We've made it to the last day of the Circuit Breaker (CB) period in Singapore! The past few months of the CB was aimed at keeping people in the city-state at home in order to break the chain of transmissions of Covid-19 in the community.
We hope the series of Circuit Breaker pictures and stories have kept you entertained during this period.
Our last instalment gives you a look at what happens to retired Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) platforms. Admittedly, not pretty. But just as new acquisitions excite us, the retirement and decommissioning of old platforms represents the last phase and a fact of life for Singapore's Life Cycle Management approach to defence acquisitions.
Unlike some defence forces, the SAF does not have a tradition of keeping decommissioned platforms in running condition. Perhaps as our armed forces evolves, it may be worth rethinking this policy. There are sufficient numbers of skilled and interested private citizens in Singapore who can contribute the time and expertise to keep old war machines in running condition, just as enthusiasts have been able to keep warbirds and old war machines going decades after they were retired.
Gone but never forgotten.
Oh I always wondered why the A-4S never went on the old warbird market. The latter models would still have a lot of appeal to American defense contractors like Draken International, who fly ex-Kiwi A-4K and find their radars useful for adversary training.
ReplyDeleteHi David, thank you very much for sharing these photos through the CB period.
ReplyDeleteReally enjoyed them and quite a few brought back memories.
Thanks again and stay safe!
I have seen those Skyhawk fuselages stacked up in a Jurong scrapyard in 2000. Could be the same scrapyard you photographed. It's a pity they and the Tiger IIs with their modernised systems were not sold to American adversary contractors for continued flying.
ReplyDeleteDavid, thanks for entertaining us over the last 2 months! Really appreciate it!
ReplyDeleteHi David,
ReplyDeleteMany thanks for the 56 days of CircuitBreaker Photos.
Am sure you have more photos / stories to share!
Our Skyhawks were progressively retired in the late 90s till 2000s.
ReplyDeleteThe earliest American adversary training companies were started only in the mid 2000s and only in recent decade did the USAF started to outsource DACT training to these companies. So the timing was not right to start with.
Secondly, I suspect our Skyhawks would not interest these companies much because they were largely configured as strike assets, unlike to the RNZAF's A4s, which were more multi-role with their APG-66 radars.
Served onboard RSS Intrepid (L203) before.
ReplyDelete