Due to the spares contract being so badly written, HEDP is correct. I was at Shawbs collecting an Apache and could see with my own eyes that gearboxes etc were being removed from aircraft already delivered, when I asked the Westlands Tech's what was going on they told me they were being removed and sent back to Yeovil so that Westlands could comlpete the contract on time and therefore look good on the text book delivery. So, the Army has never had 67 complete Apache.
The problem was, the AAC started flying the aircraft without the spares being available to replace components such as gearboxes etc. In the early days we had a couple of incidents during training which due to being over-cautious resulted in components being changed. Those were delivered from the production line an not replaced. The Army robbed Peter to pay Paul.
Brewster has a point though. Out of the 67 Apache's bought and paid for, we can only supply 8 to combat operations. Is that value for money? Where are the 8 CTT's worth of pilots if we are at less than 50% manning? Why is nothing positive being done?