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

[luke_sandoz]

One day someone's gonna rake all you leafs...

Seems glitter is able to fall off turds after all. Maybe switching out leaders will save the RCAF

[ricnunes]

I just can't to see this moron being "expelled" from the Federal Government.

The good news (and to complement luke_sandoz's post) is that according to polls (since the 1st of February) the trend seems to be that there's a very good chance for this to happen in the next elections:



source:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_p ... l_election

With "Red" being the Liberal Party (LPC) which is Trudeau's party while "Blue" is the Conservatives.

[ricnunes]

Good chance for F18 decision if the con win I hope.

Why??

I would say that if the Conservatives win that the bigger chances are for the F-35 (and by far).

Remember that when the Conservatives were government that they basically selected the F-35 (without competition). Only after the Liberal government won the election afterwards was when this fighter aircraft procurement "charade" happened (again, in great part due to the Justin Trudeau's election promise to not buy the F-35 and buy a cheaper aircraft, as if that existed in the first place) which resulted in the current Canadian fighter competition.

[ricnunes]

What I was hoping for is once the con win, just scrap the competition, get the F35 and call it a day.

Yes, I agree that would be the best course of action.

However the most likely thing to happen IMO, is that the Conservatives (if they win) will just let the competition go on and in the end select the F-35 as the winner of that same competition. But even with this I don't think that the any other aircraft including the F-18 which you mention earlier on, will have much of a chance to win this competition. This one will be for the F-35! At least I hope so...

We have other things as well that need replacing, like the new camo, ships, vests, and other stuff. I just hate how it takes soo long to make a decision.

Yes, I agree that there's a lot of stuff that needs to be replaced within the Canadian Forces, including some of what you mentioned above.
However I absolutely don't think that cammo is one of them. I don't see anything wrong with CADPAT. Actually the US Marines seem to be extremely happy with it or more precisely with a variation of it, which is MARPAT.

[optimist]

I just can't to see this moron being "expelled" from the Federal Government.

The good news (and to complement luke_sandoz's post) is that according to polls (since the 1st of February) the trend seems to be that there's a very good chance for this to happen in the next elections:

source:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_p ... l_election

With "Red" being the Liberal Party (LPC) which is Trudeau's party while "Blue" is the Conservatives.

It looks like the LPC and NDP can form a coalition and win government.

[ricnunes]

It looks like the LPC and NDP can form a coalition and win government.

That would be the very first time that something like that would happen in Canada.
As such I find such scenario unlikely to happen.
IMO, there are too many diferences between the NDP (basically "Social-Democrats") and the LPC (which despite being often touted as "Left" they are indeed "Center-Right" or resuming, Liberals).
But of course, we can never say never.

[optimist]

It looks like the LPC and NDP can form a coalition and win government.

That would be the very first time that something like that would happen in Canada.
As such I find such scenario unlikely to happen.
IMO, there are too many diferences between the NDP (basically "Social-Democrats") and the LPC (which despite being often touted as "Left" they are indeed "Center-Right" or resuming, Liberals).
But of course, we can never say never.

Possibly because it wasn't an option before, to take power. The NDP has only recently increased their voting block. Politicians will sell their first born to get into power. I see it as quite likely, seeing that neither the LPC and CPC have enough to win outright. There is going to be a coalition formed by someone and I can't see the CPC getting support from NDP.

[ricnunes]

Possibly because it wasn't an option before, to take power. The NDP has only recently increased their voting block. Politicians will sell their first born to get into power. I see it as quite likely, seeing that neither the LPC and CPC have enough to win outright. There is going to be a coalition formed by someone and I can't see the CPC getting support from NDP.

Again I have to disagree (except for the part where "Politicians will sell their first born to get into power", that is ).
If you look at the recent election history of Canada (for the Federal Government) there was a chance of this happening in the past, like for example the 2006 election where the Liberals won 103 seats and the NDP won 29 seats so here the Liberals and the NDP could at least in theory have formed a government (although still a minority one) by having a total of 132 seats. Instead the Conservatives which were the most voted party having won 124 seats formed a minority government. The parliament supporting this government was dissolved 2 years later and in the 2008 elections the Conservatives won again with minority but otherwise with a larger margin (this time the sum of the Liberal and NDP seats was inferior to the Conservative seats).

So I would say that if the Conservatives win with minority then the most likely thing to happen is that they would form a minority government (even if it doesn't last the entire term) like happened in 2006 and 2008.

Moreover, I doubt that the NDP wants to be associated with an ever increasingly unpopular Justin Trudeau.
Perhaps if the Liberals were lead by another more popular and above all more consensual leader - note that Trudeau is not even consensual within is party and government at least since recently, just look at the SNC-Lavalin controversy - then the scenario that you posed could become somehow more likely. But even then I have my doubts, again looking at the Canadian election history.

[ricnunes]

Hell no, I dont support F18, I meant the replacement for it. it was 2am when I posted that

LOL, no problem. It happens to us all

Off topic:

The new camo is a digitalized multicam. If the coulour changes, the rest has to chage as well, ruck sacks, vests, plate carriers, small pacts etc. Its not a priority from my point of view(grunt guy) but some higher up decided to change it, the current CADPAT is fine. There are other things as well but no money and no love from the govt

According to what I've read, the Canadian Forces are planing to adapt Multicam which is not a digitalized camo pattern (instead it's an "analog" camo). Or are you saying that the Canadian Forces are planning to field a modified version of Multicam which is digitalized?
Jezz, if that's the case then this is even worse than I thought because from everything that I've read, the advantages of Multicam is that it isn't a digitalized pattern.

Anyway, I fully agree with you. New camo is definitely not or shouldn't be a priority for the Canadian Forces and of course I also agree that the government has no love for the Armed Forces.

[magitsu]

If all else fails, Canada can buy Swiss Hornets within 5 years. Their center barrels are made of titanium unlike the rest, so they're good for 5k hours. They also offer a tantalizing prospect to Canadian maintainers with previous SLEP experience. Finland can also pitch in with more, less sturdy ones but with slightly better avionics. Maybe the JASSMs could be donated alongside for "real" capability increase.

Canada could pay with the 500M partnership fee, which they've already invested into F-35.

[optimist]

Possibly because it wasn't an option before, to take power. The NDP has only recently increased their voting block. Politicians will sell their first born to get into power. I see it as quite likely, seeing that neither the LPC and CPC have enough to win outright. There is going to be a coalition formed by someone and I can't see the CPC getting support from NDP.

Again I have to disagree (except for the part where "Politicians will sell their first born to get into power", that is ).
If you look at the recent election history of Canada (for the Federal Government) there was a chance of this happening in the past, like for example the 2006 election where the Liberals won 103 seats and the NDP won 29 seats so here the Liberals and the NDP could at least in theory have formed a government (although still a minority one) by having a total of 132 seats. Instead the Conservatives which were the most voted party having won 124 seats formed a minority government. The parliament supporting this government was dissolved 2 years later and in the 2008 elections the Conservatives won again with minority but otherwise with a larger margin (this time the sum of the Liberal and NDP seats was inferior to the Conservative seats).

So I would say that if the Conservatives win with minority then the most likely thing to happen is that they would form a minority government (even if it doesn't last the entire term) like happened in 2006 and 2008.

Moreover, I doubt that the NDP wants to be associated with an ever increasingly unpopular Justin Trudeau.
Perhaps if the Liberals were lead by another more popular and above all more consensual leader - note that Trudeau is not even consensual within is party and government at least since recently, just look at the SNC-Lavalin controversy - then the scenario that you posed could become somehow more likely. But even then I have my doubts, again looking at the Canadian election history.

I didn't know that. It must be fun trying to pass a bill, when the opposition out numbers you.

[ricnunes]

I didn't know that. It must be fun trying to pass a bill, when the opposition out numbers you.

Yeah, sometimes (or ever most times) it's "fun" indeed.

However I like such arrangements since it forces the government party to negotiate bills with the opposition (or at least, parts of the opposition) in order to reach a consensus which IMO often results in bills that are better for the people in general, this as opposed to the majority governments which trend to rule as they please, in some or even many case for the bad.
The downside is that such minority government sometimes if not usually, don't finish their terms.

[Corsair1963]

Canada's fighter jet tender competition (finally) takes off next month

Attempts to replace 3-decade-old CF-18s began in 2010, but have been mired in politics


The politically charged competition to replace Canada's aging fleet of fighter jets will rocket forward at the end of May as the federal government releases a long-anticipated, full-fledged tender call.

There are four companies in the running: Saab of Sweden, Airbus Defence and Space out of Britain, and the American firms Boeing and Lockheed Martin.

Once the request for proposals is released, the manufacturers will have until the end of the year to submit bids, defence and industry sources told CBC News.


It was the former Conservative government that kicked off the effort to replace the three-decade-old CF-18s in 2010, an attempt that was shot down in a dispute over the way the F-35 fighter was selected.

The program became mired in politics when the Liberals promised during the 2015 election campaign not to buy the stealth jet. A final decision will now have to wait until after this fall's election.

The competition comes at a time of renewed geopolitical rivalry between the West and Russia and China, and the chief of the Swedish Air Force says his fighters have been busier than ever.

Maj.-Gen. Mats Helgesson said Sweden, which has a long history of being a neutral and non-aligned country, has over the past few years found its airspace violated more frequently by both Russian and NATO warplanes.

That has required a stepped-up state of readiness for the country's Gripen fighter jet squadrons.

"When we look around our borders, especially over the Baltic Sea, we can see increased activity, not only Russia but also NATO," Helgesson told CBC News in an interview.

"We see exercises. We see daily training and we also see intelligence gathering in a way that we haven't seen for many years."

The Swedish air force is about the same size as the Royal Canadian Air Force. It has long flown the home-grown Gripen, which has gone through various iterations and models since it was first introduced in the mid-1990s.


The aircraft's design improvements, said Helgesson, are a direct result of what the military and the country's engineers can see being developed in Russia.

"It's no secret that we need to be able to meet, not only Russia, but also other high-performing aircraft in the future," he said, pointing to Russia's Su-30 fighter jet, the more modern Su-35 (known by the NATO designation "The Flanker") and the stealth Su-57.

There has been a rigorous political and academic debate about whether Canada should choose a legacy design from the 1990s, such as the Gripen, or the recently introduced Lockheed Martin F-35 stealth fighter.

The notion that stealth fighters are needed for conflicts with countries like Russia — countries that have advanced air defence systems — was partly dismissed by the Swedish Defence Research Agency in a recent report.

Russia's anti-access/areas-denial weapons (known as A2/AD) are not all they're cracked up to be, said the report released last month, which looked at the use of such systems in the Syria conflict.

"Much has in recent years been made of Russia's new capabilities and the impact they might have on the ability of NATO member states to reinforce or defend the vulnerable Baltic states in case of crisis or war," said the report.

"On closer inspection, however, Russia's capabilities are not quite as daunting, especially if potential countermeasures are factored in."

The Gripen is intended for operations in rugged environments, such as Sweden's Arctic region, Helgesson added.

"We are operating from dispersed bases," he said. "We use highways and small airfields spread all over Sweden in remote places, far away. And the logistics footprint is very small."

The Arctic is, naturally, an important area of operation for the Swedish air force and having far-flung bases has required the force to become creative about warehousing fuel, ammunition and other supplies.

Canada's CF-18s occasionally operate from forward bases in the North, but those deployments are infrequent compared with the routine activity of the Swedes, experts have noted in the past.

Like Canada, Helgesson said, Sweden has just started reinvesting in defence.

The competition among manufacturers for Canada's fighter jet business is expected to be intense.

Lockheed Martin will again pitch its F-35 stealth fighter. Boeing is in line to offer the Super Hornet — a larger, more advanced version of the F-18. Airbus Military plans to offer its Eurofighter Typhoon.



https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/fighte ... -1.5096811

[spazsinbad]

Similar quotes may be found in the TURKISH threads: viewtopic.php?f=58&t=53202&p=413485&hilit=Sweden#p413485

"...countries that have advanced air defence systems — was partly dismissed by the Swedish Defence Research Agency in a recent report.

Russia's anti-access/areas-denial weapons (known as A2/AD) are not all they're cracked up to be, said the report released last month, which looked at the use of such systems in the Syria conflict.

"Much has in recent years been made of Russia's new capabilities and the impact they might have on the ability of NATO member states to reinforce or defend the vulnerable Baltic states in case of crisis or war," said the report.

"On closer inspection, however, Russia's capabilities are not quite as daunting, especially if potential countermeasures are factored in."..."

[Corsair1963]

If, the F-15EX is so capable and cost effective. Then odd that Boeing isn't pitching it to Canada for it's future fighter???