FlightGlobal.com
Home
Premium
Archive
Video
Images
Forum
Atlas
Blogs
Jobs
Shop
RSS
Email Newsletters
You are in:
Home
Aviation History
1968
1968 - 0068.PDF
70 FLIGHT International, II January 1968 craft. Hawker Siddeley had not yet had time to do it officially, for it was extended, all stops out, on rushing the development programme ahead. The cost of the Harrier was in the band of £750,000-£ 1,000,000 a copy, according to numbers ordered and equip- ment fitted, said Mr Robert Lickley, HSA chief military executive. This was about 15 per cent more than a compar- able conventional aircraft but Mr Bedford considered that the Harrier's effectiveness was such that fewer would be required for a given task and V/STOL was likely to be cheaper in the end. Mr Lickley said that export deliveries could begin in 1970. One can assume that the British Government, in its present cost-cutting frame of mind, would agree to the stretching-out of RAF Harrier deliveries, for this would lighten expenditure over the immediate few years, and thus export deliveries might be accelerated. HSA officials rigidly declined to name any country as a hot prospect for export sales; one said that the first export order was quite likely to be for a navy and the Harrier was particularly attractive to the staffs of non-carrier navies, for it could put them back in the air-strike business. Thought is being given to means of physically attaching the Harrier on landing to pitching, rolling ship platforms. As Sensor records in this issue, Israeli interest in the Harrier, previously reported in Flight, is still very warm and a likely purchase from that country would be of the order of 60 aircraft. One might also surmise that, for all its pre- occupation wdth unilateral V/STOL pro- grammes and joint partnerships in this field with the United States, West Ger- A possible Harrier fighter tactic? The recce-pack-equipped Harrier makes a vertical take-off from a standing start. VTOs were also demonstrated many's interest in the Harrier is not exactly flagging. On its promising exportability and the patent interest throughout the world in V/STOL combat aircraft must rest Hawker Siddeley's main hopes that the Harrier will escape the forthcoming axings. This aircraft, said Bill Bedford, "can boost our balance of payments, strengthen the pound, give Britain a new lead in advanced technology and pave the way for long-term civil applications." ROBERT R. RODWELL Offset Uplifted THE TALKS in Washington last week between US Government representatives and a joint MoD/Mintech team about possible changes in UK orders for US aircraft, and the offset sales agreement, were startlingly brief, for they were over the day they began, Monday, January 1. The US Government agreed to raise the ceiling of the offset agreement by SI00 million (about £41.78 million), to S825 million. Ostensibly this increase is to overcome the adverse effect, for Britain, of devaluation on the agreement (and also increasing F-lll costs), but there can be little doubt that it is also intended as a fairly persuasive insurance against Britain cancelling the F-lll order. The extra $100 million, it is intended, will be accounted for by direct sales of British equipment to the USA. The breakdown of the whole agreement is now as follows: $400 million in joint British/US sales to third parties, i.e. the Saudi Arabia deal; and $425 million in direct sales to the United States. Such swift agreement on changing the offset agreement (modifications were first requested by Mr Healey when he met US Deputy Defence Secretary Mr Paul Nitze in Brussels last month), can be taken as a measure of US Government concern that Britain should not cancel the F-lll purchase. Another pointer to Washington's anxiety is the fact that the increase was agreed on the very day when the President announced measures to correct the US balance of payments deficit, despite the offset agreement being generally unpopular with Congress. The fact that the increment is to be in direct sales to the US might also indicate that the DoD recognises tht small USAF order for Handley Page Jetstreams (see last week's issue) will be merely the tip of a fairly massive ice- berg, and that the $100 million Spe; engine deal for LTV A-7D attack air craft might also be increased. In a letter to The Times last week] Handley Page managing director Mr U Green (admittedly, since the USAF Jet-; stream order, not entirely disinterested!! argued strongly against cancellation oi; the F-lll order on the grounds that the: offset agreement gives unparalleled opportunities to hundreds of British firms to establish bridgeheads in the previously highly protected US militan; market. Sir Leon Bagrit, Elliott-Auto; mation chairman, supported Mr Greer: by making the further point that somj offset orders received had resulted v.[ British companies combining work ir.[ advanced technologies which wouli otherwise have lapsed with British can- cellations. RAAF F-111C Training THE OFFICER COMMANDING the first F-111C squadron of the RAAF has been ap- pointed. He is Wg Cdr Bill Hughes, at present commanding 2 Sqn, RAAF, which flies Canberras from Phan Ran? in South Vietnam, on operations against Vietcong and North Vietnamese regular forces. Pilots and navigators for the fin' F-111C conversion course, which will start in the United States in March, are to be drawn largely from the Canberra crews now flying operationally Vietnam. Eight crews will comprise each F-111C course, which will last 23 weeks. Air Commodore to be Lyneham CO RAF LYNEHAM has become the first opera tional RAF flying station in Britain be commanded by an air commodore- Only one other RAF station, Akrotiri in Cyprus, has an air commodore i» command. Air Cdre D. E. Hawkins, a Second World War flying-boat pilot with h sinking of a submarine to his credit took over at Lyneham last Friday. January 5, from Gp Capt Norman Hoa<* well known as an aviation artist. For the
Sign up to
Flight Digital Magazine
Flight Print Magazine
Airline Business Magazine
E-newsletters
RSS
Events
