I will believe it when I see actual action. This current government (and a few before) have a history of announcements and equate that to action, where there is very little if any actual movement. It’s all the same crew so I have my doubts.
If Canada could only stop tying both its shoes together we would actually be able to walk the walk instead of just talking the talk. One thing Canada can always be counted on is to do the wrong thing for political reasons... I can't see that changing anytime soon. Canada's motto should be: "We dither, the world passes us by".
I’m with you on fighters. What is important in any conflict is mass. You only need stealth in the first few hours. And a small purchase of F-35s give you that. Gripen E is a decent jet and good value. It might not be the best but you don’t need the best all the time. You need good and you need mass. And you get over any range issues by having more air to air refuelling. Airbus do that very well with the A330 MRTT which is currently in operation with my own UK, France and many others.
I’m less sure about the argument for Bombardier on AEW. It’s a less capable aircraft and, when it comes to AEW, you need capability. Mind you I get the concern over reliance on Boeing. It’s one I suspect the UK is struggling with at the moment as we operate P-8s and are buying E-7s. Now if only Airbus could come up with something based on e.g. the A220-300 (i.e. the C Series …).
Good thought provoking article. As a former Canadian leader of a well known gas turbine OEM I am keenly aware of the arguments for and against sole source supply. In this case, with the current US government and the fundamental changes to our relationship with the US I am strongly in favor of diversifying and greatly increasing the number of fighters in our Air Force fleet. Moving closer to our 2% of GDP commitments to NATO by buying a mix of more Gripons with F-35’s and the subsequent Canadian jobs with Gripons is a great bonus
Canada's a production partner for the F-35, but keeping work share is related to actually buying aircraft. Currently, that would impact 100 Canadian companies and about $1.8 billion in contracts.
I have separately addressed how Canada should address the cancellation penalty. My "solution" is to have the White House pay that penalty. See my separate posting.
Getting involved in the British/Japanese/Italian/Swedish Tempest program would make a lot of sense as a longer term solution. The Typhoon would probably be a good choice as an interim solution, but not sure how quickly Canada could get some into service based on current production. Agreed about avoiding Rafale, though - that's a pretty expensive aircraft, and France has been very difficult in terms of technology transfer.
In hindsight, I regret not preempting the Columbia engine rumor in the column. Sorry about that, but I left it out for brevity. It was a classic case of rumor & speculation getting around the world before Saab could get their pants on. Saab released the following in response to the SA Defensa column:
"This post and information within are not accurate and not true. It is misleading the reader. All the relevant licenses and permissions are in place. Gripen E, logistics & industry package are the perfect fit for Columbia." - Richard Smith, Deputy Head of Marketing & Sales for Gripen, Saab AB.
Thailand also recently selected the Gripen-E over the American F-16V, and there have been no credible reports of the Trump administration moving to block that sale.
The Gripen for Canada team includes many of the Canadian firms currently supporting the GE F404 engines in our CF-18s who can easily support the GE F414 in the Gripen. The F414 is an evolution of the F404, and incorporates Swedish technology originally developed for the Swedish-made Volvo (GKN) RM12 which was a modified GE F404 made in Sweden under license.
I doubt that the US Government would violate their parts agreements with Sweden and Canada; Sweden could retaliate by making GE F414 engines in Sweden without permission. If they do block us, then we would need to reevaluate more than just buying fighter jets from the USA. Thanks for reading.
Ah, this is good information and a good argument that we’d be able to get F414 engines even under a somewhat authoritarian and hostile US regime.
I was caught by all the websites posting that rumour as fact.
I do think though that past performance does not guarantee future performance. Just because the Trump admin has not (yet) blocked Thailand from obtaining the Gripen-E doesn’t mean that they wouldn’t for Canada. The US has not publically speculated on annexing Thailand; they have for Canada.
In hindsight, I regret not preempting the Columbia engine rumor in the column. Sorry about that, but I left it out for brevity. It was a classic case of rumor & speculation getting around the world before Saab could get their pants on. Saab released the following in response to the SA Defensa column:
"This post and information within are not accurate and not true. It is misleading the reader. All the relevant licenses and permissions are in place. Gripen E, logistics & industry package are the perfect fit for Columbia." - Richard Smith, Deputy Head of Marketing & Sales for Gripen, Saab AB.
Thailand also recently selected the Gripen-E over the American F-16V, and there have been no credible reports of the Trump administration moving to block that sale.
The Gripen for Canada team includes many of the Canadian firms currently supporting the GE F404 engines in our CF-18s who can easily support the GE F414 in the Gripen. The F414 is an evolution of the F404, and incorporates Swedish technology originally developed for the Swedish-made Volvo (GKN) RM12 which was a modified GE F404 made in Sweden under license.
I doubt that the US Government would violate their parts agreements with Sweden and Canada; Sweden could retaliate by making GE F414 engines in Sweden without permission. If they do block us, then we would need to reevaluate more than just buying fighter jets from the USA. Thanks for reading.
Subsequent to my post (i.e. this happened a few hours ago), the Colombian defense minister denied reports that the US has threatened to veto Colombia's purchase of the Gripen, which certainly lends credence to Smith's statement. However, and I am certainly no expert on ITAR, my understanding is that even if "All the relevant licenses and permissions are in place" the US government can revoke, suspend or amend any export permissions. I do think that more reporting on the Colombian situation would be helpful in terms of clarifying exactly what is going on.
I am a lot less sanguine about the Trump administration and don't take much comfort in: "I doubt that the US Government would violate their parts agreements with Sweden and Canada", to me that seems like exactly the sort of thing the Trump administration would do.
As the expert, would Sweden be able to switch to another engine for the Gripen-E, or is it too integrated? If Sweden did just manufacture F414 engines without permission for Canada, would that cause us any maintenance problems etc?
Let's get Swedish planes, Korean tanks, Finnish icebreakers, etc ASAP. Build them here and get the tech transfer. It's the fastest way to greater independence in an increasingly dangerous world.
Yes. Much like the Poles did with their purchases from the ROK, the first tranche should be manufactured in the parent country while we stand up the manufacturing capability, and then subsequent tranches and spare parts, etc made here. And who knows, maybe we can sell a few to Mexico.
Sad as it might be, this could be a way to re-purpose a couple Canadian auto plants if the tariffs reduce the number of cars we can sell. Germany's probably going this route, since it's behind on EV market share, and its existing ICE plants will make good tank factories.
Great article. The only reason we ever needed the F-35 — or for that matter the Poseidon or the Boeing AEW — was to be interoperable with US forces. If that no longer is available to us, stop pissing $$$ down that money hole, and look elsewhere, even if it means we’re out the sunk costs already spent — it’s not as if they’ll be worth it. Don’t even consider a mixed fleet, although I like your notion of trolling Trumpty Dumpty with cutting the order by 5 jets for every week he leaves the tariffs on. Point is, I’m happy to whittle down to zero.
But you base your fleet numbers on the false premise that we need an expeditionary Air Force to go overseas and fight other people’s battles. In the current “every country for itself” environment, we don’t need that any more than we need an expeditionary army to send cannon fodder away. Especially when we can’t recruit enough people to man (er, people) the present force levels. The Euros are in better shape now than they were in 1915 or 1939 or 1950.
We only need enough Air Force to keep the USAF from thinking they need to come and patrol our skies for us to protect them. 90-ish Gripens would do that, although it’s problematic if they have Yankee engines. Point is, get anything else that’s available quickly. Oh, and then find the pilots to fly them.
You omit the issue of protecting our own land and air mass. Why would Europe aid us if we are not engaged with Europe. With his orangeness threatening both us and Denmark there is a strong case for Canada and Europe working together in at least the eastern Arctic. That would help us, but we would need to commit to Europe and a couple of sqns of fighters would do that. We cannot continue to rely on others when they cannot rely on us and we cannot pragmatically do it alone.
no remote instant kill switch, just the slower cut-off critical parts and support kill- near-term flight operation continues but gradually (and no very long despite Canadian armed forces skill at keeping old platforms working) fleet is grounded, and it takes a long time to change to something else.
How about we *don't* repeat the stupidity of the F-5 Freedom Fighter buy with a purchase of the Gripen? Fans of Swedish fighters get far too excited about what's actually a tiny plane that inherently lacks payload and capability. The range and capability of the radar is limited by the smaller antenna that can fit in the nose; its payload is limited by its small size and the touted range drops significantly as it gets loaded up. Finally, it lacks the stealth characteristics that have come to define 5th generation fighter technology. It's not going to be a strike fighter with its lack of payload and lack of stealth; its small size and limited radar capabilities aren't going to make it much of an platform for patrolling Canadian airspace.
I put little weight on FFCP requirements that were written in a way to possibly allow something other than the F-35 to win. Remember: the Liberals publicly trashed the F-35, declaring they'd never buy it. They still ended up buying it, because the other aircraft really didn't compare in capability.
That's not trivial. The only other fighter engine that's close would be France's SNECMA M88, and it's not as powerful as the F414 used in the Gripen E/F. You're also not talking about merely swapping in one engine for another: there's also impacts on aircraft weight distribution, structure, intakes, and potentially aerodynamics. And in the end, you still get a little lightweight fighter that's increasingly obsolete as newer aircraft like F-35, NGAD, Tempest, FCAS, and various Chinese types come online.
Does the Gripen need to patrol our airspace, i.e., stay up with long loiter time? Or just fly fast to intercept a contact detected on radar probing or invading our airspace? Isn’t that how we do interceptions now? We don’t keep CF-188s on airborne patrol.
These contacts are going to be sub-sonic Tu-95 Bears just as they were during the 1950s when the CF-100s were intercepting them. We have fewer bases now than we used to so the interceptors will have to fly farther and maybe need aerial refueling if they are going to be carrying enough AIMs to reliably down a squadron of Bears. But that sounds do-able.
With the fighter jet controversy running into decades, making any decision based on a knee jerk tariff war with the US is probably not constructive. On the issue of defending our sovereignty in the north, you are going to pay a lot of money patrolling coast lines which are not really of interest to the Russians or Chinese anyway. The old DEW line ended up becoming obsolete when everybody thought up the idea of chucking nukes into orbit. While the economics for Canada are challenging the economics for Greenland are ridiculous.
With Canada's GDP at 1/10th of the US GDP and not having a lot of the top tier defence companies, the best Canada can hope to achieve is a specialized role in NATO. We seem so far away from meeting the 2% of GDP targets that maybe it is time to rethink what we need to do and how to do it.
Ukraine is also showing us that warfare is changing and if we are making a 10 year plan, drones and IA have got to be factors.
So let me get this straight; The last Conservative government ordered the F35 with some of the manufacturing to be done in Canada, then the Liberal government cancelled the project to restudy the purchase. After study, the military agreed on the F35 but with no manufacturing in Canada but at a higher cost to purchase. Now Carney, the savious or the country presumably, wants to study the project AGAIN!!! Mr. McColl you seem to be priasing the idea to take another look. We've been kicking this can down the runway for how many years now =- a decision was made over ten years ago to buy the F35 and we could have had them here by now but the LPC had to study the project again and decide to go with the F#%.
Now they want Gripens that are admitedly a fine plane but consider that this means two sets of parts, two sets of specialized tools, two sets of softwear and the list goes on. I would also like to suggest that it is high time to avoid placing our military service in Quebec when other parts of the country are equally capable and not such a drain on our transfer payment funds.
As the lyric goes - "meet the new boss, same as the old boss" but apparently we are prepared to be fooled again.
Chris, apparently I spoke out of turn. As you point out there are parts made in Canada - I was not aware of that and assumed (we know what that means) that we lost those contracts when we backed out of the F35 contract under JT. Thanks for the correction.
What an excellent and thought-provoking commentary. Whichever political party is able to form the next government, I believe that Alex McColl's op-ed here offers a viable and sensible blueprint for the Royal Canadian Air Force and Canada more generally, insofar as our piloted air defence capabilities are concerned.
I appreciated, as well, Mr McColl's realpolitik--indeed, the Government of Canada could well put pressure on the United States by diminishing the ultimate size of our F-35 purchase to send a message conveying our dismay and resolve in the face of the Trump administration's senseless and threatening economic coercion.
NB: I acknowledge, nonetheless, @George Skinner's point about the age of the JAS-39 design (a fourth generation fighter jet designed in the late 1980s and updated in the early years of this century), and also the problems with jet engines.
I will believe it when I see actual action. This current government (and a few before) have a history of announcements and equate that to action, where there is very little if any actual movement. It’s all the same crew so I have my doubts.
That's because words over action is a feature of our culture. Risk aversion above all else.
If Canada could only stop tying both its shoes together we would actually be able to walk the walk instead of just talking the talk. One thing Canada can always be counted on is to do the wrong thing for political reasons... I can't see that changing anytime soon. Canada's motto should be: "We dither, the world passes us by".
I’m with you on fighters. What is important in any conflict is mass. You only need stealth in the first few hours. And a small purchase of F-35s give you that. Gripen E is a decent jet and good value. It might not be the best but you don’t need the best all the time. You need good and you need mass. And you get over any range issues by having more air to air refuelling. Airbus do that very well with the A330 MRTT which is currently in operation with my own UK, France and many others.
I’m less sure about the argument for Bombardier on AEW. It’s a less capable aircraft and, when it comes to AEW, you need capability. Mind you I get the concern over reliance on Boeing. It’s one I suspect the UK is struggling with at the moment as we operate P-8s and are buying E-7s. Now if only Airbus could come up with something based on e.g. the A220-300 (i.e. the C Series …).
Good thought provoking article. As a former Canadian leader of a well known gas turbine OEM I am keenly aware of the arguments for and against sole source supply. In this case, with the current US government and the fundamental changes to our relationship with the US I am strongly in favor of diversifying and greatly increasing the number of fighters in our Air Force fleet. Moving closer to our 2% of GDP commitments to NATO by buying a mix of more Gripons with F-35’s and the subsequent Canadian jobs with Gripons is a great bonus
I’d like to know what the cancellation penalty would be to tear up the contract with the US. We cannot be beholden to an irrational “partner”.
Canada's a production partner for the F-35, but keeping work share is related to actually buying aircraft. Currently, that would impact 100 Canadian companies and about $1.8 billion in contracts.
I have separately addressed how Canada should address the cancellation penalty. My "solution" is to have the White House pay that penalty. See my separate posting.
Unfortunately the Gripen uses American engines. The US could easily block the purchase. Maybe the French Dussault Rafale would be a better option.
If that’s a concern then why not the Eurofighter? A truly European project not dominated by one country with its own selfish interests.
Getting involved in the British/Japanese/Italian/Swedish Tempest program would make a lot of sense as a longer term solution. The Typhoon would probably be a good choice as an interim solution, but not sure how quickly Canada could get some into service based on current production. Agreed about avoiding Rafale, though - that's a pretty expensive aircraft, and France has been very difficult in terms of technology transfer.
Came here to post this. US can and does use the engines as a tool of foreign policy.
https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/not-so-fast-america-shoots-down-swedens-gripen-jet-deal-with-colombia
I think we should join the European 6th-gen fighter programme and in the meantime consider the Rafale.
More likely: Lockheed Martin agrees to more domestic control of the fighters to salvage the rest of their sale.
In hindsight, I regret not preempting the Columbia engine rumor in the column. Sorry about that, but I left it out for brevity. It was a classic case of rumor & speculation getting around the world before Saab could get their pants on. Saab released the following in response to the SA Defensa column:
"This post and information within are not accurate and not true. It is misleading the reader. All the relevant licenses and permissions are in place. Gripen E, logistics & industry package are the perfect fit for Columbia." - Richard Smith, Deputy Head of Marketing & Sales for Gripen, Saab AB.
Thailand also recently selected the Gripen-E over the American F-16V, and there have been no credible reports of the Trump administration moving to block that sale.
The Gripen for Canada team includes many of the Canadian firms currently supporting the GE F404 engines in our CF-18s who can easily support the GE F414 in the Gripen. The F414 is an evolution of the F404, and incorporates Swedish technology originally developed for the Swedish-made Volvo (GKN) RM12 which was a modified GE F404 made in Sweden under license.
I doubt that the US Government would violate their parts agreements with Sweden and Canada; Sweden could retaliate by making GE F414 engines in Sweden without permission. If they do block us, then we would need to reevaluate more than just buying fighter jets from the USA. Thanks for reading.
Ah, this is good information and a good argument that we’d be able to get F414 engines even under a somewhat authoritarian and hostile US regime.
I was caught by all the websites posting that rumour as fact.
I do think though that past performance does not guarantee future performance. Just because the Trump admin has not (yet) blocked Thailand from obtaining the Gripen-E doesn’t mean that they wouldn’t for Canada. The US has not publically speculated on annexing Thailand; they have for Canada.
This isn't a hypothetical - the US just blocked Colombia from buying Gripens for this reason.
How long for SAAB to develop a non-ITAR engine version? They have plenty of incentive to do that?
Less time than we can stand up the production line?
It's a good question and one I hope we're talking to the Swedes about!
In hindsight, I regret not preempting the Columbia engine rumor in the column. Sorry about that, but I left it out for brevity. It was a classic case of rumor & speculation getting around the world before Saab could get their pants on. Saab released the following in response to the SA Defensa column:
"This post and information within are not accurate and not true. It is misleading the reader. All the relevant licenses and permissions are in place. Gripen E, logistics & industry package are the perfect fit for Columbia." - Richard Smith, Deputy Head of Marketing & Sales for Gripen, Saab AB.
Thailand also recently selected the Gripen-E over the American F-16V, and there have been no credible reports of the Trump administration moving to block that sale.
The Gripen for Canada team includes many of the Canadian firms currently supporting the GE F404 engines in our CF-18s who can easily support the GE F414 in the Gripen. The F414 is an evolution of the F404, and incorporates Swedish technology originally developed for the Swedish-made Volvo (GKN) RM12 which was a modified GE F404 made in Sweden under license.
I doubt that the US Government would violate their parts agreements with Sweden and Canada; Sweden could retaliate by making GE F414 engines in Sweden without permission. If they do block us, then we would need to reevaluate more than just buying fighter jets from the USA. Thanks for reading.
Thank you for your substantive response.
Subsequent to my post (i.e. this happened a few hours ago), the Colombian defense minister denied reports that the US has threatened to veto Colombia's purchase of the Gripen, which certainly lends credence to Smith's statement. However, and I am certainly no expert on ITAR, my understanding is that even if "All the relevant licenses and permissions are in place" the US government can revoke, suspend or amend any export permissions. I do think that more reporting on the Colombian situation would be helpful in terms of clarifying exactly what is going on.
I am a lot less sanguine about the Trump administration and don't take much comfort in: "I doubt that the US Government would violate their parts agreements with Sweden and Canada", to me that seems like exactly the sort of thing the Trump administration would do.
As the expert, would Sweden be able to switch to another engine for the Gripen-E, or is it too integrated? If Sweden did just manufacture F414 engines without permission for Canada, would that cause us any maintenance problems etc?
Let's get Swedish planes, Korean tanks, Finnish icebreakers, etc ASAP. Build them here and get the tech transfer. It's the fastest way to greater independence in an increasingly dangerous world.
Yes. Much like the Poles did with their purchases from the ROK, the first tranche should be manufactured in the parent country while we stand up the manufacturing capability, and then subsequent tranches and spare parts, etc made here. And who knows, maybe we can sell a few to Mexico.
Sad as it might be, this could be a way to re-purpose a couple Canadian auto plants if the tariffs reduce the number of cars we can sell. Germany's probably going this route, since it's behind on EV market share, and its existing ICE plants will make good tank factories.
Great article. The only reason we ever needed the F-35 — or for that matter the Poseidon or the Boeing AEW — was to be interoperable with US forces. If that no longer is available to us, stop pissing $$$ down that money hole, and look elsewhere, even if it means we’re out the sunk costs already spent — it’s not as if they’ll be worth it. Don’t even consider a mixed fleet, although I like your notion of trolling Trumpty Dumpty with cutting the order by 5 jets for every week he leaves the tariffs on. Point is, I’m happy to whittle down to zero.
But you base your fleet numbers on the false premise that we need an expeditionary Air Force to go overseas and fight other people’s battles. In the current “every country for itself” environment, we don’t need that any more than we need an expeditionary army to send cannon fodder away. Especially when we can’t recruit enough people to man (er, people) the present force levels. The Euros are in better shape now than they were in 1915 or 1939 or 1950.
We only need enough Air Force to keep the USAF from thinking they need to come and patrol our skies for us to protect them. 90-ish Gripens would do that, although it’s problematic if they have Yankee engines. Point is, get anything else that’s available quickly. Oh, and then find the pilots to fly them.
You omit the issue of protecting our own land and air mass. Why would Europe aid us if we are not engaged with Europe. With his orangeness threatening both us and Denmark there is a strong case for Canada and Europe working together in at least the eastern Arctic. That would help us, but we would need to commit to Europe and a couple of sqns of fighters would do that. We cannot continue to rely on others when they cannot rely on us and we cannot pragmatically do it alone.
The kill switch is fake news. Make a bloody decision and finish the bloody project. We cannot afford any more delays!!!!!
That's probably why the author said: "there is no such thing as a remote kill-switch".
no remote instant kill switch, just the slower cut-off critical parts and support kill- near-term flight operation continues but gradually (and no very long despite Canadian armed forces skill at keeping old platforms working) fleet is grounded, and it takes a long time to change to something else.
How about we *don't* repeat the stupidity of the F-5 Freedom Fighter buy with a purchase of the Gripen? Fans of Swedish fighters get far too excited about what's actually a tiny plane that inherently lacks payload and capability. The range and capability of the radar is limited by the smaller antenna that can fit in the nose; its payload is limited by its small size and the touted range drops significantly as it gets loaded up. Finally, it lacks the stealth characteristics that have come to define 5th generation fighter technology. It's not going to be a strike fighter with its lack of payload and lack of stealth; its small size and limited radar capabilities aren't going to make it much of an platform for patrolling Canadian airspace.
Both the F-35 and the Gripen-E met the requirements of the FFCP evaluation.
If you add a new requirement for full sovereign control of mission data, only the Gripen-E meets the requirements.
I put little weight on FFCP requirements that were written in a way to possibly allow something other than the F-35 to win. Remember: the Liberals publicly trashed the F-35, declaring they'd never buy it. They still ended up buying it, because the other aircraft really didn't compare in capability.
What's the capability of a fighter with no spare parts, and restricted functionality software?
How does the Gripen (powered by an American-designed F404 or F414 engine) address this problem? Buy Typhoon or Rafale.
Sure, or SAAB has a ton of incentive to design for a non-ITAR engine version now.
That's not trivial. The only other fighter engine that's close would be France's SNECMA M88, and it's not as powerful as the F414 used in the Gripen E/F. You're also not talking about merely swapping in one engine for another: there's also impacts on aircraft weight distribution, structure, intakes, and potentially aerodynamics. And in the end, you still get a little lightweight fighter that's increasingly obsolete as newer aircraft like F-35, NGAD, Tempest, FCAS, and various Chinese types come online.
Does the Gripen need to patrol our airspace, i.e., stay up with long loiter time? Or just fly fast to intercept a contact detected on radar probing or invading our airspace? Isn’t that how we do interceptions now? We don’t keep CF-188s on airborne patrol.
These contacts are going to be sub-sonic Tu-95 Bears just as they were during the 1950s when the CF-100s were intercepting them. We have fewer bases now than we used to so the interceptors will have to fly farther and maybe need aerial refueling if they are going to be carrying enough AIMs to reliably down a squadron of Bears. But that sounds do-able.
Sounds sensible but why do I think we will end with neither, rather than both?
Only in a country like Canada would a guy like Alex McColl not be working in aviation and defence industry in a leadership role.
With the fighter jet controversy running into decades, making any decision based on a knee jerk tariff war with the US is probably not constructive. On the issue of defending our sovereignty in the north, you are going to pay a lot of money patrolling coast lines which are not really of interest to the Russians or Chinese anyway. The old DEW line ended up becoming obsolete when everybody thought up the idea of chucking nukes into orbit. While the economics for Canada are challenging the economics for Greenland are ridiculous.
With Canada's GDP at 1/10th of the US GDP and not having a lot of the top tier defence companies, the best Canada can hope to achieve is a specialized role in NATO. We seem so far away from meeting the 2% of GDP targets that maybe it is time to rethink what we need to do and how to do it.
Ukraine is also showing us that warfare is changing and if we are making a 10 year plan, drones and IA have got to be factors.
So let me get this straight; The last Conservative government ordered the F35 with some of the manufacturing to be done in Canada, then the Liberal government cancelled the project to restudy the purchase. After study, the military agreed on the F35 but with no manufacturing in Canada but at a higher cost to purchase. Now Carney, the savious or the country presumably, wants to study the project AGAIN!!! Mr. McColl you seem to be priasing the idea to take another look. We've been kicking this can down the runway for how many years now =- a decision was made over ten years ago to buy the F35 and we could have had them here by now but the LPC had to study the project again and decide to go with the F#%.
Now they want Gripens that are admitedly a fine plane but consider that this means two sets of parts, two sets of specialized tools, two sets of softwear and the list goes on. I would also like to suggest that it is high time to avoid placing our military service in Quebec when other parts of the country are equally capable and not such a drain on our transfer payment funds.
As the lyric goes - "meet the new boss, same as the old boss" but apparently we are prepared to be fooled again.
Hang on now. Parts for the F-35 are manufactured in Canada. The whole sordid history of this procurement in Canada is infuriating, but no need to fib.
Chris, apparently I spoke out of turn. As you point out there are parts made in Canada - I was not aware of that and assumed (we know what that means) that we lost those contracts when we backed out of the F35 contract under JT. Thanks for the correction.
What an excellent and thought-provoking commentary. Whichever political party is able to form the next government, I believe that Alex McColl's op-ed here offers a viable and sensible blueprint for the Royal Canadian Air Force and Canada more generally, insofar as our piloted air defence capabilities are concerned.
I appreciated, as well, Mr McColl's realpolitik--indeed, the Government of Canada could well put pressure on the United States by diminishing the ultimate size of our F-35 purchase to send a message conveying our dismay and resolve in the face of the Trump administration's senseless and threatening economic coercion.
NB: I acknowledge, nonetheless, @George Skinner's point about the age of the JAS-39 design (a fourth generation fighter jet designed in the late 1980s and updated in the early years of this century), and also the problems with jet engines.
100%