OTTAWA - Canada is in the final stages of high-level talks with the United States to acquire six battlefield helicopters for operations in Afghanistan, says Defence Minister Peter MacKay.
"We're not quite there yet, but I'm confident we'll have something very soon,'' MacKay said in an interview with The Canadian Press.
Supplying air transport to get soldiers off the bomb-strewn highways of Kandahar was one of the major conditions set down by the Manley panel for Canada's continued military involvement in the war-torn country.
The independent panel set a deadline of February 2009 to have the helicopters, which could be used for troop movements and resupply mission, in place.
In his first detailed interview about the scramble to provide helicopters, MacKay said the Defence Department has been pursuing three options -- all of them involving variants of the Boeing CH-47 Chinook heavy-lift aircraft.
The first option, and the one MacKay suggested is the most likely to succeed, involves convincing the U.S. Army to let Canada's air force slip ahead in the production line.
The main drawback to that proposal is the air force would likely not get the specific model of helicopter -- a CH-47-F -- that it had requested almost two years ago.
"I think we're going to get tails earmarked for the American army, but they may not be the exact specs of the ones we had originally envisioned and that's where we're into a bit of a negotiating stage,'' MacKay said.
He says the other options include:
- acquiring older, refurbished Chinooks under a U.S. army program and leasing those helicopters until an existing Canadian order is filled, in much the same way Leopard 2 A6 tanks were borrowed from the Germans.
- leasing helicopters from another country.
NATO has been examining a program whereby countries fighting in Afghanistan pay for the use of helicopters from countries that don't have major troop commitments.
The Conservative government announced in June 2006 that it intended to spend $4.7 billion for 16 heavy-lift battlefield helicopters and 20 years of maintenance support.
The program has been stalled, partly because the air force asked Boeing last year for design changes to make the Canadian Chinooks more versatile and give them longer range.
National Defence has yet to sign a contract with the U.S, aircraft giant and delivery of the first helicopter -- under the original plan -- isn't expected until 2011.
The delay has been great source of frustration to the army, which quietly implored the Manley panel to make helicopters an urgent priority in its final report, which was released in early January.
The Manley report also mandated the purchase of advanced unmanned surveillance aircraft.
Cabinet last spring killed a proposal to buy as many as 12 U.S. Predator drones because of concern over sole-source contracts.
The Defence Department recently put out a tender to lease a mid-level drone that can fly for 12 hours "to gather and transmit high-quality imagery at a distance of 100 kilometres from Kandahar, Afghanistan.''
Even though it's a step down from the Predator, MacKay says he's confident Project Noctua -- as the air force is calling it -- will fulfil the requirements set out by the independent commission.
