In regards to Paul's site, yeah it seems it's a common problem with the IT departments of various companies banning access to the site and they aren't all staffed by spotty twenty somethings, my last job had 40-somethings who were just as full of their own self importance and just as incompetent as the 20-somethings.
They list it as "forbidden category - weapons" or "forbidden category -military" from what I've seen. I've never seen it banned under the category of "games" however.
Anyway, onto the original questions...
The Australian Abrams are former US Army & USMC models built to M1A1 standard rather than new builds. They are rebuilt to "zero hour/zero kilometer" configuration. This was probably done so that they would
not be fitted with the depleted uranium armour.
The reason for not using the depleted uranium armour was a government decision because they didn't like the idea of radioactive material trundling around the place (yeah, yeah, I know and you know it has no chance of contaminating anything or anyone but the government did not want to upset the greenies who are fanatically opposed to radioactive materials - although they don't seem to mind all the benefits from nuclear medicine or seem to care that the sun provides more radiation but that's another story for a different thread).
They are also fitted with the Tank Urban Survivability Kit i.e. TUSK.
We purchased 59 M1A1 AIM* MBTs and seven M88A2 recovery vehicles (some sources say five M88 but Australian government sources say seven) along with MAN TGA 8x8 prime movers (AKA tractor truck) towing trailers designed & built by Drake Trailers Australia to form 14 heavy tank transporters.
The trailer has a split deck that spreads to the width of the tank when needed just like other oversized load bearing trailers. It can also lower itself to the ground for loading so the suspension takes none of the loading forces.
* AIM - Abrams Integrated Management.
The tanks are run on diesel rather than avgas and this has no appreciable impact on the operational range of 430km. The decision for diesel is that every other vehicle in the Army (aside from staff cars and the like) runs on diesel.
The operational range is a sore point as the Leopard AS1 MBTs got about 500km. It's not a big problem for Europe or North America where there are many more facilities but it's a serious issue for Australia where the distance between rural towns may be anywhere between 200 to 500 kilometers. Particularly relevant for the Abrams because as far as I know, it does not have a fuel pump to allow it to refill itself. It still relies on an external pump to transfer fuel.
There are two specific reasons the Abrams was chosen (not taking into consideration the political reasons for buying it) - it was already wired up for network centric warfare and it makes for easier inter-nation operability and support (including parts, training etc. etc.) with the US.
As to commissions for US officers to provide experience, this is half right. For decades now, the Australian military has offered the opportunity for personnel from certain allied nations with the appropriate experience, to join our military. The most favoured nations are New Zealand, Canada, the UK and the USA although personnel from Rhodesia, South Africa, Malaysia, Singapore, Papua New Guinea and Fiji have also been a part of this.
Specific consideration is given to officers and personnel with technical training - they don't particularly want more grunts. It was not done to get experience for our defence force but done more so to get qualified personnel to fill out numbers as many of the potential candidates here are not always interested in joining the military
The same has been true in the past for the UK and the USA in regard to Australian military personnel joining them and I am assuming it still holds true today.
The Jindalee Over The Horizon Radar network AKA JORN (Jindalee Operational Radar Network) had its origins in some 1950s ionospheric testing but also took into account the proof of concept for OTH* work done by the USN in the 1950s.
* OTH - Over The Horizon
JORN itself was largely developed in a period from 1975 to 1985 and as I understand it, there was a lot of collaborative work between the US and Australia as part of The Technical Cooperation Program (AKA TTCP).
This collaboration came about because Australia could demonstrate that their research was as mature as the US research (and therefore the US would not be burdened with a partner that would contribute little but get all the benefit).
@ Schone - With all that in mind, I would assume that the visitors you had were all part of the ongoing collaboration. You may be interested in this PDF of the overall history of JORN
http://www.dsto.defence.gov.au/attac...izon_radar.pdf
And yeah, when you see just
where the JORN is aiming, you can tell pretty damn quick, who we are concerned with but it's also used for detecting activity such as illegal immigration, smuggling and poaching... which, interestingly enough, does seem to largely originate from the same place we are militarily concerned with...