THE HOWARD government has wasted $6.6 billion on a lemon-the Super Hornet fighter jet-as part of its recent budget. According to Peter Criss, former Air Commander of Australia, "I have trouble with the word 'super' and 'hornet'. Perhaps I would call it super-dog or super-bug, but certainly not a Super Hornet."A recent report to the US Senate Armed Services Committee states that "testing [of the Super Hornet] has identified a number of deficiencies, perhaps 100 items of which about 25 to 30 are appropriately considered major deficiencies."

So why is the government throwing billions at second-rate hardware? At the heart of this issue is a debate about the role of the US alliance.

The US is developing a new generation of fighter jets-the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter-in partnership with Europe and Israel. The $US40 billion development is led by American corporate giant Lockheed Martin.

The US government has already placed a $US200 billion order for 2400 F-35s. It is encouraging its allies to place orders in order to increase "inter-operability" between global military networks. Australia has, for example, placed its own $16 billion order.

According to one supporter of the deal, retired Air Vice Marshall Brian Weston, this would "best allow Australian industry to exploit the industrial and technological opportunities offered by the largest military aircraft and procurement contract of all time."

But many figures within the military establishment have reacted with outrage. They argue that Australia cannot rely on the US to protect its regional "air superiority". According to air force specialists Peter Goon and Dr Carlo Kopp, the "United States is confronting serious 'strategic overstretch', and faces budgetary problems which will impact on its long-term modernisation plans and available force size."

They point to the US crisis in "Iraq, Afghanistan, Africa and other theatres in the Global War on Terror draining resources."

Therefore, "the United States may have serious difficulty in responding quickly to Australia's needs, with the required force strength. Therefore, Australia needs to plan to perform independent operations in the region, especially when confronting regional air power.

"The notion that regional contingencies geographically outside South East Asia would only be dealt with as part of a US-led coalition is neither realistic nor supportable.

"Should Australia fail to develop [the required] capabilities, it would most likely not achieve air superiority in a regional conflict, with concomitant losses in ADF equipment and personnel, and subsequently, significant material losses to economic infrastructure, especially in the mining and energy industries."

They argue that Australia has radically different military needs to the US and its European and Israeli allies. For example, they say Australia needs the capacity to fly and re-fuel over vast distances in order to destroy "enemy" aircraft "on the ground".

Essentially, they are arguing that the acquisition of F-35s is about keeping American corporate and political interests onside, rather than acquiring the best available hardware.

This debate is about how Australia can best dominate the region in the context of declining US hegemony and the rise of China. Goon and Kopp are not opposed to the US alliance: "This [plan] does not preclude maintaining a close relationship with the United States" because it "provides Australia the option of offering high capability category assets for future coalition operations with the United States".

But they are correct to point out that the US is not obliged to protect Australian capitalism in wartime. They make a mockery of John Howard and Kevin Rudd's shared assumption that we need the US alliance to "protect" Australia.

What makes this worse is that the F-35 is not even battle-ready-the first test flights occurred only five months ago. That's why the government wants to replace Australia's ageing F-111 fleet with the Super-Hornet as an "interim solution".

By Tom Barnes