Dan,
9,000 troops to Iraq, and standing behind the President like Italy and England did was the key. Both PM's publicly asked Pres Bush to buy their machine, on their local TV. If he had turned them down, they would have been very embarrassed, after taking the heat to back the Iraq mission.
Here is a link to a discussion of the VH-92 demonstrator:
http://webpages.charter.net/nlappos/wildcat1.pdf