Bye bye P-82... :-(

[mustangdriver]

I do agree with that. I wish there were more people that were high positions that were educated and cared about what museums and private owners were trying to do.

[Mark_Pilkington]

Bob Pruitts 109 wreck faced no such export limit, but it would have had to apply for export and be assessed.

I've read that Bob was going to sell the airframe, but ultimately did not due to difficulties in exporting the aircraft out of the country.

Bob Pruit's ME-109 has already been exported from the country and is now in Germany, its no example at all of these laws being silly or not working?

Its more likely the sale price suffered from the additional cost to transport from Australia.

Bf 109G-6
410077
Germany
CR
<°+ tech off Stab
IV/JG 54
RK+FY
VH-BFG
Raised from Lake Swiblo in Russia 1992. Ex Tuchino AFB Moscow, to Canada then Australia and now finaly in Germany. Reported for sale.

Fair enough, but I don't agree with your assessment. It's not like those planes are the first ones to fly in Australia or the first one to accomplish this or accomplish that or even set any records in. The Mossie and Beau, IMO, are not "historically significant" in parallel and in the same context to the examples that I gave above..........Cultural and historical significance does play a role, but in your examples, one can make an argument that virtually anything can be deemed "culturally and historically signficant". That is our only difference here - the definition of what is "culturally and historically significant". Your definition is more liberally applied and mine is much more strict and narrow. We both have differences of opinion. In the long run, neither of our opinions matter, as neither of us are lawmakers.

I dont think you have proven that the law is silly? nor evidenced anything but your opinion.

International (UNESCO) and National Lawmakers in Australia (and indeed the US) have drafted the laws that your opinion is dis-agreeing with, I am simply arguing and evidencing in support of the laws they have made.

I think those laws seems to operate quite conservatively, I still havent seen any actual evidence of aircraft denied export that havent been correctly assessed as culturally significant?, rather than your own opinion on their relative significance, and general opposition from a idoligical point of view?

Yet you do seem to recognise a narrow group of aircraft that ARE of cultural significance, he first to fly etc such as the Wright Flyer etc.

Cultural heritage is not derived solely from being the first one to fly or to have set records, otherwise all of our museums would be empty of most of the aircraft they hold, and we wouldnt have forums full of people admiring and restoring them.

Given only FIVE aircraft have ever been denied export permits under these laws, its hardly evidence that "virtually" anything can be deemed "culturally and historically signficant", , an Australian export permit applications are assessed by idependent and qualified assessors who determine the significance.

Obviously if Bob Pruits 109 was able to be exported without problem, and the Beaufighter was denied export, then they are not considered to be of equal significance to Australians and under this Australian law, and thats the context that matters, and evidences their successful application.

Will some countries get shafted over other ones? Yes, of course.

Which is why such laws exist, internationally, (and even in the USA)

In Australia we have a Government fund that can be used to acquire moveable cultural heritage at risk of being exported, to bring them into public ownership.

BTW, what does "Australia, a land mass equal to the continental USA" have to do with anything we are talking about? It has no bearing or relevance to what we are debating.

If Australia was the size of Rhode island then perhaps preserving two or even one example of historically significant airframes might meet the need of the local population, in terms of educational and heritage access.

Having a law that protects retention of two examples of an important and significant type to Australians in a land mass of of 7,617,930 square kilometres (2,941,300 sq mi) for a distributed population of 20 million Australians is quite relevent to the debate and indeed hardly liberal or over generous.

If we all lived in the one place in the world, or alternatively could travel without limitations financially or otherwise, then we could let all of the aircraft reside in the USA, and the rest of us could simply come and visit them on holiday, cultural heritage laws aim to keep significant cultural heritage from being traded off to the highest bidder, and simply shifted to the wealthiest societies.

Capitalism is fine and delivers many benefits as against alternative economic and political models, but as the recent GFC showed markets cannot be successfuly operated totally unregulated, or purely for the benefit of the richest players in the game.

Regards

Mark Pilkington

[A2C]

mustangdriver wrote:
The funny thing that I find here is that once again only part of the story is told, just to paint the NMUSAF in a bad light. Never mind that it had it's day in court twice, and both times the NMUSAF won. This isn't a case of the NMUSAF deciding they wanted something, it is a case of them getting ticked after something they believe they owned was being sold. Any one here would do the exact same thing if we felt this way. Especially when they made two visits to try and settle it out of court prior to this whole thing and were told to stick it in their ear.


NMUSAF won = G O V E R N M E N T

So what will be confiscated next?

[A2C]

Having a law that protects retention of two examples of an important and significant type to Australians in a land mass of of 7,617,930 square kilometres (2,941,300 sq mi) for a distributed population of 20 million Australians is quite relevent to the debate and indeed hardly liberal or over generous.

Protecting it from who? Evil collectors? What about the NMUSAF? Maybe the P-82 needed to be protected from them.

[gale_dono]

cultural heritage laws aim to keep significant cultural heritage from being traded off to the highest bidder, and simply shifted to the wealthiest societies.

Capitalism is fine and delivers many benefits as against alternative economic and political models, but as the recent GFC showed markets cannot be successfuly operated totally unregulated, or purely for the benefit of the richest players in the game.

Regards

Mark Pilkington

quotin 'dis

[gary1954]

[quote="warbird1 The only thing that perturbs me is some of the silly "culture embargoes" that some countries have like Australia where warplanes that were not even used are not ever allowed to leave the country. Free trade, free information flow, and unrestricted sales - are those not good things for the preservation of warbirds?

Australia has a moveable cultural heritage law that requires the export of historic aircraft to be approved, and allows for the denial of export if the aircraft is considered significant to Australian culture and history, AND there is not two similar aircraft preserved in public collections in Australia.

Such a policy allows for many aircraft in Australia to be bought and sold on the open market, (and if applied to the Lackland B-24 from a US perspective would have allowed it to leave to the UK on the basis of the preserved examples elsewhere in the USA.

The Spitfire Vb now in the NMUSAF, swapped for the Lackland B-24 came from Australia, the NMUSAF Beaufighter also came from Australia (and in my opinion should have been denied an export permit, however the AWM's mark II was considered an equivalent spitfire despite the different technical and operational significances (one being a European war veteran the other being a Defence of Darwin veteran.)

The Oscar now in Paul Allen's collection came from Australia, and was the sole intact example, and a war prize captured by Australian's in PNG, (in my opinion that should have also been denied an export permit.)

The only surviving Australian built DH Mosquito in the country was denied an export permit and is now fully restored in the Australian War Memorial.

A mustang and ME-109 were impounded by Australian Customs and forfeited due to customs fraud, the ME-109 had not had an export permit applied for, or assessed, it was being smuggled out disguised as a mustang. (in my opinion the ME-109 was delivered to Australia as a war prize, was the sole intact example in the country, and should have been denied an export permit had an application been made)

The number of aircraft denied an export permit from Australia can be counted on one hand, and includes the Moorabbin Beaufighter, which was correctly denied an export permit.

"where warplanes that were not even used are not ever allowed to leave the country" - so which particular aircraft examples do you have, to back up such statements.

Unfortunately, such un-imformed "throw away" comments become legend and then "fact" with no relationship to the truth.


regards

Mark Pilkington[/quote]

Mark, the incident of the Mustang/ME109 was Doug Arnold (Blackbushe Airport) involved in that? I recall he got into some trouble with Customs about trying to get an aircraft into England in a crate marked as machine parts or something like that.

[warbird1]

Bob Pruit's ME-109 has already been exported from the country and is now in Germany, its no example at all of these laws being silly or not working?

I could be wrong, but I thought that the law prevented Bob from selling them to the first person/organization that he wanted to sell them to. Remember, I wasn't positive about this aspect, but just remember reading about it.

I dont think you have proven that the law is silly? nor evidenced anything but your opinion.

I wasn't trying to "prove" that the law is silly. I thought it was fairly clear from the outset, that the position expressed was purely my opinion. I was not writing a legal brief to "prove" anything.

International (UNESCO) and National Lawmakers in Australia (and indeed the US) have drafted the laws that your opinion is dis-agreeing with, I am simply arguing and evidencing in support of the laws they have made.

UNESCO laws are well and good intentioned, but unfortunately many countries violate them and don't enforce them. In a perfect world, UNESCO would save ALL of the world's heritage, but unfortunately that is not the case.

Given only FIVE aircraft have ever been denied export permits under these laws, its hardly evidence that "virtually" anything can be deemed "culturally and historically signficant", , an Australian export permit applications are assessed by idependent and qualified assessors who determine the significance.

That's good to know. What 5 aircraft were they and when did they happen? I was under the impression that it was much, much more prevalent in Australia.

Obviously if Bob Pruits 109 was able to be exported without problem, and the Beaufighter was denied export, then they are not considered to be of equal significance to Australians and under this Australian law, and thats the context that matters, and evidences their successful application.

I don't know if that's a fact. I seem to remember Bob having problems exporting it initially to the first intended buyer. I really wish DaveM2 could pipe in here to set the record straight.

BTW, what does "Australia, a land mass equal to the continental USA" have to do with anything we are talking about? It has no bearing or relevance to what we are debating.

If Australia was the size of Rhode island then perhaps preserving two or even one example of historically significant airframes might meet the need of the local population, in terms of educational and heritage access.

Having a law that protects retention of two examples of an important and significant type to Australians in a land mass of of 7,617,930 square kilometres (2,941,300 sq mi) for a distributed population of 20 million Australians is quite relevent to the debate and indeed hardly liberal or over generous.

If we all lived in the one place in the world, or alternatively could travel without limitations financially or otherwise, then we could let all of the aircraft reside in the USA, and the rest of us could simply come and visit them on holiday, cultural heritage laws aim to keep significant cultural heritage from being traded off to the highest bidder, and simply shifted to the wealthiest societies.

So what you're really saying is that it is more of a matter of accessibility? You mentioned about all of the aircraft residing in the USA. I have never espoused that viewpoint. Remember, I supported the Lackland B-24 going to Duxford.

Again, I'm not saying that every single aircraft or artifact should be up for bid. Some obviously should be retained in their national country of origin. I'm simply saying that our definitions of what is "culturally significant" differ. I have no problem with the non-significant cultural heritage "being traded off to the highest bidder, and simply shifted to the wealthiest societies", as you say.

[warbird1]

mustangdriver wrote:
The funny thing that I find here is that once again only part of the story is told, just to paint the NMUSAF in a bad light. Never mind that it had it's day in court twice, and both times the NMUSAF won. This isn't a case of the NMUSAF deciding they wanted something, it is a case of them getting ticked after something they believe they owned was being sold. Any one here would do the exact same thing if we felt this way. Especially when they made two visits to try and settle it out of court prior to this whole thing and were told to stick it in their ear.


NMUSAF won = G O V E R N M E N T

So what will be confiscated next?

FIFI, unfortunately, IMO.

[Mark_Pilkington]

Having a law that protects retention of two examples of an important and significant type to Australians in a land mass of of 7,617,930 square kilometres (2,941,300 sq mi) for a distributed population of 20 million Australians is quite relevent to the debate and indeed hardly liberal or over generous.

Protecting it from who? Evil collectors? What about the NMUSAF? Maybe the P-82 needed to be protected from them.

No protecting "it"/"them" from export overseas, the law has no impact on private ownership in Australia, or flying versus static preservation, or "Evil collectors" (am one myself?)

smiles

Mark Pilkington

[Mark_Pilkington]

Mark, the incident of the Mustang/ME109 was Doug Arnold (Blackbushe Airport) involved in that? I recall he got into some trouble with Customs about trying to get an aircraft into England in a crate marked as machine parts or something like that.

Gary,

I cant recall the specific person involved so I wouldnt like to link Doug Arnold to it without independent confirmation.

A UK owner was apparantly exporting a CAC Mustang and the ME-109, with both listed as Mustangs, customs impounded both, and they were forfeited.

The 109 is now in the collection of the AWM, (where it had been stupidly disposed from in the late 1950's by a Curator whose interest was army heritage, and scrapped a combat veteran Beaufort, a Japanese Sally, the first Wirraway and a Hampton Bomber.

The CAC Mustang went to the RAAF Museum and was then swapped to a local collector for a replica SE5a and Avro 504k

There was an earlier illegal export of a mark VIII spitfire to the UK listed as scrap metal.

And yes obviously export laws arent needed - smiles

regards

Mark Pilkington

[gary1954]

Thanks Mark. I know I read about Arnold getting busted by Customs back in the late late 70's early 80's somewhere in the aviation maget-zine world. I literally met his head in May 1980 at the Blackbushe airport, I was interested in seeing his B-25 (9115Z) he had stashed in a hangar, and wanted to photograph 9494Z that was looking abandoned on the field. Arnold stuck his head out between the hangar doors, gave me the run of the place, except for the hangar he was in. I could tell there was a Spit in there, but he wouldn't let me visit that one. Interesting feller he was.

[rreis]

Well, this makes me happy, there's a country in the world where customs officials know the difference between a Mustang and a Me 109.

[Steve Nelson]

To my knowledge 4 B-24s came out of India. Tallichets', Pima's, CF's, and I think one went to the UK. All but CF's were intact.

I believe the B-24M in the Canada Aviation Museum collection is also an Indian veteran, making it a total of five.

I've always been rather annoyed that the Lackland B-24 went across The Pond, and would have rather seen her at Willow Run. But now that I think about it, if she had come to Yankee, she might very well have been lost in the 2004 fire.

I'm only joining commenting in this thread as a B-24 fan. I'm not gonna touch the F-82 debate with a ten foot pole!

SN

[JDK]

Six or eight B-24s are ex- RAF then Indian Air Force, according to the Warbird Directory. Two reported as stored in 2001, plus the RAF Museum example, Pima, Weeks, Canadian Aviation Museum, Collings, and the Indian Air Force Museum.

[Nathan]

I plan on keeping away from WIX for awhile and for USAFM BS reasons just like this. It pains me the current problems the warbird movement faces and it is too much for me to have to read about it on a daily basis.

Its just too upsetting and unthinkable what the USAFM did. I'll stick working at Geneseo. Perhaps I'll delay my first visit to the USAFM the rest of my life.