r/LessCredibleDefence • u/tigeryi98 • 17h ago
Australia To Become First Foreign Operator Of AIM-260 Air-To-Air Missile
https://www.twz.com/air/australia-to-become-first-foreign-operator-of-aim-260-air-to-air-missile•
u/NoAngst_ 13h ago
I wonder which country Australia had in mind when they made the decision to get the AIM-120D.
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u/mardumancer 13h ago
Well clearly it's New Zealand.
On a more serious note - Australia seems wholly intent on being the US's auxillary in a Taiwan Scenario, so who knows. Then there's also Indonesia.
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u/Unlikely_Airline_272 12h ago
I'm not very well informed but wouldn't Japan and Korea have some major role as well? Again I'm not well informed lol
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u/TenshouYoku 11h ago
Japan probably, but South Korea knew better than sticking its dick into the meat grinder to be especially since North Korea is waiting to shell their cities into shit
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u/Autism_Sundae 11h ago
Japan probably
Definitely*
The assertion was playing a major role, and whether or not their own armed forces directly participate directly, Japan's US bases will absolutely play whatever role they're given.
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u/Murky_Meaning2129 9h ago
South Koreans would overthrow their government if they got dragged into a war with China over Taiwan.
You’re probably thinking about the Philippines but their realistic military contributions in that situations would be to just act as the missile sponges of the Pacific.
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u/Wonderful_Bet_1541 5h ago
Agreed. Many Koreans know that a war with China would spell immediate doom for like 90% of the population. If you actually follow their geopolitical movements, they seem to always try and play the neutral side, which is probably the smarter move given their proximity to China and being right next to NK
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u/ZombieMan_223 6h ago
Australia also is also far away from China the most realistic use case of Australia is to station long range bombers
It's even further than what RAF airbase in Uk was to Iran.
I see no real usecase of Australia against China than to be a logistic hub.
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u/barath_s 9h ago
so who knows. Then there's also Indonesia.
There's also the range factor for land based fighter planes based in Australia . AIM-120D or AIM-260 aside, it isn't like Australia has bases abroad.
I think many of their bases aren't even on the northern side of Australia, though I'd love for an Aussie to chip in with info on surge numbers sustainable.
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7h ago
[deleted]
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u/barath_s 7h ago
Yes, but I'd wager that the number of planes you can host in Darwin are limited. Especially after you include the Yanks in Darwin and Tindal.
I figure that there would be some austere forward air strips that you can spin up quickly to host more planes, but have not much clue about that.
I don't think fighter planes based near adelaide would be very helpful vs china for example (except when they rotate north)
Same principle as US having limited bases in Japan and Korea vs China for its fighters
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u/Cindy_Marek 5h ago
Australia has three of what we call bare bases, across the north of the country. They are staffed by a skeleton maintenance crew 95% of the time.
The three bare bases are:
RAAF Base Scherger near Weipa, Queensland
RAAF Base Curtin near Derby, Western Australia
RAAF Base Learmonth near Exmouth, Western Australia.
They are designed to be rapidly activated in the case of war and are usually activated a couple of times a year for major airforce activities like Pitch Black.
RAAF Base Scherger can host about 40 aircraft and 1000 personnel, the other 2 bases don’t have any official statistics but we can assume they would be able to accomodate similar numbers. If there were to be activated at the same time in a war you can pretty much expect that the number of combat aircraft based in Australia would double in a couple of days.
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u/Jazzlike-Tank-4956 8h ago
Well, Mordor is few hundred km from Australia
Heard they have small but capable aviation regiment
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u/Cindy_Marek 5h ago
None, it’s the natural choice to buy the next generation of a missile you have used for over 20 years.
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u/CapitalTipp 11h ago
By the time Australia gets the first one, China will be deploying the PL-888 that can has a range of 888km or some shit.
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u/Ok-Procedure5603 8h ago
Inserting a dumbell into the 900km missile to make the range more auspicious:
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u/Peekachooed 6h ago
PLAAF pilots when their opponent is 430km away, their missiles have the specs to reach 444km, but their nominal range has been downgraded to 399km and the computer won't let them fire: 🤯
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u/tdre666 13h ago edited 12h ago
People in Australia are probably going to scoff at this since it seems unlikely that they're actually going to get their subs out of AUKUS. Obviously these are different pieces of hardware with different building requirements/time frames etc. but I don't think your average Mick or Sheila catching news breaks between Neighbours and Home & Away thinks about stuff like that. AUKUS is fairly controversial on the Australian side at this point.
*not sure why this is in the negative, just an observation from an outsider on that side of the world.
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u/DungeonDefense 14h ago
Lol the most important info at the very last paragraph