Sweden becomes first EU-nation to procure Blackhawks as a stopgap measure while waiting for the constantly failing NH90 (Eurocopter).

[Adar]

The NHI NH90 is a medium sized, twin-engine, multi-role military helicopter manufactured by NHIndustries. The production has suffered constant set backs and initial tests from the German and Australian militaries suggest that it is unable to effectively fulfill it's multi-role function while carrying soldiers (about Germany here and Australia here).

The Swedish government placed it's order for the helicopter in 2001 despite the Swedish military preferring the already proven Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk. This was overruled by the government since the NH90 would be a strategic consortium between several EU nations (export production planned in France, Italy and Germany but also local production in Finland and Australia). Developing a multi-role helicopter was also expected to bring cost savings as dedicated search and rescue helicopters, anti submarine warfare and MEDEVAC helicopters wouldn't be necessary with a multi-role helicopter.

So far the project has been disastrous and the estimated delay for the Swedish helicopters is expected to be 10 years which means that the helicopter won't be operationally available until 2017. The Government has therefore decided to procure 15 Blackhawk helicopters from Sikorsky while waiting for the NH90.

Personally I find this decision silly since the Blackhawk is more than capable of fulfilling the expected capabilities of the NH90. The reasonable thing for our government to do would be to break the contract due to the delays and put any political blame on the Social Democrats (who ordered the helicopter). Sadly it looks like some kind of political pride means that we are going to replace the most proven helicopter in the world with an overpriced piece of crap which got a limited carrying capacity, is unable to mount a machine gun for self protection and got issues with a floor that can be damaged by dirty boots.

To me it also looks like an excellent example of how things tend to go haywire when you create international consortiums to conduct advanced development projects. Political considerations means that production is placed where the politics want it rather than where the best infrastructure is located. And the political prestige also means that there is little pressure on the participating companies to produce something cost efficient of high quality. It's just easier to produce a piece of crap which the politicians already have promised to pay for regardless of cost.


The article about the procurement:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Sweden Becomes 1st European Nation to Procure UH-60M Helicopters
Taken from
(Source: Sikorsky Aircraft Corp.; issued May 18, 2011)
STRATFORD, Conn. --- Sikorsky Aircraft Corp. today announced that the U.S. Government has agreed to sell 15 Sikorsky UH-60M Black Hawk helicopters to the Swedish Defence Materiel Administration (or FMV, which is the Swedish acronym) for operation by the Swedish Armed forces.

The transaction will take place under the U.S. Government's Foreign Military Sales program, and represents the introduction of the latest and most technologically advanced Black Hawk model into Europe. Sikorsky is a subsidiary of United Technologies Corp.

The Swedish Armed Forces will use the aircraft for medical evacuation, utility, and search and rescue missions. Sikorsky is slated to deliver six of the helicopters in 2011 and the remaining nine in 2012 under an accelerated production schedule.

Sweden is a member of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan.

"We're honored to support the Swedish Armed Forces, and we congratulate them for being the first European Union nation to choose this highly evolved UH-60M aircraft, which is part of a lineage of aircraft that have proven themselves countless times under the most extreme conditions all over the world," said Mick Maurer, President of Sikorsky Military Systems.

The UH-60M helicopter is the latest version in the long and highly successful BLACK HAWK family. It is flown by the U.S. Army and provides additional payload and range, advanced digital avionics, improved handling qualities and situational awareness, active vibration control, and improved survivability compared with the predecessor UH-60L model.

The Black Hawk helicopter is well known for its ruggedness, survivability and mission flexibility, having logged more than 9 million flight hours since the first model was introduced in 1978. Worldwide, approximately 3,000 are in operation today. Sweden will become the 26th nation to operate Black Hawk helicopters and only the second in Europe, where Austria operates UH-60L models. U.S. forces have flown various Black Hawk models for 1.2 million flight hours to date in Afghanistan and Iraq without a single material failure.


Sikorsky Aircraft Corp., based in Stratford, Conn., is a world leader in helicopter design, manufacture and service. United Technologies Corp., based in Hartford, Conn., provides a broad range of high technology products and support services to the aerospace and building systems industries.

[Farnan]

The UH-60 is a good multi-role helicopter, a good choice for Sweden.

It also has the advantage of being the primary utility helicopter of the US, making spare parts relatively cheap.

[MathiasOfAthens]

Thanks guys... US is in bit of a money problem so we need more Europeans to step up and by our weapons.

[Rolling Thunder]

Or you could have bought the Westland Lynx. It's not like utility helicopters are in short supply.

[Azog 150]

Or you could have bought the Westland Lynx. It's not like utility helicopters are in short supply.

I thought the Lynx was seen in lacking the firepower of attack helicopters and lacking the transport capabilities (I believe it can only carry 4) on more dedicated transport helicopters, and that it has widely been seen as a bit of a procurement up?

Jack of all trades and a master of none.

I understand it is good in the naval role though

[justicar5]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mil_Mi-24

Hind, I mean come on, it's cheap and badass, what more do you want? :p

[Farnan]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mil_Mi-24

Hind, I mean come on, it's cheap and badass, what more do you want? :p

Two things:

Sweden is unofficialy aligned with the US, buying Blackhawks improves their relations with the US.

The UH-60 is widely used and flown by the US, thus spare parts would be cheaper. There is also interoperability of parts with the US military.

Plus it can only carry 8 compared to the 14 carried by the Black Hawk

[Adar]

Two things:

Sweden is unofficialy aligned with the US, buying Blackhawks improves their relations with the US.

Improving the relations with USA is probably a minimal factor. USA doesn't care enough about such a small sale and Sweden already got good relations with USA. The only political factor I can see in this is that the Swedish military is completely NATO standardized (we trashed the superior link 16 to ensure interoperability with NATO aircrafts through datalink) which means that any non-NATO helicopters would be unable to compete.

I think this is a pure quality question and the Blackhawk is the most cost efficient solution on the market if you want to fly with a medium-heavy load in a combat zone.

[SPECTREtm]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mil_Mi-24

Hind, I mean come on, it's cheap and badass, what more do you want? :p

Something that isn't caveman technology?...


Anyway, good choice Sweden! I would have loved if our countries could have made the purchase together as I've heard rumours about the danish navy wanting to buy Blackhawks too for some time as our old SR-61 aren't going to live forever, and the few Lynx we have are just... meh...

I also wonder why our air force bought the AW-101s...

[justicar5]

Something that isn't caveman technology?...

who cares how old it is as long as it works? And given the updates and new models that age is slightly misleading anyway.

[Pyrich]

Any new system is full of bugs and blood is often the price for a fix to be made. Buy more Blackhawks imo, they've already bleed many of the bugs out

And we need the money

[saglam2000]

The Lynx is faster and smaller, the UH-60 carries more weight (1600lb for lynx vs 2600 for UH-60) and troops (10 for lynx and 14 for UH-60) so i personally think Sweden made a good choice based on what they want to use the helicopters for (search/rescue and evac)

[Menelik_I]

The Eurocopter is a political project, the crapy rotorcraft is a just a by-product, good for sweeden to get the Blackhwaks.

Maybe we are saying it is a ''backup'' just to not alarm the EUdiots in Bruxelles and escape political pressure, once they got the goods they can say you to Brussels in all peace of mind

[Manuel I Komnenos]

American stuff: tested and works

[Kanaric]

The Chinese uses Blackhawks as well, bought from Sikorsky instead of the US. Its really the ultimate utility helicopter is high quality and everyone knows this, i dont see why more nations are buying it. Rescue, military, personal transport, etc.

[Azog 150]

The Chinese uses Blackhawks as well, bought from Sikorsky instead of the US. Its really the ultimate utility helicopter is high quality and everyone knows this, i dont see why more nations are buying it. Rescue, military, personal transport, etc.

I can tell you why Britain didn't buy it (And its mind-numbingly stupid). We were planning on purchasing Blackhawks (and they would have come in very handy in Afghanistan, where for a good few years our troops suffered from a severe lack of helicopters). However, the Blackhawks would have gone to the Army Air Corps, which the Navy's Fleet Air Arm didn't like.

As a result, in order to satisfy the navy, we purchased the inadequate (For Army needs) and more expensive Lynx (Which was also delayed and came with a host of technical problems that needed to be ironed out), which has very little use in countries like Afghanistan, simply so the Fleet Air Arm could have some shiny new helicopters. Now the Army has 120 Lynx's which are all but useless to them, just so the Navy could get their 80 Lynx's, and 62 more 'Future Lynxs' are due to arrive in 2014 (With a several billion price tag), when we could have got 60 Blackhawks off the shelf and into service by 2007 for less money

There was also the fact that the Army was forced to go for expensive Puma refits instead of purchasing the Blackhawks (Which would actually have turned out cheaper, and lasted longer then the Puma refits) just because the MOD wanted to 'buy British' (And this is a serious problem with our procurement system in general)

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/ju...wk-helicopters

[Søren]

Fleet Air Arm

R.I.P.

[leeho730]

The reason behind is very simple: to reduce dependency on US in terms of military development. There are other examples, such as Eurofighter Typhoon, which have been successful, and comparable to F-22 (http://www.eads.com/eads/int/en.html). Even United States Air Force Chief of Staff General John P. Jumper praised the aircraft (http://web.archive.org/web/200705061...ter_facts.html), and considering he is one of the few pilots to fly both F-22 and Eurofighter, it means something.

It's true that development and production costs are usually several times that of outright purchase prices, but development and production of indigenous war machines can be beneficial long-term: war machines make money! In addition, instead of relying on foreign power for military needs, the nation can gain independence in regards to military technology. For example, Japan decided to develop enhancement toF-15J through Mitsubishi, reducing reliance on US. This can also force US for more favourable terms on the bargain table.

Although this helicopter project has been disastrous, and black hawk is one fine helicopter, there are other examples where development and production of indigenous weapon systems have been successful. The governments are not stupid; they believe spending money to make more political and military independence is worth it, like US citizens during their American Independece war which showed the world that independence and freedom is worth the human costs.

Does that mean US weapon is bad? Nope, US weapons and war machines are the some of the finest, if not the finest, in the world. But being able to buy comparable, quality non-US product means a nation, as a customer, can bargain more when dealing with US. Cheaper prices, better diplomatic terms, sharing military technologies etc.

Competition is good for customers!

[Adar]

The reason behind is very simple: to reduce dependency on US in terms of military development. There are other examples, such as Eurofighter Typhoon, which have been successful, and comparable to F-22 (http://www.eads.com/eads/int/en.html). Even United States Air Force Chief of Staff General John P. Jumper praised the aircraft (http://web.archive.org/web/200705061...ter_facts.html), and considering he is one of the few pilots to fly both F-22 and Eurofighter, it means something.

The Eurofighter is great as long as two things are fulfilled:

1) European nations fight a nation which is so powerful that we need something better than Jaguars but still not powerful to kick our asses.

2) USA is wrong in their one sided focus on low visibility against conventional radars.

And I strongly doubt point nr 1...

Although this helicopter project has been disastrous, and black hawk is one fine helicopter, there are other examples where development and production of indigenous weapon systems have been successful. The governments are not stupid; they believe spending money to make more political and military independence is worth it, like US citizens during their American Independece war which showed the world that independence and freedom is worth the human costs.

There is a huge difference between indigenous weapons and international consortia. Weapon systems like Gripen, CV90, Leopard 2, Challengers, Pumas and Type 212 submarines are all great examples of where indigenous weapon systems are highly advanced and advancing both civilian and military technology.

The problem with international consortias is that all the participators want to milk as much money and technology as possible out of their own area of responsibility. This mean that the final weapon system is likely to end up an overcosted and overcomplicated piece of crap that only is bought due to political prestige.

[leeho730]

The problem with international consortias is that all the participators want to milk as much money and technology as possible out of their own area of responsibility. This mean that the final weapon system is likely to end up an overcosted and overcomplicated piece of crap that only is bought due to political prestige.

Nope. Saudi woudln't have bought 72 euro fighters just for the political prestige. It's more than US$100 million EACH. A nation does not spend US$7.2 billion just for the sake of buying it. Singapore is considering purchase as well. One good advantage of international consortim is that the purchasers have greater share of military technologies upon purchase. It's perfectly understandable that US would not want to share sensitive military technologies such as stealth system, but US is more restricted in that. Otherwise why would Japanese consider upgrading radar systems of F-15j indigenously through Mitsubishi? Toyota is also considering developing upgrades for F-15j, although there is a chance that they're using this to actually leverage more military technology from US.