 Defense Minister Gordon O'Connor had later requested additional funding of 15 billion dollars to acquire fleets of helicopters and aircraft, such as the Boeing Chinook helicopter, the Boeing C-17 Globemaster plane, and the Lockheed Martin C-130 Hercules aircraft.He later announced that new Leopard 2 Tanks would be added to the fleet replacing the older Leopard C2 vehicles by the summer of 2007.Most of the equipment would provide operational support for the soldiers currently serving in Afghanistan.