Sorta classified German readiness rates

a reply to: Forensick

It was a bad idea from the start. There's no capability gap between the C130 and C17. You just end up with an aircraft too large or (worse) too small for the task at hand. Turns out you end up procuring smaller and larger transport planes anyway.
But even without additional aircraft, the A400M is considerably more expensive to procure and operate than a mixed C130/C17 fleet of comparable size. And thats not even talking about capabilities.

But who cares. It was never about the airplane but always about buying European.

originally posted by: mightmight
a reply to: Forensick

It was a bad idea from the start. There's no capability gap between the C130 and C17. You just end up with an aircraft too large or (worse) too small for the task at hand. Turns out you end up procuring smaller and larger transport planes anyway.
But even without additional aircraft, the A400M is considerably more expensive to procure and operate than a mixed C130/C17 fleet of comparable size. And thats not even talking about capabilities.

But who cares. It was never about the airplane but always about buying European.

If that’s true then it wasn’t at the start, the idea was an aircraft that can carry what the 130J and some of the C-17 to the same places a C-130J could get in and therefore replace it.

2012:

www.thinkdefence.co.uk...

a reply to: Forensick

Small problem though, it turns out you don't need to lift more than the C-130J can to places the C-17 can't go.
It's an irrelevant niche capability without any basis in reality, since there are very few places the A400M can go to while they C-17 cannot if it really had to.

But even if it were relevant, consider the tradeoffs.
There will always be a hell of a lot of hardware the A400 won't be able to move. You end up needing a heavy lift capability. The RAFs C-17, SALIS and Nato SAC. And Uncle Sam is always ready to help out, right?
On the low and you have the same issues. You can get by with flying just the C-130. But the A400M is woefully oversized for far too many missions. Spain and France both fly CASAs. Germany is looking for a low-end solution as well, but that will take a long time.
That still not enough though. Turns out everyone buying the A400M ends up flying C-130s anyway. The RAF has one squadron of C-130Js. The Spanish Air Force flys perfectly adequate C-130Hs. And France and Germany (!!) are in the process of forming a joint C-130J squadron, whole France has another active C-130H squadron. No one is getting rid of those.
Why? Capabilities. The C-130J is a great platform for aerial refueling. It's a nightmare on the A400M due to the oversized turboprops. It's a great platform for SF ops. The manufacturer can offer any combat-proven modification you can think of without much hassle. The A400M is a glorified transport, barely capable of landing on dirt. And if you look at what caused the crash in Spain in 2015, I don't think they can take much if any punishment. They can haul between airports and not much else.
Oh, and it can actually go where you need to go. In reality, the A400M simply can't do the smaller airfields the C-130J can land on. Lofty promises and all that.

Der Speigel just reported that the Bundeswehr, which is supposed to have enough 155mm ammunition to fight for 30 days of intensive combat (230,000 shells), has a total of 20,000 rounds of 155mm ammunition in total.

www.spiegel.de...

a reply to: Zaphod58
So does that mean the entire German armed forces has only 3 days worth of 155mm shells for intensive combat?
Their next conventional war won't last long 😱

Its kind of mad how the German military has sunk back to the long hair days of the late 70's early 80's when they were just derided as a military force by the rest of Nato...even the Dutch were more highly regarded as soldiers than the Germans at that time (and the Dutch were usually pretty high and chilled).