Bad relationship

If I was going to stereotype, one thing I learned from Korea is that the people can have a short temper.

So when I read in today's Australian Financial Review (AFR), "Howitzer bombshell angers South Korea", (Geoffry Barker), my first thought was that this was not the kind of business partner to leave in the lurch.

S.Korean defence industry was rightly upset when they heard of the cancellation of the Australian self-propelled artillery project (to be made in S.Korea) by radio news with no forewarning. The South Korean embassy was informed 20 minutes before the public announcement.

Did I just mention "upset"? Furious would be a better description. Business reprisal in some form from S.Korea is a guarantee.

Aside from the idea if Australia even needs this kind of weapon's system, officials made this cancellation decision as part of an effort to save money. Even though gross excess like 22,000 defence civilian employees, a war in Afghanistan that provides no defensive value to the nation, too many flag-ranks and SES and a spend-thrift buying policy still exist.

S.Korea offers a lot of potential defence industry solutions for land, sea and air. How the future Australian-S. Korean defence industry relationship progresses is an open question.

Korea is learning

Getting smarter on the F-35 situation.

The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter Concurrency Quick Look Review published on Nov. 29 last year concluded that U.S. defense giant Lockheed Martin will only be able to start producing a fully operational version of the F-35 in 2017.

Just a little entertainment for the day...

Oh dear.

LOCKHEED HIT FOR MISLEADING REMARK

29-feb-2012
KOREA TIMES
By Lee Tae-hoon

U.S. defense giant Lockheed Martin will face a penalty unless it formally offers an apology for misleading statements over Korea’s plan to purchase fighter jets for 8.29 trillion won ($7.3 billion), multiple sources said Tuesday.

Senior officials at the Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA) said that Lockheed Martin has undermined the credibility of the government’s plan to purchase 60 advanced jets in a fair international competition.

The company has been cornered over a report by Dusty Ricketts of the Northwest Florida Daily News that claimed Stephen O’Bryan, vice president of Lockheed Martin’s F-35 program integration, told reporters in early February that Korea had already agreed to purchase F-35 jets.

Many media outlets here churned out articles suggesting that Rickett’s report confirmed the ruling Saenuri Party lawmaker Song Young-sun’s claim that that President Lee Myung-bak promised Barack Obama to purchase F-35s in a summit in Washington on Oct. 13 last year.
Rep. Song told The Korea Times that she still suspects a shady deal might have occurred during the summit, but does not have “hard facts,” nor any witness to back her claim.

Senior DAPA official said the agency sent a letter of complaint to Lockheed Martin on Feb. 15 regarding Korea’s next-generation fighter acquisition bidding in which Boeing and EADS are also participating, but it has yet to receive any response.

They warned that the more Lockheed Martin postpones making a formal public apology, the more it will have to lose.

“If Lockheed Martin hesitates to respond to the South Korean government’s call to make a formal apology, possibly in an attempt to save face, it will suffer a harsher penalty for its role in misleading the public,” a senior DAPA official said.

DAPA has yet to obtain an audio file of O’Bryan’s media briefing on Feb. 1 at the Eglin Air Force Base in Florida, but it claims that circumstantial evidence indicates that the Lockheed Martin official made a slip of the tongue.

Korea drops stealth requirement for fighter buy

Korea has dropped the stealth requirement for a fighter buy of up to 60 advanced aircraft.

I suspect they have seen through the "fifth-generation" fighter swindle.

South Korea and U.S. in mil-tech tampering disagreement

S.Korea is being accused of tampering with purchased U.S. mil tech. The explanation of "Tiger Eye" in the article is not correct but the message in the article is what is important.

This is why different FMS (foreign military sales) customers need different "requirements" that suit "their needs". Note the definition of Delta SDD in the F-35 program here.

Maker of the F-35 insults Korea's intelligence

LM must think they can go to Korea and mislead potential customers; that the local news won't print it in English and that the Koreans are gullible or stupid.

In any event, take a read of this and look for the typical spin.

South Korea wants a low-observable cruise missile

South Korea is looking for a JASSM like cruise missile. If the JASSM worked as advertised this might be a good idea. Well it might be a good idea regardless.

The JASSM blew out on costs big time in the U.S. It still has to prove some fusing issues and is on a watch list to keep reliability acceptable for the USAF in anything other than highly scripted range events.

Yet even if the probability of kill is lower than needed and you end up with more than the expected number of duds it might not be so bad. Why?

Most of the targets South Korea would want to hit are kind of close. Spend a billion or more on “JASSM-level” missiles (whatever that means) might be a better idea than spending tens of billions on over-priced and over-hyped Just So Flawed fighters or some other option.

Yeah, that might work.