The ADF's Kaman Helicopters

An old article from June of last year on the subject of the Kaman helicopters being a bad deal for the Australian Defence Force. From the article;

Singapore's aerospace conference showcased a plethora of civilian and military hardware at the Changi Exhibition Centre in February. Nine hundred exhibitors offered a high-tech selection of weapons, executive jets, supersonic stealth fighters - even spacecraft design.

Senator Robert Hill, a newcomer to this secret world of defence business, was soaking it in as he strolled the exhibit's aisles, until he stumbled across Kaman Aerospace's stand. He froze.

In pride of place was a poster of its Seasprite helicopter, with the declaration "The right choice for the Royal Australian Navy". According to bystanders, the unfortunate salesman had just begun his spiel when Senator Hill informed him he was no less than the Australian Defence Minister and was far from convinced the navy had made the right choice when it signed up with Kaman to supply 11 Seasprite helicopters. Costs had blown out to more than $1 billion, he told the startled salesman, and the project was running three years late - if Kaman could deliver at all.

The Kaman Seasprites were intended to be the helicopter for the smaller Patrol Vessels that Australia was to build with Malaysia. The deal never got off the ground, yet the Kaman's were purchased anyway. The Royal Australian Navy would have been better served with the larger Seahawk that currently operates off the Navies Frigates.

"You can't dispute it's the wrong helicopter," Mr [Aldo] Borgu said. "There are obvious question marks over the Penguin anti-ship missile as opposed to the Harpoon, and the anti-sub capability isn't as good as the Seahawks. We should have got the Seahawks. On balance the ADF would have been better off."

The ADF Defence Budget in 2003/2004 describes the "Anzac Ship Helicopter" capital project as running three and a half years late and that the delay is caused substantially by the failure of a subcontractors development of the integrated software. Kaman has got new subcontractors to do this work. The software component of the contract is not expected to be completed until late 2004.

Risk and Defence Capital Funding

The software company that was unable to deliver the integrated software for the Australian Navy's Kaman Seasprite Helicopter was Litton Integrated Systems. The work was taken over by Northrop Grumman Information Technology of San Diego. Littons webpage, www.littondsd.com is directed to Northrop Grummans Electronic Systems website.

According to Defence, it was Kamans managerial responsibility to ensure that Litton kept to its contractual obligations, it wasn't for Defence to manage the sub contractors. The Defence Department also claimed that the prime contractor was not suitable for this kind of project that involves highly developmental, software-intensive project. The ASPI Paper on the 2003 Defence Budget questions this project with;

A broader question is whether Defence should seek to buy "Australia Only" solutions on projects like this with only a small production run; a path that incurs significant development costs and increases exposure to high levels of technical risk.

The team for this project included Tenix, CSC Australia, Scientific Management Associates and Safe Air NZ. However the prime was an inexperienced contractor which evidently mismanaged the software component. Managing software risk is difficult, especially if the management and team don't keep up to date with rapidly appearing risk management technologies such as unit testing, continuous integration, automated functional testing, and software process technologies such as Agile, Crystal, Extreme etc.

In my opinion Australian Defence should be seeking indigenous solutions and Australian industry involvement of greater than 90%. There are many benefits to indigenous development. One is the hidden subsidy to indigenous high tech through government funded technology research and application. Australian medical science has been a world leader for a long period, this is due to the continued and constant investment through the public health system into research and development. With the same continued and prolonged investment into high tech through defence spending Australian high tech will take a more prominent and innovative exposure on the global stage and markets.

The other reasons is political. The Australian government and Australian leadership has been unable to tangle itself from the paranoid and erroneous view that Australia requires an all encompassing security policy that lays Australian interests at the feet of US interests in return for US security. This is a small, naive, failed and dependent doctrine indicative of weak Australian leadership. This view and policy needs to be broken once and for all. The manner in which to make the "great and powerful friends" doctrine irrelevant is to have an Australian defence force that is indigenously supplied and indigenously sustainable to ensure Australian sovereignty and defence.

More Reading on Kaman seasprite

• Kaman Seasprite
• Robert Hill
• The Expensive Dud