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Aviation History
1994
1994 - 2805.PDF
DEFENCE NEWS IN BRIEF • US BASE CLOSURES The US Department of Defense is closing or reduc ing operations at an addi tional 27 overseas military bases as part of the current drawdown of US forces worldwide. The latest round of base closures or re-align ments brings to 944 the number of overseas loca tions affected since 1990. The USA will end, reduce, or place on standby opera tions at 871 US installations in Europe. All but three of the re-alignments are in Germany, with the rest in Iceland and the Azores. Most of the affected military installations belong to the US Army in Germany. • ISRAELI COMBAT AID The Israeli air force will equip its fighter squadrons with the autonomous com bat-evaluation (ACE) sys tem, made by Rada in Israel. The award follows a pro longed evaluation. The ACE system is aimed at replacing the existing air-combat man- oeuvering-range instrumen tation systems now in use as the air force's main debrief ing tool. • WAAS THUMBS UP The US Department of Defense has approved Federal Aviation Administration plans to provide global-positioning- system error corrections to commercial users via the wide-area augmentation sys tem (WAAS). Indian air force seeks indigenous aid... RUSSIAN DEFENCE manu facturers' demands for payment in hard currency, and Western defence-industry prices, is forcing the Indian air force to increase radi cally the amount of equipment and spares it sources locally. The service is briefing more than 100 Indian companies on areas where it wants to purchase locally. Its target is to procure some 70% of all spares and com ponents locally by the year 2000. The air force now buys only around 20% of such defence material in India, but the policy, if implemented succesfully, could be worth between $300 million and $500 million anually to Indian industry. Russian manufacturers now demand that India pays them in hard currency for supporting the country's Mikoyan MiG-21s, MiG-23sandMiG-29s. As a result of the demand for hard currency payment, spares-replace ment costs have climbed from 25% to 80% of the maintenance budget in the past four years. • ...as HAL courts helicopter partners INDIA'S HINDUSTAN Aeronautics (HAL) is court ing McDonnell Douglas, Bell and Eurocopter as potential partners for the production phase of its mili tary utility advanced light helicopter (ALH) now in development. HAL is ex pected to make a choice concerning its ALH produc tion partner by mid-1995. Four prototypes of the ALH have been developed to meet army and navy requirements. Germany's MBB, now part of Eurocopter, supported the development. • Israel evaluates Hawk to meet trainer need THE ISRAELI AIR Force is evaluating the McDonnell Douglas (MDC)/British Aero space T-45 Goshawk as a con tender for its new jet trainer. The air force had originally planned to wait for the outcome of the USA's Joint Primary Aircraft Training System (JPATS) programme before making a deci sion on a replacement for the air force's fleet of Fouga 170 Magisters. Repeated delays in the US pro gramme, and the projected inade quacy of the Magister in meeting future training requirements, have prompted an examination of alter natives to the eventual JPATS winner. This has materialised in the form of a new round of pre-selec- tion work in which BAe's Hawk, on which the T-45 is based, is viewed as a "serious option". Senior Israeli air force officers have visited BAe in the UK at least twice this year to look more close ly at the Hawk. Israeli officials say that, if the Hawk meets the air force's requirements, the likelihood is that a modified variant of the T-45 would be procured using US Foreign Military Sales (FMS) funding. Other aircraft evaluated include the FMAIA-63 Pampa, Embraer EMB-312 Tucano, Promavia Jet Squalus, Pilatus PC-9 and the Aero L-59. The aircraft would also replace the Douglas A-4 Skyhawk advanced trainer. • The Israeli air force's Magisters are headingfor the scrapheap Greece negotiates to buy Germany's Alpha Jets GREECE AND GERMANY are in Government-level negotiations over the sale of ex- German air force Alpha Jets to the Greek air force. According to Deutsche Aero space, which stands to win techni cal and logistical support work if the sale goes through, Greece is interested in buying 60 of the age ing trainer/light-attack aircraft, > which the German air force would otherwise have to scrap. Germany has found it hard to sell the aircraft to date, with a sales bid to the French air force col lapsing and no other potential customers apparent. Germany gave 50 of its original 175 aircraft to Portugal in 1993 as payment for the use of Beja Air Base, Portugal, as a tactical train ing centre. The German air force then marked a further 90 for the scrap heap before the negotiations with Greece. The air force's remaining 35 aircraft are in service with 49 Fighter-Bomber wing at Fiirst- enfeldbruck for Tornado lead-in training. These last are due for retirement in 1995, when Panavia Tornado training is to move to Holloman AFB, New Mexico. Alongside its bid for the upgrade of Hellenic air force F-4E Phantoms, DASA finance chief and chairman-elect Dr Manfred Bischoff predicts a potential military-aircraft market in Greece worth a potential DM500 million ($33.3 million) to Germany. Germany is bidding to modernise and extend the lives of 69 Greek Phantoms, basing its bid on experi ence in its F4-F improved combat effectiveness programme. J FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL 16 - 22 November 1994
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