You're overlooking a couple of really important points.........

"Defender in Tas" wrote in message
m...
The problem with our having the F-111 is we now have people arguing
that we shouldn't lose such a great capability. It's a double-edged
sword. The F-111 has served us well, but can we really justify its
cost in this day and age? The Army has been run down, and the $300
million we spend on the Pigs would fund the raising of two extra
infantry battalions.

Except Infantry Battalions are kind of manpower-intensive. The ADF is
having a hard enough time filling existing vacancies without creating
1200-1800 more overnight.

We need extra capability for air defence - the F/A-18s with adequate
air refuelling or basing sufficiently close to the action (at our bare
bases in the north, or Tindal) have strike capabilities, and it is
much cheaper to add new weapons such as HARM to their arsenal - but we
need more aircraft for air superiority, to take on SU-27s and win.

That's why I suggest replacing the F-111s with either the F/A-18E or
surplus ex-USN or USMC F/A-18s. We need to be able to put more
aircraft in the air at once. The F-111 force cannot put that many
planes over a target even allowing for full serviciability - which
seems to be rare.

A lack of aircrew doesn't help much either. Fast jet-capable crew are few
and far between, and you want to create more airframes with no-one to fly
them?

With four full squadrons of fighters, additional AAR aircraft and the
AWACS that will enter service in a few years we would be able to repel
attacks against likely threats from our near neighbours.

Wouldn't it be better to destroy those enemy fighters where they are most
vulnerable.......... on the ground? Pigs are better at that than Bugs.

Eventually those fighters will be the stealthy F-35. But until that
arrives, and it won't be available in 2012 - let's not kid ourselves,
we need to maintain all-round air defence capabilities by retiring the
F-111 and acquiring as a temporary measure additional fighters.

If you have to rely on air *defence*, you'll lose the war.

The F-111 is not a fighter.

No ****?

And we cannot afford a single role bomber in this day and age and with our
defence budget.

Have you been reading the Swiss manual of warfare?

--
De Oppresso Liber.