Seems the Australian Army WILL replace the less than stellar Tiger ARH, and the selected aircraft is perhaps unsurprisingly the AH-64E Apache. I’m reasonably satisfied with the decision as anything was better than the Tiger, which just never quite cut it. Personally I would have been a little happier with the AH-1Z as it is fully marinized and could be deployed for extended periods on our Canberra class ships. I also suspect the Zulu is a little kinder on the wallet, however the Apache is fine and stops the ridiculous dancing around the term “attack helicopter” that drove the idiotic purchase of the “armed scout” Tiger. Its nice to see that the Apache will also be bought in a modestly greater number than the Tiger too with 29 AH-64’s to replace 22 Tigers, 5 of which will be dedicated to training leaving 24 machines combat coded. Personally I would like to see far more bought as I give the odds of a US/China conflict in our region around a 40-60% chance of occurring in the next 20 years. If you have 5 combat coded squadrons of 12 each and a training, deep maintenance and attrition reserve of 15 more you can do something useful, whereas 22 unreliable Tigers was a money draining farce.

Of interest to this will be the second link I have put to an Op ED piece by Jim Molan a retired Australian Army officer and prominent politician who gives some historical insights as well as his views on the selection.

Thirty years ago such a decision would have been an impractical dream, now its looking increasingly like a necessity.

www.defenceconnect.com.au/land-amphibious/7497-defence-minister-confirms-tiger-replacement-selection