Should the Air Corps be scrapped?

Irish_PC9 wrote: »

Are you dumb? The Irish Army Ranger Wing would be called in they would take over the plane and arrest possibly kill the suspects hijacking the plane.The Navy would do the same with boats and smugglers.

And yes,the Irish Air Corps have the grey coloured jet's have Anti-Air Missile Systems and Heavy Machine Guns.

And possibly more jet's that I wouldn't know of.I've been training with the Ranger Wing in plane hijackings and the ARW would definately go after the terrorist's.So there's a little lesson for you.;)

Should i laugh or cry????:eek:

Irish_PC9 wrote: »

Are you dumb? The Irish Army Ranger Wing would be called in they would take over the plane and arrest possibly kill the suspects hijacking the plane.The Navy would do the same with boats and smugglers.

And yes,the Irish Air Corps have the grey coloured jet's have Anti-Air Missile Systems and Heavy Machine Guns.

And possibly more jet's that I wouldn't know of.I've been training with the Ranger Wing in plane hijackings and the ARW would definately go after the terrorist's.So there's a little lesson for you.;)

You joined and wrote that for the craic didnt ya??? :pac:

The Irish Army is a frequent target of begrudgers, but when push comes to shove, it often performs better than our health service, writes Dr Anthony O’Connor

There are some days at work that you don’t forget in a hurry. I had one such recently. At 3pm on the day after one of those horrible sleepless Monday nights that January can bring, I got a call asking me to accompany a gravely ill young man to a hospital in London. Tran-sport was to be arranged courtesy of the air corps and the much maligned government jet.

The journey was mercifully uneventful, apart from passing the Prime Minister of Spain on the runway. We arrived at King’s College Hospital in London and safely delivered our patient.

King’s itself is a magnificent, brooding old London building. With its high ceilings, long corridors and foreboding wooden panels I found it reminded me of the Mater Hospital. An ambience enhanced by the fact that our welcoming committee at the doors of the emergency department included an elderly Dubliner with a large gash on his forehead performing a drunken serenade with his eyes shut. We turned around and made for home in London’s slowest ambulance. A 19-mile journey from the hospital to the RAF airbase took 90 minutes on this NHS charabanc. My journey was punctuated by several anxious phone calls enquiring of our progress from the airfield which had to stay open for a few hours beyond its usual time to accommodate our departure. You know you ha-ve seen it all in a medical SpR career when you find yourself getting grief from the RAF at the end of an on-call shift. Earbashings from surly radiologists and highly-strung surgeons will never hold quite the same cachet of fear when you have incurred the displeasure of a man who could turn a squadron of Typhoon euro-fighters on your sorry ass. I eventually flopped into bed at 1am, 41 hours after starting work.

The military in this country are frequently held up for derision. There is a broad consensus among the commentariat that our armed services are unfit for purpose and an unnecessary expense. As with most majority opinions in this little island of ours, however, it is wrong. Every year this country asks its armed forces to do a lot of things. Many of them are difficult, many are dangerous. I cannot recall them making a mess of any of them or letting the country down. Neither can I think of a single other branch of the public service or Irish public life of which the same can be said. We send them into war ravaged countries to wage peace. We ask them to confront unexploded bombs from dissident terrorists and gangsters. We command them to rescue survivors and recover the dead from our freezing waters. We order them to deal with natural disasters like floods and fires and social ones like drug smugglers and curious, inquisitive doctors on windy approaches to Baldonnell. When luminaries like the Queen, Barack Obama and the Chinese vice-premier come they are gladhanded by taoisigh, presidents, celebrities and Jedward before being handed hurleys and pints of Guinness. However, it is the barely-noticed men and women in uniform that do the heavy lifting to make it happen.

That day when we went over to King’s College Hospital in London, nothing was too much effort for the air corps personnel that brought us over. When the call came, they just got on with it and did everything they needed to do with no fuss whatsoever. They showed professionalism, kindness and humanity and I am extremely proud that they bear our flag on their uniforms. Their sole concern at all times was the safe transfer of our patient, regardless of inconvenience to themselves; this is an attitude all too unfamiliar among many of us employed in the delivery of health services.

It is a sad but true irony that many of our so-called caring professionals could do with taking a leaf from the book of the fighting men and women. I am sure our army, navy and air corps are not perfect organisations, but those in them do their difficult and dangerous jobs without complaint or rancour in the face of frequent opprobrium from the airwaves. The four-star critic-in-chief of our army is Ivan Yates, for-mer TD turned radio presenter from Wexford. This man retired from public li-fe in his early 40s and receives a government pension of €74,800 per year (according to the Wexford People newspaper) for sitting on his well-appointed backside and decrying servicemen earning significantly less than that, to the delight of his own army of public-service bashing radiostation-texting monkeys. Actually, forget that. Monkeys are noble, intelligent animals; these fellas are eejits, not monkeys.

The catchcry of that crowd when hearing of any government expenditure is a sneering, sarcastic ‘Isn’t it a great little country?’

It actually is, but that’s in spite of them.

Uncle Fester wrote: »

The four-star critic-in-chief of our army is Ivan Yates, for-mer TD turned radio presenter from Wexford. This man retired from public li-fe in his early 40s and receives a government pension of €74,800 per year (according to the Wexford People newspaper) for sitting on his well-appointed backside and decrying servicemen earning significantly less than that, to the delight of his own army of public-service bashing radiostation-texting monkeys.

Not to mention apparently declaring himself a UK resident back in 2010... nothing to do with escaping his debts by declaring himself bankrupt in the UK, of course.

BostonB wrote: »

There seems to be a lack of clarity on what the primary/secondary roles of the AC, and thus no one seem to know what equipment they need.

But I can't think of any scenario to which PC9's is the answer.

i'd certainly agree with your first premise, and it goes to the heart of the problem - if you don't know what an organisation is supposed to achieve, how can you tell whether it has succeeded or not and whether it has the right establishment and equipment to allow it to succeed?

i'd dispute the second wrt the PC-9M's - there is a role they could undertake well within the current doctrine/operations of the Irish military (that of overwatch, ISR and CAS/Interdiction on Peace Support Operations) but for some reason they, like the LU/ML helicopters, stay at home while the Army goes overseas and sub-contracts either a commercial operator, or a military partner to provide the same capability as is sat on the tarmac at Baldonnell.

BostonB wrote: »

The PC9 is not best suited to Overwatch and ISR. That would be its primary role so its mis matched there. Its debatable if CAS/Interdiction is something we need.

i'd agree that its not best suited to the role, but there's no denying that it can do the role - as for CAS/interdiction, when the IA deployed to Chad they needed access to the French Air Force and Artillery to provide back up should they have needed it, indeed the DoD required it in order for the op to go ahead - the 'safe' debacle. thankfully they didn't need it, but the fact is that when the IA goes abroard someone is ready to support them should they need that support, the IA is likely to be better served when that support is provided by another Irish asset, local to the IA's AOR, and having trained with the IA previously.

both the FAF and the IA are good, well trained forces, but i wouldn't have bet my life on the 100% success of the first CAS mission requested by IA soldiers from FAF Mirage F1's - as far as i'm aware no Irish soldier has ever brought in a fast jet CAS mission, no Irish soldier has ever brought in a CAS mission that used 500lb guided weapons, and no CAS airstrike has ever been helped by one of the parties not having done it before.

BostonB wrote: »

Thats an argument of not doing roles we are not equipped for, or have the budget to sustain.

Do our PC9 have any of the targeting systems required of a COIN aircraft, or indeed anything else COIN aircraft might have in terms of protection.

how can it be a role the IAC isn't equipped for when it has the aircraft, the crew, the weapons - as regularly seen on the DF flickr page - and the ground crews to suuport them, what kind of bizarre reasoning is that?

the IAC PC-9M's certainly have the targetting systems for unguided rockets and the .50 guns - other systems like Hellfire and Paveway are 'bolt-on' capabilties, the IAC at baldonnel has the tech capability to install them, and it could probably do them in the field. as far as i'm aware the IAC aircraft are not fitted with a DAS, but again there are 'bolt-on' systems available.

its not a big job, it wouldn't require a re-build, its just a metter of buying the kit (or asking partners to donate them) and attaching it. thats it.