NATO: Choppers on a shoestring

(Via Danger Room)

A heavy-lift helicopter, contracted by NATO, was shot down by the Taliban on Tuesday near the town of Sangin, in Afghanistan’s Helmand province. Reports indicate a rocket-propelled grenade brought down the 30-ton, Moldovan Mi-26 chopper ...the biggest operational model in the world.

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A chronic shortage of suitable NATO choppers means the alliance contracts a large proportion of its front-line air logistics to civilian firms. When I was at the Dutch base in Uruzgan in 2007, a civilian Mi-26 was a regular visitor, alongside U.S. C-130s and Dutch CH-47 Chinooks.

British journalist Richard North points out that the destroyed chopper’s operator, Pecotox Air, has been banned from European airspace, due to safety violations — and has also been implicated in a weapons smuggling probe. The shot-down Mi-26 was reportedly hovering over Sangin to deliver “humanitarian aid,” despite major fighting in the area for three weeks now. North believes the humanitarian claim is a front — that the Mi-26 was actually delivering supplies to a British base when it was hit, but the British government wants to distance itself from Pecotox, and from the broader lack of helicopters.

The Brits are contracting with shady, private companies to get their supplies in Afghanistan airlifted...?

Makes you wonder.