Pressure increases on [Canada] to stay or leave F-35 program

[madrat]

The Canadians balked at Boeing in general, not the price.

[ricnunes]

Here's the scary thing, Bestfighter4Canada better reflects the thought of the Canadian electorate, and some politicians than F-16.net on this issue. Let that sink in for a minute when you think that the F-35 is the assured option.

That's far from being exclusive to Canada!

Every or at least the vast of majority of JSF partner countries and FMS customers had the same "problem" above, including the United States itself! These other countries also had online communities and politicians/political parties venting stuff against the F-35, many of whom were likely a lot more powerful on their countries than Bestfighter4Canada is in Canada.

I would say that Bestfighter4Canada has about the same power to be influential on the decision to purchase the future Canadian fighter aircraft as you and I and anyone here personally can!
It's not like a Blog with a "Bah looking" will change anything or be influential in any means on the Canadian future fighter decision.

[ricnunes]

If Canada wanted any other fighter than the F-35 then they would have picked it.

EXACTLY!

The Canadians balked at Boeing in general, not the price.

Well, the Canadians were already balking at the "interim Super Hornet deal" price/cost quite before the Boeing-Bombardier dispute.
The Boeing-Bombardier dispute that came up later gave the Canadian government the perfect excuse the ditch the "interim Super Hornet deal" once and for all!

[Corsair1963]

If Canada wanted any other fighter than the F-35 then they would have picked it. Every single competitor to the F-35 has been flying for years. Canada could have opted to sole source them, but didn’t. When the time came to pick an interim fighter, Canada picked the one US fighter, the SH, for interoperability reasons. Then they balked at the price of the SH. Meanwhile, they continue to pay to be in the F-35 program despite all of this. If you think anything other than the F-35 is getting picked then I have some great swamp land to sell you.

Canada has already turned down the Super Hornet as many here have stated. So, just think of the outrage of the "American Public". If, Canada acquires a "European Fighter" over an American one....

[XanderCrews]

The Canadians balked at Boeing in general, not the price.

No they balked at the price, in fact the Canadian Government was so taken aback they had to scramble to call the US for clarification. Heres a brief explanation as to why:

For YEARS Boeing told every media outlet in Canada that asked them that the Super Hornet would cost 65 million (thats bolded because its important)

The media would then use qualifying language "Boeing says" or "boeing Claims" their super hornet will cost 65 million Boeing never deviated from that number.

Whenever asked the magical number 65 million came up. year after year regardless. Watch how this number again pops up in this report from late november 2016, about buying interim Super Hornets:

The Liberals pegged the cost of one F-35 at $175 million and one Super Hornet at $65 million, but those numbers have been repeatedly questioned.

Meanwhile, Kuwait recently announced plans to buy 40 Super Hornets for $13 billion. While the deal includes eight Super Hornets dedicated to electronic warfare, that still works out to $335 million per plane.

At the same time, Denmark is moving ahead with plans to buy 27 F-35s at a cost of $4 billion, which amounts to about $148 million per plane.

just to give you an idea of how "off" the Liberal estimate was the title of the above is "Ottawa might be buying 18 Super Hornets; price tag could exceed $1.1B" ( How did they arrive at 1.1billion? well like good repeaters they multiplied 18 by 65...)


Here it that same line again repeated in a 2017 piece:

During the 2015 election campaign, the Liberals estimated the cost of an F-35 at $175 million per plane, with the Super Hornet coming in at $65 million.

With no one in the mainstream media ever actually looking into the cost, Boeing got away with this false claim to the point that the Liberal Government ACTUALLY BELIEVED it and adopted themselves as FACT.

And then this happened:

The “estimated total case value” in the notification to Congress was US$5.23 billion, or $6.6 billion Canadian, prompting criticism from the Conservative Party.

yes that 6 times the 1.1b the first article warned of-- for EIGHTEEN Super Hornets.

Now I'm gonna run outta fingers and toes, but turns out at 6.6 billion Canadian that was a BIT more than 65 million.

366 million actually or well over 5 times the cost the Liberals had been tricked into believing

So hats off to Boeing, they had the liberals believing in magic. You repeat a lie enough and all that. Now of course we here know that Boeing was using just fly away (and a generous one at that) compared to the F-35s full program cost.

But the liberals suffice it to say, were SHOCKED to the point they were scrambling on the phones. They've been using that number since 2015 themselves and then were telling people it would cost just over 1 billion, and instead it comes back 6 and a half billion. HAHAHAHA even funnier when one remember the reason the F-35 was so badly ungood was its out of nowhere cost escalation.

very few people in Canada (Richard Shimooka is one actual example that did) ever analyzed Boeings claims apples to apples. They instead used the qualifying language, and gave Boeing free viral marketing.

Shimooka never got the kind of widespread attention his cost analysis deserved that debunked Boeings claims, destroyed the passive media's useful idiots, and would lay waste to the Liberals favorite number. He should not have been the only one looking into that and trying to spread the truth. The Canadian Media failed, and it failed badly. Its a great example of how companies manipulate the media, who then in turn push the narrative that manipulates people, and even entire political parties. Again this cost Boeing nothing, but had a major impact.

It wasn't until Boeing revealed the actual contract price that the lie was finally discovered.

This is even more enraging when we think about how this number has been used to undermine the JSF in Canada from nearly day 1. I'm not saying that Canada would have F-35s and this whole thing could have been avoided. BUT what I am saying is if the F-35s closest competitor had had honest reporting about its cost, instead of undermining it with a company provided lie, Canada would probably have F-35s right now. 175 million vs 366 million? rather than 175 million vs 65 million, well that makes a helluva difference when reported honestly and would have put out most talk of the F-35 being too costly.

Here's the scary thing, Bestfighter4Canada better reflects the thought of the Canadian electorate, and some politicians than F-16.net on this issue. Let that sink in for a minute when you think that the F-35 is the assured option.

I would say that Bestfighter4Canada has about the same power to be influential on the decision to purchase the future Canadian fighter aircraft as you and I and anyone here personally can!
It's not like a Blog with a "Bah looking" will change anything or be influential in any means on the Canadian future fighter decision.

Thats not the point though. hes not saying BF4C is influencing, hes saying its a reflection of the Canadian public. Having lurked there many times, Canadians have a completely different attitude thanks to the very limited and very specific kind of reports they hear on it thanks to Canadian Media.

Its like theyre in their own little world, and it shows. again this isn't BF4C's fault. the conditioning has paid off very nicely. like my 65 million example there. No one in the states was ever being told Super Hornets were 65 million, and certainly not year after year. Theyre good little students, they regurgitate what theyre told, and even better attack anyone else that tries to tell them otherwise. knowledge, sources, experience, reason, facts, history are meaningless to them.

[Corsair1963]

The public perception of the F-35 in Canada. Is very similar to Australia just a few years back. Yet, today the RAAF is proudly flying the F-35A and very happy with it.

[spazsinbad]

The public perception of the F-35 in Canada. Is very similar to Australia just a few years back. Yet, today the RAAF is proudly flying the F-35A and very happy with it.

You are way off about the public in Australia - sure there were naysayers - however generally the government & the RAAF were able to make their case, & have it reported OK, despite negative media/naysayers such as APA & EricFacePalmer.

[Corsair1963]

The public perception of the F-35 in Canada. Is very similar to Australia just a few years back. Yet, today the RAAF is proudly flying the F-35A and very happy with it.

You are way off about the public in Australia - sure there were naysayers - however generally the government & the RAAF were able to make their case, & have it reported OK, despite negative media/naysayers such as APA & EricFacePalmer.

Well, you clearly know more than I would on the subject. Yet, my general perception was the Australian Public had a negative opinion of the F-35. Of course that was because of like you said the Media and Naysayers!

[spazsinbad]

Have you forgotten the wonderful 'parliamentary inquiries' where APA & sundries were put in their place? Rightly or wrongly Australian media 'try' to present 'two sides' which unfortunately gave APA and the like too much undeserved oxygen. Also that served the purpose of gaining 'negative headlines' for clicks & readers. IF the perception of the F-35 was negative, according to those in power, why was not the Oz buy terminated? NoWayJose. Both sides of parliament made noises but they have always supported the buy, just quibbled about irrelevancies mostly and supporting half-hearted enquiries - because 'that is politics'. Australia does not have NUMnut Pollies; unlike some countries. However they do play politics pretty hard - regard the knifing of Prime Ministers over the last decade on both sides. And the F-35 sails onward.

Only perhaps at the start of the F-35 Oz participation was there some ex-RAAF bigwig noise. Mostly it was about how the F-35 was selected plus idiots claiming the Shornet was a SUPAdog for example. Those nitwits have gone away. The RAAF - the ones who matter - the ones with THE KNOWLEDGE - have always been happy & our budget for the F-35 always good.

[XanderCrews]

The public perception of the F-35 in Canada. Is very similar to Australia just a few years back. Yet, today the RAAF is proudly flying the F-35A and very happy with it.

Its not the same at all I'm afraid. The Australian government never waivered in its official support and then placed actual orders complete with real money to do what we call "buy" the aircraft.

Canada its seems as a scandal. Canada has waivering governments (note the plural) there's not really a more dysfunctional or indecisive F-35 partner out there. And before we mention Turkey, the issue with them is that they're buying it, not that they are refusing to buy it

Australia had a vocal minority, that was probably the most vocal to be sure, but their real effect was nil. Canada has had actual official government backed drama.

[luke_sandoz]

The public perception of the F-35 in Canada. Is very similar to Australia just a few years back. Yet, today the RAAF is proudly flying the F-35A and very happy with it.

Its not the same at all I'm afraid. The Australian government never waivered in its official support and then placed actual orders complete with real money to do what we call "buy" the aircraft.

Canada its seems as a scandal. Canada has waivering governments (note the plural) there's not really a more dysfunctional or indecisive F-35 partner out there. And before we mention Turkey, the issue with them is that they're buying it, not that they are refusing to buy it

Australia had a vocal minority, that was probably the most vocal to be sure, but their real effect was nil. Canada has had actual official government backed drama.

Nailed it.

[ricnunes]

Thats not the point though. hes not saying BF4C is influencing, hes saying its a reflection of the Canadian public. Having lurked there many times, Canadians have a completely different attitude thanks to the very limited and very specific kind of reports they hear on it thanks to Canadian Media.

That's not my perception. My perception is that the "reflection of the Canadian public" (the majority of it) about the subject (future Canadian fighter), is:
- I or We don't care! (which one will win)

Unfortunately the general Canadian public don't care about their military. As such and not only, BF4C is definitly not a "reflection of the Canadian public".

Its like theyre in their own little world, and it shows. again this isn't BF4C's fault. the conditioning has paid off very nicely. like my 65 million example there. No one in the states was ever being told Super Hornets were 65 million, and certainly not year after year. Theyre good little students, they regurgitate what theyre told, and even better attack anyone else that tries to tell them otherwise. knowledge, sources, experience, reason, facts, history are meaningless to them.

I have to disagree with you regarding the above.
BF4C is an "online platform" conceived to promote the Gripen E as Canada's future fighter aircraft and at the same time being anti-F-35 (probably because they conceive it as being the biggest threat to Gripen in Canada).

So they are BIASED. As such I'm don't believe for a second that they limit themselves to regurgitate what they're told! They (BF4C) regurgitate what best fits their narrative which is being Pro-Gripen E and Anti-F-35.
As an evidence of this is what you correctly mentioned in your post - The Super Hornet doesn't cost $65 Million and now that we are at it, neither does the other aircraft (Gripen E, Rafale, Typhoon, you name it...) cost what their respective companies claims - and this is well known even within the (biased) media. Yet, BF4C continues to refuse to acknowledge this.

[ricnunes]

The public perception of the F-35 in Canada. Is very similar to Australia just a few years back. Yet, today the RAAF is proudly flying the F-35A and very happy with it.

They are diferences of course but in general I would say that you are IMO absolutely right.

Moreover, in Italy there's currently a government that when was elected also promised to cancel the F-35! Yet when they reached the office they completely changed their stance regarding the F-35 (doesn't this kinda reminds/resembles the country starting with "Ca" and ending with "da" and with a "na" in the middle?) .

Yet, we could go on discussing the diferences and nuances between what happens in Canada and in the other countries or more precisely between each country but the fact is that IMO, what is happening in Canada also happened in many, if not most of other countries that purchased the F-35 and/or are JSF members (although again, with its diferences/nuances).
IMO, the biggest diference regarding the public/political perception/stance regarding the F-35 between Canada and the other countries is that the other countries already decided to buy the F-35 while Canada is yet to decide to buy it.

[Corsair1963]

The public perception of the F-35 in Canada. Is very similar to Australia just a few years back. Yet, today the RAAF is proudly flying the F-35A and very happy with it.

They are diferences of course but in general I would say that you are IMO absolutely right.

Moreover, in Italy there's currently a government that when was elected also promised to cancel the F-35! Yet when they reached the office they completely changed their stance regarding the F-35 (doesn't this kinda reminds/resembles the country starting with "Ca" and ending with "da" and with a "na" in the middle?) .

Yet, we could go on discussing the diferences and nuances between what happens in Canada and in the other countries or more precisely between each country but the fact is that IMO, what is happening in Canada also happened in many, if not most of other countries that purchased the F-35 and/or are JSF members (although again, with its diferences/nuances).
IMO, the biggest diference regarding the public/political perception/stance regarding the F-35 between Canada and the other countries is that the other countries already decided to buy the F-35 while Canada is yet to decide to buy it.

Actually, they did decide to buy it, then hold off and have a fighter competition, then not to buy it, back to holding another fighter competition......

[spazsinbad]

Read my posts about Australia for a good overview which can be backed up by reading the Australian F-35A thread here:

TITLE says it all: viewtopic.php?f=58&t=23043 Australian lawmakers confident in F-35's future