FoxtrotRomeo999
Active Member
Simon Ewing-Jarvie has an interesting website New Zealand's National Security. Not sure if he is considered a serious contributor to NZ Defence issues.
NZDF General discussion thread
- Thread starter NZLAV
- Start date
Well, if you can ensure you don't refer to every Naval vessel as being a frigate, nor every AirForce aircraft as either a Spitfire or a Hercules, then you'll be standing head & shoulders above the majority of NZ's media when it comes to Defence
. The most obvious outcomes are often hard to quantify or prove... but here's a few salient points I think you'll find most on here can agree with.After substantial budget cuts under Ruth Richardson, within a decade our Navy lost 2 of its 4 combat capable frigates (arguably they were obsolete but there's always a secondary role in an emergency that they could've filled, to our allies delight). The Airforce also lost its entire fast-jet combat capability, although it has retained some low-level capability with Orions & Helicopters.
The key point of the cuts to Navy & AirForce combat capability is that as a maritime nation our Naval & Air assets were always going to be the cornerstone of any meaningful Defence strategy and more importantly, any meaningful contribution to a regional security upon which NZ & our South Pacific neighbours so critically depend. An Army based strategy provides for no 'forward or projected defence'... without the means to get the NZ Army offshore, in meaningful numbers, fast… it relies on security risks being allowed to get to NZ before a strategy can be executed.
Like our neighbours we need to effectively remain aware of risks to ourselves… these will generally materialise at a distance and should be dealt with at a distance... not in our coastal waters nor our airspace! However our ability to even identify or track such has been severely reduced in recent decades thru cuts and under-investment in new technologies.
The thing many NZers don't seem to grasp is this is not so much about the risks of invasion, which is generally accepted as far less likely scenario, it's our economic life-blood...the sea lanes that our imports & exports travel. If blockaded they would overnight cripple our economy and make COVID lockdowns look like lolly-scrambles! Our biggest risk is effectively economic invasion which can be done militarily simply with implied rather than actual force and it would cripple NZ & our neighbours.
That's why to contribute effectively NZ needs to have the capability to project outward & provide a contribution that allows us to identify & manage risks at a distance... 4 P8 aircraft (Orion replacements) and 2 Frigates don't offer a persistent regional contribution. So what I'm saying is the cuts to Navy & AirForce have been at the cost of our most meaningful & effective platforms, meaning our contribution has dropped in both quantity and quality terms substantially.
However there is also the other side of the coin... Search & Rescue (SAR) and Humanitarian Aid & Disaster Relief (HADR) which we are obligated to do... having one of the biggest SAR areas in the world that we are mandated as responsible for... an area much bigger than central Europe in size. We no longer have the capacity to do this effectively unless there are no other concurrent tasks required.
As an example the 1990's cuts saw the fleet of 10 Andover transport aircraft dumped without replacement. The Andovers spent a lot of time up in the Pacific Islands and their demise saw us reduce the transport fleet from 17 aircraft (10 Andover, 5 Hercules, 2 Boeing 727) down to just 7 transport aircraft in total... and that number will persist even after the Hercules are replaced... the RNZAF simply can't take on multiple operations and sustain them over a period of time. That means the NZDF as a whole cannot do nearly as much in our region as it could 3 decades ago... including the more 'civilian' if tasks such as SAR & HADR.
NZ has not 'pulled it weight' or 'punched above its size' for the last 30 years as cuts to platforms and under-investment in new ones has bitten. We do a number of high-profile 'PR' jobs & we do them damn well, but a defence force is measured by allies by its effective military capability, not it's secondary roles of SAR & HADR.
Australia has interpreted the security challenges in this region vastly different to us... admittedly with the luxury of a much bigger economy of course! They have invested heavily in expanding core combat capability...and none of us realistically expect, nor demand, that NZ follows suit... but we've actually substantially reduced our equivalent capabilities rather than electing to even just retain the status quo.
So how has that affected our international relationships? Well is it merely a coincidence that in the same timeframe that we have diverged defence investment in pretty much the opposite direction to Australia that our relationship has become noticeably more strained? NZer's in Australia have lost any real privilege they had over non-NZ immigrants to NZ; we've bickered over trade (remember NZ Apples into Oz!); we're getting their trash (501's) dumped on us at an alarming rate; and recently citizenship revoked dumping at least 1 Australian bred ISIS supporter on NZ....all signs of a relationship where a sense of respect has evaporated!
Yes Australia did get bombed during WW2 (Darwin & Broome) so may have a particular view to their north, but so too NZ experienced direct enemy activity in our coastal waters in both world wars.. yes ships were intercepted ('raiders') & even and some of our harbours mined... look up the Germain raider Orion or sinking of the SS Niagara! How many NZers even know this stuff?
See the thing is most developed nations seem to grasp the concept of a 3-legged stool where your relationship with other nations is built around 3 equivalent tenents... (1) Trade, (2) Foreign Affairs', and (3) Defence. NZ gets the first 2 right, but unfortunately has dropped the ball on the 3rd!
Anyway I dare say you got enough feedback to write a book…good luck!
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Simon Ewing Jarvie
Active Member
Glad you find my site interesting. As to being a 'serious contributor', I guess that all depends on your viewpoint. Certainly, 66k views by 21k unique visitors on unclas.com plus thousands of listeners on the 'Indefensible New Zealand' podcast points to it being more than a hobby without (because I can't) listing my contract research clients in the national security space.
I write and podcast from a contrarian perspective i.e. challenging the status quo and taking unconventional approaches in the same way a Red Team does in an exercise or war game. It's not purposefully negative, it employs alternative thinking and alternative futures. That is specifically designed to 'provoke' a conversation. I was once one of those main stream PhD guys someone listed earlier but also have 25 years uniform time with operational experience. I left my university colleagues to do their thing many years ago because all the effort required to produce a refereed journal article isn't worth the few dozen who read it. Often, the subject is stale by the time 6-12 months of editorial work has been undertaken and it changes nothing in terms of national security capability for New Zealand - which is why we're all here isn't it?
Unsurprising, I guess, is that my offshore audience is growing rapidly and the domestic audience is relatively static. That highlights a problem for everyone who wants to effect change in national security. We all need a better conversation with a bigger audience of Kiwis in order to bring the political pressure to bear that is needed for NZDF to rebuild.
Anyway, before NgatiM taiahas me for taking up bandwidth, I have, as you can see 'decloaked.' I've been watching these forums for a couple of years and getting some great ideas and leads to follow. So thanks to you all, keep the flame alight and feel free to get in touch if there's something you want to discuss.
Cheers
SEJ
FoxtrotRomeo999
Active Member
Simon, sorry. Wasn't meaning to undermine your credentials, but being one of your foreign audience, I really have no feel for how much your fellow Kiwis agree with your point of view. Some of your scenarios would IMHO would be interesting (in a good way!) interspersed to bring out the purpose of Defence (national survival and all that).
Have a great day, Foxtrot
Have a great day, Foxtrot
Simon Ewing Jarvie
Active Member
No offence taken, mate. Just filling in the blanks for those who are new here. And your post has really pumped my blog stats tonight so cheers!
SEJ
Lucy you asked what are the biggest issues. This might take you awhile to read sorry.
What is wrong starts with the policy settings. Below are the current policy settings and from that flows the planned and funded capabilities.
As part of the Strategic Defence Policy Statement 2018, Cabinet agreed to six principles to underlie New Zealand’s Defence policy:
Defence is combat capable, flexible and ready;
Defence personnel are highly trained professionals;
Defence has the resources to meet the Government’s operational and strategic priorities;
Defence operates in a way that maintains public trust and confidence;
Defence embodies and promotes New Zealand’s values; and
Defence is a credible and trusted international partner.
The New Zealand Government expects the Defence Force to support New Zealand’s security, wellbeing, and resilience across a broad range of activities under the framework of Community, Nation, and World.
At home, the Defence Force operates alongside and in support of a broad range of other Government agencies. This is most visible following natural disasters such as the Kaikoura and Canterbury earthquakes, and most recently the forest fires in Nelson. Defence Force capabilities enable border and fisheries patrols on the sea and in the air, support the New Zealand Police in high-threat situations, keep Department of Conservation rangers supplied on the isolated islands that protect our endangered wildlife, and support New Zealand’s presence in Antarctica.
The Defence Force carries out operations around New Zealand, in the South Pacific, the Southern Ocean, and Antarctica. These operations include fisheries patrols in support of our Pacific neighbours and in the Southern Ocean, and responding to disasters such as Cyclone Winston and the earthquake and tsunami on the island of Sulawesi in Indonesia.
The increasing severity and frequency of significant weather due to climate change will challenge the current ability of the Defence Force to respond to these events while maintaining a range of commitments further afield.
Ensuring the New Zealand Defence Force can deliver this spectrum of required activities, which support the overall wellbeing of New Zealanders, has been a key focus in developing the Defence Capability Plan.
The above is literally the core of our defence policy that generates we will do. Actually to be honest what they have select us to do as opposed what we realistically need to do. Thus fisheries patrols in the South Pacific and Antartica, HADR and SASO in the South Pacific, HADR in New Zealand, Climate Change and Wellbeing, and comparatively tiny token efforts to support the regional security umbrella grouping of liberal democracies. It has nothing that directly co-relates to a genuine defence response posture.
It is not any different in sentiment to the Defence 2000 policy under Helen Clark's government 21 years ago. We are not just sea blind, but blind in practically all domains air, land, sea and space. The Defence Force under this policy is simply a subset of diplomacy - soft power type diplomacy only. It is this fundamental structural imbalance that perverts us having a balanced and coherent external relations setting. It also forces our external relations thinking into silo's - where as other more mature approaches, more mature countries, have the synergies of mutual benefit between trade and defence for example much stronger.
So New Zealand has a defence policy designed to continue working for us in the future, as if the the seismic changes geo-politically that have happened pre Sept 11 2001 and continued right up until this day, have never happened or won't happen. A today, where we now head into the 3rd decade of the 21st century that sees dozens of PLA(AF) aircraft entering into the ADIZ's of Taiwan, South Korea and Japan on a daily basis, wolf warrior and debt diplomacy, state sanctioned Cyber and Electronic warfare activities, the nine dotted line around the SCS, PLA(N) submarines tracked through Japanese waters by the JMSDF, EA-03 Soaring Dragon drones being deployed on the Indian border, Australia strong armed over trade, Hong Kong where you lived and probably saw 6 million people who once enjoyed freedoms we take for granted brutally shut down, (though in the last few weeks we are starting to understand how they feel), the plight of the Uyghurs, and some, meaning our policy makers, think that we can be some kind of disconnected ethereal moral vacuum - and ignore all of the above. That whatever happens, the ships will keep coming here with their critical goods let alone all the lovely stuff we like to use and consume (like coffee, sugar, batteries, petrol, medicines, ect, that the planes, both passenger and freight will still fly here, that vice versa we can leave or still be able to conduct trade, that we will still have an internet and phone connection with the world, ..... it is simply intellectually bankrupt.
Am I surprised at the apathy of New Zealand at best towards Defence and us possessing not even the fundamental spectrum of capabilities to either a) protect ourselves and b) by making a contribution to our like minded partner nations? No. Because NZ confuses being liked with being respected. Those nations who are under going geo-strategic stresses - who we also need to survive. Am I surprised at worst, that sees a New Zealand that actively seems to be rejecting any form of defensive combat capability, not just to others, but even ourselves - our society, culture, economy and history, because we are just too pretentiously smug and superior about how special we are, how much better we are, like we have some special kind of spiritual totem of protection - a Taniwha as Ms Mahuta believes. Again not at all.
Why is it that every country in the Indo-Pacific region who we are partners with, friends with both new and old, are seeing the massive geo-political disruption going on and responding to it - are we trying to pretend and party like it is still 1999. We are at a point in history not unlike the massive geo-political disruption that built up twice last century into global hot wars, an outcome we all wish to avoid, that sees them doing the Mahi and Whakaaro to build up tangible defences as a deterrent or last resort - and all we do is just on keep on wishing it away. As for the outlook. At best we have a deepening Cold War 2.0, but it is early days, but it is not going to get any better. All of those 6 cabinet prescribed policy points signed off above are just going to be vapourware anyway. It is not a defence policy. It is more like a charter for a charitable NGO.
There is nothing that we can ever do with our current capabilities - just a couple of P-8A's, two frigates and two OPV's to stop illegal over fishing if a PRC sponsored ghost fleet entered into our wider EEZ. There is no enforcement capability anyway - no stick to wave as a warning to keep those fleets away. And in this Cold War 2.0 the more missing in action we are - others will have nothing but contempt for our so called "values" - all the talk of resilience, wellbeing, thats marvellous, but its just words. The kind of words that a naturopath therapist would have on their brochure.
Leaving it all up to others, to do the Mahi (work) means we as a country will no longer have a say in future matters, literally no longer have a say in our destiny. If anything our destiny could by mid century cease to exist as an independent nation state like we have now. That is not impossible. There is always road kill in the aftermath of any great power conflict even for the swimmers and non swimmers. The Polish were brave people, they fought in WW2 after they were invaded on the side of the allies, just for it to become a vassal Soviet state as the victors divvied up the spoils. Ditto the Czech Republic.
A defence force that is combat capable is the first line in that policy. However that does not translate into defence funding and acquisitions. Thus virtually no combat capability, no deterrence element, no credible contribution to the critical mass of the regional security umbrella. It simply puts the burden on the other nations and the greater risk of collective failure. Lucy, up to 20 years ago NZ provided 20% of the Air Combat capability, 20% of the Maritime Patrol capability, 20% of the Infantry capability and 20% of the Frigate capability of the ANZAC nations. Plus we provided a range of other capabilities much like we have now - air transport, helicopters ect. This policy was called Self Reliance in Partnership. We added strategic weight to each other - yes we were the little sibling - but we gave that little bit extra contribution to be a deterrent to our interests, both nationally and regionally. That Anzac contribution added on to the strategic weight to Singapore, to Malaysia, the South Korea, Japan and others. That is where the defence of New Zealand was all about. The thing is back in those Pre 2000 days - we still went up into the Islands to do HADR, SASO. We still went down into Antarctica and the Southern Ocean, but we also contributed a small but valued hard power element to the wider regional security umbrella.
Last thought. Projecting out into the future 10-15 years from now - and this is not science fiction but a possible vignette that another country has workshopped based on current adversary capabilities, we begin to find that their is an increasing number of high altitude long range UAV's like an EA03 Soaring Dragon with ISR or Electronic Warfare payloads onboard (designed to disrupt our electromagnetic spectrums), launched from PLA(N) carriers 1000kms away or from temporary usage rights from an ex debt diplomacy airport asset and are increasingly entering into first NZ AIDZ's, and then EEZ and then territorial airspace. How would we counter that - we know its there - but actually how would we deal with it?
What is wrong starts with the policy settings. Below are the current policy settings and from that flows the planned and funded capabilities.
As part of the Strategic Defence Policy Statement 2018, Cabinet agreed to six principles to underlie New Zealand’s Defence policy:
Defence is combat capable, flexible and ready;
Defence personnel are highly trained professionals;
Defence has the resources to meet the Government’s operational and strategic priorities;
Defence operates in a way that maintains public trust and confidence;
Defence embodies and promotes New Zealand’s values; and
Defence is a credible and trusted international partner.
The New Zealand Government expects the Defence Force to support New Zealand’s security, wellbeing, and resilience across a broad range of activities under the framework of Community, Nation, and World.
At home, the Defence Force operates alongside and in support of a broad range of other Government agencies. This is most visible following natural disasters such as the Kaikoura and Canterbury earthquakes, and most recently the forest fires in Nelson. Defence Force capabilities enable border and fisheries patrols on the sea and in the air, support the New Zealand Police in high-threat situations, keep Department of Conservation rangers supplied on the isolated islands that protect our endangered wildlife, and support New Zealand’s presence in Antarctica.
The Defence Force carries out operations around New Zealand, in the South Pacific, the Southern Ocean, and Antarctica. These operations include fisheries patrols in support of our Pacific neighbours and in the Southern Ocean, and responding to disasters such as Cyclone Winston and the earthquake and tsunami on the island of Sulawesi in Indonesia.
The increasing severity and frequency of significant weather due to climate change will challenge the current ability of the Defence Force to respond to these events while maintaining a range of commitments further afield.
Ensuring the New Zealand Defence Force can deliver this spectrum of required activities, which support the overall wellbeing of New Zealanders, has been a key focus in developing the Defence Capability Plan.
The above is literally the core of our defence policy that generates we will do. Actually to be honest what they have select us to do as opposed what we realistically need to do. Thus fisheries patrols in the South Pacific and Antartica, HADR and SASO in the South Pacific, HADR in New Zealand, Climate Change and Wellbeing, and comparatively tiny token efforts to support the regional security umbrella grouping of liberal democracies. It has nothing that directly co-relates to a genuine defence response posture.
It is not any different in sentiment to the Defence 2000 policy under Helen Clark's government 21 years ago. We are not just sea blind, but blind in practically all domains air, land, sea and space. The Defence Force under this policy is simply a subset of diplomacy - soft power type diplomacy only. It is this fundamental structural imbalance that perverts us having a balanced and coherent external relations setting. It also forces our external relations thinking into silo's - where as other more mature approaches, more mature countries, have the synergies of mutual benefit between trade and defence for example much stronger.
So New Zealand has a defence policy designed to continue working for us in the future, as if the the seismic changes geo-politically that have happened pre Sept 11 2001 and continued right up until this day, have never happened or won't happen. A today, where we now head into the 3rd decade of the 21st century that sees dozens of PLA(AF) aircraft entering into the ADIZ's of Taiwan, South Korea and Japan on a daily basis, wolf warrior and debt diplomacy, state sanctioned Cyber and Electronic warfare activities, the nine dotted line around the SCS, PLA(N) submarines tracked through Japanese waters by the JMSDF, EA-03 Soaring Dragon drones being deployed on the Indian border, Australia strong armed over trade, Hong Kong where you lived and probably saw 6 million people who once enjoyed freedoms we take for granted brutally shut down, (though in the last few weeks we are starting to understand how they feel), the plight of the Uyghurs, and some, meaning our policy makers, think that we can be some kind of disconnected ethereal moral vacuum - and ignore all of the above. That whatever happens, the ships will keep coming here with their critical goods let alone all the lovely stuff we like to use and consume (like coffee, sugar, batteries, petrol, medicines, ect, that the planes, both passenger and freight will still fly here, that vice versa we can leave or still be able to conduct trade, that we will still have an internet and phone connection with the world, ..... it is simply intellectually bankrupt.
Am I surprised at the apathy of New Zealand at best towards Defence and us possessing not even the fundamental spectrum of capabilities to either a) protect ourselves and b) by making a contribution to our like minded partner nations? No. Because NZ confuses being liked with being respected. Those nations who are under going geo-strategic stresses - who we also need to survive. Am I surprised at worst, that sees a New Zealand that actively seems to be rejecting any form of defensive combat capability, not just to others, but even ourselves - our society, culture, economy and history, because we are just too pretentiously smug and superior about how special we are, how much better we are, like we have some special kind of spiritual totem of protection - a Taniwha as Ms Mahuta believes. Again not at all.
Why is it that every country in the Indo-Pacific region who we are partners with, friends with both new and old, are seeing the massive geo-political disruption going on and responding to it - are we trying to pretend and party like it is still 1999. We are at a point in history not unlike the massive geo-political disruption that built up twice last century into global hot wars, an outcome we all wish to avoid, that sees them doing the Mahi and Whakaaro to build up tangible defences as a deterrent or last resort - and all we do is just on keep on wishing it away. As for the outlook. At best we have a deepening Cold War 2.0, but it is early days, but it is not going to get any better. All of those 6 cabinet prescribed policy points signed off above are just going to be vapourware anyway. It is not a defence policy. It is more like a charter for a charitable NGO.
There is nothing that we can ever do with our current capabilities - just a couple of P-8A's, two frigates and two OPV's to stop illegal over fishing if a PRC sponsored ghost fleet entered into our wider EEZ. There is no enforcement capability anyway - no stick to wave as a warning to keep those fleets away. And in this Cold War 2.0 the more missing in action we are - others will have nothing but contempt for our so called "values" - all the talk of resilience, wellbeing, thats marvellous, but its just words. The kind of words that a naturopath therapist would have on their brochure.
Leaving it all up to others, to do the Mahi (work) means we as a country will no longer have a say in future matters, literally no longer have a say in our destiny. If anything our destiny could by mid century cease to exist as an independent nation state like we have now. That is not impossible. There is always road kill in the aftermath of any great power conflict even for the swimmers and non swimmers. The Polish were brave people, they fought in WW2 after they were invaded on the side of the allies, just for it to become a vassal Soviet state as the victors divvied up the spoils. Ditto the Czech Republic.
A defence force that is combat capable is the first line in that policy. However that does not translate into defence funding and acquisitions. Thus virtually no combat capability, no deterrence element, no credible contribution to the critical mass of the regional security umbrella. It simply puts the burden on the other nations and the greater risk of collective failure. Lucy, up to 20 years ago NZ provided 20% of the Air Combat capability, 20% of the Maritime Patrol capability, 20% of the Infantry capability and 20% of the Frigate capability of the ANZAC nations. Plus we provided a range of other capabilities much like we have now - air transport, helicopters ect. This policy was called Self Reliance in Partnership. We added strategic weight to each other - yes we were the little sibling - but we gave that little bit extra contribution to be a deterrent to our interests, both nationally and regionally. That Anzac contribution added on to the strategic weight to Singapore, to Malaysia, the South Korea, Japan and others. That is where the defence of New Zealand was all about. The thing is back in those Pre 2000 days - we still went up into the Islands to do HADR, SASO. We still went down into Antarctica and the Southern Ocean, but we also contributed a small but valued hard power element to the wider regional security umbrella.
Last thought. Projecting out into the future 10-15 years from now - and this is not science fiction but a possible vignette that another country has workshopped based on current adversary capabilities, we begin to find that their is an increasing number of high altitude long range UAV's like an EA03 Soaring Dragon with ISR or Electronic Warfare payloads onboard (designed to disrupt our electromagnetic spectrums), launched from PLA(N) carriers 1000kms away or from temporary usage rights from an ex debt diplomacy airport asset and are increasingly entering into first NZ AIDZ's, and then EEZ and then territorial airspace. How would we counter that - we know its there - but actually how would we deal with it?
Mr C, I totally agree with what you have written above, What the government left out from the above list is the simple task which every defence force is in existence has and that is to defend the sovereignty of their country and in our case of NZ and the freedom of our people. That is the main task of any defence force and has been completely missing as a task in the last 30 odd years.
Lucy, to achieve this (Defend NZ) is relatively simple in our case as we are an island surrounded by at least 2000km of water' This important as it places strike aircraft outside of their combat radius to us unless they are on an Aircraft Carrier and potential threats do not have them in large numbers.
1. we need to know what is going on in our area, in the air, on the water and under it. This requires good surveillance and a high level of intelligence gathering. Four P8's is not going to achieve this and does not provide us knowledge of what is happening in the air and there is going to be too few of them.
2. We need to be able to control or neutralize any threat that enters our area. Again due to our location this is simplified due to the distances involved and the likelihood that any threat to us would involve a simultaneous threat to Australia. So any threat to us would be diluted. this is easiest to achieve with air power, including both modern weapons for anti air and sea. The force required would not be dissimilar in size to the strike wing of the early 1990's of about 40 aircraft including modern combat capable advanced trainers.
3.The navy require additional assets to keep our lines of communication open and the army additional heavier weapons to exist on a modern battle field.
All our forces are very deficient in numbers in terms of manpower and equipment to defend us as if a threat arose help may be some time away. A modern well armed and balanced force would provide a significant deterrent to aggression against us and this what we need as we don't want to have to fight anyone if this can be avoided.
The world strategic situation is deteriorating for various reasons including the combined pressures of global warming and unrestrained population growth. I suggest you read this summary of a US army report on the subject.
U.S. Military Could Collapse Within 20 Years Due to Climate Change, Report Commissioned By Pentagon Says - VICE
If we wait until we see a threat, we will be at least a decade to late and maybe more to achieve a meaningful improvement to our situation.
Redlands18
Well-Known Member
@MrConservative I thought Adern's only reply to the RANs SSN decision summed her Governments attitude up very well, instead of such a massive Australian Defence policy change sending red flags all she done was say "well they won't be welcome in NZ waters"
Nighthawk.NZ
Well-Known Member
I think there is a little more to it than that... and Scott Morrison's visit Months before ... where he says the typical fluffy dogs BS that "there are some far from here who would seek to divide us, but they will not succeed" He already knew what AUKUS was coming and the fall out and even how it may put a strain on Trans-Tasman relations... and that the divide may seem to be getting bigger...
What we don't know is, what was truly said behind closed doors... which is a crux of many issues. What is said in public after closed door meetings are two very separate things...
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John Fedup
The Bunker Group
Climate change will be a problem for all militaries. The biggest problem for America’s military is the national debt and political polarization so severe it might result in civil unrest or worst case scenario, outright civil war.
John this is the NZ thread not US one. Stay in the lane.
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Sorry mate. I was attempting to channel my inner Allo Allo Lieutenant Hubert Gruber and his little tank "Hubert". It was a rather nice rant after a long week. At least I didn't attempt senior service, nautical disaster, by saying Boat or HM War Canoe. On the one side, we lost ACF but on the plus side, we get 105 LAVs. Cool, except that is hardly a priority for a maritime nation and, Army was playing the man instead of the ball. An inglorious period of our history. IMHO!
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Nighthawk.NZ
Well-Known Member
One of the other things the average kiwi forgets is not just about keeping our shipping lanes and lines of communication open but also the resources that the NZDF also need to to protect, from fishing to to possible oil and other minerals. It is well known that the Southern Ocean/Ross Sea is rich in resources not just fish but possibility of oil is quite high.
What would New Zealand do... or better yet what could New Zealand do if CCP sent it's ghost fishing fleet down there and strip fish the area. Also How hard of a fist would the NZG use... would they allow the RNZN to give warning shots over the bow or worse to stop the vessels by real force if required.
Considering the we only have x2 OPV that are semi capable of sailing there with a dedicated SOPV coming in the next 8 years(ish) And while every says they are under armed (and I agree) however there is the issue of what armaments are allowed down in the southern ocean. We current have the P-3K2's and soon the P-8A's but as mentioned previously they can spot these vessels... but can't do jack about it if push comes to shove. The Navy is very limited due to number of hulls in the water.
These fleets have been spotted all over the pacific and it is only a matter of time that they enter NZ waters. It will only take NZ saying the wrong thing about the CCP before they get the order to fish in these waters. These same fleets have been spotted with protection from the Chinese Coast guard... and while so far this has been limited to in the South China Sea again it is only a matter of time that this changes to every where they go. It's probably only a matter of time that the PLAN start protecting these fleets as well. Then what would NZ do?
New Zealand stupidly signed up to the Belt and Road Initiative from China (which we should personally just rip it up and get out of... but that is another rant for another day) it basically, is just about giving the CCP access to these resources. And while there is currently no evidence of this being abused in the Southern Ocean it is only a matter of time when resources get hard and harder to acquire and eyes set upon the Ross Dependency ... China is hungry for resources and to feed its population... They don't care if the strip fish of strip the resourses of an area... What would or what could NZ do if it happens in our territory... the answer at the moment "Sweet FA"
What would New Zealand do... or better yet what could New Zealand do if CCP sent it's ghost fishing fleet down there and strip fish the area. Also How hard of a fist would the NZG use... would they allow the RNZN to give warning shots over the bow or worse to stop the vessels by real force if required.
Considering the we only have x2 OPV that are semi capable of sailing there with a dedicated SOPV coming in the next 8 years(ish) And while every says they are under armed (and I agree) however there is the issue of what armaments are allowed down in the southern ocean. We current have the P-3K2's and soon the P-8A's but as mentioned previously they can spot these vessels... but can't do jack about it if push comes to shove. The Navy is very limited due to number of hulls in the water.
These fleets have been spotted all over the pacific and it is only a matter of time that they enter NZ waters. It will only take NZ saying the wrong thing about the CCP before they get the order to fish in these waters. These same fleets have been spotted with protection from the Chinese Coast guard... and while so far this has been limited to in the South China Sea again it is only a matter of time that this changes to every where they go. It's probably only a matter of time that the PLAN start protecting these fleets as well. Then what would NZ do?
New Zealand stupidly signed up to the Belt and Road Initiative from China (which we should personally just rip it up and get out of... but that is another rant for another day) it basically, is just about giving the CCP access to these resources. And while there is currently no evidence of this being abused in the Southern Ocean it is only a matter of time when resources get hard and harder to acquire and eyes set upon the Ross Dependency ... China is hungry for resources and to feed its population... They don't care if the strip fish of strip the resourses of an area... What would or what could NZ do if it happens in our territory... the answer at the moment "Sweet FA"
Back in the day, while the NZDF was only 20% of the combined ANZAC force it was effectively making that force 20% larger; it was providing niche capabilities such as ground attack, and was respected for its professionalism. While the last is still largely true, for its personnel anyway, the first two are not. From this side of the ditch we look on in sorrowing amazement as the NZ government appears to believe that all are people of good will who will never, ever do anything to threaten or damage NZ. Where’s my cardy and the sheet music for kumbaya?
LucyCraymer
New Member
Okay this is I'm sure a dumb question. But any chance you could tell me what sort of "heavier weapons" we need and what we need for a modern battlefield? And what sort of assets do the navy need to keep comms open? Do you mean in terms of making sure the Southern Cross cable isn't cut and satellites wiped out or so that our navy can continue to operate with ally ships? THANKS
LucyCraymer
New Member
Thanks Lucas. Any chance you could tell me a little more about what the helicopters couldn't do? These real world examples are excellent! Also I'm very issued in the problems caused when NZ tries to respond to two things at the same time.
Ah I see, then I stand corrected. In that context the point is entirely appropriate and it does appeal to my sense of humour. My apologies.
Todjaeger
Potstirrer
@LucyCraymer, you seem to misunderstand about the RNZN's role in keeping New Zealand's "lines of communication" open. This is not referring to an undersea cable, or even satellite constellations, but rather to New Zealand's Sea Lines of Communication (in this context of the acronym SLOC). Wikipedia (not a favoured source here on the forum) does have a reasonably decent explanation of the term here, as well as some examples from history.
In the context of NZ, the SLOC's are the maritime routes between NZ ports and all overseas ports that NZ imports and exports transit along.
Ignorance of NZ's SLOC does highlight what we on the forum tend to refer to as NZ's "sea blindness". I would imagine that the average Kiwi does not stop to really consider where things they use or consume every day come from, or how it gets to NZ so that they can be purchased. One result of this ignorance is that many Kiwis seem to not realize how situations and incidents far away from NZ can and have impacted them.
An example would be the situation off the coast of Somalia from approximately 2008 until 2013, a period when Somali piracy was particularly bad. Until the piracy largely collapsed as the combined results from a number of measures which included a significant international naval presence, the piracy was increasing the costs and time required to ship goods between ports which would normally have SLOC's which transited through the area. If I recall correctly, it was estimated that it increased the average shipping insurance costs by USD$100,000 per voyage. Some shipping companies opted to adopt other measures like hiring onboard security, or altering the route a ship would transit. However, either of these measures taken to protect a ship, her crew, and the goods being transported would increase the shipping costs, and in the case of using alternate routes, could require additional fuel purchases as well as increasing the transit times due to a longer and less direct route being taken.
Where the above example would have impacted Kiwis is that exports shipped from NZ to markets in places like Europe would cost slightly more than they had prior to the piracy problems and there would likely be slightly less demand for or purchases of the more expensive Kiwi goods. At the same time, the cost of imports to NZ from the same areas would also increase, so that Kiwis would not be able purchase as much for the same amount as before, or items would cost more than previously.
An unfortunately reality is that there are quite a number of places along the very long SLOC's between NZ and NZ's trading partners where there is the very real potential for some sort of situation to develop, or incident to occur, which will negatively impact NZ's international trade. In my opinion, it seems almost even more unfortunate that the average Kiwi seems quite oblivious to how easily an issue could happen which would negatively impact the quality of life in NZ.
One of the most important roles of the RNZN should be to help protect NZ's SLOC's, which could involve a range of threats, and would therefore require the RNZN to possess a range of response capabilities. It is also important that RNZN personnel and vessels be able to operate alongside the personnel and ships of other navies, especially those belonging to friendly and allied nations. One of the reasons this is important is that in many of the scenarios where a SLOC is threatened, the threat could impact a number of nations and therefore drawn an international response. The piracy situation off the coast of Somalia has also been an example of this, where vessels and personnel from a number of different nations have contributed to the reduction of the threat from pirates in the region.
Another unfortunate reality is that there are really too many and too distant potential threats to NZ's SLOC's for the NZDF to be able to protect them all. This means that NZ needs to be able to rely upon the navies of friends and allies to help protect and keep open some of these SLOC's, and in the same manner, NZ's friendly and allied nations need to be able to rely upon NZ assisting with protecting their SLOC's. In fact, in many instances the SLOC's of a friendly nation would also be a SLOC that NZ would use. It would therefore behoove NZ to be able to both provide for their own defence, and also be able to aide in the defence of other nations.
However, given apparent budgetary decisions and policy statements, it does not seem that the NZDF and what it is and should be responsible for has been considered a priority for quite some time, really for decades honestly. Lacking insight into NZ's political landscape, I cannot comment on how much of the current situation is a result of ignorance vs. an ideological inability or unwillingness to look at NZ's security situation honestly and objectively. I am certain that there has been at least a degree of governmental awareness of how negative things could become. Unfortunately though, it has been my perception that instead of openly and honestly admitting to how poorly resourced the NZDF has been, government instead decided to obfuscate the NZDF's resourcing.
Relating to the NZDF resourcing, one might even be able to write an entire article on the Capital Charge, it's impact upon the NZDF budget, what the difference has sometimes been between the stated Vote Defence budget vs. what the NZDF budget actually was in real money. I would likely need to search back through some of my posts from a decade ago or more, but I recall a time when the government of the day was declaring the Defence budget was 1% of NZ's GDP. However, when I sat down and went through the publicly available Vote Defence budget, I found that the actual level of funding was only about 0.67% of GDP, with about a third of the "budget" seeming to be nothing more than a bit of accounting "magic" to make the Defence budget look higher without the NZDF receiving any additional real money.
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No question is dumb when you are wanting to learn.
WRT army heavy weapons there are different schools of thought. It also depends upon how your army is structured and what you want it to do. Currently the NZ Army has a light infantry force along with towed M119 105mm artillery guns. Generally speaking light infantry don't have much support, operating independently and they definitely don't have an artillery regiment in tow. Nor do they generally ride into battle in armoured vehicles; they're more likely to walk into battle using cover to sneak up on an enemy and hold the ground for a short time until help arrives.
I am of the school of thought that the army should have self propelled guns / howitzers in the form of a 105mm gun turret mounted on an 8x8 Infantry Fighting Vehicle, the same vehicle that the infantry use. It can shoot and scoot before counter battery fire arrives. The gun crew are inside the vehicle at all times and protected from small arms fire along with some shell splinters. Whereas with the towed gun, the gun crew is larger, gun has to be set up & dug in which takes time, after firing has to be refixed onto its trails, reattached to towing vehicle, crew reembark into vehicle and then leave. That all takes time and before they have reattached the gun to the towing vehicle the first rounds of the counter battery fire will have arrived. The crew are out in the open with no cover. So you lose both the gun and the crew. Meanwhile the SPG is probably ½ km down the track looking at setting up another shoot, undetected. Our sole ally and most of our coalition partners use the 155mm gun, but again that has its pros and cons. This Think Defence article explains it quite well.
105mm, 155mm or Something In-between?
A guest post from Obsvr The defining characteristic of field artillery for the last century has been ‘firepower mobility’ of indirect fire. Any target within range can be engaged, providing the eff…
www.thinkdefence.co.uk
The NZ Army currently has no air defence capability apart from 7.62mm & 12.7mm machine gun fire. The 25mm autocannon in the NZ LAV can offer some air defence capability but only if the target is below the gun's maximum elevation, which I think is about +30 - 35°. For proper air defence capability the gun elevation should be at least +75°. The army did have 12 Mistral MANPAD shoulder fired air defence missile launchers, but they were trying to sell them to free up some money. They also have the Javelin ATGM (Anti Tank Guided Missile) which can be used against helicopters at low level. However being NZ they probably need Cabinet approval to fire a Javelin missile. The last time that the NZ Army fielded a viable air defence was in the early to mid 1950s.
WRT communications that's a defence wide issue and we have to work on the principle that we will loose space capability in the first day of a near peer war in the Indo-Pacific. There are various workarounds being mooted in the US and Europe, and NZ does have the capability of implementing those workarounds if there is the political foresight and political will. We build Cubesats here and we have our own operational space launch capability, with another undergoing research and prototyping. So we can launch replacement SATCOM and surveillance SAT constellations when we have to; and we should have a stock of both ready to go to. Secondly we can use either manned aircraft and / or UAVs as ACN / BACN (Airborne Communications Nodes / Battlefield Airborne Communications Nodes) as and when required. With the aircraft specialist aircraft don't need to be acquired because the equipment can be integrated into an existing aircraft such as the current RNZAF B757-200 Combi. The RNZN's ability to operate with our ally Australia and any coalition ships, communications wise is already built into the frigates because they have the Link 16 & 22 TDL (Tactical Data Link), and along with Aotearoa, Manawanui, and the OPVs, other secure communications systems.
My thoughts on this is that the only real dumb question is the one you fail to ask and thanks Ngati for answering the questions so well, save's me.
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Lucy I will have a go in the meantime to answer your question with respect to the lack of helicopters and the lack of an ability to do more than one thing at a time.
Fifteen years ago the government at the time made the decision to buy Medium Utility helicopters and Training / Light Utility helicopters. These were to replace 15 UH-1H Iroquios and 5 Bell-46G Sioux helicopters (Once 9 as we never replaced the ones that crashed or were junked). The government instructed Defence to undertake a study to find out the optimal amount required. Option 5C was considered the optimum solution because it met all key operational requirements.
Option 5C
10 medium utility aircraft
10 training and light utility aircraft
Optimum mix to meet all key operational requirements.
Effective mix for humanitarian aid and disaster relief operations.
Light utility suitable for intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition and reconnaissance roles.
Regarding the T/LUH Helicopter fleet with 10 airframes it was found that 4 aircraft would always be able/available to conduct the training element the NZDF requires. It would also be able to always provide three aircraft for other deployment in the Light Utility Role so as to provide limited capacity for deployments of short duration (in the Pacific), and enable a limited amount of tasking in support of the NZDF, the Government and other departments and agencies.
In other words with a fleet of ten the government would be able to supply 7 aircraft to the operational flight-line. The other three aircraft would be rotated through the various maintenance stages. Note that this really is the bare minimum as it only provides limited capacity.
The government therefore ordered just 5 aircraft and a 6th non flying attrition spare was purchased.
Here are the roles that these 5 T/LUH are attempting to conduct.
Capability Requirements - necessary to support policy objectives of the
Pilot and Helicopter Crewmen Training Requirements include:
Training for helicopter pilots.
Training for qualified helicopter instructors.
Initial training for helicopter crewmen.
Training for helicopter crewmen instructors.
Conversion to aircraft types and consolidation flying for pilots destined for NH90
and Seasprite helicopters.
Continuation training for helicopter pilots.
Capability Requirements - necessary to support policy objectives of the
Light Utility Requirements include:
Air movement.
Command, control and communications.
Special operations – limited counter terrorism tasks.
Search and rescue.
Aero-medical evacuation.
Aerial sustainment.
Light observations tasks.
Ferry.
Maintenance test flying.
As stated above the optimal fleet size for the Medium Helicopter Replacement Project was 10 airframes if a larger helicopter like the NH90 was acquired. The NZ Government decided that just 8 operational airframes would be sufficient, because their acquisition budgets were as usual unrealistic or set to an arbitary figure. Further details are here:
Major Projects Report 2013 Volume 2 Part 3 | Ministry of Defence website
www.defence.govt.nz
Option 5B (The second best option from the study) outlined a fleet of 9 medium utility aircraft (NH-90) and 8 training & light utility aircraft. They noted that this 9 + 8 fleet would meet all key operational requirements, however there would still be a risk to being able to generate concurrent tasking and aircraft availability (through to lack of over-all fleet numbers) and no allowance made for attrition.
This 9 + 8 fleet would still create insufficient training helicopters for the deployable light utility capability and will create risk to concurrent tasks such as sniper use or troop transport overall.
It would also mean that the expensive Medium Utility helicopter would be used inefficiently used for light tasks. Finally this reduced fleet would be unable to provide Special Forces with rapid tactical mobility for counter terrorism activities.
Remember in the end we bought not 10 + 10 (Optimal) or even 9 + 8 (Acceptable) - but just 8 + 5 (13) airframes to replace what used to be over 20 helicopters in the NZDF fleet.
Of those 8 airframes - 3 aircraft were meant to be available for domestic tasks and training, including national contingencies. Three aircraft available for deployment overseas and when not deployed training with Land Forces (train as you fight) with the other going through scheduled or unscheduled maintenance. Everything going well at a targeted 75% serviceability rate that means the NZDF has just 6 functional medium utility helicopters. The truth is the NH90 is a bit of a problem child and has not quite lived up to availability targets, so really we just have five at anyone time we could be certain about. As for deploying three - you would need all three always operating when deployed never going unserviceable to be certain to provide air mobility at any one time a NZ Army Task Element. Best practice would be to deploy four to have a Reserve / Rotatable airframe - because you are months and 1000's of Kms away from Ohakea! Finally, we did not buy until recently the flight simulator and did not specify the folding rotor or uprated undercarriage so it could be usable off the HMNZS Canterbury - which can only sealift three NH90's anyway.
We were lucky to be able to acquire 10 used Sea Sprite Maritime helicopters in 2014 of which eight are able to support operations and two have been retained for attrition spares. These aircraft are remanufactured (now what you may not realise is that some of these ”new” helicopters have original US Navy serial numbers that date back to in some cases to 1963, the year JFK died, others date in manufacture serials back to the year the Beatles put out the White album 1968. (For example airframe serial NZ3616 was built as as UH-2B in 1963, converted to a UH-2C, further converted to a SH-2F and served with USN until 01/06/93. Then it was stored in the desert at AMARC from 04/06/93. Transferred on 17/10/01 by ship to Australia and rebuilt again for use with RAN by which time it had 9570 hrs on airframe as a UH-2B, UH-2C & SH-2F. It was then sent back to Kaman at Bloomfield, CT in March of 2008 and eventually rebuilt again as SH-2G(I). Before being sold along with nine others to NZDF. In 2016 NZ3616 was back in the Pacific at Pearl Harbour likely 50 years after it served as a fresh airframe with the USN. So some of our SeaSprites are older than our 55 year old Hercules and Orions )
The prior original Sea Sprite order from the 1990’s (delivered in 2001) was your typical bare arse NZ government order for just 4 aircraft, then a further single additional airframe was ordered following a heavy landing on a Anzac frigate while under deployment in the Middle East (which effectively meant we had just 1 part-time operational Sea Sprite). The reality was that we needed at least 9 operational with a further 3 reserve/spare/rotatable aircraft to cover the ability to place helicopters at sea on RNZN vessels and still retain a shore based training and maintenance programme.
One last thing to bear in mind the studies undertaken about the replacement helicopter fleet was conducted in 2002-2003 nearly 20 years ago when we were meant to have a benign strategic environment - not entering into the 3rd major geo-political change era of the last 120 years.
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