It's not a White Elephant, it's a Golden One!

Tiger might well be a white elephant for the Army. But for Eurocopter, it is surely one of the Mother Lodes - The Comstock or El Dorado perhaps ?

Who else could be inveigled into purchasing a pig in such a big poke ?

Not the Yanks, and no-one else in the Western world wanted to have anything to do with Tiger. The Germans ordered a few - after all, through a maze of company ownerships, they might even see a few Deutschemarks come back home! But then, some nameless civilian bureaucrats in Australian Defence Central began to deal with this project - probably aided and abetted by RAAF officers.

The Reconnaissance Aircraft Replacement Project had actually been going on since roughly 1977, when an ASR was written. The author commented on it, and visited the Aviation Corps Directorate in Campbell Offices to discuss aspects. There was some interest, and a couple of quick and dirty presentations. The writer of the ASR actually got a world tour out of the whole shebang. When he got to his favored factory, suprise...they had lost his invitation.

The whole project then sat on the back shelf for some years. Ross Grant, posted into Air Office, rejuvenated the whole thing, and launched Project Air 87. With Great Publicity.

Apart from the publicity, Air 87 attempted to match sensor technology in the Army/Corps/Division areas with air vehicles. This was a sensible theoretical approach. It was a practical difficulty because Army did not really have much idea of what sensor technology was available. Also, some of these requirements conflicted with the woolly clouds which the RAAF consider their areas.

RAAF have never defined just what their areas of reconnaissance are. If another service proposes something that might have promise, they just say, "Oh, that is in our court," - not that they intend to do anything. It's their way just in case it amounts to something and they can expand their empire further - doesn't matter if someone else needs it operationally.

This makes it difficult for Army to define their own areas of responsibility. And, OTH radar, Project Jorn, was just getting off the ground. JORN was supposed to produce surveillance info over a huge area. No-one knew just what JORN would produce, so no-one was willing to hitch their horse to a falling star. In fact, given proper instructions, the JORN people can produce very good results. The problem is that very few people have been trained to task or interpret JORN. We have here a world class system, screwed up because very few people know how to task JORN; and few people know how to interpret JORN results. The responsibility for this situation lies, very clearly, with the military staff seconded to Central.

The overall result here was that the longer range surveillance requirements fell into a big black hole. RAAF was quite happy about this, as they could say that the Orions could fix it. Army could not find the fallacy in this statement, because they did not have the knowledge to specify what the Orions should look for or see, or even what their full capabilities were. After all those army people just can't be trusted to think or appreciate technology can they? This task was made somewhat incomprehensible as the Orions were supposed to replace the Fleet Air Arm, in toto.

Army Aviation was supposed to be up with all of the modern technology, and should have been able to advise on what was a reasonable approach. Unfortunately, Army Aviators still tend to be "strap them on and let's fly" jockeys. Military knowledge, let alone appreciation of the benefits of modern technology, passed them by. Yet, a reasonably full appreciation of what was possible existed outside the Classified Tomes.

The Surveyors of the World had long since established the Journal of Remote Sensing - and commercial remote sensing was starting to lead the military requirements. Hands up, Army Aviators, who has ever read the Journal of Remote Sensing ?

What can be done to improve on the Mark I eyeball ?

The first thing is to record the scene for posterity. That is, cameras. Jim the Pom did introduce cameras, but he was such an unpopular person that everyone was relieved when he retired. This was a great pity, as the Brit Army Aviation Flight in Berlin had discovered that altitude plus huge lenses with fast film resulted in an intelligence bonanza. They happily took photos of hitherto unknown Soviet machinery for some years.

It is not rocket science to deduce that one of the avenues which Army Aviation might well have taken post Viet Nam was development of a high quality hand held photographic service. Given encouragement by a civilian, we developed B & W photos at Nui Dat; why was this not thought to be a Good Thing ? (see editor's note)

In Viet Nam we had the 547 Sig Troop function. This seemed to be a good development to all concerned, except perhaps to Task Force Int Officers, who often found that 547 data did not necessarily agree with their forecasts. (read our 547 Sig Troop Article) It is interesting, in this context, to note that one of Australia's very best Int officers forecast the 1968 Tet Offensive some six months previously. His paper was regarded as scurrilious by his superiors, and he was posted forthwith from the Embassy in Saigon to an RTB, from which he resigned, and went on to better things.

What a waste ! Who was his boss ? Undoubtedly some chairwarming clown who got promoted for following the accepted US line. The Australian Ambassador should not escape ridicule here either, as he declined to accept the reasoning behind the paper. I, personally, hope that he shivered in his boots when Saigon awoke to Tet on January 30, 1968. He would be hard put to deny the veracity of a paper which he had considered inaccurate, inept, and a general waste of time. And I note that he has never gone to print to so do.

But we are getting tangential. Post Viet Nam, the 547 Sig Troop airborne D/F equipment fell into disuse, and as far as I can deduce, was not replaced by the Signals Corps. I found this to be totally incomprehensible, and cannot really comment. Except to say that Elint in the Div area is an Army Aviation function, and why were we not there ? I am aware that there were areas of which I was not aware, and maybe this function was not as moribund as I've assumed.

It seemed that the average Army Operations Branch Officer was totally immune to technology. The scientific types in the various service organisations were much better informed, but they could not find an audience in the areas that they were supposed to advise. The Aviation Corps mirrored the Operations Branch. Mark 1 eyeballs were the thing!

Army had a lot of other materiel items on its plate, most of which seemed very small beer when one considered the cost of $1 million per item for aircraft. Small beer or not, these things were essential to Army. For $1m, one could get lots of trucks, landrovers, ammunition, and even some of the strange devices required by the SF people. And the smarter Army officers did not have to be told that $1m per item did NOT include maintenance, spares, and all of the smoke and mirrors that accompanies modern aeroplanes. They could visualise just what we are seeing now - a big black hole, papered with money, populated by contractor people who can see the end of the tunnel. Except that it's now maybe, $4m per item.

After many years, we got to the stage where people actually wrote serious Requirements, User Studies, and all of the claptrap required by the Modern Capital Procurement Organisation.

After reading all of this stuff, and that was a job and a half, and considering the $$$ available, I predicted the outcome. Quite successfully. Boeing, at maybe $4M per Apache, never had a chance. Bell Textron, whose Viper was something cooked up overnight, were not there, either. The Requirement was for another Silver Bullet. This follows RAAF procurement practice over the years since Korea. We have seen RAAF with a succession of technically superior aircraft, the characteristics of which are supposed to cause any possible enemies to stop and think. And, if you happened to be within the very limited endurance of the Mirage, you would definitely stop and think. For twenty minutes.

Similiarly, the F-18. I personally think that the range and loiter capability of the F-15, obsolescent though she might be, would have been a much better Stop and Think factor. We do not need the latest and greatest here in SE Asia. What we need is range, loiter, and carrying capacity. What did the Mighty United States Air Force use in Laos and North Viet Nam when they wanted Range, Loiter and Carrying Capacity to rescue downed pilots? A old Navy bird, the piston powered Spad, the A-1, redesignated from it's initial Navy AD type number, the Able Dog.

And what do we want to support the PBI ? You got it, Range, Loiter and Carrying Capacity. Our old Cessnas could carry two 17 pods of 2.75 inch FFAR's in South Viet Nam - 40 years ago! The Pilatus Porter even more. A European aircraft will carry 68 mm SNEBS, which is, I think, the same rocket. Do we get any significant improvement in a general purpose area weapon ? Maybe they can carry four 17 pods. We should be looking for it, but I do not think that the passage of 40 years has really improved things.

Cobras in SVN were carrying four 17 pods in 1970. And they had the 20 mm cannon pods, also, in 1970. Not perfected, maybe, but the PBI were quite happy. Maybe now we get more sophisticated rockets, but do we really need them? I think not. Sophisticated rockets target armoured vehicles. Most of the targets we see will be personnel in trenches, or in the open. The incidence of hi tech armoured vehicles on the northern Australian coastline is rather low. But I'm all for precision, and the latest Cobra can handle guided rockets, it's just a matter of systems fit.

Anyhow, we now have got the Tiger. It's a Golden Elephant. Golden for Eurocopter, because they have got a subservient customer who has put too much into it now to call it a day. I think that we are the First Customer. They are working all their problems out on our aircraft, because we were too stupid to specify a working example. ( Remember, the author did a bit of work on the initial assembly proposals. He was quite confused by the 12 month software installation period. It seems that it was really a 12 month Development period). Which is why it is our White Elephant. We just have to pay more money and it will all work out.

How much more money? Well, we are not to certain about that, because we are just getting to the xy stage, and if that works, we thenhave to progress to the xz stage, if we are to produce what you want. And after that, we will have to refine various bits, because your pilots will point out that this does not quite fit, and that would be better if M and z were better integrated. I mean, it's a dream world for the pilots, isn't it ?

And, who is going to own the software ? I hope we do, but I suspect that it will be contracted. We will have a fine building, full of computers, totally misunderstood by Army aviators, even less understood by RAEME, costing very large lumps of money (Initiates, remember the BAE Rapier contract). We had an FFG-7 in software in Fyshwick, and a fine consumer of $$$ that was. Plus, someone else owned the whole program, and sometimes we waited 18 months for a response.

And how much will we have paid in ten years time ? With twenty-something aircraft which have a unique software fit ? How much would membership of Boeing's Apache fleet have cost us ? I think that in a very few years, the cost of Apache ownership, plus the benefits of interoperability with the US Army, would be a fraction of the cost of Tiger. The only thing that remains is to figure out is who got the commission on the Australian sale. He's probably retired, a pillar of the community. Pity he cannot be transported to the PBI at a suitable time.

I would remind a couple of people who MIGHT read this , that, in the late 80's, I predicted that computer software would become far more lucrative than metal bashing. Who Won ?

We do not want Tigers in Army Aviation. We want cheap workhorses, which can carry maybe six 17 pods, and a couple of 20mm cannon with about 600 rounds each. Basic measures against ground launched weapons - detection and countermeasures. Ability to determine the existence of radar guided weapons Endurance maybe four hours, loiter with FULL weapon load, the same. Appropriate communication electronics.

I think that this specification is pretty close to the current US Marine Cobra. Maybe we could even afford enough for the boggies to have a ride.

Spike