Australia must apply hard-learned project management lessons if its white paper is to pay off
Peter La Franchi/CANBERRA
Launching a contract signing ceremony for the Royal Australian Air Force's A$3 billion ($1.68 billion) Project Wedgetail Airborne Early Warning & Control project on 20 December, the then Australian Defence Minister John Moore was taking a reflective view. Wedgetail, he said, "has had a long career-I can certainly remember AEW&C being part of Coalition [Government] policy for a number of years.
"I certainly recall it being part of the 1987 [Defence] white paper, the 1994 white paper, and I can remember it being in our policy for the 1996 [Federal] elections. Here we are in December 2000, delivering on the contract."
Moore, who two days earlier announced his resignation from the Australian Parliament, had overseen a tumultuous period in Australian defence acquisition history. It included a year-long freeze during 2000 on new contracts and project starts, including Wedgetail.
The minister's two years in office also saw one of the nation's largest defence acquisition scandals erupt - the revelation of major software problems on the Royal Australian Navy's Collins Class submarine project, requiring nearly A$1billion extra investment to resolve.
Australia, Moore noted, had learned hard lessons on the submarine programme and these would be freely applied on Project Wedgetail. But once the aircraft entered service, the retiring Minister stressed, Australia would be well positioned to "participate-in the campaigns of the future in a far more sophisticated way" than current capabilities allow.
Wedgetail forms a key element in the evolving Australian Air Defence surveillance architecture for providing 24h monitoring of the continent nation's northern approaches. The project represents the only major new aerospace surveillance sensor acquisition by Australia for at least the next five to seven years. It also fills a major hole in the existing layered aerospace sensor strata between the 12,000km (6,500nm) range Jindalee Operational Radar Network (JORN), new TPS-43 tactical air defence surveillance radars being acquired from Lockheed Martin, and a new defence air traffic control system (or ADATS) being developed by Raytheon Systems.
The architecture is further populated by RAAF's Lockheed Martin P-3C Orion surveillance force, existing warship radars, new Raytheon APG-73 radars being fitted to RAAF Boeing F/A-18 Hornets, the Australian Army's SHORAD air defence systems and, within two years, an initial Australian-owned and operated ground station capability for the US Space Based Infra-Red Surveillance System.
The big picture
Beyond 2007, the architecture is to incorporate a new medium range surface-to-air missile (SAM) system, and a mature wholly-Australian controlled SBIRS ground station capability. Between 2010-2015, Australian Government capability projections include new front line fighters, phased array long-range warship surveillance radars, ship-launched Raytheon SM-2 or SM-3 SAMs, new or upgraded manned maritime patrol aircraft and, possibly, the Global Hawk endurance unmanned air vehicle.
Underlying the architecture are plans for a significantly enhanced national integrated air command system. This will link both strategic and tactical level surveillance assets into two initial blocks known as Northroc, operating from RAAF Base Tindal in Australia's Northern Territory, and Eastroc, located at RAAF Base Williamtown, 180km above Sydney on the Eastern seaboard. Each block is to be built around existing RAAF command reporting units with a new command and control architecture to be developed by 2005-06 by Boeing under a long-delayed project known as Air 5333. The Air 5333 contract is expected to be signed later this year, three years after Boeing was selected to develop the system.
Above the Northroc-Eastroc co-ordination and control axis, the surveillance architecture is being progressively integrated into the Austr-alian Defence Force's Joint Command and Control System. This should be completed in 2003, or some two years ahead of Air 5333.
In the interim, however, RAAF and Australian Defence Force planners are now seeking to "fill the gaps" in the system, which includes enhancement of strategic level communications using a combination of satellite and terrestrial linkages, and the development of an ADF-wide Link 16 capability.
The new Australian defence white paper released 6 December flags plans to "improve our ability to fuse data from JORN and other sensor systems to provide an integrated national surveillance picture." The paper also endorses "a sustained program of enhancement to the JORN over the horizon radar once it enters service in 2002."
Dollar and sensors
The sheer cost of Wedgetail within the Australian defence budget context means it will dominate all RAAF expenditure plans well into the coming decade. Australian defence analysts predict the project stands to force a major contraction of funding for other aerospace projects out to at least 2005-08. Australian analysts also argue that any cost-blow outs or delays in the Wedgetail programme would completely derail the RAAF's future investment planning, with this including the proposed Air 6000 new fighter project and any revised attempt to acquire a new light tactical airlifter by 2010.
Added to this is an already apparent hole in the 6 December white paper funding projections. The paper allocates a total of A$5.3 billion to new air combat capability development out to 2011, with Wedgetail accounting for A$3billion. Planning for the purchase of five new in-flight refuelling tankers is expected to need another A$1 billion, while upgrading the RAAF F/A-18 fleet, including a centre-barrel fuselage replacement, is expected to account for a further billion. All three projects are required to have capability delivered in full between 2005-2007, with sufficient residual required in the block allocation to fund the first three years of the new fighter programme prior to 2011.
Previous funding estimates released by the Australian Government suggest the new front line aircraft project could cost as much as A$20 billion. The white paper's fine print says that overall Australian Defence Force funding will continue to be pressured "by the need to make provision for the replacement of the F/A-18 fleet. Although the F/A-18 will still be in service for another 15 years, significant funding for its replacement will need to be provided from about 2007".
Wedgetail has already cost the RAAF its planned Air Combat Manoeuvre Instrumentation Range, a $140 million contract for which was to have been signed with Cubic in December. Instead, the funds were diverted into Wedgetail. The RAAF now hopes to launch a new range competition in the 2004-05.
Finalisation of the Wedgetail contract comes in the wake of a difficult and ongoing series of Australian aerospace surveillance projects. These include JORN and the still-troubled Sea Sentinel P-3 upgrade, with software development a key problem in both programs.
JORN has been progressively coming on line for the past 18 months with a fully functioning system now expected in the first half of next year at a final cost around A$1.7 billion. The development contract was originally awarded a Telstra team in June 1991. At that time, the project was forecast to cost A$685.5 million. The prime contractor since the end of 1999 has been RLM Systems, a Tenix Defence Systems and Lockheed Martin joint venture.
Quiet arrival
The RAAF's prototype AP-3C quietly arrived in Australia from the United States in late December to undergo an extensive test and evaluation programme during the first half of this year. The aircraft will be displayed for the first time during February's Australian Airshow.
As the lead aircraft in the programme, its arrival in Australia represents a project slip of three years on original planning that called for 17 aircraft to be upgraded and returned to service by this year. Prime contractor Raytheon has been paying unspecified value liquidated damages to the Australian Government for at least the past two years.
At the 20 December signing ceremony, the head of the Australian Defence Material Organisation, Michael Roche, said that risk management lessons from earlier projects would play a key role in ensuring Wedgetail delivers successfully.
The development programme, Roche said, remained "conservative" with the lead aircraft being delivered in 2006 and entering full operational service in 2007. "We have put enormous amount of effort into this project already. There has been earlier definition studies, there has been a lot of testing done - not just on software. There has been over 1500h of windtunnel testing on this aircraft with the radome mounted. In relation to software, a good proportion of it already exists and will be reused. I think something like three-quarters of the total software lines of code exist.
"We have put a significant amount of money and effort into developing risk mitigation strategies. We have independent verification of the software development as it occurs. We have a number of milestones which have to be achieved. There are some 20 critical milestones on this project, 14 of which occur before the first aircraft is delivered. Each of those will enable us to check the progress on the software."
A key submarine project lesson, Roche said, would also be to agree to ensure the agreed AEW&C specification remained stable, "letting Boeing get on with their work. There will not be changes in our requirements after this contract is signed. It is important to let them get on with the job."
Mr Roche also stresses that Boeing and its primary teaming partner Northrop Grumman have "between them delivered probably 90% of the world's AEW&C [aircraft] to date, so there is a very significant domain experience in those two companies. That, put together, gives us a considerable level of confidence that the software will work."
Source: Flight International
