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From the Magazine: THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH TIGER AND TAIPAN – UPDATED
This startling conclusion is the culmination of several years of effort to find out why Australia has had disproportionate problems keeping our 22 Tiger Armed Reconnaissance Helicopters (ARH) and 47 Taipan Multi-Role Helicopters (MRH) flying. Other countries have nowhere near the same level of difficulty as has been experienced here. The online publication of the first version generated a great deal of feedback. Some of it was hostile but readers were also good enough to provide more information about Army / CASG support systems – particularly the software tool CAMM2 – and, as a consequence, the analysis remains largely unchanged. The track record of Airbus is not as good as we originally argued, but overwhelmingly most of the support problems can be traced back to Defence processes. One of the negative responses was from a Tiger pilot, who wrote powerfully about the unreliability of the ARH and how this caused frustration and even embarrassment if coalition partners were present. He said that everyone in Army was looking forward to the introduction of the Apache fleet. We cannot use his name without permission, and so readers can better understand the author’s perspective, here is my full reply: “Hello (name removed) – thank you very much for taking the trouble to email. My work can only be improved by having more contacts with experienced people like you contributing to my knowledge and I look forward to the continuing dialogue. “My own experiences with Tiger are the complete opposite of yours. I am not a helicopter pilot but an important experience for me was spending 2 weeks with the French ‘Mosquito’ helicopter battalion in Afghanistan in 2011. They had 4 Tigers (one always on hot standby); 6 Gazelles (they operated them in pairs with Tiger because as I am sure you are aware the French only had the 30mm gun, not the air to ground missiles); and an assortment of Cougars and Caracals. All of this was supported by 100 technicians – of whom 22 were Tiger specialists – based at Kabul International Airport. This is an excerpt from APDR. To read the full story, click here. For Editorial Inquiries Contact: Editor Kym Bergmann at [email protected] For Advertising Inquiries Contact: Director of Sales Graham Joss at [email protected]
TAGSTaipan Multi-Role HelicoptersTiger Armed Reconnaissance helicopters
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Kym Bergmannhttps://asiapacificdefencereporter.com/
Kym Bergmann has more than 35 years of experience in journalism and Australian and international defence industry. After graduating with Honors from the Australian National University, he joined Capital 7 television, holding several positions including foreign news editor and chief political correspondent.
After 2 years on the staff of a Federal Minister, he moved to the defence sector and held senior positions in several companies, including Blohm+Voss, Thales, Celsius and Saab. In 1997 he was one of 2 Australians selected for the Thomson CSF 'Preparation for Senior Management' MBA course, the other being Chris Jenkins - formerly the CEO of Thales Australia.
He has also worked as a consultant for a number of companies, including Raytheon, Tenix (now part of BAES) and Martin Marrietta (now part of Lockheed Martin). He had several board appointments, including Thomson Sintra Pacific (1994 - 96) and Saab Pacific (1998 - 2003).
He retains good personal links with senior figures in Government, as well as in industry and the media. He decided to return to journalism in May 2008, and holds the position of editor for Asia Pacific Defence Reporter (APDR) and Defence Review Asia (DRA). He is also a podcaster and commentator on defence and national security issues.