Took me a while to understand the analagy too. You might have a point in that "The plan will work, long live the plan" mentality could have its limits. Still, almost there.
As someone else pointed out, green Lynx still has a part to play, especially if Puma is pulled out of Ireland: merlin looks unlikely to be used in the province.
With reference to time taken to bring an aircraft into service, how long are we looking at before we have BLUH working. Two, five or ten years? (ABIW, don't feel the need to add any childish, chippy rear crew comments at this point)
Anyone any idea how long?