SA's Giant Airbuses Will Give Africa the Lift It Needs [Sunday Independent, 2004-12-12]

Publication	Sunday Independent
Date	2004-12-12
Reporter	Helmoed Römer Heitman
Web Link	www.sundayindependent.co.za

The government's decision to join the Airbus A-400M programme is an indication that it understands that South Africa will play an expanded regional security role for many years to come.

One of the major shortfalls in Africa's ability to conduct peace support operations is a lack of airlift capacity to deploy troops and their equipment quickly over long distances, and then to sustain those forces.

The distances involved and the mostly very poor road and rail infrastructure make airlift essential.

The decision to acquire the necessary airlift should, therefore, also be seen as a further commitment to the New Partnership for Africa's Development (Nepad) which, as President Thabo Mbeki stressed at Davos in January 2001, will not succeed unless there is "peace, security and stability".

Achieving that, however, will require the ability to mount and sustain peace support operations.

That Africa cannot yet do effectively without extensive assistance by major powers is in large part because Africa's armed forces generally lack sufficient airlift to deploy and sustain credible forces.

As the major economic power south of the Sahara, South Africa will increasingly be expected not merely to participate in peace support operations of all types but also to take a leading role.

More to the point, it is the SANDF that is widely seen as one of the few forces on the continent that has the capability to mount a quick-response operation to contain a crisis before it spirals out of control.

The South African Air Force's (SAAF) current fleet of 12 C-130 Hercules, of which only nine are in use, is inadequate to meet the requirement. The Hercules lacks both the overall capacity and the ability to transport heavy equipment and vehicles. Worse, the Hercules cannot transport an Oryx helicopter unless the gearbox is removed. Reassembling the Oryx then takes about 24 hours and requires a lot of equipment to be flown in with it.

The current reliance on chartered aircraft is also far from ideal. It presents safety and security risks, and there is always the niggling doubt whether a commercial operator will risk his aircraft for an air assault or hot extraction.

Given that peacekeeping can very quickly become peace-enforcement, that is a real risk.

The A-400M will give the SAAF the capability it needs for the regional security role, offering the payload and range required for Africa, with the ability to operate from short and unprepared strips.

An A-400M can transport two Casspirs, two Ratels, a Rooikat or six vehicles in the Land-Rover class with trailers. It can also transport an Oryx or Rooivalk with only the rotor head removed, allowing it to be brought into action within about four hours of arrival.

In a disaster relief role, it can transport earthmoving equipment and items such as field hospital containers and the trailers on which to deploy them.

The Hercules cannot transport any of those except three Land-Rover type vehicles and their trailers. There is a long version of the C-130, but that only gives a longer cargo box, not any additional payload.

The SAAF's current C-130Bs do not have the same performance as the C-130Js. There is, in fact, nothing else that really compares with the A400-M. The American C-17 is much more capable but is also much more expensive to buy and operate.

The new Antonov is just a project in the Ukraine that may or may not fly, and the Ilyushin-76 is a dated design that is no longer in production.

The greater transport capability that the A-400M will bring the SAAF will go beyond increasing the flexibility of the SANDF.

The SAAF A-400Ms will become a key element of the African standby force and, thus, of Africa's ability to respond effectively to crises on the continent.

Looking beyond airlift, the A-400M can also be used as a tanker for fighters and other aircraft, and could readily be developed into a long-range maritime patrol aircraft with the range to patrol the waters around Prince Edward and Marion islands.

However, those eight to 14 A-400Ms will not suffice as the only transport aircraft in the SAAF if South Africa is to be effective in its regional role. A lighter transport aircraft will be needed to replace the 1940s vintage Dakota, and another heavier type better suited to routine troop rotation and similar tasks. The latter would most probably be derived from an airliner, and could replace the airborne command post/ electronic warfare Boeing 707s and also serve as alternative fuel tankers.

The work packages that will flow to South African aerospace companies as a result of South Africa's participation in this programme are different to the industrial participation elements of the current contracts. These will not be offsets as such, but will involve South African companies in the design, development and manufacture of the A-400M.

That holds considerable potential for the future of South Africa's aerospace industry.