The truth begins to emerge

Now it is the Observer's turn to pick up on the details that we've been running on this blog and DOTR for months, most recently here, here and here. I suppose I shouldn't keep saying, "you read it here first," but you bloody well did.

Defence ministers, we are told spurned three separate deals to buy American Black Hawk helicopters which would have helped to plug the dangerous shortage facing British troops in Afghanistan. The most recent rejection came only days ago, "the Observer can reveal."

The ministers are, of course, acting under the advice of their officials and the military. And there is only one reason why the Blackhawks are not being bought. There is not enough money to buy this (cheaper and better) helicopter and that pile of over-priced garbage otherwise known as Future Lynx so if the Blackhawks were ordered, the Future Lynx was junked.

The Army – as we have already said – blocked the Blackhawk because it is too heavy for the Army to fly. Under current arrangements, the RAF would operate them. The Army loses is organic utility helicopter capability – bye, bye Army Air Corps. And the Colonel Commandant of the AAC? Mr Saintly Dannatt, who made keeping the AAC more important than getting capacity into theatre.

We must remind readers that he had a lot of support – the lobbying has been ferocious on this, from across the board. Had ministers ignored their officials and Mr Dannatt's orchestra, there would have been the mother of all political rows, and the media would have pitched in ... on the Saintly Mr Dannatt's side.

Instead, having already pulled a fast one with the Merlin, the officials told the ministers to go for the only other option on which the Army and the RAF would agree - refurbishing Pumas. They should, perhaps have rejected the advice but hey! The narrative is that ministers should take the advice of the military.

So it is the Observer tells us that "under the initial offer from Connecticut-based Sikorsky in 2007, 60 Black Hawks would already have been available for British forces in Helmand province, where they have sustained heavy casualties from roadside bombs in their renewed offensive against the Taleban."

Yea ... and where was the media then, while an unpaid blogger has been doing the running? Where was the Tory opposition? Er ... lobbying hard for Future Lynx.

And then we have bandwagon rider extraordinaire James Arbuthnot, chairman of the defence committee, whose report last week "condemned the Puma refit" and expressed concern over its "poor survivability" in combat. He says: "The Black Hawks are extremely good, they could be acquired in large numbers and the cost of running them would be low." So why didn't he recommend getting them in his report last week?

Answer, there will be none.

COMMENT THREAD

Of course they need more helicopters ...

Challenged by Liam Fox as to why the defence secretary was not bringing more helicopters into Afghanistan, Ainsworth trotted out the "usual statistics" and then rounded on the shadow secretary, declaring, "I have yet to hear how he thinks we can get more helicopters in ... ".

Yet Ainsworth, in common with his predecessors, is fighting with his hands tied behind his back. He could bring more capacity into theatre within weeks – it could already be there, and could have been for years. But, for he or his predecessors to have done so would have been in the teeth of opposition from the military itself, which has blocked endless attempts to bring more machines into use.

Options on the table have included the leasing of Mi-8 MTVs and Mi-26s (pictured), of purchasing Blackhawks off-the-shelf from the American manufacturers, or buying and refurbishing US Huey-type machines – in use by US Marines and Canadian forces in Afghanistan.

Each time proposals have been made, they have been blocked – sometimes for good reasons, but none of the problems insurmountable. Mainly the blockages have been inter-service rivalry or because the military have been holding out for "better" machines, sometime in the future, as in the Future Lynx.

Maybe in 30 years time, historians will be able to get access to the government records and tell the full story of what has been going on, but the Future Lynx story also involves a strong element of "pork barrel" politics – keeping Augusta Westland in business – the future of the Army Air Corps, of which Dannatt is commandant general, and protecting Navy requirements for a light ASW airframe.

Perhaps a more robust, Churchillian prime minister could have cut through the maze of competing priorities and sectional interests and issued an "action this day" directive. But such is the febrile atmosphere that it would be a very brave – and foolhardy – politician who over-rode his "defence chiefs" and imposed his own choice on the military.

Any of the alternative options would have involved extra risk – over and above that of buying a fully kitted-out helicopter of a type already on the British forces inventory.

The Russian-built helicopters are not as reliable or as safe as the European and American machines, and there are problems integrating the full defensive suites into these airframes. Nevertheless, Mi-8s are in use with special forces in Afghanistan, flown by serving RAF pilots, and the users speak highly of them.

The Huey airframes are old, and have relatively limited capabilities, but they are better than the Lynxes in that they can operate in "hot and high" conditions, albeit with reduced payloads. As for the Blackhawks, they are currently on the US forces inventory, but even then there are problems with integrating the electronics and defence systems with the British fleet.

Thus are ministers handicapped. The British military has acquired a rare ability for finding "reasons" for not doing things it does not want to do, and then deflecting blame onto the politicians when the consequences become apparent, briefing all the while to a media willing to "out" ministers who "put troops at risk". They would just have to wait for one of the "minister's" helicopters to crash, and he would be toast.

The politicians have yet to find a way of dealing with this – a disease which was apparent in 1996 when Douglas Hogg deferred to his "experts" over BSE – which means government has become a process of ministers allowing their "experts" free rein, then acting as their spokesmen and taking the can when things go wrong.

Ainsworth is following in this long tradition and, in time, his successors will do the same. Fox could have put him on the spot, offering alternatives. But he too knows that, to promote them, he would have to take on the military – something he would not do, conscious that he would also be at risk of being denounced.

That in some way explains the current unreality of politics. Ministers and their opposition counterparts are emasculated, and cannot even explain why.

COMMENT THREAD

Time to get this sorted

With the recent deaths of Lt-Col Thorneloe and Trp Joshua Hammond, the number of service personnel killed in Afghanistan by mine strikes and IEDs while riding in poorly protected vehicles rises to 49 by our estimate.

With 140 KIA, that amounts to 35 percent of deaths due to enemy action (or accidental minestrikes from legacy mines). Perhaps twice as many service personnel have suffered very serious injuries, losing in total 150 or thereabouts skilled personnel. Without taking into account the huge financial costs, the Military cannot afford this unnecessary attrition.

Yet from the man on the spot, working for The Times comes one very obvious remedy, which the man himself fails even to recognise. The man in question is Tom Coghlan who records his experience riding in a Viking re-supply convoy, and an incident similar to that which killed Lt-Col Thorneloe.

Coghlan starts his piece with the effect: "The blast from the roadside bomb was a breaking storm of noise and shock that scrambled the senses and shrouded men and machines in a white pall of choking dust," he writes, with the description continuing thus:

Long seconds of uncertainty followed, before torch beams swept the evening gloom to reveal the silhouette of the sixth vehicle in the convoy, an armoured supplier, sagging sideways and half off the track. Its cabin was a shambles of metal. Its machinegun turret and its gunner were missing.

There was no sign of a follow-up ambush, but one might be imminent. On the internal radio of the Viking armoured car, an 11-tonne tracked personnel carrier, the crew swore softly and bitterly. "I wish they’d show themselves so I could f*****g ..." one voice said, trailing off to anguished silence.

The first five vehicles in the convoy had passed over the bomb before it detonated under the sixth, injuring but not killing two of the occupants. About 25 minutes after the blast the injured men were on an American Blackhawk rescue helicopter – not, incidentally, a British helicopter. We will return to that.

With the convoy now stranded two miles from its base, the troops have a nervous overnight wait for a recovery vehicle, suffering a Taleban ambush at 8am when they sustain more casualties. Why a recovery is not mounted immediately is not explained.

At last however, a rescue party arrives – a recovery vehicle, escorted by two Mastiffs. Coghlan calls then "armoured cars", which is a very odd choice of words. Cars, they most certainly are not. To call them merely "armoured" is also to miss their essential attribute. Unlike the Vikings, they are mine/blast protected vehicles.

That attribute is immediately tested. We learn that, as it neared the convoy, the lead Mastiff was caught by another buried bomb. However, Coughlan records, "Its heavy armour saved the crew, but it had to be recovered by the vehicle it was escorting."

So, putting it together – a Viking is hit by a bomb. Two crew are injured and need medevac. A Mastiff is hit by a bomb in the same location, and the crew walk away uninjured. And Coughlan draws no lessons from that at all.

The inference must be, of course, that had Lt-Col Thorneloe and his driver been riding in a Mastiff, they would still be alive today. No one yet has been killed in a Mastiff, even though it is covering the same territory as the other vehicles in theatre and taking many hits.

There is, of course, the mobility issue, with the Viking able to traverse terrain that is not accessible to the Mastiff, although it seems unlikely that a supply route could have been particularly challenging. And in any case, we have addressed this issue. If there is a mobility problem with the Mastiff, put half tracks on it.

Furthermore, someone in authority needs to ask of Force Protection if the Ridgeback or Cheetah can be turned into a fully-tracked vehicle. If the Germans could do it with the Opel Blitz in 1942, there cannot be any insuperable technical problems in 2009.

Another aspect of "mobility" however, is weight, especially relevant in the Thorneloe incident, where canal crossings were being used. Against the 12 tons well-distributed weight of the Viking, the 23 tons of the Mastiff undoubtedly causes severe strain on the primitive road system and very often exceeds the load-carrying capabilities of rural bridges.

As an alternative, there is the Ridgeback, nine tons lighter than the Mastiff 2, which is now in theatre. Not only that, sitting in South Carolina at the Force Protection plant are 50 unused Cheetahs which at 11 tons, come out at roughly the same weight as the Viking yet confer the same degree of protection as the Cougar, on whuch the Mastiff is based.

Here, we also need to look at the bigger picture. In the crossing of the Rhine in 1945, within 24 hours of the initial assault, the Allies had 36 crossing points established. Assault bridging is a speciality of the British Army and there is also that miracle of British engineering, the Bailey Bridge - or its modern equivalent.

We have long argued that the engineering component of the British forces needs substantially to be enhanced. Not least, locals also find difficulties with access, getting farm machinery and commercial trucks across canals. The "hearts and minds" aspect of such engineering works cannot be overstated, to say nothing of the tactical flexibility afforded.

Looking more specifically at the incident in question, there is also the question of why Thorneloe was taking a high-risk journey in a ground vehicle. A tactical commander might be better served by a helicopter or a STOL aircraft, such as a Pilatus Porter.

Then, having chosen a ground vehicle, one has to ask why a supply route was not cleared and then – whether or not it had been – why it was not under continuous video surveillance (by UAVs or ground assets) to prevent the Taleban bomb emplacers doing their deadly work. Given Coghlan's experience, and the fact that the IED is now the Taleban's weapon of choice, it could hardly have come as a surprise that this incident occurred.

As in life, there are always plenty of reasons one can find for not doing things and excuses there are a plenty when things go wrong. These we see in quantity in this man's Army, but the excuses are wearing extremely thin. It is time to get this problem sorted.

COMMENT THREAD

Game over

It is now a matter of record that one of the reasons why the platoon house at Musa Qala in 2006 was effectively surrendered to the Taleban was that it had become too dependent on Chinooks for supply.

With a limited number of landing sites, and the Taleban closing in, it was felt that it would be only a matter of time before the insurgents "got lucky" and downed one of these helicopters. The effect on public opinion - with the loss of upwards of 40 personnel - would have been, it was felt at the time, so severe that it is unlikely that continued British participation in Afghanistan would have been politically possible.

At that time, possibly the main threat to helicopters was RPGs, ground fire from Kalashnikovs and even 12.7mm machine guns. But, as the campaign progressed, there was an even more serious threat – the possibility of hand-held guided missiles (MANPADS as they are called) bringing down a machine.

That this has not happened – despite several attempts – is one of the untold successes of the military, and British industry. Aircraft in theatre have been fitted with a complex of physical and electronic countermeasures, known collectively as the Defence Aids Suite (DAS) which, with a combination of good tactics, superbly skilled flying and an element of luck, have thwarted Taleban attacks.

However, in a sinister turn of events, it could be that the Taleban are reverting to old technology – the dedicated anti-aircraft gun - in an attempt to achieve a "spectacular", the shooting down of a fully-laden Chinook. This, they are fully aware, could still have a devastating effect on British sentiment towards the war.

Possibly, there was some intimation of this development on 15 November last year when US Air Force A-10 Thunderbolt IIs were called in to fire cannon rounds and a B-1B Lancer dropped a GBU-38 onto Taleban hiding in a compound trying to shoot down an aircraft. A coalition aircraft also performed a show of force to deter enemy activities near the compound where the anti-aircraft fire was seen.

Nothing much was made of this at the time but, as we reported recently on 21 April there was another disturbing development.

In the space of 12 hours, the Taleban had fielded two heavy anti-aircraft weapons, each capable of taking out a Chinook or other British helicopter. Both were Soviet-made ZPU-1s, loaded and ready for use, mounted on the back of pick-up trucks. They were located in the Nad Ali district, close to Lashkar Gah, where British troops are stationed and from where Chinook helicopters frequently take off and land from the helipad.

Fortunately, as we reported at the time – in an encouraging testament to the ground work done by coalition forces - the villagers spotted the first gun and reported it to the authorities. Shortly thereafter, it was attacked by two US Air Force A-10 Thunderbolt Iis which destroyed the gun and the truck, using their 30mm Avenger cannons.

The next gun was also a ZPU-1, and again it was reported by villagers in the Nad Ali district, after it had been fired in the vicinity of the local bazaar. This one was taken out by US Air Force F-15E Strike Eagles. They first disabled the truck using strafes, preventing enemy personnel from driving the vehicle into a civilian area, and then bombed it using GBU-38s.

Although the ZPU-1 is 70s-era equipment and obsolete, with a 14.5mm calibre, it is a potent anti-aircraft weapon and could have made short work of any helicopter it hit. The rapid intervention of the US Air Force, said a coalition forces spokesman, "without a doubt saved the lives of Afghan and coalition forces".

However, the situation was to get potentially worse. We later reported, on 28 April, that another gun had been seen – this one on the 26th. This time is was a ZPU-2 - the twin-barrelled version of the guns previously reported – and very much more devastating. A Chinook would not have survived a sustained attack from this weapon.

Fortunately, as it was being towed by a farm tractor, again close to the British base at Lashkar Gah, it was taken out by a US Air Force MQ-9 Reaper, which fired Hellfire missiles. Both the tractor and the gun were destroyed.

However, it now appears that there was a fourth gun, this one reported on 25 April when it was strafed by an A-10 and destroyed. Again it was – most probably – a ZPU-2, this one mounted on a truck. The vehicle and the anti-aircraft gun were destroyed.

Thus, it seems, in the space of less than a week, the Taleban have fielded no less than four potent heavy anti-aircraft machine guns, close to a British base, the obvious intention being to shoot down a British helicopter. This is the first time that so many of such weapons have been deployed against coalition forces and could represent a new level of threat.

If the Taleban have had four of these guns, the possibility is that they could have more, and are prepared to risk all to use them. So far, we have been fortunate in that the guns so far deployed have been spotted. But the Taleban only have to be "lucky" once. A fully-laden Chinook hit by one of these guns could lead to forty or more being killed.

What is doubly disturbing is that, while the US Air Force has reported these guns – in a low key way – no mention has been made of the threat by the MoD, which has been flooding the media with "feel-good" human interest stories, avoiding any hard-edged news of the war in Afghanistan.

This presents an entirely false picture of the risks our troops face and thus fails to prepare the public for the remote but nevertheless real possibility that we could some day be confronted with the news of a helicopter disaster involving significant loss of life.

Unprepared, media and public reaction is likely to be extreme and the fall-out could very well create overwhelming pressure for the removal of British troops from Afghanistan. In one fell swoop, the Taleban could achieve a major victory.

With luck, skill and vigilance, this may not happen by the MoD bears considerable responsibility, if it does, for leaving the public unprepared, to an extent that the whole campaign is threatened. As with the famous "Blackhawk down", one Chinook down and it could be game over.

COMMENT THREAD

Lost before it started – Part 7

In this final part, where we have explored the reasons for the British failure in Iraq, we turn the tables and speculate on whether they, despite the handicaps, could have succeeded. Reviewing what actually did happen after the British had retreated to their final base at Basra airport, we believe they could.

That is the ultimate tragedy. Instead of attracting the contempt of the Iraqis and the disdain of the Americans – who will never really trust us again – we could truly have walked out of Iraq with our heads held high, without having to pretend we had achieved success. It was that close – and that far.

Could it have been different?

At the start of the occupation in May 2003, the decision to cut back troops levels to 11,000 was disastrous, but not fatal. However, with that, Blair's decision to throw his lot in with the Europeans - compensating, many believe, for his failure to deliver the UK into the embrace of the single currency - seriously hampered the ability of the Army to deal with the insurgency.

And, having pledged the nation's armed forces to the Europeans and Iraq, he offered troops to reinforce the campaign in Afghanistan. That made a tight situation worse.

Even then, defeat was not inevitable. Looking at the campaign in the round, the single most egregious failure was the decision to abandon al Amarah, walking out on a half-trained and poorly equipped 10th Division. That was a major strategic error. Yet that decision itself was not initiated by the politicians but by the military.

Strangely, at the time, there had been very little discussion or debate. Equally, there was virtually no evaluation of the strategic consequences. Then, the "retreat" was an administrative decision. The "road map" had already been revealed by Gen Houghton in March, over three months earlier.

But "repositioning" in order to concentrate on Basra was wrong. Al Amarah was the Mahdi Army's major armoury and it would have made more strategic sense to have cut off the supply of arms at source before dealing with the problem of Basra. It was a "downstream" solution, akin to mopping up a floor after the bath had flooded, without first turning off the taps.

Dealing with the indirect fire

Of course, to have maintained forces at Abu Naji would have required dealing with the indirect fire – one of the main reasons why the base was vacated. Here, the main problems were the lack of suitable equipment, in particular UAVs, helicopters and MRAPs, plus C-RAM for base defence. All three could have been provided. Most were eventually provided, but too late. This was not a problem of money. It was about timing – and commitment.

Even in 2006, at a very late hour, had Gen Dannatt been able to break free of the Army’s obsession with FRES, he could have negotiated a major MRAP package. In exchange for scrapping FRES or putting it on the back-burner, substantially larger numbers of Mastiffs could have been bought, together with other, smaller MRAP vehicles. When this happened anyway in October 2008, it was too late for Iraq – and may be too late for Afghanistan.

As to helicopters, the Army was again partly the author of its own misfortune. Many times, cheaper options than the Future Lynx were offered, and rejected. Had the Army been intent on acquiring tactical helicopters rapidly, it could have had them. It was occasionally able to borrow US Blackhawks and the Americans also provided medivac helicopters, but this was not a reliable foundation on which to carry out planning.

The Army was actually offered a new fleet of Blackhawks off-the-shelf. It turned them down. As for UAVs, the MoD already had in place a replacement programme for the Phoenix, called Watchkeeper, modified Israeli Hermes 450s – with deliveries scheduled for 2010. The modifications, incidentally, were part of the FRES programme. They included fitting extra communications systems fit in with the proposed "network" that was at the heart of the system.

Because of the urgency of providing the Army with a UAV capability, in May 2007 the programme was brought forward with the purchase of the basic Hermes system off-the-shelf, direct from Israel. What was done then could have been done earlier, but for the determination to incorporate FRES modifications. Similarly, with C-RAM being ordered by the MoD in 2007, and temporary measures taken to ensure its early deployment, it is not untoward to argue that this equipment too could have been procured earlier.

With suitable equipment, holding the base at Abu Naji could have been tenable, buying time further to train and equip the Iraqi Army 10th Division. That perhaps could have allowed the Army, with existing resources, to back the Iraqis in recovering the city that much earlier, possibly as early as February/March 2008.

A fatal error

Instead of holding the line in al Amarah, the Army committed its main strength to Basra. And there it made a fatal mistake. In September 2006, it launched Operation Sinbad – a last-ditch operation to recover the city. It was well-planned and executed, but the timing was wrong.

Very much later, the Chief of the Defence Staff, Jock Stirrup, complained that the action had been "watered down" and lacked support from the Iraqi politicians, particularly Maliki. That was always going to be the case.

The British had misread the political situation in Iraq and had acted prematurely. Maliki was still in the grip of Muqtada's party and to have openly confronted the Mahdi at that time would have been political suicide. He had not by then secured his political base, weakening the political grip of Muqtada and could not take the same robust line that he took in 2008. The British would have been well advised to have husbanded their resources until a more propitious moment.

There were, though, the dangerous and debilitating attacks on the bases in Basra, but what held for al Amarah could equally have applied to them – with the probability that, without Abu Naji having been abandoned, the pressure on Basra would not have been as strong. Nor indeed would the insurgency in Sadr City been as troublesome, possibly liberating US resources for the fray.

A change in approach

One there had been a change in the balance of political power in Baghdad, things were possible which had previously been impossible. Then, had the British maintained their presence in al Amarah, a joint British/Iraqi move could have been made on the city, cleaning it out as happened with Operation Promise of Peace. This would have made dealing with Basra an easier proposition.

Arguably, with a British presence remaining in Basra, and the indirect fire being dealt with by technology instead of the wasteful use of manpower, the situation would not have deteriorated so far.

Instead of Basra becoming the battlefield in Charge of the Knights and al Amarah being taken without a shot fired, the situation might have been reversed. The battle would have been at al Amarah.

By June 2008, Muqtada was a busted flush and with British support, again using existing resources, the 10th/14th Iraqi Divisions could have walked into the Sadr strongholds in Basra without a shot being fired. The British, instead of skulking in their base in Basra airport, would have been central to the action, with a wholly different outcome to the one that has come to pass.

The tragedy is that this could have been done with existing manpower resources. Through the recovery of first Basra and then al Amarah, the US did not commit more than 2,500 troops – less than the British had available. What they had and the British did not, was the right equipment – and the right mental attitude.

A lack of commitment

To have won would have required the same degree of commitment injected by President Bush, Robert Gates and Gen David Petraeus. Yet, the Army - Dannatt in particular and Jackson before him - was not prepared to sanction what was required to fight a war that he and the rest of the Army no longer believed was winnable.

That was the real problem. Wars are won and lost in the minds of men. Even without the political drag, this war would have been lost because the Army had decided it was not worth winning. More to the point, it had decided that the price it would have to pay in order to win was unacceptable.

In Iraq, therefore, the Army was defeated by its own leaders. Indisputably, the major fault lay with the politicians, in particular, one man – Tony Blair. But the Army was not without fault. Its equipment was wrong, its tactics were wrong and, in the final analysis, it lost faith in its mission and gave up.

Whether Service chiefs could have made a difference lies in the realm of speculation. The indications are that they did not try. They accepted defeat and, in so doing, made it inevitable.

COMMENT THREAD

Defence questions

And so the fortnightly Monday ritual came around again in the House of Commons today, that of Defence Questions, where MPs have the opportunity to question ministers on topical issues relating to – you guessed it – defence.

Today, as always, was a mixed bag, but there were some interesting questions on the security situation in Iraq, which are worth a separate post. We'll do that, probably tomorrow. But there was also an interesting procurement question from the energetic Tory MP, Ann Winterton, about the Army's light helicopter fleet. She asked:

What plans does he (the minister) have to replace the current Gazelle fleet, and will he consider the purchase of light assault helicopters to fill the capability gap, bearing it in mind that the 40 Future Lynx aircraft that are due to come into service in 2014 will replace more than 200 aircraft from the current Gazelle and Lynx fleets? Does he acknowledge that there will be a huge future shortage of capacity, and what will the Government do to fill that?

It was the minister of state who answered this one, Adam Ingram, who – predictably, gave a less than complete answer. But then that is to be expected. The oral question game is as much about putting things on the record and registering an interest of concern, as it is trying to elicit answers. Anyhow, Ingram answered thus:

Clearly, we must define what that future shortage is; it must be well defined. We then have to define what the procurement strategy should be to fill that gap and make sure that that which we procure has durability and utility over the longer period. The reason why I am giving that answer is because procurement is not simply about saying, "Let's take it off the shelf and stick it out into theatre." I know that the hon. Lady understands that. I will provide her with a written response to the detailed points she has raised so that she can have the best understanding of how these matters are progressing.

Behind this simple, and cordial enough exchange, there is a major issue brewing. Much of the attention on military helicopters has been focused on lift capability, and the shortage of troop and store-carrying helicopters such as Chinooks and Merlins. But light assault, or more specifically, light utility helicopters (LUH) are a different animal entirely, and we are running into serious trouble in this respect.

Firstly, though – the type itself. Light utility helicopters – typically carrying 4-6 passengers (sometimes more) – are an important part of Army aviation. They perform diverse roles, from observation, forward air control and reconnaissance, to light attack (armed with machine guns, unguided rockets, and even guided anti-tank missiles). In a counter-insurgency role they are invaluable for escorting convoys and over-watch on patrols.

They can insert small numbers of troops into the battlefield – and extract them – and can then support them with observation and direct fire, and have a vital casualty evacuation (CASEVAC) function. They can carry out limited supply missions and also perform a useful air-taxi role, transporting personnel when roads are not safe, or routinely – especially VIPs. They can be, and often are, used as trainers.

Now, the current machine in Army Air Corps service is the Gazelle. This is a French-designed helicopter, created by the company Sud Aviation, which later became Aérospatiale and later still Eurocopter (a Franco-German-Spanish group which is now a Division of EADS). It originated in a French Army requirement for a light utility helicopter and the design was adopted by the British. A total of 292 were built by Westland Helicopters, in a deal signed in February 1967, the aircraft coming into service in 1973. In other words, the type has been around for 34 years. By 2005 (the latest figures we have available) there were 127 machines in the inventory.

In British service, the aircraft have been used in combat in the Falklands, in Kuwait, Kosovo and in Iraq (Gulf War I). It was also used for air patrols in Northern Ireland. British Gazelles were only armed when used in the Falklands, where they were fitted with machine guns and rocket pods, but these were not used.

They are not currently used in either Iraq or Afghanistan and are unsuitable for operations in hostile theatres. Although their performance is good, especially in hot and high condition, they are extremely vulnerable to ground fire (even small-arms) and do not lend themselves to armouring. Crash survivability is poor – certainly not up to modern standards – and the avionics and communications equipment is now substandard.

As such, the Gazelle fleet is in the process of being phased out and disposals have already taken place. The final phase out is scheduled for 2018.

The crucial issue thus is that, unless a replacement is sought, pretty quickly given the time military procurement takes, there will be a serious capability gap. In fact, because of the unsuitability of the Gazelle, that gap already exists, because it is not being used in active theatres.

However, the only proposals from the government so far, to fulfil that gap, is a project known as the Battlefield Light Utility Helicopter (BLUH). As far as is known, though, this project is intended only to replace the Lynx - and there appears to be no specific (or any) replacement scheduled for the Gazelle.

Furthermore, according to a Written Answer on 16 October 2001 by Lewis Mooney, BLUH was "planned to enter service from the middle of this decade and to have replaced the current Lynx by the early years of the next." This is the "Future Lynx" programme, but that only amounts to 40 helicopters for the Army, and initial deliveries are not due to start until 2011. The type will not enter operational service until 2014 with the British Army, and will replace (currently) over 100 Lynx Mk7/9s.

Thus, effectively, the only forward plans so far declared by the British government amount to replacing over 200 machines (Gazelles and Lynx) with a mere 40. Clearly, we are stacking up for a huge shortage of capacity. Furthermore, at an average £14 million each, the future Lynx is an enormously expensive machine, whereas a LUH, typically, can cost a "mere" £3-4 million.

Possible Gazelle replacements are the MD 900 Explorer and the Eurocopter UH-145 (which has actually been ordered by the US Army as the winner of its light utility helicopter competition). The US-built Eurocopters, however, are not intended for the battlefield – rather, they are to be used in "permissive" environments, primarily to take the pressure off the Blackhawks, which are designed for combat use and can thus be redeployed.

However, with added armour kits and defensive equipment, the UH-145s (and indeed the MD 900s) can be modified for battlefield use, and would prove a valuable asset from our troops in both Iraq and Afghanistan, the need for which we have been arguing for some time.

Everything takes such a long time in politics, but at last the issue is on the agenda.

COMMENT THREAD