E86,
As much as I don't like the Aust Labour Party, the procurement decision for the Sea Sprite lies squarely with the Navy Procurement team led by a CAPT Engineer. The Patrol Boat option (muted with Malaysia) fell through well before the final deal but the project team fell in love (lust?) with the idea of this small airframe packing all of the goodies. Too many inexperienced people with too much pull on the D.
For those of us who were at the frontline when the final deliberations were being undertaken, we were assured that the aircraft was a working model and we wouldn't fall into the trap of the Sea Hawk (S70B2) integration problems. Lo and behold, only a month or so late, we were stuck with this pig with four different major weapons system and a new thing called ITAS to make it all work. Yes we were assured, we can get a P3 into an airframe that size. What a waste and all those at Nowra knew it.
Its only money so lets do it properly the next time. Poor old 805 Sqn - over sea and sand (in what exactly).