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#3054118 - 07/17/10 04:24 AM Canada buys the F-35  
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Farcaster Offline
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Conservatives announce $9-billion purchase

No competition, no White Paper, no bids. We did all that back in 2001 when the Libs were in power, and invested $168-million in development. We've recouped more than twice that in contracts so far, and now the Liberals are screaming that there should be a new competition.

"Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff said a Liberal government would put the sole-sourced contract on hold and call on the House of Commons defence committee to review the governments secret, unaccountable decisionto buy the fleet." Later, he said if he becomes Prime Minister, he'd cancel the contract! That's not going over very well with Canadians who recall what former Liberal PM Chretien did back in the mid-90's. The dumbass appears to have been unaware that back then, Liberal PM Chretien did just that for the replacement of our 1950's Sea King helicopters, at a cost of $500-million, after the Conservatives had ordered 50 EH-101's. Pilots died as those old helos fell out of the sky on a regular basis and couldn't operate off our ships any longer.

Anyway, replacing 60 CF-18s one for one with the F-35 is really the only real option. Our Hornets will be close to 40 years old when the Lightning IIs start to arrive in 2016. This year, Boeing completed the 2nd phase of the CF-18 modernization program for our Hornets, adding the Link 16 system, a helmet-mounted sight, new cockpit displays and a new flare-dispensing electronic warfare system. The CF-18s are due to be retired in 2020. Boeing says we've gotten more mileage out of our F-18A/Bs than anyone in the world, but they're at their limit for upgrades.

We've had the Russians flying Bears in our Arctic airspace a lot lately, and I can't wait to see our air-force meet them at the border in these!

Last edited by Farcaster; 07/17/10 04:28 AM.

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#3054119 - 07/17/10 04:33 AM Re: Canada buys the F-35 [Re: Farcaster]  
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Well, as much as I hate no-bid contracts, I don't know that anyone's putting out anything that Canada might be interested in.

The Eurofighter's too expensive even for us Americans and I can't imagine the Sukhoi Su-30 in CAF livery. I suppose you could bootstrap those Hornets for a another decade or so.

pfunk


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#3054129 - 07/17/10 05:24 AM Re: Canada buys the F-35 [Re: Farcaster]  
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I think replacing the CF-18's with the F-35 is a very smart move for Canada.


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#3054144 - 07/17/10 06:24 AM Re: Canada buys the F-35 [Re: PanzerMeyer]  
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How i wish the YF-23 still existed, it would be a shoein.

#3054147 - 07/17/10 06:51 AM Re: Canada buys the F-35 [Re: RMachucaA]  
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I think the F-35 is a good choice for Canada.

Meanwhile the danish parliament decided a while ago to postpone the decision to find a replacement for our F-16 AM MLU's two mere years, at least two parties in parliament are against even getting new aircraft on the grounds that "no enemy exist that can threaten danish airspace...." and we have seen sov... Oops russian snoop through danish airspace over Bornholm.

Staffan


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#3054225 - 07/17/10 01:22 PM Re: Canada buys the F-35 [Re: Squid_DK]  
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Yes, as the 1993 experience showed, procurement projects pushed to the back burner tend to stay there. Hence why the air force is still flying 50 year old Sea Kings.

Wish I could say I was as pleased about the decision to resurrect the Joint Support Ship project, but what can you do.


"...for who are so free as the sons of the waves?"
#3054330 - 07/17/10 04:13 PM Re: Canada buys the F-35 [Re: PFunk]  
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Originally Posted By: PFunk
I suppose you could bootstrap those Hornets for a another decade or so.


The way the project is going, we might have to, to be honest.

I wasn't aware of how expensive the Typhoon is. Does anyone know the costs vs. a F-35A?


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#3054333 - 07/17/10 04:15 PM Re: Canada buys the F-35 [Re: Corsair8X]  
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According to wikipedia its 63M Euros for a Typhoon and $191.1M USD for an F-35. Not sure what the conversion is but the F-35 sounds more expensive.


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#3054337 - 07/17/10 04:19 PM Re: Canada buys the F-35 [Re: ForSquirrels]  
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Just read a little more into that wiki article. It says the final flyaway cost for an F-35 is expected to be $89M USD which I am pretty sure would be cheaper.


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#3054349 - 07/17/10 04:27 PM Re: Canada buys the F-35 [Re: ForSquirrels]  
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Originally Posted By: ForSquirrels
According to wikipedia its 63M Euros for a Typhoon and $191.1M USD for an F-35. Not sure what the conversion is but the F-35 sounds more expensive.
63M comes to 81.5M US$

Originally Posted By: ForSquirrels
Just read a little more into that wiki article. It says the final flyaway cost for an F-35 is expected to be $89M USD which I am pretty sure would be cheaper.
Projected prices always end up higher, so I'd be surprised if that "$89M US" would be the eventual price.

#3054353 - 07/17/10 04:32 PM Re: Canada buys the F-35 [Re: JAMF]  
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Ahh, costs. What they sell it for and what it's worth are a lot of different things. I've seen the Eurofighter unit value at hundreds of millions (GBP) in some places so I don't think it's possible to get an accurate unit value unless you're in Marketing. What it's worth depends on what they factor in; R&D costs, economy-of-scale predictions (and even then, what scale), inflation... you might get better luck getting a straight answer from a politician. My own guess is that they are comparable, with the F-35 costing just a smidgen more, but that's IMO.

#3054364 - 07/17/10 04:43 PM Re: Canada buys the F-35 [Re: JAMF]  
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Michael Ignatieff is a jackass. He has no idea how to run the country, he's just squawking to hear his own voice. Voting in Canada has become very difficult, since I don't trust the Conservatives, the Liberals are effectively leaderless, and the NDP is just scary.

It's not surprising that we're getting the JSF. We've dumped money into the program from the beginning. Too bad is looks like the North end of a Southbound camel. The CF-188 is a great looking plane.


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#3054411 - 07/17/10 05:42 PM Re: Canada buys the F-35 [Re: Ltfransky]  
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If only Deif hadn't scrapped he Arrow !!! wink


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#3054440 - 07/17/10 06:12 PM Re: Canada buys the F-35 [Re: No105_Archie]  
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Let's see if the F-35 doesn't get scrapped, or cut back to a token U.S. buy so that the unit costs scare everybody else off.

#3054441 - 07/17/10 06:13 PM Re: Canada buys the F-35 [Re: No105_Archie]  
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The fighter competition here was also totally insane. The whole show was totally tailored for the JSF.

Eurofighter just went "WTF? At least *try* to look like a fair competition. We're out of here.".

And when Saab submitted their bid, with operation and maintenance numbers validated by the swedish goverment as being correct (seeing as they kind of operate the plane), the norwegian defense department just went and said "Oh those figures are wrong, those costs will be three times as high since we're asking for a slightly modified version" and awarded it to JSF (who doesn't even have a solid price yet).

Pure #%&*$#.

Last edited by EAF331 MadDog; 07/17/10 06:14 PM.
#3054446 - 07/17/10 06:19 PM Re: Canada buys the F-35 [Re: JAMF]  
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Cat Offline
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I'd love to see Su-30MKIs in haze grey and wearing maple leaves. That'd send a much-needed message to Western defense contractors about keeping costs down.

Frankly, though, I'm surprised the Canadians didn't think "Gripen." Saab's solution would seem to me to be exactly what Canada needs-small, fast, versatile, not too expensive, and state of the art. But I'd say that Boeing made the F-35 too sweet to ignore. Probably made some stopgap deal regarding the current Cf-18 fleet.

For that matter, you'd think that Super Hornets would have been a good solution for the Canadians, too. They're already familiar with the basic airframe.

Miao, Cat


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#3054466 - 07/17/10 06:40 PM Re: Canada buys the F-35 [Re: Cat]  
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I would have prferred to see a leasing of latest model Super Hornets with the idea of waiting until 6th generation tech is available, since investing so much into a system like the F-35 now will make it tough to afford a true breakthrough system later.

#3054467 - 07/17/10 06:44 PM Re: Canada buys the F-35 [Re: Cat]  
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Does Canada provide air support in Afghanistan?

#3054475 - 07/17/10 06:53 PM Re: Canada buys the F-35 [Re: Razorback]  
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Canadian fixed-wing aircraft in Afghanistan are used for strategic/tactical airlift only.


"...for who are so free as the sons of the waves?"
#3054493 - 07/17/10 07:15 PM Re: Canada buys the F-35 [Re: fatty]  
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canada needs the f-35. it fits almost all the roles necessary.

the only negative is range and the single engine.

we will see how it can handle the cold temperatures of alberta or the northern areas when the government decides to open new airbases way up there in the arctic.

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