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Home | Update | LATEST ISSUE | Gallery | FR Profile | Datafiles | FR 1/98 NATO IS LOOKING FOR NEW OPTIONS TO JOINTSTARS by Karl Schwarz This time, even lobbying at the highest political level wasn't enough: On 6 November, at their routine fall conference, the NATO armaments directors rejected the American "fast track" offer to buy Northrop Grumman E-8C JointSTARS battlefield surveillance aircraft. The US government had suggested to set aside two of the aircraft from the production for its own Air Force and subsequently deliver them to NATO in 2001/2002. Parallel to this first procurement, an upgraded version for a further four aircraft was to be developed together with the European partners. This solution would have had the advantage that there were no costly production gaps in the E-8 production. This was also the main reason why the Americans had offered to take over the financing in the first years of the program. Still, such a generosity wasn't enough. While some smaller countries seriously considered a participation in the program, a major European investor, such as Germany, was missing. The German defence ministry commented that "there are currently no funds earmarked in the budget. Furthermore, the German defence ministry doesn't see a high urgency for such a system. France and Great Britain were no players in this project anyway due to their own national programs. Since the need for surface surveillance systems in the frame of NATO is fundamentally agreed on by all of the alliance's partners, in order to close gaps in the operative imaging surveillance capability, the so called Provisional Project Structure in Brussels will now again start an intensive search "for fresh concepts and procurement options in order to cover the entire ground surveillance capabilities of the alliance". A report is due to be completed until the next armaments directors conference in April of 1998. From today's point of view, it is difficult to assess which new options may arise in this short time frame, especially since the just approved NATO staff requirement is going to be kept as a basis. At least, it doesn't call for a specified number of aircraft, but rather describes the desired system performance. The new situation focuses attention to the British ASTOR program, for which Lockheed Martin and Raytheon are competing. Together with UK partners, they are offering solutions based on the large business jets Gulfstream V and Global Express respectively. ASTOR supposedly offers a better performance and is cheaper than the E-8. However, this can only be proven on paper so far. Although reportedly not being able to fulfill the British requirements, the Northrop Grumman mini-JointSTARS has become a player again just a few weeks ago. However, the configuration of the system is unclear. This gives room for a lot of speculation about the possible combinations of various system components, maybe resulting in a solution that would satisfy everybody. For the US government, it is important that parts of the costly developed JointSTARS will be integrated into the program. Northrop Grumman and Lockheed Martin can approach the issue somewhat more pragmatic since they will be one company soon anyway. Whichever system will fulfill the desired "minimum and essential core capabilities established by NATO", it will have to cope with the main problem. Especially for the German forces this is a continued and dramatic lack of funds. From page 57 of FLUG REVUE 1/98 Home | Update | LATEST ISSUE | Gallery | FR Profile | Datafiles | FR 1/98 Copyright 1997/98 by Motor-Presse Stuttgart. All rights reserved. Last updated December 5, 1997 FLUG REVUE, Ubierstr. 83, 53173 Bonn, Germany