You brought this thread back from the dead!
Australia also bought the C17. lol
The A400m isn't really capable of doing the “strategic lift” mission, something all these nations need. The A400 is essentially a C130 on steroids, nothing more. She does NOT posses the range and payload capacity to truly fill the strategic role, which the C17 can. When you try to reach out to any real range, the A400 can't carry much, also even at short range, the A400 isn't able to carry a MBT. For inner theater and tactical lift, the A400 will be an absolutely awesome lift asset (if they develop this machine further), being more capable than a C130 (from it's base design) because of the ease with which she can carry larger vehicles like the Stryker, heavy pallets etc.
All those countries that bought the A400 will now STILL buy some C17s like the UK, or they will be forced to lease / rent other aircraft from the Ukraine, Russia or elsewhere to give them the strategic lift assets they need (as an example- the Germans rented / chartered aircraft to support themselves in Afghanistan).
The A400 is a typical Euro dud. All the EADS members (as usual) will buy it as soon as EADS / Airbus builds it. That simple. What their actual military needs are, the machines capabilities, cost performance measures etc are all superfluous and in most cases “make belief” figures anyhow to justify the purchase. The only exceptions are in some cases those nations like the UK where you have a true expeditionary military that actually gets used. There necessity dictated that they organically have certain capabilities.