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INTERNATIONAL F-35: WHO'S BUYING?
Officially the World's Number One Military Aviation Magazine | www.airforcesmonthly.com
F-4F Pharewell
LUFTWAFFE RETIRES ITS
PHINAL PHANTOMS
TRAINING WITH
THE ‘HOG’
A-10s at Nellis
FORCE REPORT
BULGARIAN
NAVAL AIR ARM
BOEING’S
Modernising the fl eet
X-37
The USAF'S
Secretive
Spaceship
“ You want
to land it
THERE?”
RAF Tactical Landings
RAF Tactical Landings
A
IRCR
AFT P
ROFI
LE
HAWK: OLD NAME - NEW JET
HAWK: OLD NAME - NEW JET
JULY 2013
UK £4.50
Britain's Trainer for the Future
For daily news stories visit
www.airforcesdaily.com
e-mail the news team at:
milnews@keypublishing.com
CONTENTS
JULY
CONTENTS
CONTENTS
CONTENTS
CONTENTS
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CONTENTS
CONTENTS
CONTENTS
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CONTENTS
CONTENTS
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CONTENTS
32
“You want to land
THERE?”
Derek Bower explains how the
Royal Air Force manages rough-field
operations for its Hercules tactical
transport aircraft and provides
mobile air traffic control.
48
F-35 International:
Surviving Politics and
Avoiding the ‘Death Spiral’
In spite of sequestration in the
United States, those running the
F-35 programme expect to bring
down costs by selling the system to
partner nations’ air forces for years
to come. David C Isby investigates.
Birds’ of the 66th Weapons
School – Gary Wetzel visited the
squadron to find out about its vital
role training US Air Force Fairchild
A-10 Thunderbolt II pilots.
Serbian Air Force’s first newly
trained J-22 pilots in a decade.
82
Boeing’s X-37B:
the USA F ’s Reusable
Space Plane
Like us, Blair Watson is intrigued
by the US Air Force’s X-37
project – just what is it all about?
70
Warthogs – Extinct
in Europe
Hans Drost and Dick Wels report
from Spangdahlem Air Base in
Germany as the last US Air Force
A-10s left Europe in May.
36
Future Fleet Air Arm
TOP GUNS
Royal Navy fixed wing pilots are
flying with the US and French navies.
Lewis Gaylard explains why.
56
AIRCRAFT PROFILE:
BAE Hawk AJT
BAE System’s Hawk Advanced
Jet Trainer carries the name and
pedigree of one of the world’s
most successful trainer aircraft
since the war, but, as
AFM’s
Jerry
Gunner found out, today’s Hawk is
a bird of a very different feather.
76
End for Croatia’s
Fishbeds
?
Frank Noort and Stephan van
den Krommenacker visited the
MiG-21s of the Croatian Air Force
to find out how long the veteran
Fishbeds
can keep going.
42
COVER FEATURE:
F-4F Pharewell
They think it’s all over – it is
now. After 40 years of service the
German Air Force is about to retire
the last of its McDonnell Douglas
F-4F Phantom IIs – Gary Parsons
reports from Wittmundhafen
Air Base in Germany.
64
The Hog Trough
One of the many units at Nevada’s
Nellis Air Force Base is the ‘Brown
81
Serbia’s new Tigers
Igor Salinger reports on the
Free DVD
Claim your FREE
‘Flying’ DVD worth
£19.99 when
you subscribe
to AirForces
Monthly. See
pages 14 & 15
for details.
42
F-4Fs in their element.
Florian Friz
REGULARS
4
Editorial
90
Exercise Report:
DACT 2013
Roberto Yáñez
and
Alex
Rodríguez
had the tough task
of reporting from the Canary
Islands on the Spanish Air
Force’s big exercise of the year,
which had support from the RAF.
94
Exercise Report:
Swedes Train for
Afghanistan
Swedish Hkp16 Black Hawk
crews have been preparing
for Afghanistan, as
Corné
Uittenbogaard
describes.
96
Ops Board
Just when is RIAT? All the
summer events and airshows.
27
Deployments and
Contracts
98
And Finally…
“Once
a fi ghter pilot – always a
fi ghter pilot”
Dave
Eade
reports on how a 90-
year old former jet display pilot
was reunited with his aircraft.
28
Attrition
75
Feedback
Letters
and e-mails from readers.
95
Exercise Report:
Star Vega 2013
Francesco Militello Mirto
reports on the Italian Air
Force’s biggest exercise of the
year, held over the island of
Sardinia in the Mediterranean.
92
Exercise Report:
Trident Fury
The
Royal Canadian Air Force
played host to the US Air Force
over Vancouver –
Derek Heyes
reports.
86
Force Report:
Bulgarian Navy
Robin
Polderman
visited Chaika
to report on the country’s all-
helicopter naval air arm.
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#304 JULY 2013
3
An RAF Reaper returns to Kandahar
after an Operation Herrick mission.
Will the skies of Europe be closed to
UAVs?
Crown copyright/MoD
The drone debate
UNMANNED AERIAL vehicles –
UAVs, UAS, drones, or whatever
you want to call them – have
been making the headlines
recently. The national media’s
obsession with calling any
unmanned aircraft a ‘drone’
shows the general level of
ignorance about the subject
- strictly speaking, a drone is
not controlled by a remote pilot
but follows a pre-planned path
in its navigation systems.
News stories in the UK,
Germany and Pakistan – to
name but three nations – have
featured UAVs within the last
month. Protesters, angry at
the use of RAF MQ-9A Reapers
in Afghanistan, broke into RAF
Waddington in Lincolnshire on
June 4 to create a ‘peace garden’.
Ironically, the Reapers have been
used on Operation Herrick since
2008, although it is only since a
control room at Waddington was
commissioned earlier this year
that the protesters appeared.
In Germany the axing of the
Euro Hawk programme has
brought political embarrassment
to the Bundestag (see
headlines
).
It would seem that bungled
procurement and short-term
thinking is not the sole preserve
of the UK Government, and
refusal by EASA to certify
UAV operations over Europe
must surely put a big question
mark against current ‘drone’
programmes under development.
It is almost certain that NATO’s
Alliance Ground Surveillance
project will now consider a
manned platform instead of a
version of Northrop Grumman’s
Global Hawk, which could
start to look much like the
RAF’s own Sentinel R1, slated
for the chop when current
operations in Afghanistan end.
And then there’s the persistent
debate about American ‘drone’
strikes in Pakistan, with the
country’s recently re-elected
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif
determined that: “This chapter
of daily drone attacks shall now
be closed.” Pakistan claims
that strikes are killing innocent
civilians, which could breed
more extremism towards the
US. For all the benefits that
unmanned aerial activities
bring, it appears that a number
of issues balance the equation.
Cover image - Frank Crebas/Bluelifeaviation
GARY PARSONS, EDITOR
GARY PARSONS, EDITOR
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4
#304 JULY 2013
www.airforcesmonthly.com
For daily news stories visit
www.airforcesdaily.com
e-mail the news team
at: milnews@keypublishing.com
NEWS
HEADLINES
Death Knell for NATO
Global Hawk?
Above:
Northrop Grumman RQ-4E Euro Hawk 99+01 takes o from Manching, Germany, on January 11 for its fi rst fl ight since being fi tted with a SIGINT sensor suite.
EADS
T
HE GERMAN Government’s
system and the sensor, has
performed flawlessly and
safely throughout the entire
flight test programme. Media
reports that indicate there are
challenges with the aircraft’s
flight control system, as well
as excessive costs associated
with completing airworthiness
certification, are inaccurate.”
German Defence Minister
Thomas de Maizière played down
cancellation of the programme
on which at least €500 million
has been spent, saying: “Better
a miserable end than endless
misery.” That may not be
enough to silence critics in the
German press calling for his
head following admissions that
the government had known of
the problem since at least 2011,
but still pumped money into
it. Even if the documentation
problems can be overcome,
certifying the aircraft safe to fly
in European airspace requires
additional systems estimated at
a further half a billion euros.
While that is bad news for
Germany, it could be equally
upsetting for NATO, which has
its own Global Hawk programme
based on the RQ-4. German
politicians are asking what
likelihood there is of the project
being allowed to fly in European
airspace. They say it would
be better to pull out now and
save the €483 million Germany
has pledged for the NATO
venture. The main challenger
to Chancellor Angela Merkel in
Germany’s election – scheduled
for September, Peer Steinbrueck,
says he does not see a need for the
aircraft. “Against whom or what
should these drones be pointed
and deployed?” he asks. “I have
come to the conclusion that
Germany doesn’t need drones.”
All NATO members would
benefit from the intelligence
gathered by the planned five
NATO Block 40 Global Hawks,
part of the Allied Ground
At a press conference the next
day he said programme costs
and the US decision to phase
out Global Hawk Block 20 and 30
had influenced the cancellation.
He did not expect independent
national mission planning would
be possible until at least 2017
and would have to be conducted
from the US before then.
The capability requirement
sought from Euro Hawk is still
pressing and German military
leaders are investigating ways
to integrate the SIGINT sensors
decision to cancel its acquisi-
tion of further Northrop Grumman
RQ-4E Euro Hawk unmanned air
vehicle (UAVs) could have far-
reaching consequences. At a press
conference in Berlin on May 15,
Stéphane Beemelmans, German
State Secretary at the Federal
Ministry of Defence, confirmed
rumours that no further Euro
Hawks would be purchased. The
reason for the decision was that
the government is unlikely to be
able to gain certification from the
European Aviation Safety Agency
(EASA) to fly in German airspace.
One of the aircraft, serial
number 99+01, is at the
German test establishment at
Manching, Bavaria, trialling a
Cassidian-developed SIGINT
(SIGnals INTelligence) sensor
suite, planned for mounting on
five of the aircraft to replace
the Breguet Atlantic E SIGINT
aircraft retired in 2010. German
press reports suggest that
documents required to achieve
certification cannot be provided
to the EASA because they are
classified, making it impossible
to certify the type in Europe. In
response to the announcement,
the companies involved said in
a statement: “EuroHawk GmbH,
Northrop Grumman and EADS
remain fully committed to
the Euro Hawk programme.
The full Euro Hawk system,
including the mission control
“Against whom should these drones
be pointed and deployed? I have
come to the conclusion that Germany
doesn’t need drones” - Steinbrueck
Surveillance system. However,
only 13 nations have signed up to
fund the programme: Bulgaria,
the Czech Republic, Estonia,
Germany, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania,
Luxembourg, Norway, Romania,
Slovakia, Slovenia and the United
States. The loss of Germany’s
contribution would be a severe
blow politically and financially.
(being developed for the platform)
onto other aircraft. Herr de
Maizière explained that money
allocated to Euro Hawk will be
used instead to buy a different
platform, presumably manned,
for the sensor payload. All
candidate airframes will be
evaluated by the end of the
year. Development of the sensor
suite intended for use on Euro
Hawk is continuing, as are test
flights of the sole German Euro
Hawk, until September. At the
same conference, de Maizière
announced that a German
military aviation authority
to certify all military aerial
vehicles will be created.
Germany still committed
De Maizière signalled continued
commitment to the NATO
programme at a meeting of its
defence ministers in Brussels on
June 4, saying: “We have signed
an agreement and Germany
usually sticks to its agreements.”
www.airforcesdaily.com
#304 JULY 2013
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