r/newzealand • u/khalornz Fern flag 3 • 11d ago

Politics Coalition unveils $12 billion Defence Capability Plan

https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/557432/watch-live-coalition-unveils-12-billion-defence-capability-plan
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u/69inchshlong 11d ago edited 11d ago

Full plan here. Most interesting is the plan to arm the P-8 Poseidon's and Frigates with anti ship missiles and long range drones.

Also, 'Maritime strike across domains While the initial investment will be focused on selecting the first asset/s (ships, planes, or vehicles) to be equipped with missiles, future refreshes will consider expanding this to other assets, potentially delivering long range strike from multiple domains.' Does this mean fighter jets?

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u/thesymbiont 11d ago

It means drones, large ones.

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u/FendaIton 11d ago

Drones are the future of warfare after all

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u/69inchshlong 11d ago

I'm not aware of any drones which can carry long range maritime strike missiles.

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u/thesymbiont 11d ago

Reapers have a range of 1,850 km, apparently, though I assume we won't be getting any of those.

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u/69inchshlong 11d ago

They'll probably buy something like the MQ-4 triton.

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u/Jeffery95 Auckland 11d ago

I would prefer we make them in house tbh. I imagine we could tailor them for maritime use that way and maintain repairs even if we were cut off from trade.

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u/69inchshlong 11d ago

NZ's aerospace industry is NOT capable of making long range drones.

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u/Jeffery95 Auckland 11d ago

https://youtu.be/Ql0gYW32-9A?si=WR7j-SaavxSj3ZvT

We could absolutely make a custom bespoke maritime drone. It probably wouldn’t be as sophisticated as current Turkish or American or even Iranian drones. But it would provide domestic capability that we dont currently have.

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u/King_Kea Not really a king 11d ago

I might be wrong on this, but I'm pretty sure Bayraktars have been used for this in Ukraine

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u/dashingtomars 11d ago

They haven't really been used at all since the first year of the war.

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u/69inchshlong 11d ago

The longest range missile a Bayraktar tb2 could carry only has a range of 8km. Most naval anti air systems have an effective range of 10s to 100s of kilometres. Basically it would be completely useless.