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Background  — Airlifters — NATO’s Strategic Airlift Interim Solution

SALIS:  the Strategic  Airlift  Interim  Solution On 23 March 2006 NATO put a multinational air- lift contract into effect.[1] Under the terms of the agreement, six Antonov An-124-100 strategic air lifters will  be available to 15 NATO members. [2] Two Antonovs will be based at Leipzig-Halle air- port in Germany while the remaining four aircraft are held in reserve in Ukraine or Russia.  Canada was among the original signatories of SALIS. [3]

Honkin’ Big NATO Airlifter Operating the huge Antonov airlifters will be Ruslan SALIS GmbH, a subsidiary of  Volga Dnepr. Crews will be Russian or Ukrainian. SALIS members can use the pooled aircraft for any international or domestic mission.  NATO now has the ‘assured access’ to strategic airlift  it  is has been seeking.

NATO has been trying to get to grips with its shortfall in strategic airlift since 2002.  NATO plans for a multinational airlift emerged in June of 2003. The SALIS contract runs for three years (at a leasing rate of about US$220M). The lease can be extended until 2012 and some are predicting that the arrangement “might turn into a perma- nent solution beyond 2012.”  For Canada, the implications are obvious  –  an end to strategic lift contract worries and assured access to An-124s with a few days notice. As Herman Kurapov notes, an  “acquired aircraft will be idle ... more than 80% of its potential operating time”. SALIS will give Canada access to 125 strategic airlift flying hours while contractors are left to worry about pilots, maintenance, and any idle time on the tarmac.

Also see:  A Modest Proposal  Extending NATO’s SALIS to North America  and the  Tactical Airlifter Update (C-130J, C-17, and A400M).

[1] The actual contract was signed between NATO and Ruslan SALIS GmbH in January of 2006. The latter represents Ukraine’s Antonov ASTC (Ukraine) and Russia’s Volga-Dnepr Group.  NATO flights “will be performed by Ukrainian and Russian crews on [a] parity basis”. [2] Belgium has now joined NATO members Canada, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Germany, Great Britain, France, Hungary, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, and Slovenia. SALIS also extends to two non-NATO members: Finland and Sweden. [3] SALIS ties in with other multinational agreements including the Status of Forces Agreement. SOFA “provides a reciprocal legal frame- work for the treatment of NATO and Partner troops, including Russian troops, operating in or transiting through one another’s territory.” In other words, Canadian troops and equipment could overfly Russia to reach Afghanistan from the north without any juridical problems.