How Australia‘s military does with less

[Jungle]

A_Berry, you must be in the Pilbara Regt. Very interesting use of Reserves, one I think we should look at here.
I communicate regularly, via e-mail, with a friend who is a Sgt in the Reg Aust Infantry (RAR). There is discussion of reducing the number of Inf Batts to four, including 4 RAR (CDO) which belongs SOCOMD. So we are not doing that bad with 9 Inf Batts, (6 x LAV and 3 x Light). The big difference is in capabilities: we have more units, they have more hardware (ie: TPT ships etc...) As stated in the article, I sailed on the Tobruk from Darwin to Suai, and I found it very impressive to have the ability to land troops and supplies anywhere even without a port.
So yes Infanteer: the old saying about the grass being greener certainly applies... especially in the winter !!!

 

[Jungle]

From memory, in Timor during the INTERFET mission, Aussie soldiers were earning $110(aust)a day in total allowances

Well, I stand corrected... here is what I found:

Allowances will be reduced from the current $125 per day,

This is from an Aussie forum. As you can see, our allowances are not that great... although I don‘t go on ops for the money, it‘s certainly nice when you come back with a few thousand $$$ to spare.

 

[A_Berry]

Just to set the record straight - the ADF has ordered 22 Tiger Attack Helicopters (thanks Kevin) with delivery starting next year.

 

[Aussie]

In the Australian Army at the moment we have six infantry battalions.

1RAR - Light Infantry
2RAR - Light Infantry
3RAR - Parachute
4RAR - Commando
5/7RAR - Mechanised
6RAR - Light Infantry

The move to cut it to four battalions was made bfore Timor and was scraped when the deployment came up, with the goverment announcing the the army would keep all six battalions.

Many higher ups in the army want an increse to eight or nine battalions, but I doubt it will happen.

It seems like you guys have more battalions, but ours are more mobile.

 

[northamericanrebel]

Hmmmm....vic bitter and fosters....that speaks for itself LOL

 

[RCD]

Well we are still waiting for our goverment to paid last year gas bills, are boats are being tied up.But they found some 119 million money for the Air Force with broken patch up planes for new green combat uniforms,& just this week our Forces wasted 100,000 dollars on a Cdn Forces logo that was rejected. On a personal note while in the forces in Calgary & Central Canada it was/is cheaper to buy a house than to lived in the PMQ,S No more subsidies.Just taxes & more taxes. and not to forget user fee‘s NO LIFE LIKE IT!

 

[Slim]

Were you with the LdSH(RC)? Sounds like you‘re talking about Harvey/Currie Barracks around 1990!

 

[patt]

yes i can agree with you PMQ‘s are the sh*ts and they are not worth the money that we pay to rent them

 

[GForce]

Perhaps they need to increase soldier‘s paychecks. After 20 seconds of thinking i‘ve come down to that.

 

[Thompson_JM]

Perhaps the politicians should try to promote more value into the CF and educate the citizens of canada about the very real need to maintain and promote an effective military. (we dont have to be big, just good) there seems to be a lack of concern in ottawa about the CF. and the lack of concern spreads out and all over the country. As one member so eliquently put it in another thread. "The same people who complain about how the CF gets too much money as it is, will be the first to whine when something happens and we need the CF and it cant respond"

somedays it feels like you just cant win..