My first post, so please excuse the verbosity!!
On 11 April last, the late Whiskyjack and I attended the Auckland meeting called by National Defence spokesman Dr Mapp, one of three he arranged around NZ.
Also present to speak were fellow MP Tim Grosser, ex MFAT trade negotiator, plus a senior solicitor Dr Mapp knew. Attendees included a lot of former senior servicemen, including Rear Admiral (retd) Welsh, Col (retd) R Dearing (served in Borneo vs Indonesia) - cant recall the rest. Minor perspective - Whiskyjack was 31 and easily the youngest there (I am 45, I felt I was young too!). Dr Mapp was on the "Defence Beyond 2000" parliamentary committee enquiry back in 1998/99 and was one of those who issued minority report as appendix, opposing some of the majority recommendations. He used to be Army territorial intelligence officer.
Given the passage of time and equipment now acquired, National seems to have moved into some line with that report (aka "Quigley enquiry")
In no particular order, these were my impressions :
1) Forget the Air Combat Force - dead and buried, RIP. It would need a Saudi Arabian sized oilfield to get it back, maybe. BUT the MB339 is almost certainly a goer, up to 12 units, for training and "show the flag" stuff. Dr Mapp isnt opposed to ACF, just cant justify against other higher priorities.
2) Additional funding - at last election, National leader Dr Brash (leaked email) suggested NZ$200m (currently say US$140m) annual increase. New leader Key is former commercial banker - Mapp unwilling / unable to commit to what $ National might bump up the budget. Defence Long Term Development Plan and Defence Sustainability Initiative, both set out by current govt, have Defence spending rising anyway (albeit the big rises happen in the future, 2010 onwards....) I dont think more than $200m as a bump up to the base on which the others are set is going to happen.
3) Third frigate - even Key has spoken in favour of this. Failure to acquire HMAS Arunta (another ANZAC class Meko) back in 1998 was black spot for then National minority govt. But whether NZ would ask Australia for a surplus ANZAC (if any are surplus anyway) or whether we would look for an orphan one-off design, unspecified. Ex-naval personnel most critical of any suggestion of "yet another" design. Danish Absalom (and derivative frigate) were mentioned due to their multi-role capabilities.
4) Existing ANZAC class - strong preference to upgrade to same standard as owned by RAN. As long as RAN does and works kinks out first! At least our Seaprites fly!
5) Navy generally - real concern over manning levels, especially certain key roles, worry that we wont be able to man what we have (2 * ANZAC, tanker plus 7 Protector ships and survey ship). I asked RA Welsh privately if a third crew for the 2 OPV's made more sense than 3rd hull, comment was crewing existing ships alone would be tough. So seems no-one has thought of 3 crew / 2 OPV ship option.
6) Major discussion on use of Reserves. Cant see 3rd regular battalion - maybe HQ unit. Real emphasis on rebuilding the TA to round out regulars and enable longer deployments like Timor. Even the Bosnia deployment in early 90's stretched army. All agreed get back to 4,000 - 6,000 level desirable. Discussion on making that happen - funding, encouraging young people to join, took up quite some time. This seems to be a fundamental plank to Nationals thinking both Whiskyjack and I agreed.
7) A400M - real likelihood. C130H just cant carry NZLAV any useful distance, and NZLAV seems to be the standard candle. But see comment following about funding. I had impression 6 was the likely number. I know a number of NZ politicians had favoured getting a C17 and adding to the Australian squadron - like that could happen now that Air NZ (shock horror) has flown Australian troops to Kuwait!
8) T/UH and NH90. Grosser and Mapp seemed appalled at the price for 8 machines (okay, 9, but we are pulling one apart for spares). Generally agreed 10 was minimum useful number. Mapp indicated more T/UH would be priority - and he flatly stated more likely to get $$ than jets.
9) UAV's - incredibly - werent even mentioned!! I know RNZAF and now Army have some locally built ones but Predator / Reaper / Mariner didnt get a look in, despite their capabilities! I would have thought an NZ contribution to a Darfur UN deployment of UAV's for patrol would be excellent (keeps the troops home after all) but, no, they didnt come up!
10) I *REALLY* worry about politicians and dollars!! I am an accountant by training and occupation and fully understand the "capital charge" and was really worried by the almost total lack of understanding of it by virtually everyone else at the gathering. Dr Mapp gave impression it was almost interchangeable with "normal" funding - which it certainly isnt! The A400M would almost certainly be funded by a lease deal rather than a straight buy, which isnt a bad idea I guess. I would pick that to be NZ$2 billion plus for 6 with spares, training etc and that would kill the capital expenditure budget for probably 6 years!
11) Orion replacement - P8 Poseidon only option (but still no mention of Mariner as complement).
Rather than explain the capital charge here and make this longer I will post an explanation in a couple of days hopefully with some figures. Note that NZ has 2 Defence organisations as well - NZDF and MoD. And there are cross-party payments as MoD acquires the equipment and then sells it to NZDF!
These are just my impressions anyway. Dont look for big $$ increase and expect incremental capability increase for what currently exists. Jet trainers to refly only "new".
On 11 April last, the late Whiskyjack and I attended the Auckland meeting called by National Defence spokesman Dr Mapp, one of three he arranged around NZ.
Also present to speak were fellow MP Tim Grosser, ex MFAT trade negotiator, plus a senior solicitor Dr Mapp knew. Attendees included a lot of former senior servicemen, including Rear Admiral (retd) Welsh, Col (retd) R Dearing (served in Borneo vs Indonesia) - cant recall the rest. Minor perspective - Whiskyjack was 31 and easily the youngest there (I am 45, I felt I was young too!). Dr Mapp was on the "Defence Beyond 2000" parliamentary committee enquiry back in 1998/99 and was one of those who issued minority report as appendix, opposing some of the majority recommendations. He used to be Army territorial intelligence officer.
Given the passage of time and equipment now acquired, National seems to have moved into some line with that report (aka "Quigley enquiry")
In no particular order, these were my impressions :
1) Forget the Air Combat Force - dead and buried, RIP. It would need a Saudi Arabian sized oilfield to get it back, maybe. BUT the MB339 is almost certainly a goer, up to 12 units, for training and "show the flag" stuff. Dr Mapp isnt opposed to ACF, just cant justify against other higher priorities.
2) Additional funding - at last election, National leader Dr Brash (leaked email) suggested NZ$200m (currently say US$140m) annual increase. New leader Key is former commercial banker - Mapp unwilling / unable to commit to what $ National might bump up the budget. Defence Long Term Development Plan and Defence Sustainability Initiative, both set out by current govt, have Defence spending rising anyway (albeit the big rises happen in the future, 2010 onwards....) I dont think more than $200m as a bump up to the base on which the others are set is going to happen.
3) Third frigate - even Key has spoken in favour of this. Failure to acquire HMAS Arunta (another ANZAC class Meko) back in 1998 was black spot for then National minority govt. But whether NZ would ask Australia for a surplus ANZAC (if any are surplus anyway) or whether we would look for an orphan one-off design, unspecified. Ex-naval personnel most critical of any suggestion of "yet another" design. Danish Absalom (and derivative frigate) were mentioned due to their multi-role capabilities.
4) Existing ANZAC class - strong preference to upgrade to same standard as owned by RAN. As long as RAN does and works kinks out first! At least our Seaprites fly!
5) Navy generally - real concern over manning levels, especially certain key roles, worry that we wont be able to man what we have (2 * ANZAC, tanker plus 7 Protector ships and survey ship). I asked RA Welsh privately if a third crew for the 2 OPV's made more sense than 3rd hull, comment was crewing existing ships alone would be tough. So seems no-one has thought of 3 crew / 2 OPV ship option.
6) Major discussion on use of Reserves. Cant see 3rd regular battalion - maybe HQ unit. Real emphasis on rebuilding the TA to round out regulars and enable longer deployments like Timor. Even the Bosnia deployment in early 90's stretched army. All agreed get back to 4,000 - 6,000 level desirable. Discussion on making that happen - funding, encouraging young people to join, took up quite some time. This seems to be a fundamental plank to Nationals thinking both Whiskyjack and I agreed.
7) A400M - real likelihood. C130H just cant carry NZLAV any useful distance, and NZLAV seems to be the standard candle. But see comment following about funding. I had impression 6 was the likely number. I know a number of NZ politicians had favoured getting a C17 and adding to the Australian squadron - like that could happen now that Air NZ (shock horror) has flown Australian troops to Kuwait!
8) T/UH and NH90. Grosser and Mapp seemed appalled at the price for 8 machines (okay, 9, but we are pulling one apart for spares). Generally agreed 10 was minimum useful number. Mapp indicated more T/UH would be priority - and he flatly stated more likely to get $$ than jets.
9) UAV's - incredibly - werent even mentioned!! I know RNZAF and now Army have some locally built ones but Predator / Reaper / Mariner didnt get a look in, despite their capabilities! I would have thought an NZ contribution to a Darfur UN deployment of UAV's for patrol would be excellent (keeps the troops home after all) but, no, they didnt come up!
10) I *REALLY* worry about politicians and dollars!! I am an accountant by training and occupation and fully understand the "capital charge" and was really worried by the almost total lack of understanding of it by virtually everyone else at the gathering. Dr Mapp gave impression it was almost interchangeable with "normal" funding - which it certainly isnt! The A400M would almost certainly be funded by a lease deal rather than a straight buy, which isnt a bad idea I guess. I would pick that to be NZ$2 billion plus for 6 with spares, training etc and that would kill the capital expenditure budget for probably 6 years!
11) Orion replacement - P8 Poseidon only option (but still no mention of Mariner as complement).
Rather than explain the capital charge here and make this longer I will post an explanation in a couple of days hopefully with some figures. Note that NZ has 2 Defence organisations as well - NZDF and MoD. And there are cross-party payments as MoD acquires the equipment and then sells it to NZDF!
These are just my impressions anyway. Dont look for big $$ increase and expect incremental capability increase for what currently exists. Jet trainers to refly only "new".
fftopic and not strictly defence related, being more aviation/airline industry related. As far as I know, Air New Zealand is NZ's national carrier and a publicly traded company, but with a majority stake owned by the NZ government (~75% IIRC) and are part of the requirements of the company, it must remain owned by an NZ majority. Given the recent flap about Air NZ flying charter flights of ADF personnel into Kuwait, I was under the impression that Air NZ was operated separately or independently from the NZ government, being run as a business. As such, it would report to the shareholders on costs, earnings, profit (loss) etc like any normal business would and would be interested in earning as much profit as possible like any normal business. Now I begin to wonder if Air NZ is more of an extension of the NZ government, as opposed to a separate entity. If someone could clarify this matter to me, it would be appreciated.