Comment on Australia secures $250m US package for F/A-18F & EA-18G fleets
Gorgritch_umie_killa@aussie.zone 1 week agoI didn’t read the article before commenting. I now have. Based on this comment I think you might’ve missed it in the article as well. Anyway whatever our miscommunication, its announcing a training and support package, no new aircraft are being purchased. So this fits with maintaining status quo and readiness. So from both our comments we probably agree on that.
But your response had a problem I want to highlight. You didn’t really demonstrate how its a move in the direction of multipolarity instead of my claim that its a move that can undermine Australia’s sovereign capability.
For me, what I’d be looking for to answer the caution around US technology sales to an ally would be something in the deal and it’s ongoing delivery that shows meaningful independent decision making and agency in use and destruction by the purchasing nation. Nothing in your comment really addressed that.
As I say it doesn’t matter now, but for the wider discussions around US hegemony of the Allied US/NATO alliance structure it does.
The below is where I’m at, when it comes to trust in the alliance. Its more of restatement, in a different way, of my first comment though.
Further sales of these aircraft are from a Nation that has demonstrated it’s willingness to simply consider invasion (Greenland) of an allies’ territory. This lowering trust joins a rising caution that its very hard for a purchasing nation to eliminate the possibility of kill switches being installed, either before or after purchase, for exquisite platforms. These combined should do lasting damage to the prospects of having a trustworthy alliance partner in the US. If they’re not raising alarm bells in defense, politics, and the country in general I question whether we really understand the predicament these developments place us in.
supersquirrel@sopuli.xyz 6 days ago
The F18 Growlers are based on an old airframe, this is less of a concern. Plenty of nations fly older US aircraft that the US sold to them at some point who the US is no longer allies with. The F35 is a different question entirely, the US doesn’t even own the copyright to that jet and it is one problem after another and in general I think what you are pointing out becomes more and more true the newer the aircraft is.
I understand the hesitation though, but from US perspective I am happy there is another nation with this expertise, not just the US.
I don’t think you understand until you see a flight of these go by like sharks while you consider they are entire surveillance, electronic warfare and intelligence suites somehow shoved into a jet. Sure, go with an alternative aircraft from a different country when it becomes available, maybe join the fighter aircraft program Canada just expressed interest in, but for now? I feel more safe knowing it isn’t just my country that possesses these.
Between these and AH64Es, Australia has an extremely solid air defense network and it is inevitable that given Australia’s massive size and numerous littoral environments that Australia will become one of the most powerful militaries on earth, if not in number than certainly in expertise and doctrine. Sure, Australia has a lot of problems but it is a much more functional democracy than the US, so yeah… I am not going to say you are wrong just consider that side of things. Consider that it is dangerous to only let the US possess tools like these…
You have to understand pretty much every other equivalent tool in the world is a big, slow business jet platform. An electronic warfare Gripen exists but it is an order of magnitude less capable and it has no such established history of iteration and refinement over decades of real world use.