Jaryd stock
4th September 2012, 12:45 PM
THE US military has been launching spy drones from the Edinburgh air force base near Adelaide for several years, it has emerged.
The use of the suburban base for US spy drone operations from 2001 to at least 2006 was discovered by a group of amateur aviation buffs, who monitored at least 10 take-offs or landings of the giant $200 million Global Hawk unmanned aerial vehicles.
Australian Strategic Policy Institute senior analyst Andrew Davies said he was puzzled as to why the US Department of Defence was using an Australian military base for Global Hawk operations.
"These things stay airborne for a very long time," Mr Davies, a former Defence intelligence analyst, said. "It begs the question of why weren't they flying from an American base in either Guam, if they were interested in the western Pacific, or Diego Garcia, if they were interested in the Indian Ocean."
Mr Davies said the Global Hawks, which were the largest and most expensive drones ever built, acted as low-level satellites and currently lacked the capability to monitor ship movements in disputed areas such as the South China Sea.
"At various times around the world people who the US has been trying to keep tabs on have known when the satellites are going to be moving overhead, and have simply stopped moving at that point," Mr Davies said.
"What a Global Hawk does is give you a fairly persistent ability to fill in those gaps."
Defence has confirmed to the ABC's Foreign Correspondent program that the Global Hawks have used the Edinburgh base for "replenishment purposes".
However, Defence did not respond to detailed questions from The Australian yesterday.
While the operation of the aircraft in Australia has been kept under wraps since an initial demonstration flight in 2001, the West Beach Aviation Group in Adelaide had photographed take-offs and landings, as well as listening in to radio chatter.
Group vice-president Paul Daw said the aircraft usually took off and landed at night-time.
"If ever we saw an American transport (plane), usually a C-141 Starlifter, come in and unload a couple of shipping containers, we guessed that it was unloading the command and control base for the Global Hawk," he said yesterday.
Mr Daw said one of the group members would listen to radio scanners for about 20 hours a day, and called other members when he thought a drone would make a landing.
"Because of the type of call-sign and flight path used by the pilot, we knew it was Global Hawk coming in," he said.
Mr Daw said he did not expect to find out what missions were carried out by the aircraft after they left Australia.
Australian National University military and security expert John Blaxland, a 30-year army veteran, said the US Department of Defence might have used Australian airspace and landing on RAAF bases as a marketing ploy.
"The Americans have been trying to get us to buy them, so they've had good reasons to bring them out here and market them to us," Dr Blaxland said. "Who knows exactly was going on there, but there is definitely a commercial dimension to the issue."
The use of the suburban base for US spy drone operations from 2001 to at least 2006 was discovered by a group of amateur aviation buffs, who monitored at least 10 take-offs or landings of the giant $200 million Global Hawk unmanned aerial vehicles.
Australian Strategic Policy Institute senior analyst Andrew Davies said he was puzzled as to why the US Department of Defence was using an Australian military base for Global Hawk operations.
"These things stay airborne for a very long time," Mr Davies, a former Defence intelligence analyst, said. "It begs the question of why weren't they flying from an American base in either Guam, if they were interested in the western Pacific, or Diego Garcia, if they were interested in the Indian Ocean."
Mr Davies said the Global Hawks, which were the largest and most expensive drones ever built, acted as low-level satellites and currently lacked the capability to monitor ship movements in disputed areas such as the South China Sea.
"At various times around the world people who the US has been trying to keep tabs on have known when the satellites are going to be moving overhead, and have simply stopped moving at that point," Mr Davies said.
"What a Global Hawk does is give you a fairly persistent ability to fill in those gaps."
Defence has confirmed to the ABC's Foreign Correspondent program that the Global Hawks have used the Edinburgh base for "replenishment purposes".
However, Defence did not respond to detailed questions from The Australian yesterday.
While the operation of the aircraft in Australia has been kept under wraps since an initial demonstration flight in 2001, the West Beach Aviation Group in Adelaide had photographed take-offs and landings, as well as listening in to radio chatter.
Group vice-president Paul Daw said the aircraft usually took off and landed at night-time.
"If ever we saw an American transport (plane), usually a C-141 Starlifter, come in and unload a couple of shipping containers, we guessed that it was unloading the command and control base for the Global Hawk," he said yesterday.
Mr Daw said one of the group members would listen to radio scanners for about 20 hours a day, and called other members when he thought a drone would make a landing.
"Because of the type of call-sign and flight path used by the pilot, we knew it was Global Hawk coming in," he said.
Mr Daw said he did not expect to find out what missions were carried out by the aircraft after they left Australia.
Australian National University military and security expert John Blaxland, a 30-year army veteran, said the US Department of Defence might have used Australian airspace and landing on RAAF bases as a marketing ploy.
"The Americans have been trying to get us to buy them, so they've had good reasons to bring them out here and market them to us," Dr Blaxland said. "Who knows exactly was going on there, but there is definitely a commercial dimension to the issue."