More Weirdness

[Nonskimmer]

Originally Posted by Wildcat

Well trained yes, well equipped yes and no. Individual soldiers are well equipped with quality hardware (I'm talking about helmits, body armour, weapons, NVG's, NAD's even excellent boots). On the bigger iteams the Government has been spending it up big. The Leopards are beening replaced by Abrams, Air Warfare destroyers are going to be built (in the city where I live, in fact), Amphibious assault ships are being sought to replace the old ones we have now, F/A 18's and F111's will be replaced by the JSF when it comes into service, the Army has finally recieced attack helicopters plus more heavy lift choppers are on the way (Merlins in think?) AWACS aircraft have been ordered, Rapier SAM's have been replaced with new RBS-70's and the hundreds of ASLAVS and APC's have all been upgraded.
As you can see the Government is obviously making an attempt to upgrade and replace ageing equipment and in some cases add new capabilities to the ADF. As for buying American, the ADF has a lot stuff that's not American such as Steyr rifles, Tigre helicopters, RBS-70's the thousands of Land Rovers etc. The ADF will usually buy equipment that is good quality and value for money (not always a good thing!)

That basically sounds to be very similar to Canada's military to a large extent. It seems that Australia has moved to a faster track in updating and re-equipping though. The individual Canadian soldier is also very well trained with excellent personal equipment, but some of the larger gear could use some replacing, and we could stand to be bigger. The biggest killer of all with us is our support infrastructure. It's a shambles, there's no other word for it. Spare parts and civilian maintenance expertise are at a premium, thanks to the foolishness of the Chrétien cabinet and their hatchets. Re-equipping in the face of post-9/11 is still slllllllooooooooow with the Canadian Forces. We're unfortunately still a little too liberal minded as well, even in the face of the threat from terrorists. The minority Conservative government is actually still having a bit of a rough go trying to sell the idea of defence spending.

[Wildcat]

Originally Posted by plan_D

Excellent boots!? I wish the British military had them.

It seems that we have a new power on our hands in Australia.

Nah I don't think so, our military is not big enough.

Originally Posted by plan_D

How about naval power?

Our navy is small but pretty well equipped IMO. It's biggest problem is it's lack of protection from the air, however this has been addressed with the building of brand new air-warfare destroyers. The new ampib assault ships will also boost the Navy's capability when they replace the old (ex USN) ships we have now. I don't know how our ANZAC class FFG's stack up against others of its class, maybe Skim could tell us? Our Collins class subs were an absolute sh*t fight when they were first built, but since they're had all their problems sorted out they are some of the best conventional subs going around. There's a famous story of one of our subs penetrating a US carrier battle group and "sinking" the carrier whilst on exercise. The sub skipper notified the carrier it had been sunk only to be told that was impossible, needless to say it was confirmed destroyed by some nice photos of it through the periscope!
One thing our Navy gets a lot of practice with is intercepting illegal refugees and fisherman from indonesia. As you can imagine this is a huge operation patrolling the massive coastline we have. They are quite successful however with the aid of the Orions of the RAAF and the vast Over the horizon radar network set up across the top end of the country. The Army also has coastal surveillance soldiers patrolling the top end and hidden on many of the small islands off the coast.

[Nonskimmer]

I really don't know much about the ANZAC class frigates, but the Collins subs are supposed to be one of the better diesel boat classes out there today. The Aussie government really stuck by their development despite the initial difficulties. I'll give 'em credit for that.
Penetrating a carrier's defences in a diesel submarine is hardly impossible. We've been demonstrating that for years on exercises with NATO allies. The US Navy regularly exercises with Peruvian or Chilean diesel boats in order to practice their diesel hunting.

[Wildcat]

Well there ya go, cheers mate!

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

The Australians use the UH-60 Blackhawk as well. We infact have a partnership program with where we send some of our Pilots and Crewchiefs to Australia to fly with you guys. Wish I could have done it in my time in Service but well I am getting out in a couple of months. Damn I am going to miss the Blackhawk.

[Nonskimmer]

From what I've read just briefly, the Anzacs seem very similar to our Halifax class patrol frigates, albeit a little newer with a bigger, 5 inch gun. The Kiwi navy has ordered two of them as well I guess.

What I get a kick out of is the name of the first vessel of the class. It's just one big acronymn.

HMAS Anzac: Her Majesty's Australian Ship - Australian and New Zealand Army Corps

[Wildcat]

Your right, I've never really thought of that!

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

Thats wiered, good thread to post that in!

[Gnomey]

Yeah that is weird.

[R988]

The Jindalee OTHR is quite something, aside from bouncing off the ionosphere to get uber long range (can apparently see as far as Korea on a good day) apparently it can also detect disruptions in airflow therefore being able to track 'stealth' aircraft by their wake turbulence.
I believe it's fairly sensitive to weather conditions though, hard to say for sure since it's all top secret.

[loomaluftwaffe]

pity, our air force is still thinking of purchasing cheap fourth generation fighters, and has a few F-16s and F-5s at best