Air Vice-Marshal Graham Lintott

After five years on the job as leader of the Royal New Zealand Air Force (RNZAF), Air Vice-Marshal Graham Lintott will leave his post at the end of April to become Wellington's defense attaché in Washington.

Chief of the Air Force Graham Lintott speaks to the media in Palmerston North, New Zealand. (Marty Melville / Getty Images)

Lintott joined the RNZAF in 1973 and became a pilot. He flew Sioux and Iroquois helicopters in New Zealand and served in Singapore before becoming a member of the Air Force's Red Checkers formation aerobatics team.
He attended several courses overseas, including the Australian Defence Force Joint Services Staff College and the Royal College of Defence Studies in the U.K., from which he graduated in 2001.
Promoted to air commodore, he spent the next few years at HQ Joint Forces New Zealand, and in late 2004 was appointed assistant chief, Strategic Commitments and Intelligence, HQ New Zealand Defence Force, in Wellington. He was promoted to his current rank and appointed the chief of Air Force in 2006.

Q. The RNZAF is receiving new A109 and NH90 helicopters and improved C-130 and P-3 aircraft over the next 12 months. What does this involve?

A. Both the C-130 and the P-3 projects are much more than just minor upgrades; they really are new aircraft with regard to systems, and we have a complex introduction into service (IIS) task ahead of us.
On top of the four additional fleets - "additional" because we have to fly the legacy aircraft concurrent with the new ones - are a range of simulation devices that we have not had before.

Q. How will these new platforms and systems affect deployments?

A. The economic crisis continues to challenge us. I never underestimate the resources it is going to take, and we have been preparing for [the new platforms] for some years now. We know where the stress points are.
Over the next three to four years, we will not really be in a position to deploy our [new aircraft] without compromising the IIS task. If we do have to deploy, and the IIS program is delayed by weeks or months, then so be it.

Q. The New Zealand government's 2010 defense white paper forecast that the next 25 years will be more challenging than the past quarter-century. What does that mean for the RNZAF?

A. [It] means continuing those key roles that all air forces have - carrying things, sensing things and engaging targets.
We have limited capabilities in the engagement role, but we certainly are very well-equipped for ISR [intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance] and transport. By the 2020s, we may be looking at additional ISR platforms.
Additional capabilities may not be able to be delivered in an earlier time frame because of the economic situation, but that is a temporary thing. I think the next decade is going to be a period of holding the line. After that, the economy will grow and we can grow with it.

Q. What future is there for remotely piloted vehicles (RPVs) in the RNZAF?

A. The RNZAF has imagery analysts deployed in Afghanistan with the Royal Australian Air Force RPV operation, so we are gaining experience right at the front end of that operation.
Because of our geography and climate, we should be looking at RPVs of at least Predator size and capability that, for example, can get down to the Southern Ocean and the Antarctic to conduct surveillance.
It is going to be around 2025-2030 [before] we are thinking of augmenting the P-3 with RPVs and integrating them into a full spectrum ISR or ISTAR [intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition and reconnaissance] capability for New Zealand.
I am not sure New Zealand will ever be able to afford a [national] Global Hawk-style RPV, but perhaps we could share such a capability with another nation.

Q. What practical regional cooperation exists between the RNZAF and its allies?

A. We share the duties of surveillance in the South Pacific with the Australians, the French and the Americans. We engage in a broad range of exercises and activities throughout the Asia-Pacific region, and the Five Power Defence Arrangements are particularly important to us.
We have cooperative airlift agreements in place with Australia, and now with the U.K. and NATO, where we contribute and offset each other's air transport,making better use of the global capability to our mutual benefit.

Q. How are the RNZAF's Antarctic operations?

A. The RNZAF has been operating in the Antarctic since the 1950s in support of the U.S. and NZ Antarctic research programs. None of our aircraft can get down there, miss the approach and [then] get back to New Zealand.
In the last couple of years, we were launching P-3s from Invercargill, flying 11- to 12-hour sorties with only about an hour on station in the Ross Sea. It was a grossly inefficient way of doing business. Now we refuel our P-3s at the U.S. McMurdo base, which enables us to spend more time on station. We have just cleared our B757 for Antarctica operations; they carry passengers and [thus] free up the U.S. [Antarctic-bound] C-17s to carry more freight. In the future, you'll see bothC-130s and B757s supporting our Antarctic program.

Q. What air power trends and capabilities have caught your eye?

A. I think it comes back to the RPVs and the flexibility and utility of those platforms and their growth in the future. You have already seen a multirole Predator in terms of surveillance and carrying missiles; it can truly do the whole ISTAR mission. I think the extensions and applications of that sort of capability is another exciting dimension for air power.
Cyberwarfare is going to affect us all in the future. It's a national issue. Air forces, armies, navies and other government agencies have to focus on that threat in the future. I think that environment might become more challenging than it is currently.

Q. Do you envisage new roles for the RNZAF?

A. I don't think so. If you take it back to what air power is all about - seeing, transporting and engaging, I think that is what we will continue to do.
How we deliver those capabilities, what hardware, what software, what mix of piloted and remotely piloted aircraft, how we command and control them, how we better integrate into the joint operations arena at all levels - those are the things that will change, other than cyberspace operations, which could overarch everything.

Q. What can the RNZAF usefully demonstrate to other Air Forces?

A. Perhaps people can learn lessons around the multirole, multiskill approach necessary in a small air force, including how we train and employ our people.
New Zealanders just have a natural way of engaging constructively with different cultures. Take our operations in Timor Leste, in the Solomons, in Afghanistan. There is an element of force protection, there is an element of war fighting, but there is also an element of constructive engagement. And whether that is engaging with the coalition or the host nation, we are damn good at it.

Q. What experience of the U.S. military will you take with you to Washington?

A. More than a decade of engagement with the U.S. defense industry, especially with the P-3, C-130 and Seasprite. My practical experience includes flying [U.S. Navy] helicopters in Antarctica, managing the F-16 acquisition project, education with the [U.S. Naval] Postgraduate School and, recently, a very close relationship with the Pacific Air Force HQ in Hawaii. I have worked with U.S. forces in Rwanda, Sinai, Afghanistan and in Kyrgyzstan and have been involved with the intelligence community during my time as head of [RNZAF] Strategic Commitments and Intelligence.
I am very much looking forward to being at the forefront of our relationship development with the U.S. defense and military organization. While we are at different ends of the size spectrum, we share common values, common standards, and our people always engage and operate well together.
By Nick Lee-Frampton in Wellington.

Service profile

Personnel: 3,185, including 2,592 active-duty troops, 185 reservists and 408 civilians.
Aircraft: Six P-3K Orions, five C-130H Hercules, two Boeing 757-200s
Helicopters: 13 UH-1H Iroquois, five Bell-47G Sioux helicopters, five SH-2G Seasprites that deploy with the Royal New Zealand Navy. The Iroquois and Sioux are to be replaced by eight NH90 and eight A109 helicopters over the next couple of years.