Redlands18
Well-Known Member
The Army has been operating Chinooks since the mid 90s, including operational deployments into a war zone. They operated Blackhawks from around 1990 to 2021, without any issues at all (except for the 1996 collision), so how have they been a disaster? I don't know if there is enough information in the public domain to say whether the Tiger and Taipan problems would not have occurred with RAAF stewardship. Also, there is virtually no experience left in the RAAF for operating Helicopters.The new C-130Js are beyond doubt the best tactical aircraft to replace the old A/E/H/Js. Please forget about A400 and the stupidly political C-27J (absolutely nothing against the peps of 35SQN).
We just need to get enough frames and introduce the helicopter AAR / non strategic F-18F/G AAR roles.
The next best thing would be to bring Apache and Chinook back into proper air power and the RAAF, after the disaster of Army stewardship.
The future medium airlift fleet looks to be pretty much settled on 24 C-130Js but no KC-130Js at this time, so no Helo AAR capability at this time. I would not say that the C-130J is beyond doubt the best but as an all-up package they suit Australia's requirements better than the A400, C-2 or C-390