vehicles.

It has already specified some capability – Harris radios, an Australian EOS remote weapon station (RWS), and the Rafael Spike LR2 anti-tank guided missile (ATGM) which has also been selected to equip the new Rheinmetall Boxer CRVs under LAND 400 Phase 2.

But the ADF’s plans to acquire these new armoured vehicles which would be produced locally could conceivably result in a number of separate new factories, each of which would produce a relatively small run of less than 500 vehicles.

But once those production runs are complete, without additional immediate orders either from the ADF or overseas, they would likely have to retrench a large proportion of their skilled workforce, thus creating mini ‘valleys of death’.

The term valley of death most recently referred to the period of years between the end of major construction of the SEA 4000 Hobart class air warfare destroyer (DDG) and JP 2048 Phase 4A/4B Canberra class landing helicopter dock (LHD) vessels, and the planned start of new major projects such as the SEA 1180 Arafura class offshore patrol vessel and SEA 5000 Hunter class frigates, when companies had no choice but to lay off skilled workers.

Already Rheinmetall is creating a plant to produce about 190 Boxer CRVs at the new Military Vehicle Centre of Excellence (MILVEHCOE) at Redbank near Ipswich in southern Queensland. And should Rheinmetall’s Lynx IFV be chosen for Phase 3, that’s where they will also be built.

But during the recent federal election campaign, the Commonwealth government gave a very strong indication that a factory to build 30 Hanwha K9 Thunder self-propelled howitzers and 15 K10

‘This is the largest ever single investment in new Army capability...’

The Redback’s T2000 turret developed by EOS and Elbit Systems features armour options up to STANAG level 6. HANWHA

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REDBACK

ammunition supply vehicles under the resurrected LAND 8112 Protected Mobile Fires project would go to Geelong (see page XX of this issue).

“We will utilise the outcomes of the tender process cancelled by Labor and the Coalition’s Smart Buyer framework, as the starting point of an accelerated approval process,” Prime Minister Scott Morrison promised during the election campaign.

“This will ensure that an Australian prime contractor can deliver a world-class platform with work beginning in Geelong before the end of 2022-23.”

That seems pretty unambiguous – Hanwha K9 guns and their supply vehicles will be built in Geelong. And according to Hanwha, so will the Redbacks if the company wins LAND 400 Phase 3.

That makes two new armoured vehicle factories, plus the Thales PMV factory at Bendigo. And if GDLS or BAE Systems wins LAND 400 Phase 3, that raises the possibility of yet another factory.

For Hanwha, making its vehicles in Australia is much more than a means to sell equipment to the ADF. It sees production of armoured vehicles in Australia as a strategic backstop to its factories in South Korea, which in the event of conflict with the north would likely be held at threat.

“From our perspective, in event of a conflict, having a supplier is of paramount importance,” Cho said. “Our key objective of delivering a secondary supply chain in the event of conflict has not changed. We come from a nation that has been on a war footing since the Korean war.

“Throughout that period, what has become very important to the Korean armed forces is the ability to deliver self- reliance – we see Australia as being no different,” he added. “Therefore our objective here is also to create self-reliance for the Australian industry base. Production and assembly in Australia would assist in having that capability embedded in Australia.”

As a threatened nation which has had to sustain a

heightened state of military readiness, the Republic of Korea has developed some quality military kit, none of which has ever been chosen by the ADF. The only exception is the RAN’s AOR HMAS Sirius which was originally constructed as a commercial tanker in the Hyundai Mipo Dockyard, but that vessel is due to be decommissioned in 2020 when new Spanish-built replacements arrive.

Hanwha has launched a very concerted bid to redress that situation. Hanwha Defence Australia was formally launched in Victoria in late May, along with its LAND 400 Phase 3 teaming arrangement.

The event featured Hanwha Defence chief executive officer Sungsoo Lee, who said the company’s four decades of experience delivering more than 7,000 armoured vehicles had been distilled to create Redback in response to the nextgeneration requirements of the Australian Army.

Redback derives from the K21 IFV which was first fielded in 2009, and which now has more than 400 in service with the Republic of Korea Army.

The K21 was designed with substantial input from the intended end users, the Korean military, and their experience with the predecessor Daewoo K200 IFV which entered service in the late 80s and which was also sold to Malaysia.

K21 was designed to overmatch the likely adversary IFV, the Soviet-designed and widely used BMP-3. Redback is more ambitious – it’s intended to match the latest Soviet T-14 Armata family, especially the Armata T-15 IFV variant which is just now entering Russian service in small numbers. The Armata is yet to be exported but, like most Soviet equipment, they likely will.

LAND 400 Phase 3 parallels the US Army program to replace its large fleet of Bradley IFVs which entered service in the 1980s. That program has proceeded in different forms since 1999 and, in its latest third iteration, is now termed Next Generation Combat Vehicle (NGCV).

The LAND 400 Phase 2 Infantry Fighting Vehicle will provide a substantial increase in capability over the M113A2 and AS4 it will replace in Army service. DEFENCE

NGCV aims to procure modern IFVs with a high level of protection for occupants, improved sensors, a gun of 30mm with a path to upgrade to 50mm, and an eventual capability to be optionally manned.

Both LAND 400 Phase 3 and NGCV will feature mostly the same contenders and, like Australia, the US plans to shortlist two types then conduct extensive trials before reaching a final decision.

Under the Phase 3 teaming arrangement, Hanwha Defence is the prime, and Canberra-based EOS – through its subsidiary EOS Defence Systems – is the principal first tier sub-contractor. In collaboration with Elbit Systems, EOS has designed what it says is the most advanced armoured vehicle turret in the world for Redback.

“We believe Redback in combination with the EOS turret establishes a new global standard for simultaneously optimising protection, lethality, weight, mobility, price and future growth for a fighting vehicle,” Sungsoo Lee said.

The T2000 turret features armour options up to STANAG level 6, providing protection against 30mm APFSDS at 500 metres, and a 155mm artillery round exploding at 10 metres.

Hull armour is a classified combination of steel and composites, and Hanwha has already engaged with Australian steel firm Bisalloy – which was recently qualified by Rheinmetall to provide armour for the Boxer CRV – to trial some its armour steel for possible use on Redback.

Providing a high level of protection for crew and dismounts comes with a weight penalty. Redback has a combat weight around 42 tonnes. It is neither the heaviest nor the lightest Phase 3 contender, with the Lynx weighing in at nearly 48 tonnes, and the BAE CV90 at around 35 tonnes.

But it is still more than double the weight of the legacy M113AS4’s 18 tonnes, and not far short of a M1A1 Abrams MBT at 62 tonnes. By comparison, the US Bradley weighs in at 32 tonnes.

The turret features a roof-mounted EOS RWS, a

‘We believe Redback in combination with the EOS turret establishes a new global standard...’

coaxial machine gun such as a MAG 58, and a pair of Spike LR2 ATGMs in a pop-up launcher.

The basic main gun is a Bushmaster MK44S in 30 or 40mm calibre, but with an option to go up to 50mm.

With suitable types of armour piercing ammunition, a 50mm gun would be effective against even some main battle tanks. But for IFVs, 30mm is widely considered to be in the sweet spot for range, lethality and onboard ammunition capacity.

The sensor suite links to Elbit’s Iron Vision, an interesting capability whereby imagery from external sensors is displayed on a crew member’s helmet visor, allowing crew members to see 360 degrees through the vehicle armour with zero latency.

This is akin to the F-35 helmet-mounted display (HMD) where data from that aircraft’s distributed aperture system (DAS) is displayed on the pilot helmet’s visor. The Israeli Defence Force is also updating its Merkava main battle tanks with this capability.

And rounding off the impressive T2000 turret is Elbit’s Iron Fist active protection system, a pointdefence system against incoming anti-tank missiles or even artillery and tank shells.

Cho said the EOS T2000 turret would also be offered for its US bid, and back into Korea. “We have provided in our view probably the most modern IFV,” he said. “It is also being considered for the NGCV in the US (and) the Korean Army is also looking at the same system.”

Most appealing for Australian industry is the prospect that Korea will choose to update its large fleet of IFVs with a more modern version derived from Redback. That could involve substantial exports, which could go a long way towards making the Australian manufacturing base more sustainable.

“The way we see it is the component manufacture out of Australia, as long as it represents competitive pricing and a standard of quality the international market expects, why wouldn’t you export,” Cho said.

“We see no barrier as to why it wouldn’t be supporting the Australian industry base to do so. Of course each of the nations have their own desire to have localisation. But certainly I think Australian can be very competitive.”

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HEAVY MACHINERY When it comes to defence business in Australia, the big players are often subsidiaries of foreign firms. But now an Aussie veteran-owned small to medium enterprise (SME) is taking a shot at the big time

BY MAX BLENKIN

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C

anberra-based ECLIPS, best known as a supplier of innovative logistics equipment to the ADF and to the Australian resources sector, wants to become a prime on a significant Defence contract.

That contract is LAND 8120 Phase 1, Army’s effort to recapitalise the its ageing field engineering equipment with new commercial off-the-shelf (COTS)-based equipment, with modifications where needed to meet the inherent requirements of Defence.

There is a long list of equipment required for the project – cranes, excavators, front-end loaders, tractors, bulldozers, rollers, graders, skid-steer loaders, tele-handlers, concrete production plants, rock crushers, and even a beach recovery vehicle to support amphibious operations.

Defence cites a very wide range of uses for this kit, including construction, demolition, development of protective earthworks, route development and maintenance, airfield and port construction and repair, port operations, supply and

distribution, humanitarian assistance and disaster relief and beach recovery. All up, Defence requires 312 items of machinery in 17 groups.

The 2016 Defence Integrated Investment Program (IIP) refers to these as “engineer support platforms,” and notes a projected cost of $200-300 million and a program timeframe of 2017-2026.

This is the least sexy and the least costly end of the defence procurement spectrum. What’s being acquired will often be, more-or-less, the same type of equipment commonly seen on civil construction and mining sites across the country, just painted green.

Eclips managing director Shaun Moore said ECLIPS was a unique company well-positioned to win this deal. “Since our formation 12 years ago we have been immersed in the mining, oil and gas industry, and military markets,” he told ADBR. “We are unique because we have been learning, innovating, developing and sharing practical solutions across multiple Australian and international markets,” he added. “I was recently told that one of the challenges that the Australian defence

‘...we have been learning, innovating, developing and sharing practical solutions across multiple... markets’

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HEAVY MACHINERY

industry faces is competition from the other markets – ECLIPS is living proof that this does not have to be the case.

“ECLIPS synchronises with other sectors to ensure that the knowledge of best technology, best value for money deliverables, proven in Australia, is shared across our Australian Industries.

We are perfect for this project because we understand military and we understand commercial civil engineering and we have deep relationships in both.”

“Australia has a world leading civil engineering industry. We move more dirt and dig bigger holes than anybody in the world. We are the world leaders even if the machines are not manufactured here.”

The ECLIPS team is a mix of ADF veterans and young engineers.

Moore said this combination of engineers is always looking for new and inventive solutions, and the disciplined practical and contextual knowledge of veterans provided remarkable outcomes.

That approach has already attracted high praise.

Moore said he was recently told by a very senior officer from the UK Ministry of Defence that ECLIPS’s military logistics solutions were unique and world leading.

“I put this down to amazing synergies that we get from our dedicated and diverse team, and the privilege of working and learning across multiple Australian Industries,” he said.

Shaun Moore founded ECLIPS in 2007. He’s a former soldier who spent 22 years in the Army, deploying to Somalia in 1993 and then twice to East Timor. He started out as a digger and was eventually promoted to warrant officer class two then commissioned to captain, and departed the Army as a Major to run his own business.

ECLIPS started out building an urban training facility for the Army at Townsville, then smaller facilities for the Navy, Australian Federal Police, and the Defence Science and Technology Group.

But the ADF and others only needed so many modular training facilities and, once built, they have a long life and require minimal upkeep. But resources firms also need this kind of facility, and ECLIPS won a number of contracts for work on remote mining sites in Western Australia.

That led to their current bread and butter – purpose-designed logistics platforms to move problematic cargo to remote and harsh locations.

Moore said their work on the Gorgon Gas Project was a life changer. “The customer approached us looking to leverage military logistics ideology and urgently develop a solution to transport and store equipment in work packs for vast material movement from Perth to Barrow Island.”

The result was what’s called CROWS – the container rollout warehousing system – since sold to other global oil and gas companies and now being marketed around the world. To this end, ECLIPS has established an office in Mexico City to tap into the South American resources sector.

As innovative as CROWS has been, it wasn’t likely to attract mainstream media attention. But what

has is ECLIPS’s deployable Container Roll Out Solar System (CROSS), with the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) providing $289,725 for design, manufacture and testing.

This is a series of solar panels mounted on CROWS, stored and transported inside 20 or 40 foot shipping container. Seven CROWS, each with five solar panels, go inside a 20-foot container.

These can be speedily deployed to produce instant power – more than 15 kilowatts per 20 foot container, and more than 30 kilowatts per 40 foot container.

This has obvious applications for deployed forces and remote bases, and also to provide emergency power for humanitarian and disaster relief (HADR) applications.

Fortunately for ECLIPS, the end of the resource development boom has coincided with ramp up of the ADF’s recapitalisation of much of its capability.

ECLIPS designed and then delivered more than 2,000 ISO1C flatracks for Land 121 Phase 3, the project to replace Army’s Mack heavy trucks and Unimog medium trucks with a fleet of 2,500 Rheinmetall medium and heavy vehicles, along with 3,858 modules and 1,753 trailers.

ECLIPS then developed JMILS – the Joint Intermodal Logistics System – a wholly-Australian system for warehousing and transporting military stores which is

‘Australia has a world leading civil engineering industry’

ADBR

TOP & LEFT - Examples of some of the field engineering equipment that will be replaced under LAND 8120 Phase 1. DEFENCE ABOVE - Eclips flat racks on an Army HX77 truck. DEFENCE

also attracting interest from overseas defence forces.

ECLIPS first introduced JMILS though the rapid prototyping program to develop a capability to transport and warehouse 155mm artillery shells and charge bags so that they don’t need to be touched by human hands between factory and firing point.

Next came an Army requirement to store and transport ancillary equipment and spares for their new Grove cranes. ECLIPS designed an interface platform to hold all the Grove equipment on the standard ADF flat rack.

“Again our team looked deeper into the environment and not only created a transport system but leveraging our commercial experience the team developed a solution that provided Army with a barracks and field warehousing system, as well as field distribution system,” Moore said.

Moore said LAND 8120 is also a logical fit for ECLIPS. “We have looked at this very carefully. It is indeed a significant investment to pursue this important project. There are many good reasons for us to put our hat in the ring.

“It is time for a 100 per cent Australian-owned company to take some leadership in breaking the foreign-owned prime monopoly we have in the Defence industry. We have been converging best practice ideologies and technologies of the two industries for 10 years now and we have a track record

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of doing it. This project is perfect for us.”

Moore said ECLIPS understood how difficult it could be for Australian companies to be involved in programs like this. “ECLIPS commits to maximising opportunities for innovation and competitive Australian companies.

To do this we have created a supplier industry portal where Australian companies can register their interest to be involved in LAND 8120 as well as other ECLIPS programs.”

Moore said once ECLIPS had cracked being a Prime Systems Integrator (PSI) in Australia, the company would be taking innovative Australian engineering overseas, a move that aligns closely with that of the recently re-elected Morrison Coalition government and the initiatives put in place by former Defence Minister, Christopher Pyne. To this end, he said ECLIPS was recently invited to submit a proposal for a major contract in Europe.

But LAND 8120 is much bigger than any deals ECLIPS has done before, easily surpassing its previous largest contracts of $36 million for Defence and $40 million for the resources sector.

“It is bigger,” said Moore. “The message we want to get across is that when we do an oil and gas project, it’s $40 million and it’s done in 12 months. This is $200 million over six years. That’s $33 million a year – in the oil and gas sector we do that quantity per year.”

Defence has released some information on how it wants to proceed. The initial request for information (RFI) envisaged a single prime with a number of sub-contractors providing particular pieces of equipment. It also initially envisaged an option to lease or hire, but now seeks outright acquisition.

The request for tender (RFT) was released in March, and closes on July 30. Tender evaluation will be conducted in the third and fourth quarters of 2019, and will be followed by a decision. Contract signature is scheduled for the second quarter of next year.

Significantly, Defence stipulated that it is just looking to acquire the equipment in this deal, and that it may look at longer-term support later.

“The Commonwealth intends that Defence will support these platforms using original equipment manufacturer (OEM) data such as operating and maintenance manuals and parts lists,” Defence said.

“The Commonwealth is not seeking to establish a contract to outsource the support of these vehicles at this time.”

The existing field engineering fleet comprises some 600 vehicles in 60 variants, many of which are 20 years old which makes them elderly compared to industry which typically retains such vehicles for an average seven years.

Initially Defence thought to acquire some equipment such as bulldozers and excavators equipped with operator ballistic protection, and even a capability for remote operation during deployed operations in contested environments, especially urban areas.

But the current RFT specifies only COTS equipment with some modest modification to meet particular Army requirements.

Specialised armoured and robotic earth moving machinery could be the subject of a future procurement.

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ARMY TARGETS

ADBR

ARMY TARGETS Army looks to realistic training and simulation to better prepare for combat

BY MAX BLENKIN

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ARMY TARGETS

N

o human experience is more stressful than combat. The adrenaline rush, the senses are overwhelmed by harsh noise as bullets crack nearby, each carrying the threat of death or serious injury.

For two world wars, the Australian Army conducted weapons training mostly unrelated to what soldiers would experience the first time they actually came under enemy fire, by practicing shooting at large stationary bullseye targets at known distances, and with no-one shooting back.

Through World War 2, Korea, Malaya and Vietnam, the Army improved how it prepared soldiers for combat. Australian troops went off to Timor Leste, Iraq and Afghanistan well prepared and mostly well equipped.

Now, with the experience of two decades of deployments, the Army is looking to do even better.

“What we are looking at is an optimal system of training enablers to develop what’s called a precombat veteran,” LTCOL Dan Harrison, capability manager for land training support systems in Army headquarters told ADBR. “It focuses on building experience. It works on building people’s confidence by delivering experience. The idea is once you have gone through all this you will end up here as a pre-combat veteran. A pre-combat veteran is someone whose experiential learning is indistinguishable from combat.”

Although other militaries may have similar training concepts, the term ‘pre-combat veteran’ appears uniquely Australian. A Google search produced only references to the Australian Army, and not too many at that, while some literature refers to pre-battle veterans.

During his time as Chief of Army, now Chief of Defence Force GEN Angus Campbell said the Army should unashamedly aspire to be one of the best in the world, albeit not the biggest.

And the new approach to training is delivering on that, producing combatants who are not only better shooters, but overall better soldiers as well.

“All soldiers – regardless of their corps – need to be competent in small team tactics in complex terrain.

All soldiers need to be expert in the use of personal weapons and in unarmed combat,” says the Army’s Land Warfare Doctrine 1-0 Personnel released last year.

LTCOL Harrison said combat placed the ultimate demand on the human mind, and the more the soldier’s mind can be prepared through experience and familiarity, the greater the capacity to deal with the unexpected.

“We are making an assumption that we will not put someone in harm’s way who is not prepared to be there,” he said. “That’s something that Army has always done. We have certainly tried to prepare people for combat as well as possible.

“What we are doing now is better understanding what it takes to prepare someone for combat by

starting to delve into the preparation of the mind by knowing enough about combat psychology to know what we don’t know, and to start to focus on what are the training requirements we are delivering.”

This isn’t just for the psychologists, although they have certainly been engaged. It’s drawn much from the experience of two decades of deployments in Timor Leste, Iraq and Afghanistan. Lessons learned by Australian special forces – some of the finest exponents of close quarters combat in the world – have been consciously translated across the Army.

LTCOL Harrison said the new training techniques had already been adopted by some of Army’s brigades with very positive results.

“They started to look at the feedback and the soldiers were saying, ‘I have learned more in five days than in five years’,” he said. “That is now the consistent feedback from a number of soldiers. That is not their instructors asking them – this is scientists from the Defence Science and Technology (DST) Group.”

There’s been a very substantial investment in training facilities, capability and technology, with much more to come. Major Army acquisition projects include requirements for specific target and training capabilities. These include Projects LAND 400 Phases 2 CRV and 3 IFV, LAND 125 Phase 4 Soldier Systems, LAND 159 refresh of small arms and other lethal systems, and LAND 4108 heavy weapons refresh.

But there’s more. Both the rotation of US Marine Corps elements through the Northern Territory and the training of the Singaporean military at Shoalwater Bay require substantial infrastructure development,

‘What we are looking at is an optimal system of training enablers to develop what’s called a pre-combat veteran’

Army members train in a Weapons Training Simulation System (WTSS) at Enoggera in Brisbane. DEFENCE

ADBR

An ATS Live Fire Range in a Box trailer at Russel Hill in Canberra. DEFENCE

including target systems and ranges.

In mid-May, Defence opened a $300m tender for managing contractor services for upgrading of training infrastructure to support the US NT Force Posture Initiative. That includes a large range of works, including new weapons ranges and all required targetry for the Robertson Barracks close training area and also for training areas at Kangaroo Flats, Mount Bundey and Bradshaw. The tender closed on June 25.

LTCOL Harrison told us that, while previously target systems had been the responsibility of the Defence Estate and Infrastructure Group, that mode of delivery was changing. “CASG has not done ranges before, but there is a whole bunch of stuff we have asked them to do,” he said.

“CASG is now going to be the acquisition agency for the integrated land target system. We went to CASG and said we want you to be the ones who deliver everything that a soldier, sailor or airman reacts against in a live training environment. We said we needed a one stop shop, and CASG is going to be that one stop shop.”

LTCOL Harrison said the capability manager would continue to be the Army Simulation Program.

“In the future training environment there are going to be so many overlaps between the synthetic and live representations of operational actors, it makes more sense to have the one agency delivering the whole thing.

“You are now going to start to see an integration of your target systems and live simulation systems,” he added. “We never had that before, but we now have that written into requirements and fully funded it.”

The Integrated Land Target System group has identified a budget of $7 to $13m a year over the next 10 years which is expected to grow. The next step is to build the evidence bases.

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“At the moment it’s all qualitative data,” LTCOL Harrison said. “Now we are starting to put biometric sensors on soldiers and putting them in a free roam immersive simulator and mapping those responses.

“We are also getting the psychologists involved.

We have just announced a contract with the University of Newcastle for free roam immersive combat simulation and biometrics analysis, and we will start to build that bell-curve of what combat resilience looks like.

“We have also started to understand what it takes to prepare the mind for combat, and the target systems and ranges and other technology enablers and simulation required to support that.”

LTCOL Harrison said the development of the combat mindset in Australian soldiers begins in initial training. Traditionally, recruit basic weapons training featured emphatic and repeated warnings that firearms were dangerous, that they were only for killing, and that training in their use was a serious business.

“But what you are doing from the outset is frontloading that training with fear,” he said. “The trainee was learning from the outset to be afraid of the weapon, instead of comfortable with the weapon. By improving that mindset, you are able to free up the mind to improve learning which then translates to more advanced training, resulting in better decisions when faced with uncertainty.”

The Army will continue to use its Weapons Training Simulation System (WTSS), a virtual and immersive weapons capability as a “no consequence” training enabler using laser beams rather than live ammunition.

But no consequence means participants gain no sense of lethal consequence from their use of weapons. LTCOL Harrison said the Army was

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ARMY TARGETS

well aware of this effect, which was why troops deploying on operations always underwent live fire training before departing.

That has led to some interesting innovations.

One is greater use of frangible training ammunition, less powerful than conventional ammunition, but still able to cycle the weapon and be effective out to about 100 metres.

“It delivers lethal consequence,” he said. “In the mind of the combatant there is still an association between pulling a trigger and having a lethal consequence at the other end. But it’s much less damaging to targetry and range infrastructure.

“We wanted it as an indoor training round.

It’s lead-free which now brings indoor training ranges within the financial grasp of conventional forces. You can start to come up with some really interesting engineering solutions for training.”

One of those is the Live Fire Range in a Box, developed by Australian Target Systems which is run by former special forces officer Paul Burns.

This is a 40 foot armoured shipping container, with a video screen and bullet trap at one end, and places for two shooters firing live ammunition out of genuine EF88 rifles at the other.

The system detects the heat of bullet strike on the polymer rubber screen, and can be configured to display almost any scenario in high definition video. LTCOL Harrison said good training enablers delivered flexibility, variety and realism.

A routine grumble of office-bound Defence personnel is that they seldom get to shoot often enough to maintain currency. Additionally, ranges are often distant and heavily committed.

But the containerised Range in Box can go where it’s needed. It comes with its own weapons and ammunition which means users don’t have to undertake the hassle of drawing a rifle and ammo from an armoury.

Range in a Box is now on a capability demonstration tour to Enoggera, Shoalwater Bay and Townsville.

During the risk reduction activity at Majura outside Canberra, some SF soldiers spent their downtime practising shooting. “We had two instructors in that box for nearly a whole day,” LTCOL Harrison said. “They never got sick of it.”

This particularly allows soldiers to train on dealing with the multiple fleeting targets they will likely encounter in real combat.

Then there’s Australian company Marathon Targets’ robotic targets which are revolutionising live-fire field training in the Australian Army and also in the US Marine Corps. Each of their products unit comprises an armoured four-wheel all-terrain base unit, topped by a plastic mannequin which lowers when shot. Significantly, these operate autonomously and don’t require an operator.

They can zip backwards and forwards across a range, providing soldiers with practice in shooting at moving targets. Or they can be used in urban or bushland environments, as fleeting moving targets.

Groups of the robots will scatter when one is shot, providing a far more realistic reaction.

The US Marine Corps found that practicing with these robots dramatically improved ability to hit moving targets. In earlier days, the first time soldiers

actually encountered moving targets was on the battlefield.

LTCOL Harrison said it was quite a big deal to have an Australian company exporting into the US defence market. “We identified this as a training requirement some 20 years ago and invested in the engineering.

They ended up developing a unique product, and there was enough here to keep them in business.

“We have them at school of infantry at Singleton, use them for combat shooting training and sniper training,” he added. “The feedback we’ve got is fantastic – they are unique. There is no other way to train a sniper to do all the functions without a realistic human target at the other end.

“And as we started to better understand the training requirements, we now have ‘big Army’ looking at this and saying we really do need this – it’s not just a luxury for special forces.”

This does raise some complex issues, and LTCOL Harrison is cognisant that this is aimed at turning young men and women into better soldiers, not more effective killers.

“What we are doing is taking the approach that we want our young men and women to be the best possibly prepared for a lethal force encounter, and to know they have had the training and experience and confidence to deal with that situation,” he said.

He said a soldier with the tools, training and experience went to a place of confidence in their first experience of combat. “If the answer is, ‘no, I’m not prepared for this’, you go to anxiety and anxiety is exactly the last place you want to be in a firefight.

“We have always done the best we can do with the knowledge we had at the time. We have learned more about the human brain in the last 20 years and the way to prepare it for combat. We are better at understanding this and the training technologies we can use to deliver that training experience.”

When it comes to weapons system training,

A GaardTech BMP target with multiple round hits of various calibres, but remains servicable. GAARDTECH

ADBR

Army armoured vehicles, Tiger ARH helicopters and RAAF fast jets also need realistic targets, but too often what has previously been used bore little or no resemblance to real-world systems.

As an officer in the Royal Australian Armoured Corps and an M1A1 Abrams tank commander, Steen Bisgaard found himself shooting at shipping containers, half-sized wooden cut-outs, and relic friendly vehicle hulks, then producing fictional after-action reports describing what they had hit. “Simply put, everyone could see the targetry problem, but no-one had solved it,” he told ADBR. His company GaardTech was launched in 2018, and now makes realistic 2D and 3D replica armoured vehicle targets, including T-80, BMP3, BRDM-4 and SA-6 in 3D, and T-80, T-90, BMP-3, BRDM and BTR-80 in 2D. These are all common Eastern Bloc systems likely to be encountered anywhere Australian troops are deployed, but GaardTech says it will produce any 2D or 3D target type a customer may request for mission-specific and emergent-threat training.

GaardTech’s targets also come with systems to create realistic thermal, RF, WiFi and GSM signatures to enable night training using thermal sensors and long-range detection systems, along with conventional targeting systems.

“All our systems are steel so they have exceptional durability – they can take many rounds,” Bisgaard said.

“We have seen more than 25 Abrams main battle tank rounds go into a 3D target and it’s still standing, and more than 1,000 25mm rounds into 2D targets and they are still standing.”

During Exercise Chong Ju 2019, the Army’s live-fire demonstration at Puckapunyal, one 2D target was engaged simultaneously by multiple ASLAV 25mm guns and then Tiger ARH 30mm guns, and still stood to enable training for another day.

“We try and make them at a cost point so that once you have destroyed them, you can recycle them and receive a new fresh set,” Bisgaard said. “That also enables people to know exactly where they have hit the clean targets, so scoring and shot placement is enabled, plus it supports the ADF’s clean range policy, increasing environmental sustainability.”

Next from GaardTech is a demonstration to Army and the RAAF of their robotic 3D full size steel T-80 targets which are powered by electric motors and are able to be controlled remotely or with a semiautonomous capability. A group of tanks could appear in the distance and then conduct a series of manoeuvres – a far more realistic training scenario for Australian forces than one employing just static targets.

So far the RAAF has just used these targets for aerial observation training. “RAAF has completed two orders in the first half of 2019,” Bisgaard said, adding that, “GaardTech anticipates we will see ordnance dropped on these in one of their next activities.” Any target hit by live RAAF ordnance likely won’t be reusable, but GaardTech says that’s still cost-effective given the high cost of flight hours and ordnance.

GaardTech 3D targets are also set to be used at Shoalwater Bay Training Area for July’s Exercise Talisman Saber in an activity involving the US Marine Corps’ multiple launch rocket system (MLRS).

Bisgaard said their targets had great potential for artillery training. “Long-range fires and critical asset targeting is extremely important for how a networked force will want to fight,” he said. “You want to be able to find the high value systems and then destroy them from as far away as possible with minimal expose to your assets.

“A UAV can now go and find the enemy high value targets, however they will not be just sitting in the open waiting to die. They will have to be identified using multiple sensors and then they have to be struck within the limited strike window.”

GaardTech targets are manufactured in Brisbane and shipped as flat packs. A single shipping container can fit 10 full-sized 3D T-80 tanks, and each can be assembled in an hour using hand tools.

Bisgaard said this method works out much cheaper than target systems the Army has traditionally used which required large boxes, and silhouettes which required heavy vehicles and cranes to place and remove them.

“We are highly competitive on cost and we can reduce the logistics burden immensely. We estimate that we are about 50 per cent cheaper than what has traditionally been used,” Bisgaard said. “When you look at logistics in Australia, the true cost of doing an activity is extremely high due to the distances to the training areas. With GaardTech Targets you remove all the craneage, trucking and MHE costs.

“You might spend a little more on the systems than large steel plates, but getting it there and setting it up will cost far less and result in a far superior and highly realistic training scenario which will test and educate the forces beyond anything historically conducted.”

‘All our systems are steel so they have exceptional durability...’

A GaardTech SA-6 SAM system target. DEFENCE

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JOINT CAPABILITIES

JOINT CAPABILITI

Integrating the ADF’s people and equipment to prov coordinated, coherent and comprehensive capabi

BY ANDREW McLAUGHLIN

ADBR

ES

vide a bility

T

he ADF’s Joint Capabilities Group (JCG) was formed in 2017 as the second phase of the then-new ADF Headquarters (ADF HQ) Implementation Program.

The formation of ADF HQ, and subsequently JCG resulted from the 2015 First Principles Review which – through the One Defence approach – recommended key enabling capabilities within Defence be consolidated and integrated to provide a ‘coordinated, coherent, comprehensive capability’ to the ADF. JCG’s mission is to ‘deliver designated joint capabilities to improve the ADF’s warfighting effectiveness’ through its objectives of the delivery of joint outcomes by working with the services and Joint Operations Command (JOC) to be futurefocused by taking calculated risks and investing in new capabilities, and to develop a joint workforce by upskilling and promoting flexible and critical thinking.

In his Commander’s Intent, AIRMSHL Warren McDonald, Chief of Joint Capabilities says, “Joint Capabilities Group (JCG) is about maintaining a military warfighting edge, not a corporate edge. We are the linchpin of key capabilities that underpin our joint force, with our success or failure directly affecting those we support.

“We will lead Defence in its drive to optimise Joint Warfare performance by ensuring that we strengthen key capabilities such as Cyber, Space and Communications. We support Defence and Command by providing education and training, healthcare, logistics, policing, Reserve and Youth programs, civil-military cooperation and ADF sports coordination.

“We all have our part to play and undertake these activities so as to assist our allies and protect against those who seek to do us harm.”

JCG has an annual budget of about $2 billion and a combined workforce of 4,900 ADF and Australian Public Service (APS) people, and has elements at more than 90 bases and locations in every state and territory, and at overseas locations.

The nine areas AIRMSHL McDonald and JCG are responsible for are Information Warfare Division (IWD), Joint Logistics Command (JLC), Joint Health Command (JHC), the Australian Defence College (ADC), Reserve and Youth Division (RYD), the ADF Sports Cell, the Joint Military Police Unit, the Australian Civil-Military Centre, and the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) Directorate.

“In 2017, the Chief of Defence Force (CDF) stood us up so that we could get better traction, and provide better support for the enablers,” AIRMSHL McDonald told ADBR. “There are some sandstone organisations in JCG already including ADC, JLC, and JHC. “While these organisations were already in existence, for the Vice Chief of the Defence

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Force (VCDF) who they were reporting to, it was becoming – along with his portfolio where for almost half the year VCDF was representing CDF – more complicated as those organisations grew,” AIRMSHL McDonald added. “So it was recognised that we needed to stand up a ‘Joint Capabilities’ Group. And as we have moved forward in those almost two years, we have picked up other capabilities, and now we have nine areas of responsibility.”

While many of the above listed organisations were already in existence and have just been incorporated under JCG’s umbrella, IWD is new and is arguably the most important capability element JCG is responsible for.

Information Warfare has been described as the ‘Fifth Domain’ – the other four being air, land, sea, and space. Information Warfare capabilities include cyber; electronic warfare; information operations; space-based systems; command, control, and communications systems; and intelligence – all of which need to be integrated to generate coherent information capabilities for the ADF. At a relatively benign level, information warfare can involve the spreading of disinformation to deceive an adversary, as well as through state propaganda and the media, and the exploitation of open source intelligence (OSINT). At its most destructive application it involves the insertion of hacks and destructive viruses through cyber attacks on critical military networks, digital weapons systems and national infrastructure.

JCG through IWD is acutely aware of the role open source intelligence can play in future operations; such an example includes social media posts by Russian separatists and the part they played in bringing charges in the International Criminal Court against the perpetrators of the July 2014 shootdown of flight MH17 over eastern Ukraine.

Regardless, the first shots of any future war will be – or likely already have been – fired through the employment of such cyber capabilities. To this end, JCG says that IWD “leads the development of ADF information warfare capabilities and formulates the strategies and plans to counter contemporary threats in the information environment.”

IWD comprises five branches; • Information, Surveillance, Reconnaissance, and Electronic Warfare (ISREW) and Cyber which leads the development of ISREW and cyber capabilities, including cyber training and awareness; • the Space and Communications branch which is responsible for the development of satellite and strategic communications capabilities; • Joint Command and Control (C2) which develops joint command and control capabilities; • the Joint Influence Activities branch which develops capabilities aimed at enhancing the ADF’s ability to operate effectively in the

‘JCG is about maintaining a military warfighting edge, not a corporate edge.’

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JOINT CAPABILITIES

The ARH is now enjoying higher rates of availability and Army is confident it could be deployed if required. DEFENCE

information environment, and; • the Defence Signals Intelligence and Cyber Command which comprises the Joint Cyber Unit and Joint Signals Intelligence Unit, and is embedded within the Australian Signals Directorate (ASD).

At its most basic level, IWD is tasked with educating ADF personnel about the vulnerabilities they are exposed to every day. “Many of the vulnerabilities that exist in any organisation are the result of a lack of understanding about how vulnerable you are, and they’re often the simple things like clicking on a link,” AIRMSHL McDonald explained. “So we work with CIOG (the Chief Information Officer Group) and ASD to conduct education campaigns, and we’ll even send out our own phishing emails – not to catch and shame, but to catch and educate.

“Some of them are very sophisticated, and we do catch quite a few that were not used to having something displayed on their Defence Restricted Network (DRN) which is public facing through the internet,” he added. “So we work constantly to ensure we lock out any vulnerabilities.”

Those who attended the 2018 Airpower Conference in Canberra will remember AIRMSHL McDonald’s hard-hitting and compelling speech about cyber security. “That’s what we’re facing,” he said. “If we could seal off that, we’d seal off 80 per cent of our problems, it is literally that simple. We put a lot of time into weapons training, but we need to put a lot more time into educating our

personnel about the dangers of the cyber data.”

“I think the younger generation like the convenience of what social media brings,” he said.

“But with that brings complications. People like myself are probably not as engaged in it and can ignore it a little bit more – I’m not on any social media platform whatsoever, and I choose that. It’s not something I do just because I’m old, I choose to because I’ve seen where it can go in the hands of others and I think others may want to look at how they approach those social media platforms.

“With the advances in technology you can turn a picture into something completely different,” he added. “As you’ve seen in the media, there have been modifications of high profile people to say something that they never actually said, or to have faces that simply do not exist. It’s very clever, and it’s only going to become more and more common, so our people need to be aware of it.”

IWD also has an immediate focus of developing the ADF’s defensive cyber operations capabilities by building a trained cyber workforce and equipping it with the appropriate tools and training systems.

“We’re currently finalising Joint Project 9131 Phase 1 Defensive Cyberspace Operations for the deployed environment,” AIRMSHL McDonald said. “We go to government for second pass later this year, and we have been very involved in what outcome we are seeking.

‘We work with CIOG (the Chief Information Officer Group) and ASD to conduct education campaigns...’

Cyber security awareness for all ADF personnel is a key focus of the IWD within JCG.

ADBR

“MAJGEN Marcus Thompson and his team have also been responsible for standing up the cyber workforce defence collective,” he added. “They’ve got a detailed workforce plan that’s been agreed to, so we’ve caught it early. The workforce is going to start to change shape from the original intent, but we’ve got a really good framework to make sure we can develop our personnel and cope with the demands that are coming.”

Other areas of focus for IWD include the overall growth of the ADF’s cyber capability by not only ensuring all members are fully versed in cyber-security practices, but that they have input into all new projects coming into the Integrated Investment Plan (IIP) by ensuring they all have strong cyber security and resilience.

And as the ADF introduces more unmanned systems across all the domains that are reliant on satellite communications (SATCOM), IWD is looking to improve the ADF’s multi-phased Project JP2008 SATCOM capability through the establishment of the Space and Communications Branch which initially will work to develop policy objectives for space.

Another priority for the IWD is the delivery of the Project JP9347 Phase 1 Joint Data Network (JDN) which comprises tactical data links, the Integrated Broadcast System and other machine-to-machine data links used by the ADF and allies. The JDN will be designed to manage the requirements of future complex, congested and contested operating environments.

“JP9347 is going to government shortly,” AIRMSHL McDonald said. “That will put a wrapper around

all of our links that have been brought up through the individual services so we can understand the vulnerabilities and understand the upgrades required to move forward quickly.”

AIRMSHL McDonald says the future challenges JCG and the ADF as a whole faces are very real and, in many ways, already here. Therefore, one of his tasks is to look at project timelines and to try to compress them so the ADF can not only keep pace with technology, but so it can get inside an adversary’s threat development cycle.

“While I think the organisation itself will continue to move forward, the challenges are in capturing people’s attention long enough to make them understand that, in about the next seven years – collectively as a nation and globally – we are in for an enormous amount of change,” he said. “As digitisation starts to build a lot of speed, which it already has, you can sometimes catch people off balance.

“We have a tendency to overestimate the abilities of technology in the short term, but under-estimate it in the long term,” he added. “So, where do we pull that sliding scale so we can keep people focused on it? For example, if you look at the miniaturisation of electronic warfare sensors, this is a classic example of how quickly systems are reducing in size. Systems that weighed hundreds of kilos now can be the size of a laptop.

“It’s moving really quickly. We’ve seen the Air Force stand up the Loyal Wingman project, and across the ADF we’re in a transition from manned to unmanned.

In the future, the unmanned system will direct where

‘...in about the next seven years – collectively as a nation and globally – we are in for an enormous amount of change’

Through lax social media security and other open source intelligence (OSINT), the International Criminal Court has been able to bring charges against the perpetrators of the 2014 MH17 shootdown in eastern Ukraine.

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JOINT CAPABILITIES

the manned system should be, and then there may be no manned at all. How ready are we for that? How ready are we for artificial intelligence? How ready are we for robotics? Because all these things will come in more quickly than I think we are anticipating, and we have to be ready for it.

AIRMSHL McDonald says the rise of artificial intelligence has been rapid, and predicts a tipping point where it will be hard to tell the difference between a human and a robot. “Some will over-estimate artificial intelligence, but the general view AI is the equivalent of about a five year old at the moment,” he said.

“But it will mature quickly into an adult, some are saying within the next four years. Even if that is too quick and it’s 10 years, are we ready for that? By 2028 – 2030 you’ll have a little bit of difficulty understanding or trying to determine the difference between a human and a robot. They have robotic tactile feel down to that of a human.

“So, machine learning and data mining with an artificial intelligence, these are being brought together very quickly,” he added. “And then there’s human augmentation which is another thing we’re going to have to come to terms with. It’s already here with cochlear implants for example, while others have put implants in their brain so they can see infrared images.

“While some of these examples may not necessarily translate to usable outcomes, are we ready for them?

Are we ready for the revolution that digitisation will bring? Are we ready for people acting like companies, and companies acting like states which, again, is already starting to happen? How will that play out in the future, and are we ready to embrace it?

“All of these things will challenge Defence I think. So I look at some of these projects coming through with their timelines and say, ‘It’s not fast enough, you have to move more quickly’.”

A lot of what JCG is focusing on is being tested and peer reviewed through the ADC, located at Weston in Canberra. “Through challenging programs and ‘think tank’-like research they are maximising cognitive capacity in our people to grasp these information age challenges to ensure we have an enhanced intellectual edge in an era characterised by accelerating change in geopolitics, demographics and technology, AIRMSHL McDonald said.

“The ADC under (MAJGEN) Mick Ryan has really evolved into the future-focused learning institution our personnel need to be technically savvy and future ready,” he added. “He’s doing a great job of that, and is pulling in a lot of academics and setting groups for future thinkers.

“He’s really revitalised it. We’re in a good position now and setting ourselves up as leaders in Joint Professional Military Education globally. We’re attracting excellent ‘intelligencia’ and academia in to talk about these things, to understand where we are, and to give us a fighting chance of working our way through.

“We’re also setting up a Defence Artificial Intelligence Centre so that we can bring in different technologies and see how they play out on a protected unclass network. We’ll test what use they are to us so we can better understand them. It will sit under JCG, but we’ll work very closely with DSTG because they have some incredible people in their field.”

The Joint Capabilites Group organisational structure. JCG

Joint Capabilities Group Organisation

AM Warren McDonald

June 2019

Chief of Joint Capabilities

MAJGEN Marcus Thompson Deputy Chief Joint Capabilities Head Information Warfare

MAJGEN Mick Ryan

AVM Tracy Smart

Commander Australian Defence College

Commander Joint Health Command Surgeon General Australian Defence Force

MAJGEN David Mulhall Commander Joint Logistics Command

RADM Brett Wolski

BRIG Phil Winter

Dr Alan Ryan

COL Nick Surtees

Head Reserve and Youth Division

Director General ADF Soprt

Executive Director Australian Civil-Military Centre

Provost Marshal-ADF Joint Military Police Unit

ADBR

Joint Logistics Command (JLC) is Australia’s only joint military logistics capability, providing logistics support to ADF operations, force preparation, and raise, train and sustain activities.

RADM Ian Murray is the commander of JLC (CJLOG), and responsible for the delivery of JLC’s capability outputs. CJLOG is dual-hatted as the Defence Strategic J4 which is the most senior military logistics advisor to CDF and the Secretary of Defence. The role of the Strategic J4 is to harness and align the functions, components and organisations within Defence that deliver logistics support to the ADF. AIRMSHL McDonald says that CJLOG will implement the Defence Fuel Transformation Program that was approved by Government last year. “The Government has allocated funding of $1.1 billion over the next 30 years to deliver a safer, simpler, and more assured Defence Fuel Network in partnership with Industry,” he said. “The Program will make targeted investments in the Defence Fuel network and seize immediate opportunities to improve flexibility and increase the level of industry collaboration.

“The Program will ultimately reduce network risk, improve the ability of the fuel network to deal with disruption, and reduce the cost of ownership to Defence,” he added. “As part of the Program, JLC has begun engaging with Australian industry on future innovative fuel supply and facilities operations and maintenance contracts at an Industry Brief held on 4 July 19.”

CJLOG is also responsible for Explosive Ordnance (EO), an integral part in the ADF’s ability to fight and

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win. In this context, EO ranges from simple munitions to complex guided weapons, and represents challenges to Defence in terms of achieving capability, safety and security outcomes. It is a multi-function enterprise that supports the supply surety of certified EO, integrating governance, test, acquisition, maintenance, storage, handling, and distribution activities.

“The coordination of EO activities is a complex body of work, requiring harmonisation of multiple stakeholder inputs and outputs across the EO Enterprise,” AIRMSHL McDonald said.

In closing AIRMSHL McDonald said JCG will continue to be aligned with each of the services as they identify new or enhanced requirements, and develop and upgrade their capabilities. “We liaise with all the projects that come through the services,” he said.

“We have full input into them, and we debate them at investment committee to ensure we have the right balance.

“We are very well integrated with the services,” he added. “We’re adopting all the successful innovation and modernisation programs of the services such as Air Force’s Jericho piece, Navy’s Plans Pelorus and Mercator, and General Burr’s Accelerated Warfare.” (see article page 34 this issue.)

JCG on the surface can seem eclectic given its portfolio but it has more synergies than meets the eye.

“At a recent senior leadership team meeting, someone said, ‘I don’t think we will ever get accused of group think’. Given the mix of our portfolio, I think that hit the mark pretty well. And we will need all that diverse thinking to meet the challenges of the future..

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FORWARD BA

63

MOUNTING SES

Access and basing – and logistics writ large – is back in the spotlight in the Indo-Pacific and beyond

BY JOHN CONWAY

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FORWARD MOUNTING BASES

n 2018 the Australian Government’s 2018 announced a partnership with the US to develop the Lombrum naval base on Manus Island. More recently, it added plans to upgrade the Cocos Islands airport with a wider runway and taxiway, and strengthened parking aprons.

Both of these developments send a strong message about the importance of logistics in setting Australian Defence Force posture in the broader region.

Elsewhere, the UK MoD recently completed its first overseas deployment of six F-35B Lightning II aircraft to its largest overseas base at RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus.

Although it started out as a training exercise, it soon expanded to include combat operations over Syria, this deployment highlighting the critical importance of infrastructure and logistics in accelerating the integration and projection of power and influence.

While major platform acquisitions invariably steal the limelight, the mounting interest in operational access and basing, and the US’s and the Commonwealth’s increased focus on the readiness and sustainment of high intensity operations in the Indo-Pacific region, marks a significant change in the force posture which has characterised recent operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.

With economists calling for broader investment in Australia’s infrastructure to stimulate the economy, they should look no further than national security objectives as a priority.

The Sir Richard Williams Foundation High Intensity Operations and Sustaining Self-Reliance seminar in April 2019 broke new ground with a shift in focus from the design and generation of a 5th generation force to the practical aspects of its application and sustainment. The seminar examined the challenges in preparing and posturing the Defence Force for a future which is fundamentally unknowable, and the impact of policy on the way we think and prepare.

In his opening, Professor Brendan Sargant analysed

trends from recent White Papers and the wistful nature of the pursuit for a rules-based order, while Dr Andrew Carr unpacked Defence self-reliance in the context of Australian foreign policy, and Dr Alan Stephens analysed self-reliance and its inextricable link to military strategy.

Each looked to the future with a nod to the past, holding a mirror to extant policy and thinking, and painting the picture of a defence force that must now further embrace industry and become increasingly prepared to take the lead and become ever more selfreliant. And operate at higher tempos, too.

The lasting message was that policy was in a state of flux and likely to remain so, with the impact on Defence becoming clear in that it must now think in terms of what it might be required to do rather knowing with certainty what it will be going to do.

With an emphasis on preparedness and building sovereign capability, the seminar highlighted the importance of establishing favourable policy settings for the operational architecture and apparatus of a sophisticated manoeuvre capability in the Indo-Pacific region, which will go beyond the major systems which have dominated the defence narrative for the past decade.

Above all, it highlighted the criticality of access and basing, and a renewed emphasis on logistics as an essential element of defence preparedness, and the prerequisite for future operational success.

‘The lasting message was that policy was in a state of flux...’

ACCESS ALL AREAS

The past two decades have largely seen the ADF contributing force elements to US-led coalitions in support of operations with a reasonably well-defined scope in terms of missions and tasks. These tasks were extremely dangerous and difficult, and way beyond the capability of most defence forces. Whether or not they had clearly defined linkages to geostrategic objectives is another matter but, without doubt, the ADF acted professionally and further established a reputation for

HMAS Choules at Lombrum naval base on Manus Island.

DEFENCE

ADBR

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so-called ‘operational’ art of linking strategic objectives with tactical actions through the design, organisation, synchronisation, and command and control of operations and campaigns is practised.

OPERATIONAL ART

An RAAF P-8A at RAAF Learmonth, a bare-bones base in Western Australia.

Upgrades to the Cocos Island runway and taxiways will allow these aircraft to be deployed further forward into the Indian Ocean region. DEFENCE

Cocos Island is receiving upgrades to its runway and taxiways to accommodate heavier aircraft such as the P-8A and KC-30A. DEFENCE

operational excellence.

Much of the architecture and apparatus for operations in the Middle East and Afghanistan was put in place by the US with support from others.

Basing, commodities, and contracted services were provided by gulf state host nations, with the United Arab Emirates and Qatar in particular providing safe and secure facilities from which the coalition projected overwhelming firepower.

But the Williams seminar described a different future, with Defence refocusing on the Indo-Pacific theatre and its new power projection challenges, not least in relation to secure and resilient access and basing. Providing the architecture and apparatus for the operational level in the region will require increasing levels of influence and investment, just at a time when China and others are trying to do the same.

And it’s not just physical access. In most cases the ADF will also have to gain access to the information domain and, more specifically, potentially fight for access to the electromagnetic spectrum with commercial actors just as hungry for the spectrum as the military.

Therefore, in many ways it could be argued that from an organisational perspective, operations in the Middle East skipped a level – the operational level, where the

Operational art is fundamentally a form of communication with its intent to send a message to both friend and foe. It is described in human-centric terms, such as imagination, skill, talent, influence and, above all, ideas, measured in terms of the power, influence and impact they create. Logistics, for example, is fundamentally characterised as being operational art.

Yet many defence forces instinctively prefer to deal in the more tangible aspects of operational science and combat systems, even though future concepts and doctrine describe an increasingly important role for combat support and combat service support systems.

Such is the nature of Defence resourcing and acquisition that operational art is more often than not in lag of the science, and focused on the application of force at an individual combat system, or project level.

Indeed, doctrine does not help either with its somewhat scientific and business-school description which lacks important detail and nuance: ‘Operational art links available resources (means) and tactical actions (ways) to the attainment of national and military strategic end states and objectives (ends), while taking into account possible costs (risk)’.

Although this description is technically correct, the new operational environment which is characterised by long-term strategic competition across multiple domains, renders such definitions inadequate and in need of a significant refresh if it is to generate the thinking necessary to counter new threats and new risks.

Since the end of the Cold War most coalition operations have been dominated by science and management rather than operational art, especially so in the past decade, despite a broader move away from the overly scientific approach to operational planning seen in the Vietnam War era.

A key factor for many defence forces has been the harsh reality of the 2008 global financial crisis (GFC) which sent shockwaves across western economies and resulted in many forces being substantially configured for efficiency rather than effectiveness. And while the first order impact of the GFC on the ADF was limited, the US and the UK were not so lucky, with project cancellations and underinvestment in combat-enablers allowing strategic competitors to rapidly close the capability gap.

Ideally, operational art should lead the defence investment debate and be free-thinking and imaginative, open to criticism, contextualised historically, and its aesthetic dimension representing the character of the society from which the defence force is drawn.

Of course, this must be set within the constraints of an affordable defence budget and the physical building blocks of the force structure. But simply linking strategy to projects and systems, rather than mission objectives is unlikely to guarantee operational success.

History has proven, time and again, that operational success has been as much about ideas and institutions, such as bases and logistics facilities, as it was the force structure itself. The most likely missions and tasks the

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FORWARD MOUNTING BASES

ADF will conduct in the Indo-Pacific region in the future will require a similar focus on the operational architecture and apparatus necessary to enable the manoeuvre of a networked, 5th generation force.

OPERATIONAL APPARATUS

There is nothing new in recognising the importance of basing and logistics and their relationship with operational success. But the Williams seminar explored the art of logistics in a modern context, and highlighted the practical elements of projecting and sustaining a digitally networked, joint force, and the need to incentivise defence industry to become part of the solution too.

Presentations by Donna Cain-Riva, LTCOL David Beaumont, LTCOL Keirin Joyce, and WGCDR Alison McCarthy demonstrated the importance of professional mastery and intellectual rigour in the way readiness and sustainment challenges must be addressed as an enterprise when integrating the tactical edge of ADF warfighting capability with the national support base. They described the apparatus necessary to support an agile and technically sophisticated joint force that has a growing dependence on digital supply chains.

The assurance of these supply chains must also be set within the context of a secure and resilient basing strategy. Protecting and operating bases in the broader region will place an increased demand on resources and will need to consider whether the contracted logistics and support services upon which many platforms rely are able to deploy and sustain operations when threat levels are elevated.

And while the presenters validated the importance of the enabling capabilities described in detail in the 2016 Defence White Paper, they also revealed much is still to be done and investment to be made in major force-multiplying logistics projects. This will be challenging since logistics cannot be bought offthe-shelf like many major weapon systems, and it is often oversimplified to focus on supplies. Yet basing provides the platform upon which sophisticated and resilient logistics capability can be built, and firepower delivered.

Furthermore, by using the term ‘enabling capabilities’, it can relegate them to a supporting role which inevitably translates into under-investment when budget pressures impact priorities and the competition for resources.

But without these enablers the joint force is constrained significantly no matter how impressive the line-up of combat systems. The consequence of this is to limit the operational options and choices available to the Government of the day, and thereby handing a strategic advantage to a competitor.

The unfolding geo-strategic circumstances are such that yesterday’s enablers are becoming tomorrow’s battle winners.

LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION

Operational apparatus – described in terms of critical infrastructure (bases, ranges, ports and airfields), information and communications technology (ICT),

logistics support, science and technology, and health services – must be designed at an enterprise level rather than within individual projects.

The benefits of designing and building enabling capabilities at an enterprise level was exemplified in Wohlstetter’s Strategic Air Base Study, conducted on behalf of the RAND Corporation in 1954. The study examined the key factors in the selection of US bomber bases, which included, among others, distances to targets, favourable access points into enemy defences, logistics and the supply chains.

In his report into the Analytical Criteria for Judgements, Decisions, and Assessments, Barry Watts, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic & Budgetary Assessments (CSBA) from 2002 to 2014, points out that Wohlstetter’s study “not only resulted in a more secure posture for Strategic Air Command’s bomber force, but also saved the Air Force a billion dollars in planned construction costs for overseas bases”.

Watts describes the success of the study as being down to its focus on the operational art of where and how the bases would be used as part of a broader strategic system, rather than the science of simply working out how to acquire, construct, and maintain them. This exemplifies the importance of considering the asymmetries of the battlespace in a net assessment approach to competition, rather than tactical platformon-platform engagements.

Throughout history, access and basing and, more recently overflight rights, have played a significant role in the projection of military power, with the strategic significance of many of those factors enduring to this day. The most successful long-term basing locations have been those which have proven to be secure, resilient, flexible and adaptable and, moreover, available to operate within a broader strategic and operational enterprise, not just in support of local tactical activity.

While individual types of bases are described doctrinally in terms of their location, permanency, and facilities, the most effective bases are those which maintain asymmetric and strategic

China is constructing a number of forward bases with runways, air movements terminals, port facilities, and significant underground fuel and weapons storage throughout the South China Sea.

‘A key factor for many defence forces has been the harsh reality of the 2008 GFC...’

ADBR

John Conway has worked in the Australian Defence Industry for almost a decade and specialises in the design, integration and implementation of command, information warfare and human factors at the enterprise level.

He is a Board Member of the Sir Richard Williams Foundation, and his experience as a senior joint air warfare commander and air combat aviator includes Cold War Europe in the Second Allied Tactical Air Force, the Balkans, Middle East, and Eastern Mediterranean theatres of operation.

An RAF F-35B touching down at RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus.

UK MOD

relevance over time, and provide a range of options across the full spectrum of operations.

FORCE PROJECTION

Looking further afield, RAF Akrotiri on the Island of Cyprus is an interesting case in point.

Cyprus has throughout history maintained its geostrategic relevance with numerous rulers recognising and exploiting its significance. At one point it was gifted to Queen Cleopatra of Egypt by the Roman General Mark Antony. Later, Richard the Lionheart used it to mount crusades before selling the island to the Knights Templar for 100,000 gold bezants.

More recent times saw the Republic of Cyprus forming in 1960 under the treaty of independence wherein the British retained control of the military bases and installations, which remain operational to this day.

Described formally as a Permanent Joint Operating Base (PJOB), Akrotiri serves as a multi-purpose enabler for operations in the eastern Mediterranean and Middle East theatres, and beyond. It has been used by the UK and its allies as a base for operations in Iraq, Libya, Lebanon, and Syria, among others. Indeed, the ADF deployed an RAAF C-130H detachment to Akrotiri in 2006 as part of Operation RAMP to support the DFATled evacuation of Australian personnel from the war in Lebanon.

Much of Akrotiri’s success has been down to its functionality as a forward mounting base (FMB), one which delivers capability within the theatre of operations but far enough away from the combat area to allow the storage and maintenance of weapons and munitions, vehicles, role equipment, and fuel supplies without the levels of security required in forward operating bases.

A key function of an FMB is to enable and accelerate the integration of the joint force before forward deployment to main operating bases, and to carry

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out those logistics activities that are too difficult to undertake at a busy forward operating location.

In other words, it provides a stepping-stone at the operational level for individual force elements to accumulate the fighting power required in the combat area; fighting power measured in terms of both operational art and science.

The recent deployment of the six RAF F-35Bs to Cyprus, and the acceleration of their integration into combat operations over Syria provides further evidence to support the development of the architecture and apparatus of a networked 5th generation force in the Indo-Pacific. New or re-developed basing can hold extensive fuel reserves, weapons, and pre-positioned equipment for future deployments, thereby reducing the demand for air and sealift just at the time when it is needed the most.

The development of basing on Manus Island, Cocos Island, as has been reported recently in the Northern Territory, and elsewhere represents a significant opportunity to enhance the preparedness and resilience of the ADF and forward-deployed US forces. Combined with an appropriate ongoing investment in training ranges and logistics capability, the Commonwealth can leverage Australia’s enduring geo-strategic advantage, and negate the need for other highly-specialised and resource-intensive force structure drivers such as aircraft carriers.

Adaptable, secure and resilient bases provide operational access, and their inherent logistics capability links strategy to task. They link force structure to accelerated warfare, and resources with strategic outcomes.

A network of strategically located bases are the foundations of a sophisticated 5th generation manoeuvre capability, and provide increased choice and options when the time comes to project firepower and influence.

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MATV SYCAMORE

35

M AT V S Y C A M O R E

A SHIP FOR ALL SEASONS Vessel plays key role in getting trainee pilots on deck

BY OWEN ZUPP

T

he Royal Australian Naval College at HMAS Creswell is considered to be the cradle of the Royal Australian Navy (RAN), graduating its first cadets in 1916. As such, a vessel sitting nearby offshore in Jervis Bay is nothing particularly unusual.

However, as part of the recently developed Helicopter Aircrew Training System (HATS), based at HMAS Albatross at Nowra NSW, this vessel is serving a pivotal role in the training of not only today’s military helicopter pilots, but much more. And she goes by the name MATV Sycamore.

ANSWERING THE CALL

When HATS was conceived under the initial guidelines of the AIR 9000 Phase 7 project, the goal was to “provide a new training system incorporating both live and synthetic training elements to consolidate Navy and Army helicopter training into a single joint helicopter aircrew training system”.

In doing so, it brought the two services together geographically at Nowra, combined under the banner of the Fleet Air Arm’s 723SQN.

The new facility boasts purpose-built classrooms and new technologies, including virtual reality, to train the next generation of rotary-wing pilots and crew. It has merged the skillsets of Army and Navy instructors who brought their own expertise, from significant Night Vision Goggles (NVG) experience to deck landing familiarity respectively.

From marshalling to winch operations, flight simulators to flight training in a new 15-strong fleet of the twin-engined Airbus Helicopters EC135 T2+, no aspect of training has been left unconsidered. And still, for all of the benefits that HATS has brought, a key element was needed beyond the perimeter fence at Nowra that no amount of ground-based facilities could provide – real ship’s deck operational experience.

The ongoing issue was a matter of logistics.

Availing the likes of a frigate, destroyer or amphibious vessel for the purpose of helicopter deck training was difficult on a number of counts. Firstly, the vessel had to be tasked to be proximate to Jervis Bay and secondly, it may draw the ship away from its primary role, an especially difficult ask considering Navy’s high operational tempo of the past two decades or more.

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MATV SYCAMORE

But even if it was possible to organise an operational vessel to be available for training, there was no guarantee that it wouldn’t be called away for an operational duty, such as humanitarian relief in one of Australia’s Indo-Pacific neighbours.

Consequently, a dedicated vessel was needed, and the Multi-Role Aviation Training Vessel (MATV) Sycamore was commissioned.

A CHAMELEON

There is very much more to the Sycamore than meets the eye.

At first glance, the 93-metre vessel does not necessarily catch the eye of the onlooker. With a beam of 14.4 metres and a relatively shallow draft of 3.90 metres, it is not bristling with armament nor does it possess the towering superstructure that many associate with a naval vessel. But, the Sycamore is not a typical naval vessel.

Entering service in 2017, the MATV Sycamore is not one of Her Majesty’s Australian Ships, and is instead on the civil register. The Commonwealth has engaged Teekay Shipping (Australia) to crew, operate and maintain the vessel, while the flightdeck operational support team is provided under contract by OPSTAR. Consequently, the ship maintains a civilian crew of 21 including a paramedic on board. There is a single naval liaison officer who provides the conduit between the many roles the navy tasks for the Sycamore and the civil contractors that provide the service. Even so, many of the contractors have themselves previously served

in the Navy, and as such bring with them a wealth of experience.

Beneath the decks, an engineering team of four sees to the ongoing serviceability of the vessel.

Environmental systems, engines, fuel, oil, hydraulics, water, ballast, waste and electrical power are just some of the systems that are monitored and maintained.

And while the team keeps the Sycamore operational, as with Navy crews, they are also trained and able to assist in firefighting duties should they be needed.

With the vessel only planned to dock for scheduled maintenance every five years, the Sycamore possesses both sufficient redundancy and a crew that can conduct repairs and maintenance at sea.

The civilian contractors rotate through the Sycamore on six-week shifts, while the naval liaison officer – CMDR Karl Brinckmann – alternates between sea and land duties every three weeks. But with 91 bunks on board, the vessel can be home to more than two hundred people in any particular week as various units transit through the ship. This calls for an ongoing process of rotating bedding and towels, while the well-equipped galley provides high quality meals to those onboard.

CMDR Brinckmann’s duties are wide-ranging on a vessel that provides more than 300 sea days per year. In addition to his aviation role, he coordinates visits from

MATV Sycamore serves as much more than an aviation training vessel. DEFENCE

‘Elite clearance divers also use the vessel for training in a variety of skills...’

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An Albatross-based EC135 is guided down onto the Sycamore’s flight deck from the control room. OWEN ZUPP

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new entrant officer course students, or NEOCs, and trainees from the Sailor Recruit School who arrive in numbers to have their first ship-borne experience, staying overnight on the ship.

Working month on-month off, paramedic Garry Vincent is a veteran of the NSW Ambulance Service and meets the wide range of medical demands that can take place, from sea-sick recruits through to more acute conditions. In a broader sense, the paramedic on board also needs to monitor the crew’s fatigue levels and hydration while keeping one eye on the nearest land-based medical aid in case a medical evacuation, or medevac, is required.

Elite clearance divers also use the vessel for training in a variety of skills including deploying for reconnaissance on the shores of Jervis Bay to practising clearance techniques which can be used to clear mines in a setting of conflict, or post-cyclone debris in a humanitarian role as they did in the wake of Cyclone Winston’s devastation in Fiji in 2016.

Utilising the Sycamore’s aft mission deck, the clearance divers can finetune the process of launch and recovery of their teams and equipment such as RHIBs. Midshipmen populate the bridge, receiving intensive one-on-one tuition in what it takes to

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navigate and operate a vessel, as one day they hope to command their own ship. Again, as the Sycamore is a dedicated training vessel, training is the purpose rather than a by-product in an operational environment.

Clint Walters, a former Navy officer now wears a civilian uniform and offers patient, personalised attention to each of the trainees.

Through this dedicated training, the midshipmen are exposed to multiple tasks, from approaching a buoy and performing duties as officer-of-the-watch, to manoverboard drills. Such is the nature of the Sycamore that, in their two weeks aboard the ship they are able to accrue 110 of the 250 bridge training hours required.

WHERE THE SKY MEETS THE SEA

Australian Army MAJ Mark Cameron-Davies previously served in the British Army Air Corps before moving to Australia, and has had a varied career that has seen him fly the Aerospatiale Gazelle, Bell 206 Kiowa, Tiger ARH, and now the Airbus EC135 as 723SQN’s Standards Officer. He is also wearing the only khaki camouflage uniform among twenty NEOCs in their blue-grey Navy disruptive patterned uniform as the launch skims across Jervis Bay during your writer’s visit to the Sycamore.

Approaching the ship, there is no mistaking that the ‘A’ in MATV Sycamore stands for aviation, as the aft helicopter deck is the first noticeable feature. Boarding the vessel, we are relieved of our life jackets and shown to the sizeable mess by CMDR Brinckmann, where a hot coffee awaits.

The towering forms of clearance divers move about, having re-joined the vessel in the early hours, while the NEOCs take their seats with an obvious air of excitement. Everything is spotless and wellequipped, and if it wasn’t for the coffee gently swaying in the cup, one could forget that we were on board a ship – although it must be said that we were still in the calm waters of Jervis Bay. CMDR Brinckmann briefs us on the day’s operations, which began early and are varied in their nature.

From an aviation perspective, a 723SQN EC135 will be

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MATV SYCAMORE

operating onto the Sycamore in the afternoon. But before the helicopter arrives, there is still much to see and do.

The screen upon the wall in the mess also serves as the focal point for the aviation safety induction briefing which is delivered by the head of the flightdeck team, Kerwyn Ballico, from Opstar.

The briefing emphasises safety as a priority, and that many of the routinely accessible paths on the ship will be blocked off and marked with a scarlet ‘NO GANGWAY – FLYING STATIONS’ placard and will be unavailable from 30 minutes before flying operations. The potential of foreign object damage (FOD), the presence of deck lights and cameras and the lowered safety nets during operations are all covered for those experiencing Sycamore’s flightdeck routine for the first time.

The bridge of the Sycamore is equipped with a range of digital technology and radar screens, while an old-school compass can still be found, reinforcing the importance of the fundamentals and the need for redundancy.

The discussion moves to the role of the vessel in helicopter operations and the importance of SHOLs, or ship/helicopter operating limitations.

Effectively, the ship is a moving landing platform that can be manoeuvred for the approaching and departing helicopter with the ideal direction of approach being from the stern, while the ship’s superstructure can create eddies and disturbances in the airflow that can affect the helicopter in these critical phases of flight.

The SHOLs are determined during a new class of vessel or a new aircraft type’s first of class flight trials (FOCFT), an intense period of flying by dedicated test pilots in varying sea states, wind conditions, and weather to evaluate and certify the limits of operating an aircraft from the vessel.

Each SHOL is specific to each helicopter type, be it an EC135, MRH-90 or MH-60R, and each particular ship class, and it comes in the form of an overlay which attaches to a circular slide rule, similar to the old-style flight computer pilots are blooded on.

By inputting the relevant environmental conditions, including the sea state of pitch and roll, the relative wind direction and speed can be ascertained to determine the limits for safe operations. As with the compass on the bridge, while the ability to calculate the SHOL via computer is becoming available, the manual method is a fundamental skill that needs to be retained.

The flightdeck team leader joins us once again and leads the briefing for the upcoming flightdeck operations. Following a standardised format, he details the potential hazards, communication procedures, weather and sea state, relevant airspace, and a range of additional details relevant to the safe execution of the exercise.

Leaving the bridge, the EC135’s arrival time is getting close, so we make our way to the aft of the vessel where CMDR Brinckmann is waiting, with one more stop along the way.

CLEARED TO LAND

Below decks is also home to aircrew. Their locker room is dimmed with green light, allowing preflight testing and adjustment of night vision goggles

in a dedicated bracket while across the way, the briefing room is decked out with sizeable chairs, and the walls are fitted with screens and boards. MAJ Cameron-Davies points out that while the briefing room appears rather comfortable, it is also where the aircrew effectively live when not above deck and flying.

Another room below is assigned to service unmanned aerial systems (UAS). The Sycamore is the first Australian ship designed and built to operate unmanned aerial vehicles, and is fitted with the antennas and control system for the Insitu ScanEagle. It also has an adaptable module for the Schiebel Camcopter S100 unmanned helicopter to provide another asset for unmanned aircraft system support training.

Emerging into the sea air once more, we enter the flightdeck control area where CMDR Brinckmann has already conducted the preliminary checks of communications, both external and on board, as well as the status of the deck and lighting. With the systems checks complete, he now assumes yet another duty, effectively as the air traffic controller of the MATV Sycamore.

An EC135 on approach to the flight deck. OWEN ZUPP

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Sycamore’s mission deck can support RHIB operations.

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Fronted by broad windows equipped with massive windshield wipers, the control area is a sleek area with modern consoles and two substantial seats, although CMDR Brinckmann opts to stand and remain mobile.

Television-like screens show various camera angles, while central digital gauges announce the vessels heading, speed, pitch and roll.

The radio announces the arrival of the EC135, crewed by two instructors from HMAS Albatross completing their recency requirements. CMDR Brinckmann communicates with the aircraft, the bridge and the flightdeck team in concise language that relays the latest environmental information as well as the relevant clearances.

The small black dot is set against the grey overcast, but slowly takes the form of an approaching helicopter. Aided by a visual glideslope system on board the vessel, the air-crew make their first approach and landing.

When the helicopter comes to rest on the deck, a finely choreographed manoeuvre sees the flightdeck crew lash the helicopters skids to the deck before exiting again. After a pause, they return, unlash the helicopter, clear the deck and soon the EC135 is airborne again. It is a process that is repeated nine times in 35 minutes, offering a level of efficiency and training that only the dedicated Sycamore can offer. And it is a process that once saw the Sycamore land-on helicopters 64 times in a day.

The sheltered waters of Jervis Bay allow the

‘The sheltered waters of Jervis Bay allow the trainee pilots to undertake their first landings...’

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trainee pilots to undertake their first landings on a relatively stable platform, whereas there were no such guarantees when they first made a deck landing in the past. MAJ Cameron-Davies adds that an Army aviator previously may not have seen a deck landing until well into their career, but now the combined nature of 723SQN and the Sycamore allows trainee Army pilots to have the benefits of naval instructors’ deck experience, while the vessel facilitates an actual landing while still in training.

The buzz of activity subsides as the helicopter departs and the red gangway signs are taken down, returning the Sycamore to normal operations. CMDR Brinckmann removes his headset and hangs it by the console before readying to move off and attend to another activity that is about to take place on the ship.

A VITAL ROLE

The benefits of joint-service helicopter training can readily be seen at HMAS Albatross and the land-borne facilities of 723SQN. But the other key element in their success requires a slightly longer journey across the waves. Here on the relatively calm waters of Jervis Bay, the next generation of military helicopter pilots can hone their skills in the challenging environment of the potentially pitching deck.

Through the efforts of the MATV Sycamore and her crew, both military and civilian, the ability to train all manner of roles has become significantly more accessible and frequent. The challenges of operating at sea will always remain substantial but through the Sycamore, those asked to do so will be better prepared than ever before.

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REGIONAL ENGAGEMENT - IPE19

REGIONAL EN The ADF’s Joint Task Force 661 engages regional nations for Indo-Pacific Endeavour 2019 COMPILED BY ANDREW MCLAUGHLIN FROM DEFENCE NEWS RELEASES & IMAGERY

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GAGEMENT

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he ADF has again conducted a regional partner nation engagement exercise, through the successful Info-Pacific Endeavour 2019.

After a transit from Sydney, four ships and nearly 1,200 ADF personnel of Joint Task Force (JTF) 661 under the command of RAAF officer AIRCDRE Richard Owen departed HMAS Stirling in Fremantle for a three-month long six nation tour of the Indo-Pacific region on March 11.

The vessels – the LHD HMAS Canberra, Perry/ Adelaide class frigate HMAS Newcastle, ANZAC class frigate HMAS Parramatta, and auxiliary oiler HMAS Success were joined at various points on their journey by submarine HMAS Collins, an RAAF P-8A Poseidon maritime surveillance aircraft, and vessels from the various nations visited.

Embarked aboard the vessels were two MH-60R Romeo Seahawk anti-submarine and anti-surface warfare helicopter, and two MRH 90 Taipan transport and vertical replenishment helicopters. Also embarked were elements of Army’s 2RAR and 3RAR and various amphibious vehicles, and civilian representatives from the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

AIRCDRE Owen said his view of mission success was the strengthening of regional relationships while developing the ADF’s people. “It’s about how much people smile,” he said at the JTF661 departure. “When we’re in port conducting activities and exercises, how much are the people enjoying it? Are they smiling, are they laughing, are they having a good time? And, when we leave a port, do those people want us to come back?”

Then Defence Industry Minister, (now Defence Minister) Senator Linda Reynolds added, “IPE is critically important to the Australian Government and demonstrates our commitment to regional partners. We are demonstrating what we are able to contribute, such as world-leading deployable health service support and humanitarian supplies.”

First stop for JTF661 was the Australian territory of Cocos Island southwest of the western end of the Indonesian archipelago, before it proceeded to Colombo and Trincomalee in Sr Lanka.

“Australia recognises the importance of Sri Lanka in a stable Indo-Pacific region, so for IPE19 it should come as no surprise it will be our first port of call,” AIRCDRE Owen said prior to arriving in Colombo. “Sri Lanka is a partner of choice for Australia in the IndoPacific. Australia and Sri Lanka share this important Indian Ocean, which laps both our shores, including its resources.”

A Defence statement noted Sri Lanka’s important geo-political position, which sits on a maritime corridor in the Indian Ocean which is vital for the security and prosperity of both nations. It said two-way trade in goods and services is worth $1.5 billion, and open, secure sea lines of communication in the Indian Ocean is crucial for the region’s growth.

From Sri Lanka, JTF661 crossed the Bay on Bengal and the Andaman Sea, and participated in AUSINDEX 2019, the major, bilateral Navy-to-Navy exchange between Australia and India.

First held in India in 2015, 2019 was the third biennial iteration of AUSINDEX, and is as the most complex iteration to date, focusing on anti-submarine warfare

and tactical maritime manoeuvres, including with Indian Navy Kilo class submarines.

Next stop was Thailand where the task force visited Phuket and conducted a number of community events in the areas around the popular resort.

As a keen surfer, one event which was close to AIRCDRE Owen’s heart was the donation of 1,500 life jackets and 20 rescue surf boards for surf lifesaving

Commander of JTF661 AIRCDRE Richard Owen with Sri Lankan Navy Director of Naval Operations Commodore Sanjeewa Dias in Colombo. DEFENCE

An MRH 90 conducts vertical replenishment operations during IPE19. DEFENCE

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development throughout southern Thailand at the Phuket Lifeguard Club at Patong Beach.

Founder of the surf club Mr David Field welcomed the donation. “Our beach culture and surf lifesaving practices are world class and they’re something we want to export,” he said. “Today is a great day for Phuket lifesaving – many of the practices we see here today are the result of Australian cross-training and the adoption of the red and yellow flag system, and similar beach management techniques.”

Other community projects undertaken in Thailand included helping with the building of a school project which is being managed by the Asia Centre Foundation with funding from the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and the Australian aid program.

Joining the task force in Thailand was outgoing Chief of Air force AIRMSHL ‘Leo’ Davies, a former squadron-mate of AIRCDRE Owen.

AIRMSHL Davies had arrived in Phuket on board an RAAF KC-30A which had flown a number of Thai military and government officials from Bangkok to visit HMAS Canberra.

“That says we’re willing to invest, and it’s been powerful,” AIRMSHL Davies said. “This is about national and international relationships, pure and simple. What IPE does say is: ‘Hey, Air Force, what part can you do that is bigger than what you did yesterday?’ This is a real focus for the (whole) Australian Defence Force (ADF).

“It’s easy to sit in Canberra and talk about relating better with our Thai brothers and sisters, but until you put forward some real people and real resources, it

doesn’t really say a lot. We are saying a lot right now.”

After Phuket, the task force transited the busy Straits of Malacca en route to Klang, the port of the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur.

“As the main shipping channel between the Indian Ocean and the Pacific Ocean, the Malacca and Singapore Straits are some of the most strategic straits in the world,” HMAS Newcastle’s navigation officer LEUT Mitchell Smith said. “ About one third of the world’s oil production passes through these straits; that’s about 50,000 ships passing through an area only 2.7 kilometres wide and represents about $25-30 trillion in global trade. Add on top of that the international law of territorial waters and archipelagic sea lanes, this becomes a very complex transit.

“These straits are backed on to a number of nations that patrol the area and prevent acts of illegal activity known to occur throughout the straits and the South China Sea,” he added.

“It’s very important as a team that the whole ship is working together to ensure we safely transit these waters, protect our ships in company and the merchant traffic in the area.”

Newcastle’s commanding officer, CMDR Anita Sellick, said passing through the highly congested sea lane was a complex task with other ships involved. “There are many maritime boundaries that are adjacent to one another and above these maritime boundaries are also air space boundaries,” she said. “That’s where Newcastle’s strength lies – we provide force projection and air protection to the task force as we navigate these waters together.”

‘That says we’re willing to invest, and it’s been powerful’

Army officer LT Jennifer Hassett and AIRCDRE Richard Owen with junior members of the Phuket Lifeguard Club DEFENCE

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REGIONAL ENGAGEMENT - IPE19

Upon reaching Klang, HMAS Canberra was joined by four ARH Tiger helicopters from the Darwin-based 1 Aviation Regiment (see separate article on page 26 this issue). The aircraft conducted day and night decklanding qualifications for aircrew and ground staff, with the embarkation being the final stage in the integration and certification of the Tiger to be fully operational from the amphibious ships.

Apart from being led by an RAAF officer, another example of the ‘jointness’ of the crew aboard HMAS Canberra can be found in the management the air group’s movements by three RAAF air traffic control personnel.

“The biggest difference is the airfield moves and the runway points in a different direction, so we are constantly dealing with different airspaces,” SQNLDR Ross Madsen said. “Working on Canberra is a great example of joint operations, with RAAF controllers working alongside Navy on a Navy ship controlling the airspace for Army aircraft.”

After Malaysia, the task force rounded the tip of the Malay Peninsula, passing Singapore and entered the South China Sea en route to a port visit in Vietnam.

Following the completion of IPE19 it was revealed that the task force had been shadowed by Chinese military vessels during its transit to and from Vietnam, and that task force helicopters had had a laser shone in their eyes by fishing vessels of unknown origin.

“I figured out in my three month journey with the Navy that, they’re quite a friendly bunch,” AIRCDRE Owen said of the Chinese vessels on ABC Radio on the task force’s return to Darwin. “As they go past we will get hails from different ships, they want to know who we are, where we’re going, and what our intentions are. And the Chinese were no different – they were friendly, they were professional, and they said ‘G’day’.”

In Vietnam the task force visited a local school for a formal welcome ceremony. “Public diplomacy through community engagement is vital for regional activities as they allow members of the fleet – Navy, Army and Air Force – to directly enhance international relationships,” Australian Embassy official WOFF Mat Dabinet said.

“Everyone here tonight has had a wonderful time and will be talking about this visit for a long time – it’s been a resounding success.”

JJTF661 Deputy Commander CAPT Andrew Quinn expressed his gratitude to the teachers and students.

“This is my second time to Vietnam; we love your beautiful coast, delicious food and drink, but most importantly we love the beautiful people like you all,” he said. “We will return whenever you ask us to return or need help.”

During all the task force’s port visits, Australia’s defence industry was able to demonstrate some its capabilities to visitors of HMAS Canberra.

Under an initiative by the Australian Defence Export Office (ADEO), a team of DFAT and defence industry showcased Australian defence industry capabilities to host nations while military members of the task force were able to provide their perspectives and practical operational experience in support of the industry group.

JTF staff officer SQNLDR Steven Rae facilitated the exhibitions and said the collaboration involved a lot of planning. “The goal of the Defence Export Expo is to achieve greater export successes, making Australia’s defence industry globally competitive, all in support of better capability for the Australian Defence Force. This aligns with the Defence Export Strategy,” he said.

“From Canberra, I coordinate between the ADEO, various Defence attachés and other government agencies in each country we plan to visit, starting two or three months before we are due to arrive.

“Our team then briefs the executives of all the ships attached to the task group, and then, on arrival, assists in the execution of the plan for that port,” he added. “This is a great new initiative that illustrates the diversity of thinking that has gone into IPE19.”

After Vietnam, the task force visited Changi Naval base in Singapore, before HMA Ships Canberra and Newcastle proceeded to the Indonesian capital of Jakarta, and HMAS Success visited Makassar in South Sulawesi.

“We have a shared maritime border (with Indonesia) and a common interest in promoting peace and stability in the region,” AIRCDRE Owen said. “Our defence relationship is long-standing and focused on a wide

Royal Australian Navy and Indian Navy ships take part in a anti-submarine exercise during AUSINDEX 2019.

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‘The biggest difference is the airfield moves and the runway points in a different direction...’

HMA Ships Canberra and Newcastle sail in company with Sri Lankan Navy and Coast Guard vessels. DEFENCE

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JTF661 staff pose with Malay defence officials during a visitton HMAS Canberra in Klang. DEFENCE

RAAF SQNLDR Ross Madsen and FLTLT Hamish Upton in the Air Control Room on HMAS Canberra. DEFENCE

Deputy Commander JTF661 CAPT Andrew Quinn receives a gift from the Principal of Thai Nguyen Secondary School in Nha Trang, Vietnam.

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Commanding Officer of HMAS Newcastle, CMDR Anita Sellick addresses Indonesian media in Jakarta.

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variety of security-related matters including counterterrorism, maritime security, humanitarian assistance and disaster relief, peacekeeping, defence industry co-operation and intelligence.”

Members of JTF661 were joined in Jakarta by Chief of Navy VADM Mike Noonan for high level talks with Indonesian National Armed Forces officials, while in Makassar local authorities there hosted HMAS Success’s crew for Ramadan activities.

IPE19 concluded on May 29 with the arrival in Darwin of JTF661. During its nearly three-month journey, the task force covered 12,500 nautical miles “Indo-Pacific Endeavour is one of the most important annual activities of the Australian Defence Force (ADF),” AIRCDRE Owen said. “It is a major contribution to regional security and stability and deepens Australia’s engagement and partnerships with regional security forces.

“The opportunity to commemorate Anzac Day in Malaysia, experience the wonderful cultural shows on arrival into each new port and witness the Joint Task Force members make lasting memories with people from all over the Indo-Pacific region, all of these have made this deployment a fantastic time for many of the members involved,” he added.

“We’ve been able to engage all sorts of different young communities using music, using song, using dance, so having that Army band and projecting a more human perspective on what we do was important. They have done a great job,” he said. “The real success of IPE19 may not be known until countries in our region, including Australia, need help from each other.”

While HMAS Canberra stayed in Australia’s north to prepare for Exerrcise Talisman Saber, sadly HMA Ships Success and Newcastle returned to Sydney - Newcastle via her namesake city and the hometown of her captain, CMDR Anita Sellick - where they were both retired from service and decommissioned.

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BIG WAR EW

BIG WAR EW

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Big War is back – and so is Electronic Warfare

he end of the Cold War 30 years ago was a positive event in international politics.

But it was also a highly problematic event.

The monolithic military threat that had been the ‘raison d’être’ of most Western states’ military forces was gone in a matter of a months or years. Thereafter, many states were desperately searching for new foundations upon which to build their armed forces. Military threats are, after all, the single most important factor determining the composition of military forces of any state.

During the 1990s, many Western states clung to ‘peace operations’, ‘peace-keeping operations’, ‘humanitarian interventions’ or ‘military crisis management operations’ in order to formulate a new logic according to which they started to transform and develop their militaries. Future wars were, supposedly, waged out-of-area for humanitarian reasons, as big wars were thought to be a relic of a past era that was quickly on its way to the scrapheap of history.

The military forces needed to perform armed humanitarian missions are totally different from those forces preparing to fight a big war against an advanced great power in contested environments.

Thus, we witnessed a rapid decline in the fighting power of most Western militaries – the US was the exception to the rule – when the ‘new’ humanitarian logic for developing and maintaining military forces took a stranglehold on European and other Western states.

While this was happening, electronic warfare capabilities and knowhow atrophied, and the use of radios and radars became careless – emission control was a thing of the past.

As the post-Cold War era progressed, the Western way of war became synonymous with multiple wars of choice against third-rate adversaries. Instead of fighting one’s way into the theatre of operations, the use of Western militaries started to resemble logistical operations of dispensing precisionguided munition against unsophisticated enemies.

Satellites, radio networks and other C4ISR-systems were available in abundance, and without any real threat of electronic warfare present in the battlefield.

After the 11 September 2001 terror attacks, the Western out-of-area warfare perspective changed into a more aggressive one. What started as a long-term military campaign to defeat terrorist organisations – and even individual terrorists – has morphed into a ‘forever war’ in Afghanistan, and has expended to multiple ongoing operations in the Middle East and Africa.

Counter-insurgency operations became the

bread and butter of Western military forces.

Jamming remote-detonated roadside bombs became the most important task of Western electronic warfare capabilities – protecting forces deployed in Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicles. All the while, advanced statebased militaries (ie China and Russia) were conspicuous by their absence in having any meaningful influence on the way that Western militaries conceptualised future military threats and future military capability requirements.

But during the last few years it has become clear that the future international security dynamic has reverted to that of great-power rivalries. China and Russia have already challenged the shared Western notions of international security and defence.

Massed troops and fires, advanced air and missile defence capabilities and high-quality, high-quantity electronic warfare capabilities are essential aspects of future battlefields. Getting into the fight will be a struggle, let alone defeating great-power adversaries that have for decades been laser-focused on largescale, state-on-state warfare.

In the field of electronic warfare today, Western states are the underdogs. The lessons learned during the last 30 years of almost continuous warfighting have transformed the ethos and capabilities of Western militaries. A generation of warfighters and military leaders has been subjected to wrong TTPs and tactics in the field of electronic warfare (and in all other military domains) – at least when analysed from the great-power warfare perspective.

Sadly, building new EW military capabilities is going to be a long-term effort – nothing happens in a year or two. It will take at least a decade – probably much longer – for Western states to develop the required new EW capabilities to offset Russia’s and China’s lead.

In addition, it is noteworthy that Western military doctrines, knowhow and ethos have changed dramatically during the post-Cold War era. Analytical expertise on great-power combat is scarce, if non-existent. This is painfully clear also regarding EW. Cultural constructs are ‘sticky’ – they change slowly – even if there are active efforts to change them.

This means that changing the Western military mindset successfully from counterinsurgency operations and military crisis management to largescale warfighting against advanced state-based adversaries in contested environments will take its time. Although decisions to make such a transition has already been made in many Western countries, we won’t see – even in the best of circumstances – any real progress until the mid-2020s or later.

Colonel Jyri Raitasalo is a military professor of war studies at the Finnish National Defence University.

The views expressed here are his own.

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On Target

The Birth of an Australian Air Force - Pt. II

By Brian Weston

he On Target column in the previous edition of ADBR – written on behalf of the Sir Richard Williams Foundation – provided a brief outline of the man who is generally regarded as the person responsible not only for establishing an Australian Air Force, but also for establishing a sufficient and robust enough foundation on which it could later expand into a credible Australian Air Force.

This column will further expand on the huge task Richard Williams faced when the Australian Air Force was established on 31 March 1921 – with the prefix Royal being added in August 1921.

The genesis for the establishment of independent air services lay in the rapid advances in military aviation during World War I, accompanied by much theorising about how military aviation might be used in future conflicts to provide alternative strategies to the stagnant, industrial-scale, attritional trench warfare of World War I. But there was no consensus in this debate about the future strategies, roles and organisation of military aviation, with claim and counter-claim vigorously prosecuted and with navies and armies generally showing little enthusiasm, indeed often outright hostility, for the concept of independent air forces.

Britain, with massive personnel losses in World War I, was at the forefront of the development of new concepts for air operations with a view to finding new ways of winning future conflicts without suffering the huge human losses incurred in World War I. In a watershed decision, Britain decided to establish an independent air force by merging the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS), on 1 April 1918, to form the Royal Air Force (RAF) – seven months before World War I concluded.

With Australia tied into the British Empire, and with the raising of the Australian Flying Corps (AFC) in 1915 and its subsequent employment with the RFC in the Middle East and the Western Front, Australia soon gained exposure to the employment of military aviation in war. AFC personnel also witnessed the establishment of the RAF as the world’s first independent air service, as well as understanding the reasons why the RAF was established.

The debate about the future of Australian military aviation was decided by the Australian Government on 9 September 1920, when speaking in the House of Representatives the Prime Minister, Mr Hughes said: “It may be confidently expected that aviation and those

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scientific methods of warfare which developed so rapidly during the war, and which, particularly during the latter period of the conflict, were resorted to so freely, may develop still further. No doubt that development will completely revolutionise warfare and let us hope that it will make war impossible…

The air, that new element which man has now conquered, is but the sea in another form and it is on the sea and in the air that we shall have to look for our defence…”

We believe too that in the air we may hope to create a force which will be of incomparable service in defending us from an enemy. The Government therefore are placing on the estimates a sufficient sum for the building up of an efficient air force. It is proposed to afford such inducements as are hoped will encourage manufacturers to make engines and aeroplanes in this country and the Government will not hesitate to give a very substantial bonus for that purpose.”

To give effect to the government decision, the Air Board was constituted on 9 November 1920, to provide for the governance of the new air force. It comprised four members: First Air Member – Director of Operations and Intelligence Second Air Member – Director of Personnel and Training Third Air Member – Director of Equipment Fourth Air Member – Finance Member Wing Commander Richard Williams was appointed as First Air Member although his position was not as a chief, but as a ‘first among equals’.

The task for Williams, and the Air Board he chaired was immense.

There was no legislative governance framework unlike the Navy and Army, to which the Naval Defence Act and Defence Act applied. Then there was the matter of the gifting, by Britain, to the new fledging air force, of 128 aircraft – indeed, the new air force had more aircraft than personnel – including spare parts, engines, motor transport, tenders, motorcycles, tools, ammunition, bombs, cameras, wireless equipment etc, for which there was no process to receive, receipt and account for the gift equipment, nor to store and maintain the equipment.

A not insubstantial task for a new Air Board led by Wing Commander Richard Williams, then 30 years of age. The fact that he did succeed is why he is held in such high regard today.

Brian Weston is a Board Member of the Sir Richard Williams Foundation

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