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  • #31
    Apology accepted, being old I've never learnt to type, the message took me two hours to compose since i couldn't dictate it to the secretary and a recent addition to the G household keeps me awake at night, so am a bit short tempered at the moment. but truth is that acquiring second hand MBT wouldn't cost that much in the wider scheme of things, would be a hell of a lot cheaper and effective then the centauro, especially in view of the fact of how they would be utilised, would give the army a vastly improved capability, especially as there is a need to improve its warfighting capability. Logically, if the army is only going to engage in peace keeping and therefore doesn't need tanks, why bother with the Artillery corps.
    Last edited by paul g; 6 June 2003, 20:33.

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    • #32
      Where is the Centauro coming from? I keep hearing it. Is it a pure board thing or is it being seriously floated in military circles???

      -Y
      Meh.

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      • #33
        Pure board thing.

        Possibly a pirhana based gun system might be considered, but a whole new chassis wouldn't make much sense.

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        • #34
          Actually it was being mooted as a Scorpion replacement in the think tank at Irishmilitary.com, well worth a visit i your interested in this sort of idea throwing.
          The US army seems to be having some trouble integrating a 105mm full recoil gun on to the PIII chassis, it's working out to be quite expensive.
          "It is a general popular error to imagine that loudest complainers for the public to be the most anxious for it's welfare" Edmund Burke

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          • #35
            This is all board stuff and extremly hypothetical, but i think I didn't raise anything that shouldn't be discussed; as for the future cavalry corps, an AML replacement will have to be acquired from 2005 onwards, logically a Piranha III with a 40mm high velocity cannon makes the most sense, while even if they are updated with diesel engines and 90mm guns, the Scorpions are already coming up for their quarter century in service, and will have to be replaced around 2010; sounds like a long time, but its not. As for MGS, yep, there is the problem of recoil on such a light chassisalong with the Battleship/battlecruiser question; the Stryker MGS only carries 18 rounds of 105mm, which is pretty pathetic, while the Centuro is as expensive and heavy as a MBT.

            Its all to do with long term planning. Continued peace in the North (its a decade on from the Downing street declaration) and British troop withdrawl will affect the defence forces, its difficult to see the IRA returning to what petained from 1969 to 1994; when the RIR has gone and there are only 2000 british troops in the north, the defence force's barracks and units along the border will also go. While you could argue that there was a similar gap between the border campaign in the 1950's and 1969, the simple truth is that the situation is very different, and the provo's would find it hard to re-start their campaign; people who provided low level support like safe houses, intelligence, turning a blind eye etc vital to their operations, wouldn't today; while nobody would doubt that catholics in northern ireland were badly treated at the start of the present troubles, this situation has changed, nationalists today are educated, richer, and ultimatedly have a bigger stake in society, and few would be willing to support a return to pre-1994 or anything remotedly like it, and the decline of the Irish catholic church has been amazing in the past ten years.
            Moves towards collective European defence structures will also affect the composition and equipment of the defence forces, more than many on the board often realise, and not in the way they think. There is a belief that it will mean more and better quality equipment more suited to warfighting, which is true; there is also an assumption that personel level will remain static which is a mistake, the future defence forces will have fewer men even from today's levels, the air corps and naval service will draw men away from the army eventually; the AMLs were essentially bought as internal security vehicles for four PDF cavalry squadrons (around 48 were bought), should they be replaced by similar vehicles or should a new approach be taken? I'm not flaming, but realistically there won't be three brigades in both the PDF and RDF in 10 years time, there will be two PDF and 2 RDF brigades; the defence forces has traditionally always gone for men over equipment, since that was the best choice for the internal security role, but that role will largely disappear in the coming decade; UN peace keeping has also changed; the end of the cold war released the far better equiped, and more importantly, nato armies, to undertake peace support missions, and realistically the days of the Lebanon and UN peace keeping are gone; as the overseas role becomes more important to the defence forces, and we are asked to provide combined arms battlegroups to fulfil our international obligations, there will be a trade off, and manpower will decrease to pay for more equipment and increased training, a process that has already started. Also the country is more open then it was at the time lets say of the Pope's visit, things like this and improving relations with britain will affect our outlook towards things like defence and neutrality. Ten years ago, the defence forces were essentially a gendarmarie with pretensions to being an army, in ten years time it will have to be conventional trained force where the white paper committment to having a light infantry force with appropriate levels of all arms supporting capability will be revised to a light infantry force with firepower approaching that deployed by lets say for example, the US marine corps.


            Secondly, people do question the need for the defence forces, we all know and experience this, and the simple truths are that without being offensive or rude, lots of people on the board who constantly complain about the lack of equipment and government parsimony (C-Q) have never paid tax in their life on anything other than summer jobs, I have a real job as does the wife and its bloody awful trying to make ends meet sometimes, sex is fun but kids are expensive. Tax payers are consumers, irish tax payers pay a hell of a lot in a country with an extremly high cost of living, and in the absence of a threat to the state from the Provo's or any foreign state, they will question the need for the defence forces. There won't be any European money for defence spending, the EU will tell us to piss off and pay ourselves does like everybody else does, if we ask, and there will be the need to provide properly trained and equiped units. Ultimatedly, there will be a reduction in the number of brigades, and more resources will be placed into a smaller force that will be equipped for peace support missions similar to traditional warfighting.

            Therefore, IMHO, the future composition of the defence forces its structure and equipment requirements should be discussed now, in the context of what the political and strategic situation will be like in ten years time. Like everything else, future equipment depends on the sort of missions the defence forces are going to undertake in the coming decade, in Europe and overseas. If we're going to join the coalition of the willing as an open partner, or take part in EU defence, neither of which are exactly fantasy ( Colin Powel stated that we were one of its un-named members) , things like MBT, battlefield reconnaissance vehicles, artillery, artillery location radars, UAVs similar to the American dragonfly, more APCs and military standard helicopters will have to be acquired.

            Apologies since this is entirely off thread
            Last edited by paul g; 6 June 2003, 23:27.

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            • #36
              Not off topic at all (apart from the 'sex is fun' bit :o )

              This is more or less the take I had on the issue, although I'd be dubious that we'd see the full range of combat arms in Irish service. More likely that a modularity of equipment would exists, whereby Irish Defence Forces would have a force structure tailored to operate with other, complimentary, Europan forces. So with, say, British Airpower, French ELINT ... its basically how we are expected to operate now in the RRF, with just a battalion of mech inf. Presume that we'd be expected to have more indigenous capability than we do now (which MBTs would give us on the cheap), but the key will be interoperability with other EU forces and training, training and training.

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              • #37
                That's true Aidan , but in order to be interoperable and to train so that we are, we need more equipment then we do now, and we have to rethink our equpiment needs and structures. And while at brigade level we will be able to utilise the resources of other counties, eg French elint, at battalion level, we will have to provide our own equipment, and our battalions will have to be self-contained battlegroups. And there will be a diversion of men away from the army towards the air corps and naval service.

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                • #38
                  This personnel reduction vs. more equipment seems to assume no change in funding. In a European Common Defence context, could 0.75% of GDP on defence continue, or would we have to spend more?

                  There was a survey of defence spending published several months ago. Based on the number of personnel in the DF and on one indicator that tends to indicate technnological preparedness, the government underspends by abour Eur250 million. That is, to achieve an advanced, western defence force of 10500 personnel, the government should increase spending by Eur 250 million annually.

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                  • #39
                    aBSOLUTEDLY CORRECT jOHN, THETS WHY THEY'LL CUT IT TO 8, 500

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                    • #40
                      But that would leave other countries will be contributing proportionately much more to a common defence. Would other countries accept that? What possible excuse would there be?

                      Ireland is not seen as one of the poor countries anymore is it?

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                      • #41
                        Getting MBTs would be dumb. First the need to get a whole bunch of specielized equitment to support them. Second their weight makes them a bitch to have to transport. Third Helocopters are a more effective form of fire support/excort in my mind, and are the tanks of the future, and have a much higher survival rate.

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                        • #42
                          Hvae you actually read all of this thread?
                          Try reading it again and you'll find that your critiscisms have been discussed already.
                          "It is a general popular error to imagine that loudest complainers for the public to be the most anxious for it's welfare" Edmund Burke

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                          • #43
                            Sorry I did not see attack helos mentioned once yet am I missin' somethin'

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                            • #44
                              I said your critiscisms not your suggestions
                              "It is a general popular error to imagine that loudest complainers for the public to be the most anxious for it's welfare" Edmund Burke

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                              • #45
                                C-Q..is that your handbag in the corner?


                                Catch-22 says they have a right to do anything we can't stop them from doing.

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