Australian F/A-18s to get cruise missiles

Australia is considering buying long-range stealth cruise missiles for its F/A-18 fighters to help offset the planned early retirement of its F-111 strike bombers.

It would make Australia the first country in southeast Asia to introduce self-guided land-attack cruise missiles, which can strike targets more than 200 nautical miles away - four times the range of any missile now available to the RAAF.

The Government this week was examining cruise missile options, at the same time as it announced it would join the US missile defence program on the grounds that "Australia might one day be threatened by long-range missiles with mass destruction effect".

However, the cruise missiles under consideration by the RAAF have a shorter range than the intercontinental ballistic missiles the US missile defence system is designed to protect against.

The early purchase of air-launched stealth cruise missiles was one of several options examined in Canberra this week by the Defence Capability Committee as part of plans to boost sharply the strike capability of the RAAF's 71 F/A-18 fighters.

No decision has yet been made to buy the weapons. But if the RAAF does choose them, and the Government approves their acquisition, they could be in service by as early as 2008.

Defence Minister Robert Hill confirmed yesterday that the new weapons eventually chosen for the F/A-18 "will significantly increase the air force capability".

"Surface-to-air threats have increased the importance of a stand-off (long-range) missile capability for modern air forces to better ensure the survivability of aircraft and the safety of crews," he said.

However, any decision by Australia to buy long-range cruise missiles could ruffle feathers in the region, given that no other country in southeast Asia has such a capability.

Many Asia-Pacific nations, including Australia, have short-range anti-ship missiles, such as the Harpoon, but not the sort of air-launched, long-range cruise missiles being considered by the RAAF.

The air force needs to place long-range strike weapons on its F/A-18 fighters to protect against a looming gap in Australia's air combat capability in between the retirement of the F-111s from 2010 and the planned arrival of their replacement -- the new Joint Strike Fighter -- from 2013.

The capability gap has arisen from the Government's surprise announcement last month that the F-111s would need to be retired before the arrival of the Joint Strike Fighters because of the growing cost of keeping the 30-year-old bombers in the air.

The RAAF's director of Aerospace Systems, Group Captain Chris Deeble, has told The Weekend Australian that the weapons options under consideration for the beefed-up F/A-18 include the Joint Air-To-Surface Standoff Missile (JASSM).

JASSM, made by Texas-based Lockheed Martin and costing about $US400,000 ($544,000) per missile, is described by the the US Air Force as a "stealth cruise missile" with a "kick-the-door-down" capability.

The all-weather, 2000-pound, precision-strike cruise missile has a range of more than 200 nautical miles and flies autonomously to its target after launch.

A Lockheed spokesman in Texas confirmed that Senator Hill had discussed JASSM during his visit to the company in October.

"The minister was well aware of JASSM capability and the long range," the spokesman said. "He is determined to make sure Australia maintains its long-range defensive capability."

Other weapons being considered by the RAAF include the Swedish/German Taurus KEPD 350 cruise missile and a precision-strike missile known as SLAM-ER.

The Defence Capability Committee will forward its recommendations to the Government early next year.

The RAAF hopes eventually to place long-range cruise missiles on the Joint Strike Fighter, a move that would help offset the smaller range and weapons payload of the new plane compared with that of the outgoing F-111.

Reach for the sky

By Cameron Stewart, December 06, 2003

It has been a delicate two-step for Australian governments since the days of Robert Menzies. Successive prime ministers have extended hands of friendship to our South-East Asian neighbours while nurturing the RAAF's ability to rain bombs on the region if it is required.

As a result, few military issues carry more historical baggage and sensitivity at home and in the region than does the question of Australia's long-range strike force.

Now, exactly 40 years after Menzies ordered the F-111 strike bomber to ensure Australia's military dominance over its neighbours, the Howard Government is being confronted by an unexpected and thorny dilemma.

Menzies' baby, the F-111, is in terminal decline ahead of its time. Old, creaky and costing a small fortune to keep in operation, air force chief Angus Houston last month signed its death warrant. He said the plane they call Pig would be grounded from 2010, five to 10 years earlier than expected.

In the quixotic world of defence planning where people talk in decades, not years, this change of plan has caused anguish because the plane that is due to replace Australia's F-111s and F/A-18 fighters -- the Texas-made Joint Strike Fighter -- will not be delivered before 2013 at the earliest.

So for at least three years from the end of this decade -- and most likely more -- Australia will not have a strike bomber capable of launching air assaults deep into the region. This key military capability, which Australia has enjoyed for 30 years since the first F-111 was delivered in 1973, will simply disappear for several years.

So what, you might say. Australia doesn't face any foreseeable threats, so surely we can wing it?

The Government and the air force aren't prepared to take that chance -- strategically or politically. But money is tight, so the safest solution -- to lease some US fighters for a few years -- is not an option.

Houston has been forced into taking a gamble. He wants to turn his F/A-18s -- which were built to be air defence fighters -- into small strike bombers tough enough to deter any country that might be tempted to exploit the gap between the retirement of the F-111s and the arrival of the JSF.

He plans to do this not only by speeding up existing plans to upgrade the plane's structural, electronic and bomb delivery systems but -- most crucially -- also by sticking some deadly long-range weapons on it. As added insurance, these same stand-off weapons will be attached to Australia's lumbering maritime patrol planes, the P3 Orions.

This is the peculiar route by which the air force suddenly finds itself seriously contemplating buying Australia's first long-range, land-attack stealth cruise missile, known as the joint air to surface stand-off missile, or JASSM.

The air force has long harboured hopes of eventually buying such weapons for the new JSF when it arrives in Australia from 2013. But last month's decision to urgently beef-up the F/A-18 to help offset the early loss of the F-111 has suddenly put long-range cruise missiles on the table as a here-and-now option. The air force says that it could have the missiles operational within five years.

With a range of more than 200 nautical miles -- four times that of existing air force missiles -- and with stealth characteristics that make them difficult for air defences to detect, missiles such as JASSM have the potential to raise eyebrows among Australia's neighbours in the same way Menzies's F-111 once did.

If Canberra does choose to buy the land attack cruise missiles, it will be hoping that the region's confidence in Australia as a friend is sufficient to quell any concerns.

Indonesia's military has not forgotten that the Menzies government ordered the F-111 in 1963 with the specific instruction that it be capable of reaching Jakarta and carrying nuclear weapons.

Residual concerns about Australia's strike capability were evident as recently as 1993, when the Keating government ordered 15 extra F-111s to extend the life of the fleet without first telling Jakarta of its plan. The then Indonesian ambassador in Canberra, Sabam Siagian, lashed out, saying the move might raise doubts in Asia about Australia's commitment to closer defence ties with its neighbours.

Since the 1980s, Australia has justified its strike force to Asian neighbours on the grounds that it helps protect the whole region against attack from unspecified outside enemies.

The Government would make the same argument in relation to cruise missiles to quell any concerns expressed by those countries that do not possess them. Although many countries in the region, including Australia, have short-range anti-ship missiles such as Harpoon, none has long-range land attack cruise missiles such as those being considered by the air force.

But some deft internal diplomacy might be needed within the Howard Government before such weapons could be approved. Although there are no international protocols preventing Canberra acquiring cruise missiles, Australian diplomats have expended much energy at international forums through the years opposing the proliferation of long-range missiles.

Only yesterday Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said that "people shouldn't be firing missiles at each other". But Downer was talking about ballistic missiles in the context of the Government's decision this week to join the US missile defence program -- a program that aims to shield Australia from "long-range missiles with mass destruction effect". The missile defence system is directed against countries possessing intercontinental ballistic missiles with a far greater range than the cruise missiles under consideration by the air force.

In any case, the purchase of cruise missiles such as JASSM would not represent an increase in Australia's military strike capability -- it would merely reduce its decline.

The retirement of the F-111 from 2010, means Australia will lose an aircraft with a unique combat radius of 1000 nautical miles. By comparison, its planned replacement, the JSF, has a combat radius of only about 590 nautical miles. The air force hopes to eventually extend the JSF's reach by making better use of planned new air-to-air refuelling aircraft and also by placing cruise missiles on the new multi-role plane.

But in the short term, Australia's stop-gap strike solution - the F/A-18 - has a combat radius of only about 400 nautical miles. The Government's claims that the F/A-18 can be turned into a credible strike aircraft will ring hollow if it decides against extending its strike range by fitting it with a long-range cruise missile such as JASSM.

In Canberra this week, the Defence Capability Committee discussed the options for future strike weapons, including land attack cruise missiles. It will hand its recommendations to the Government early next year.

The biggest argument against buying such long-range missiles now is that the air force would need to invest substantial amounts in fitting those weapons to the F/A-18s, which are not configured for them. Given that the F/A-18s are due to be retired from service from 2012, the investment may not be worth it.

"The question is, do we spend a lot of time and money (to do this) or do we get something (a smaller weapon) that works right now," says Chris Deeble, director of aerospace systems development with the Australian Defence Force.

Aldo Borgu, of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, says that even if the air force manages to upgrade the strike capabilities of the F/A-18 before the F-111s retire, the country's overall strike capability will be sharply diminished.

"Even if they (the upgrades) are successful, Australia's strike capability will have fallen below the levels planned for in the 2000 white paper," Borgu wrote in an ASPI critique published this week. "If the F/A-18 upgrades run into trouble, we could face a serious strike capability gap."

This is the short-term dilemma for the Government. But the longer term dilemma is the cold fact that, despite growing strategic unrest, Australia no longer has the money to maintain - much less increase - its long-term strike capabilities.

Defence policy dictates that the air force's 28 F-111s and 71 F/A-18s will be replaced by up to 100 new aircraft. But experts predict that cost constraints could mean as few as 60 new JSFs are eventually purchased from maker Lockheed Martin.

Defence chiefs say that although Australia will have fewer planes, the strike capability will be largely maintained through the force multiplying effects of new early airborne warning aircraft, air-to-air refuelling and by putting stand-off weapons on the P3 maritime patrol aircraft.

But experts remain unconvinced. Carlo Kopp, of the Australian Defence Studies Centre, says that the replacement of the F-111s with the JSF will effectively halve the air force's combat strength.

"We have seen the most fundamental - and unstated - change in Australia's strategic doctrine since the 1940s: the abandoning of air power as the cornerstone of Australia's defence," Kopp says.

Given the looming decline in Australia's air strike power, it is all but certain that the Government will eventually seek to acquire long-range stealth cruise missiles. It knows that a fleet of JSFs armed with cruise missiles will not fully plug the gap left by the retirement of the F-111s. But it will help to reduce that gap - and that is better than nothing.

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,8074625%5E28737,00.html

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