Australia must ramp up air defence, particularly as China’s ‘Mighty Dragon’ is far superior

Australia must ramp up its air defence, particularly as China’s ‘Mighty Dragon’ is far superior than any other aircraft in the region.

When Peter Dutton became defence minister almost exactly a year ago our defence equipment standing in the region was complete joke. The termination of the French submarine disaster and its replacement with access to US nuclear technology started our nation on the long road to gain defence respect.

But we will never gain full respect in the region while we have no worthwhile air defence particularly as the Chinese “Mighty Dragon” – the Chengdu J-20 – is far superior to any other aircraft regularly operating in our region.

Until now being competitive in regional skies seemed an unattainable goal because the only aircraft that rivals the J-20 is the American F-22 and the US ceased production of the F-22 believing the Joint Strike Fighter- F-35 would fill the gap. We agreed to buy the JSF-F35 and it was a disastrous mistake by both the US and Australia.

Suddenly an amazing never to be repeated opportunity has arisen. I plead with Peter Dutton and his assistant minister Andrew Hastie plus shadow defence minister Richard Marles (whom the opinion polls say will be defence minister in a few weeks) to make investigating this opportunity the highest national defence priority.

According to the authoritative US defence newsletter War Zone, the US Air Force is seeking to retire 33 F-22A Raptor Stealth fighters which would reduce its total F-22 fleet size from around 186 to some 153.

The US relationship with Australia is now close as displayed by the AUKUS deal that sees us in time acquiring submarines with US nuclear technology. Currently only the UK has access to this technology.

The US has been similarly been very protective of its F-22 technology but in the wake of AUKUS would almost certainly be interested in considering an Australian proposal to lease the 33 F-22 aircraft. There are three obvious questions:

Why is the US looking to retire the F-22? Can we update the aircraft so that it is competitive with the J-20 and does an aircraft out of production in the US have a future?

The F-22 first flew around 1997 and was the only fifth-generation fighter in existence and gave the US global air superiority. But it was expensive and at the turn of the century its primary adversary, the Soviet air force, was in trouble. The US air budget was stretched by wars in Iraq and Afghanistan plus the 2008-10 recession.

US defence people believed the US could develop a much cheaper and better fifth generation aircraft — the JSF. But the JSF failed in those aims and China developed the J-20 as a rival to the F-22 – an event no one in the US thought possible.

Fast forward to 2023. The JSF-F35 in its present form has limited capabilities and cannot fly at the height achieved by the J-20. it is also unreliable, has limited flying range and is very expensive.

The US Air Force has slashed its purchases of the JSF by one third until a new Block4 software system is developed which it hopes will fix some of the problems. . Australia has taken delivery of part of its order but our aircraft need that new software (which we will pay for) and even then it will be vulnerable to the J-20

The US Air Force wants to purchase more F-15 EX Eagle 11 24 fighter jets which are ready for combat. This is an aircraft that first flew 36 years ago – well before the F-22 – but has been updated.

Meanwhile, one of the F-22 bases was hit by a cyclone and because it is not being manufactured, the F-22 is something of an ugly duckling. The F-22 jets on the chopping block are all older versions and are largely relegated to training and other non-combat duties.

The US air force says that it would take $US1.8bn ($A2.40bn) over the next eight years to bring those jets up to the latest standard – funds that it wants to spend on ‘fixing’ the JSF-F35 and upgrading other F-22’s.

Given the US is looking to retire the aircraft, Australia’s base leasing costs should be nil but the aircraft need up grading and new facilities will be required. Air Power Australia’s preliminary estimate of the cost is $US10bn, spread over some years. It sounds a lot but we can stop delivery of the JSF and maybe the US will fund some if the huge costs of making our existing JSF more useful.

Once we are working with the Americans on modernising the F-22 we might be able to show them how the JSF manufacturing pipeline could be used to make F-22’s.

The bureaucracy in both countries will be a problem, especially in Australia.

Peter Dutton’s biggest mistake as defence minister was not to clean out the management that led us into our defence mess. They are still there so whether the defence Minister be Dutton or Marles he will not have the talents in the public service to take the opportunity. Advice and help outside the public service is available.