The Italian air force has raised airborne early warning (AEW) aircraft to a top acquisition priority in the aftermath of the NATO air campaign against Libya.
Lt Gen Giuseppe Bernardis, air force chief of staff, told the Dubai International Air Chiefs conference on 12 November that having to depend on the NATO Boeing E-3A airborne warning and control system fleet was a turning point. The E-3A deployment was delayed as alliance members built the required consensus to approve the launch of operations, Bernardis said.
Italy's air force prefers to acquire its own fleet of AEW aircraft and has estimated that to buy four aircraft would cost €1.2 billion ($1.2 billion), he said.
Bernardis's presentation also included briefing slides showing images of three kinds of AEW platforms - the Boeing 737 airborne early warning and control, Ilyushin A-50, and Israel Aerospace Industries' G550 conformal airborne early warning.
Other platforms, including the Airbus Military C-295 AEW, Saab 2000 Erieye, and Northrop Grumman E-2D Advanced Hawkeye, may also be considered but were not displayed during his presentation.
Italy requires a platform with both a radar and onboard battle management system, Bernardis said. A technology requirement is an active electronic scanned array radar, he added, which would rule out the A-50 platform.
For more from Flightglobal at the Dubai Air Show
Source: Flight International
