The British administration is to purchase for the RAF another Boeing C-17 strategic transport aircraft (pictured above), bringing the total to eight – two less than the Indian Air Force fleet.

This £200 million purchase is reported in The Independent, having been announced by no lesser a personage than The Boy himself at PMQs. Such grand issues of state, such as the purchase of one transport aircraft, cannot it seems, be left to the defence secretary.

The announcement came after a challenge over today's Defence Select Committee report which warned that Britain could struggle to mount an operation on the scale of the Libya mission in the future.

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Oh, what, do you mean somewhere like Syria and then possibly Iran.

http://www.debka.com/article/21718/

Still, there's always the Argies and their South American allies.

http://www.politicalhook.co.uk/uk-to-be ... to-the-un/

I think they still miss the decommissioned aircraft carrier.
Talking about sane policies...

Could this make it to Port Stanley without silly piggy-back refuelling?

They've got to do. It was needed for Libya (not that we should have been there), it might be needed be down the Falkland Is, if nothing else, just as a warning. It might be useful for Syria (not that we should be there either), although I suspect that Cyprus should cover that.

Unrefueled range on the original C-17 is 2400 nm, and on the later versions 2800:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_C-1 ... master_III

This is neither a political nor a religious topic, so Wikipedia is a reasonably reliable source.

Now, now - let's not bash the A-400M too badly. SOMEBODY has to keep the frogs employed. After all, "PFIIGS" just doesn't quite have the same ring to it...

Don't forget the Airbus Voyager Transport Tanker that the RAF ordered without self refuelling capability, ie probe & drogue but no boom. So that's the C-17 and Rivet Joint that can't be air refuelled as well.

Arse meet Elbow.

Question: Are the wing structures of the Airbus M-400 and the Airbus 380 similar? Recent news was that Quantas found cracks in wing components in an A380 and now Airbus has been ordered to check all its A380s for similar cracks. At the very least, the production rate of the M-400 will not be helped by this.

The Dagos build this thing, not the Kermits.

The Frogs build the centre wingbox and the outer panels are built at Filton then everything is flown by A300 Beluga to Getafe in Spain. Why not militarise the Beluga?

I don't think you REALLY want to know how much THAT would cost...
}:-]

Payload capability and range are rather limited as well:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airbus_Beluga

That would be fun.

Proof that nothing is new in aviation. Airbus offered one or two for the RAF's STSA competition won by the C-17. There's a plan to belugarise the A-340!

RAF Brize Norton is in the Boy's constituency, so it is hardly surprising that the vapid ponce could not resist a bit of grandstanding at PMQs. PR is, after all, the only job he ever did.