[Cannoneer No. 4]

NZ to Fiji is 1265 miles. At 45 knots, a vessel like HMAS Jervis Bay would take 24 hours, which is pretty close to the time it would take to generate 20 sorties over that same distance with 5 aircraft. As far as the Kiwis are concerned, C-130 transportability may not be a big deal. They do, however, have C-130's. The Australians found it worth their while to fly M-113's to East Timor on C-130's.

The big deal about C-130 transportability for the Americans is that, if it can't go by C-130, the next step up is C-17 or C-5, and those can carry Bradleys, which is a much more potent machine. If you were an airborne task force commander, and you got to choose between having a platoon of Bradleys or a platoon of Strykers, which would you choose?

[Travis McGee]

A fast logistical catamaran has the added advantage of being able to loiter in an operational area off shore. With air transport, you send them or you don't. There is no holding them in internaional water, but ready and close by.

Of course, that presupposes the Kiwis had a navy to protect that fast logistics ship....

[KiaKaha]

I will fully admit that my initial “calculation” was done as an example, In NZ their has been a huge fuss made about the transportability issue, the point I was making is I cannot foresee a situation where we (NZ) would need to urgently transport the LAV’s in that manner.

The other point is the deployment of the LAV’s by air cannot be purely indicated in distance/hours, you must factor in maintenance and crew hours.

As to the C130/LAV – C17/Bradley argument I know what I would chose, unfortunately it’s a choice of what we (NZ) have. What we DO need is a ship in the RNZN capable of doing the deployment job.