Has the government purchased a dud? | 60 Minutes Australia

you can forget Health forget welfare wait till you hear how they're spending your money now 15 billion dollars of it all for a new warplane a top secret project called The Joint Strike Fighter our biggest defense purchase ever I just had a sneak preview of this wonderjet in Texas and I have to say it sure looks impressive but then I took a look at the fine print for some strange reason our defense Chiefs have gone into the deal without seriously considering any other plane the JSF has only flown seven times and it might turn out to be a dud the wrong aircraft to defend Australia no wonder there's an Almighty dogfight in the air foreign heading straight for the heavens at face flattening speed 13 000 feet in 17 seconds and we've got two enemy planes on our tail Australia's Frontline Fighter the F-18 Hornet and now I know what it's like in the middle of a dogfight horse in the sky but despite the awesome stomach churning speed this plane has seen its day that's going to attract to his exhaust and blow up the back of the airplane it's about to make way for a new generation fighter and that's where the real dogfight begins [Music] this is Fort Worth Texas Home of America's largest military contractor if you need something to kill an enemy Lockheed Martin will build it for you and business is booming here what Lockheed Martin call run station 4 is the biggest new project of all the Next Generation radar avoiding supersonic jet it's known as The Joint Strike Fighter so called because it's being jointly funded by nine governments including ours come and have a look at this six years in the making by a team of eight thousand people and one finished playing Australia plans to buy 100 of these beginning in 2013. it's the biggest defense deal in the nation's history set to cost at least 15 billion dollars this is the only one flying right now and it's flown seven times test pilot John Beasley is the only one who's flown it I think the thing that you see there is you see the future of tactical Aviation and air combat can we have a closer look I don't think so I don't think that's in the rules is it it's off limits because it's top secret how close can we get right here just here yeah that's the rules the question is though has Australia had a close enough look the price tag on each plane will be well over 100 million dollars some of our most distinguished Airmen are desperately worried The Joint Strike Fighter will be another in a long line of defense department stuff UPS I've been around long enough to smell a rat and I believe we tried to take a shortcut that has damaged the Nationals defense in the long term air Vice Marshal Peter Criss led the Air Force in the battle for East Timor he wants Australia to buy another plane the F-22 regarded as the most lethal jet fighter ever conceived it's almost unheard of for commanding officers to break racks but the former air commander of Australia has come out of retirement to fight the government's decision so in buying the Joint Strike Fighter how many other planes have we considered no others no no others not one none the process was shut down very early on a close friend of mine was was head of the team to to look at the acquisition under project air 6000 you started the process and told no stop that we're not going to do that this time we know better once the decision was made to commit to the Joint Strike Fighter it was then considered by the government to be not appropriate to continue to go and look at other alternative models Dr Brendan Nelson is the minister for defense are you telling me that due diligence was comprehensively done on other planes in making this decision all of the advice that I have is that all of the necessary alternative aircraft were looked at in terms of capability scheduling cost what they could offer to Australia in terms of the future well I'm not going to go through that now but well just just tell me for the public record and it would be if this committee looked at other Alternatives tell me which others were considered well there's I'm not prepared to go through an exhaustive list of uh we'll just get me one well the they are not prepared to go through an exhaustive list of the alternative aircraft that were considered the joints The Joint Strike Fighter was considered to be the best aircraft for us [Music] The Joint Strike Fighter will replace our aging Fleet of f-11s and this plane the F-18 Hornet The Hornet is 20 years old but you wouldn't know it when you're riding one just some more deep breaths even though I'll be just an onlooker there's a full day of preparation at William Town Base have a look at the Horizon we're upside down here and look up above you that's Newcastle there I'll be sharing the cockpit with group Captain Mel hubfeld he led a squadron of Australian f-18s backing up the Americans and British in the invasion of Iraq if anyone knows what's needed in a war plan it's him I don't want to have a Level Playing Field I want to have the advantage I'd love to have the upper hand we always ask for more fuel we want more speed we want to want to be able to carry more weapons so that if we encounter an enemy we have the best possible chance of being able to destroy that enemy to achieve our objective for the mission foreign to cope with the enormous forces of gravity pilots wear special g-suits a little bit more in your field starts to really around your abs Squadron leader Matt Hall explains how to avoid blacking out and you push as hard as you can squeezing every single muscle from here down as hard as you can basically if you can try and blow a uh a blood vessel in your eye you're doing a good job okay now take a big breath in hold it and push breathe out and in again the dogfight will involve four aircraft two f-18s versus these two Hawk trainer Jets in today's Mission these guys are the bad place so their job out there is to try and kill us and stop us getting to the Target [Music] our Target if we don't get shot down is a road bridge which will destroy with make-believe bombs all right here comes the baddest Some Noise there for you wow you're a flip coming up Pelican 512 control server terminated contact the policeman Center one two five decimal seven okay [Music] the fight's taking place in a huge slab of military airspace over New South Wales foreign back into the Target now what happened I could see now why they taught me to suck in lung fulls of oxygen we're pulling almost seven G's which means my body's seven times heavier than normal it's like being crushed against the seat by a giant lead weight okay now we're running in towards the target area okay crossing over we want to be on the southern side I'm still going to be looking out for enemy aircraft along here you get much lower if you want to prune the trees yeah after an hour of White Knuckle flying the dogfight's over but I'll have to wait till we're back on the ground to find out if our mission was accomplished that's very good news you uh think about any roller coaster you've been in in your life in an amusement park times it by about 20. strap yourself in until you can't breathe and you start to get the hang of it and then try not to feel sick in the process and worry about where the enemy is behind you or underneath you it's just phenomenal it's the word isn't it incredible I'm used to it after flying for a number of years but every mission is different [Applause] did we win yeah I got a missile and a gun spill on him so he was definitely dead before we went and bombed the bridge yep so we took out the first guy you guys shot the first guy he's gone we then flowed through to the next guy we id'd him you couldn't get a missile off so I shot him with missile and follow-up gun shot and then we went to the bridge I got my bombs off you got your bombs off done all right excellent but that's what I thought happened I would have had a clue of course it was all new to me but the fact is these F-18 Hornets are old hat a new generation plane like The Joint Strike Fighter is largely invisible to radar has super Advanced weapon systems and can deliver a more potent payload of bombs but it's not the best there is rolling off the very same production line at Lockheed Martin is the most awesome jet fighter in the world the F-22 every pilot agrees the F-22 is the Ferrari of Fighters it is the crown jewels without a doubt it's got a capability that stands at shoulders above any other fighter in the world at present why wouldn't you take it well that's what I can understand that's what I am so frustrated about in this whole process the reason we're not asking for the F-22 is because whilst it is a brilliant air-to-wear combat fighter Australia needs 100 aircraft we need a great all-rounder it can bat and it can bowl it can do air-to-air combat and strike capability there's another reason for the decision but get this the minister says he can't tell us about it because it's top secret the five percent of this aircraft's capability that is classified to which I've had privileged access Minister it's the five percent that really counts and that's why this is the correct aircraft for us trust me I'm a politician I'm very privileged to have access to all of the information that is available not only on this aircraft but a number of others this is the right aircraft for Australia you've spent a lot of hours in the cockpit of fighter planes if it came to war with one of our original Neighbors would you be confident that you could beat them in the air behind the controls of The Joint Strike Fighter no no because already in our region there are formidable very formidable predominantly Russian uh mainly Sukhoi family variants of aircraft yeah let me get this straight you're saying most of our regional neighbors will have russian-made planes that can potentially beat the Joint Strike Fighter yes that's what I'm saying that's alarming isn't it well that's that's why I'm alarmed we're going to go and buy an aircraft throw it into a region that may or may not be hostile to us and say well good luck boys I hope you come back back in Texas they allowed me into the Declassified simulator of The Joint Strike Fighter the real simulator remains top secret in an hour I was blowing the enemy from the sky [Music] there's no question it'll be a deadly War player the question is will it be the best plane for Australia it's the biggest military purchase we've ever made gee I hope you've got it right I treat decision making in this area and the capability that we provide to the men and women who wear the uniform of the royal Australian Air Force as if any one of those men and women were a member of my own family my own son my own daughter I am very confident that this is the correct aircraft for Australia and to protect the interests safety and well-being of the men and women who will flight that's why we're getting it foreign thanks for watching 60 Minutes Australia 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Channel: 60 Minutes Australia

Views: 937,261

Keywords: 60 Minutes, 60 Minutes Australia, Liz Hayes, Tara Brown, Liam Bartlett, Tom Steinfort, Sarah Abo, karl stefanovic, 60Mins, #60Mins, Air Force, ADFA, Defence, Joint Strike Fighters, Military, Spending

Id: ljT4rFplpsE

Length: 15min 14sec (914 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 29 2022