celtic League - failed MoD helicopter shopping trip led to 'gold standard cock - up'

"The protracted events began in 1995 when the MoD ordered the helicopters";
so said the reporter on Channel Four TV News this week commentating
on the curious tale of the RAF Chinook helicopters that have languished
in a hanger for 13 years - apparently unfit to fly.

However the saga started earlier than that, as we revealed in 1993,
when the Celtic League exposed in CARN magazine (the journal of the
League) the curious story of MoD officials trawling the helicopter
junkyards of the world in a desperate attempt to obtain medium and
heavy lift helicopters to support overstretched RAF and Army commitments
in Ireland.

We revealed the curious story of what we dubbed 'Britain's Bombay
Take-Away' in which MoD officials had tried to buy back disused Westland
WG 30 helicopters languishing on an airfield in India after being supplied
and paid for by the UK as overseas aid. On the same shopping trip,
we reported, the MoD officials visited Australia and tried to buy
seven Chinook helicopters - but the sale fell through.

It was only following this failure to buy used helicopters that they turned to Boeing with the order for the 'choppers' which are now the subject of what the UK media described as the "one of the most incompetent procurements of all time".

When we revealed this extraordinary saga almost fourteen years ago
the MoD said our allegations (reported briefly in some Ulster newspapers)
were "extraordinary". However four years later they did own-up to
the purchasing mission.

It seems this saga of incompetence which has bedevilled the MoD for
fifteen years still has some distance to run.

See related articles on Celtic News at:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/celtic_league/message/1430
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/celtic_league/message/595

See also older Celtic News archive at:

http://www.manxman.co.im/cleague/archive/helicopt.html

Related link:

http://republican-news.org/archive/1997/December18/18celt.html

J B Moffatt
Director of Information
Celtic League

06/06/08


The Celtic League has branches in the six Celtic Countries. It works
to promote cooperation between these countries and campaigns on a
broad range of political, cultural and environmental matters. It highlights
human rights abuse, monitors all military activity and focuses on
socio-economic issues.

TEL (UK)01624 877918 MOBILE (UK)07624 491609

Internet site at:

http://celticleague.net
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/celtic_league/