War game highlights regional tensions
The Australian
By Nigel Pittaway
31 October 2024
Philippine Air Force fighter pilots at Exercise Pitch Black 24, Northern Territory walk to their jets. Picture: Nigel Pittaway
Aside from being the largest in its 43-year history, Exercise Pitch Black 2024 was significant for highlighting the growing strategic focus on stability in the Indo-Asia-Pacific region.
Billed as the Royal Australian Air Force’s premier air combat exercise, Pitch Black is held biennially in Australia’s north and over the years it has seen a significant growth in the number of countries wanting to participate.
As such, it has grown from being an air combat training exercise to a statement by countries of strategic interest in the region. Held between July 12 and August 2, Pitch Black 2024 attracted 150 aircraft and about 4200 personnel from 16 countries around the world.
A further five countries participated as observers and some of these could possibly bring their own assets to the next event in 2026.
While the importance of the region is not lost on many of Australia’s regional partners – India, Indonesia Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand all returned for Pitch Black 2024 – the exercise also included Papua New Guinea and The Philippines for the first time.
European nations are equally no strangers to Pitch Black exercises, with France, Germany and Britain all returning this year; to underscore the region’s growing importance. Italy and Spain also participated for the first time – the former sending a large force of aircraft, including an aircraft carrier.
Aside from Pitch Black, many of these countries also participated in exercises throughout the region, including in Alaska, Japan, India, Indonesia and Malaysia.
“The Japan Air Self Defence Force participated in Exercise Pitch Black 2024, conducted by the RAAF, to contribute to realising a ‘free and open Indo-Pacific’,” a JASDF spokesperson explained.
“The purpose was to improve the practical skills of participating units, enhance interoperability with the RAAF and US forces, and deepen mutual understanding with the participating countries in a practical environment.”
From an air combat exercise perspective, one of the major drawcards of Pitch Black is the vast amount of empty airspace in the Northern Territory available for training. The exercise area covers an area of about 250 x 200 nautical miles and extends from the desert floor to an altitude of 50,000 feet, permitting large numbers of aircraft to train under realistic conditions.
“From the exercise we hope to get great training, interoperability with our partners and strengthening ties with other countries,” Wing Commander Mark Robertson, the tactical commander of the British contingent, said at the beginning of Pitch Black 2024.
“But your airspace is about twice the size of my country and I haven’t really had to look at a weather report.”
Although the US Air Force is a regular at Pitch Black exercises, 2024 was the first time it had deployed its fifth-generation Lockheed Martin F-22A Raptors to the event.
“Having the opportunity to fly in the airspace out here exceeds a lot of the other airspaces we get to operate in,” the commander of the US Air Force’s 22nd Fighter Squadron, Lieutenant Colonel Ryan Nickell, added.
“The airspace goes up to the moon and there aren’t any restrictions on supersonic speeds or anything like that. It allows us to use the full capabilities of the aircraft when required.”
Italian Navy contingent at Exercise Pitch Black 24, Northern Territory. Picture: Nigel Pittaway
The West’s only other fifth-generation fighter – the Lockheed Martin F-35A Lightning II – was also present in numbers at Pitch Black 2024, flown by the RAAF (F-35A) and Italian air force (F-35A & F-35B) and the Italian navy (F-35B). The F-35B is the short take-off and vertical landing variant (STOVL) of the Lightning II that is able to operate from the Italian navy’s aircraft carrier, the ITS Cavour.
The opportunity for nations that are already flying the F-35 – as well as others such as Singapore, who has them on order – to share information was an additional bonus during Pitch Black 2024.
The participation of the ITS Cavour was the first time an aircraft carrier had been dedicated to the exercise and, for the duration of Pitch Black 2024, it embarked the Italian navy’s older Boeing AV-8B Harrier STOVL jets. The navy and air force F-35Bs were shore-based at RAAF Darwin to allow personnel to better share information with other operators of fifth-generation fighters.
“I’m pleased to say that this is the most successful Pitch Black we have had. Three weeks ago, we had 20 countries arrive in Darwin and in the subsequent time we have built really strong relationships. We have built our capabilities and we are stronger across our regional forces and with our European partners as well,” the RAAF officer conducting Pitch Black 2024, Air Commodore Peter Robinson, said at the conclusion of the exercise.
“We’ve flown 1700 missions; we’ve had a (mission) success rate of 93 per cent and that’s phenomenal – especially for the air forces that are a long way from home and have had to rely on long supply lines.”