CWD,
You are of course correct. The "order" for 24 F Models was little more than an intention to purchase which made good headlines before the last election. We're still not actually on contract - which makes the money "uncommitted" and therefore vulnerable. However, Call-Me-Dave is in bit of a spot; he backed the 14ac purchase in parliament and has, it seemed, endorsed the move of Merlin to CHF. Like to see him spin his way out of this one!
2 attrition ac in Mk6 config would be,to all intents, useless as they would differ markedly from the Mk2/3/4 fleet....unless they were used as the prototype for a whole fleet upgrade to buy-out obsolescence issues by aligning (to a degree) with the CH47F. This, after all, was the main driver behind the Mk1 to Mk2 MLU - reconfig to something akin to the CH47D.
And you, more than most, know what a nightmare job the config manager has....