Latin American Military - Chile - Fuerza Aérea de Chile (FACh)

Revised: February 1, 1999
Copyright © 1997-1999 by Juan Carlos Barroux R.

The Air Force was initially modeled after the Royal Air Force but then was heavily influenced by the US Air Force after WWII. Today most of the influence is from the IDF with some local additions. They have old equipment that is kept in good work order and upgraded with new electronics when the budget allows.

Today's FACh is a well balanced force with a good mix of support and combat elements. Focus on an integrated air defense system with large ground based C3I facilities well coordinated with airborne radar and ELINT platforms is the backbone of this air force. The example from Israel, where such a flexible tool is the only way to manage a large air battle in a geography without any depth, has been well understood and followed in Chile.

During the years of the embargo, when the FACh not only could not buy new aircrafts but had serious difficulties maintaining the ones they had flying, one of the lessons learned was the importance of the "force multipliers". This can bee seen today in the emphasis given to ESM, ECM and ECCM, for example. Other areas of particular importance are in-flight refueling, realistic training, mission preparation and joint forces exercises.

Another area of success for the FACh has been its ability to get the industry, specially ENAER and Cardoen, to locally manufacture supplies and ammunitions. For example, now the FACh can make use of a large array of locally manufacturer cluster bombs, FAE (Fuel Air Explosives) bombs and LGBs. Local manufacturing of aircrafts is still embryonic but has shown some successes like the T-35 Pillán which has achieved some export success. It is yet to be seen if these limited export successes can be exploited with the newer version of the Pillán in joint development with some Russian companies or with the locally designed Ñancú.

Mayor challenges avait the FACh in its path to the future. The Peruvian arms escalation is raising the level of perceived threat and make urgent the replacement of the actual set of front line fighters by modern ones as integrated systems inside the Air Force. The current crop of front line fighters is a mix of heavily updated Mirage-5 and F-5E Tiger, all of which are designs that go back to the 60s, and do not represent a real threat to the Mirage 2000 and Mig-29 that are being put in service the in region. Because these old fighters are expected to soldier on for a long time more pilots are under orders not to fatigue the airframes and engines, with postcombustion take-off seldom seen for example. This creates numerous limitations in the way training is done. «You fight as you train» is the motto in Western military organisations and one only could wonder what impact these training limitations will have in the event of a conflict.

There are other challenges, and for example BVR missiles are in great need and a mayor requirement for the next fighter but the possible choices are AMRAAM or MICA, with the first probably not being offered to Chile. Another missing important piece of gear are anti-radar missiles, like ALARM. Last but not least, financial considerations in the wake of the Asian crisis make the decision to follow Perú in an arms escalation an unpalatable one.

Equipment

Units

Bases

Bibliography

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