The F-35 is not dead

[Rockie]

Oh man Old Fella, don't get me started on those two shameless, brainless, spineless losers.

[Old fella]

Oh man Old Fella, don't get me started on those two shameless, brainless, spineless losers.

Well one of them got the boot from his seat and the other is marginalized to the back and hopefully the new CON interim leader (Ambrose) will not promote him to a Cabinet/Dept. critic position. If the CONs want to establish themselves as a future government, they gotta get beyond the 30-32% base vote they have which is mostly rural, angry grey hair old men/women. They have little urban vote now and certainly not the progressive vote either. I believe the Reform era (Kenny) will have less affluence and a more swing to the former Progressive Conservative is their new direction. The decade of Harper and subsequent style is probably done as that experiment crashed in a spectacular fashion. I mean, the third party went from 40 odd seats to a majority of 184. Just my view.

[B208]

So, again, Rockie; Why is it a OK to base selection decisions on race/gender vice aptitude for the job?

What makes you think the cabinet ministers aren't extremely capable, who isn't, why aren't they, and what expertise do you bring to the table to make that determination?

Our new Minister Of Defence comes to mind as not being the best person for the job. Whilst it is true that he does have previous service, he topped out as a reserve LCol and lacks the intricate knowledge of the working of higher level DND.
LGen (retired) Leslie was a highly regarded general officer who not only has tremendous experience at the highest levels of DND but also formulated a plan to rejuvenate and lean out the CAF. In addition to this he was the liberal party's defence critic.
Gen Leslie was passed over becuase he was white. In our culturally Marxist society that is progressive thought; in any rational society that is racism.

[Rockie]

You don't need intimate knowledge of the higher workings at NDHQ to be an effective MOD, you just need to learn about it. One of our most effective MOD's in my time was a PC career politician as a matter of factback in the 80's. Our current MOD can learn all that, plus he brings to the table a unique insight into our latest adversaries and a caring for military members that only a serving military member could really have. The fact his ethnic background is also unique is not a detriment even if it was a factor in his appointment, it is a benefit in ways that someone like you could not possibly understand.

While General Leslie would also have been an excellent choice, I think there is a certain amount of truth behind the argument he is too close to the NDHQ hierarchy despite his past willingness to ruffle feathers. He is now the government whip where his unquestionable leadership skills will be put to excellent use.

Where ethnicity and gender are detriments to you, people with broader minds see strength.

[B208]

Oh brother. You can't have it both ways, Rockie. It was the Liberals and Trudeau himself who chose to trumpet the fact that the cabinet has "gender equity" to try and score points. What other conclusion can be drawn from that, than that this was a more important criteria than "capability and expertise"?

Welcome to the standards of the cultural Marxist. Rational thought and discourse are subverted and subornd to the needs of doctrine. The age of double speak and double think are upon us.
As an aside, it will be telling to see how long this thread lasts now that the politics in it has drifted away from a critique of the right.

[frosti]

This procurement is a waste of time, money and a laughing stock to our international partners.

I'm an RCAF jet-pilot, and I've come to the conclusion that reading your posts was an even bigger waste of my time.

I'm sorry, but we just don't matter, Canadians don't care about the Military, has been like this for decades. If they really cared they would give us the money and equipment we need. All I see are crumbling aircraft and buildings.

[Troubleshot]

This procurement is a waste of time, money and a laughing stock to our international partners.

I'm an RCAF jet-pilot, and I've come to the conclusion that reading your posts was an even bigger waste of my time.

I'm sorry, but we just don't matter, Canadians don't care about the Military, has been like this for decades. If they really cared they would give us the money and equipment we need. All I see are crumbling aircraft and buildings.

Oh my god.... this is what we've gotten to with this. hate to break it to ya champ infrastructure is in bad shape everywhere, not just in the Military. "Canadians don't care"...what a load of self-serving crap. How the hell do you know what I care about?

Ya see this what happens when the facts start getting in the way, the pouting starts...

[Rockie]

Welcome to the standards of the cultural Marxist. Rational thought and discourse are subverted and subornd to the needs of doctrine. The age of double speak and double think are upon us.

Ok, I admit I had no idea what "cultural Marxism" was so I had to look it up. You learn something every day....

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfre ... the-victim

[B208]

Welcome to the standards of the cultural Marxist. Rational thought and discourse are subverted and subornd to the needs of doctrine. The age of double speak and double think are upon us.

Ok, I admit I had no idea what "cultural Marxism" was so I had to look it up. You learn something every day....

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfre ... the-victim

Let me fix that for you:

http://en.metapedia.org/wiki/Cultural_Marxism

I note, with interest, your hesitance or inability to explain how the selection of our current Minister of Nation Defence over Gen Leslie was not an act of racism.

[Rockie]

I note, with interest, your hesitance or inability to explain how the selection of our current Minister of Nation Defence over Gen Leslie was not an act of racism.

Simple really...I don't need to explain why something perfectly normal that complies with longstanding convention in cabinet ministerial selection is not racist. Since you're making the accusation that it was I think you should be prepared to explain why - without resorting to loony right wing conspiracy theories that is.

Metapedia huh? Explains everything...here's a few more random quotes from your preferred source of social knowledge:

"Canada is the second largest country in the world by total area. Occupying most of northern North America, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west and northward into the Arctic Ocean. Canada shares land borders with the United States to the south and northwest. At present Canada is under a Jewish police state regime, where freedoms are very limited; the regime is backed up by a cadre of Freemasons of British ancestry and Marxists of French ancestry"

"Nazi (also the cognates Nazism and Neo-Nazism) is a political epithet invented by Konrad Heiden (7 August 1901 – 18 June 1966) during the 1920s as a means of denigrating the NSDAP and National Socialism.[1] Heiden was a journalist and member of the Social Democratic Party of Germany, whose mother was a Jewess."

"Affirmative action (or positive discrimination, employment equity, reservation, positive action) is policies which discriminate in favor of certain groups such as racial/ethnic groups or gender groups which are argued to be disadvantaged. Most typically it applies to selection of persons for employment or education but may also apply to activities such as public contracting and health programs

The section on the holocaust is particularly disturbing in its prevalent use of the word "alleged" throughout the article when describing the "alleged" camps and the "alleged" activities within.

[B208]

I note, with interest, your hesitance or inability to explain how the selection of our current Minister of Nation Defence over Gen Leslie was not an act of racism.

I didn't explain it because I couldn't.

Fixed that for you.

[2R]

Rumour is that they are going to announce the purchase on Wednesday.
That source cost me two beers ,let us see if it was worth it ,although he did not say which Wednesday

[Rockie]

Welcome to the standards of the cultural Marxist. Rational thought and discourse are subverted and subornd to the needs of doctrine. The age of double speak and double think are upon us.

Ok, I admit I had no idea what "cultural Marxism" was so I had to look it up. You learn something every day....

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfre ... the-victim

Let me fix that for you:

http://en.metapedia.org/wiki/Cultural_Marxism

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metapedia

"Metapedia is an electronic encyclopedia, which states that it focuses on European culture, art, science, philosophy and politics. It contains far-right, white nationalist, white supremacist, white separatist, antisemitic, and neo-Nazi[2] points of view.[3][4][5] It was officially launched on 26 October 2006 with the Swedish-language edition.[6][7] The English section was launched on 28 April 2007.[6][8] The Hungarian version has the most articles: 144,189 as of 27 September 2013.[9]"

[Spokes]

Are things kinda getting off topic here? The debate on the merits of this aircraft is extremely interesting, particularly given the direct experience of most of the debaters. How did it descend to mud slinging by all?

[Rockie]

Back on topic:

If the F35 delivers on the technical superiority it claims, and if they can overcome physical and aerodynamic laws to make its performance adequate, and if they can somehow reduce the price enough to at least put affordability somewhere on the distant horizon, it might be just the thing for Europe.

But it will never be suitable for Canadian sovereignty defence (the first priority of every Conservative and Liberal government). Our unique requirements are just too different than the USAF, USN, USMC or other NATO partners. The closest that comes to us is Australia, but not really. They aren't as big and their climate is a whole bunch more survivable.

[Spokes]

So Rockie, I have a couple questions.

What do you see as a good choice to fit Canada's needs? What are the contenders? What are the pro's and cons of the choice you would make?

Also, do we really expect fighters to patrol huge swaths of the arctic? Isn't that something better left to Aurora aircraft (JUSTASS maybe). I get that there may be a need to station aircraft as interceptors, but would a decent SAR capability and proper arctic survival training mitigate the single engine risk? I seem to remember being fairly confident I could easily 3 or 4 days in the high arctic after taking that course.

I am not trying to be confrontational, these are just questions that have built up in my mind having followed this discussion. I initially though the f-35 was a reasonable choice, but now am not sure. Thanks.

[Rockie]

Also, do we really expect fighters to patrol huge swaths of the arctic? Isn't that something better left to Aurora aircraft (JUSTASS maybe).

Sorry for chopping up your post but this fits my answer better.

Patrolling the arctic is already done with Auroras which is fine but they have no air defence capability which is what we're talking about here. Confronted by an Aurora, a TU-95 would simply wave and continue doing what they were doing. If the Aurora confronted a fighter the results do not bear thinking about (pun unintended).

I get that there may be a need to station aircraft as interceptors, but would a decent SAR capability and proper arctic survival training mitigate the single engine risk? I seem to remember being fairly confident I could easily 3 or 4 days in the high arctic after taking that course.

In early 1991 a friend of mine crashed a Hercules about 10 miles from CFS Alert. Despite knowing about it almost immediately and the close proximity to Alert it still took 30 hours to rescue them. Canada does not have a decent SAR capability even in the lower part of the country, and we will never have one in the north. Crash up there and you are on your own for a long time assuming they can even find you.

What do you see as a good choice to fit Canada's needs? What are the contenders? What are the pro's and cons of the choice you would make?

First off because of the above, if it doesn't have two engines it is not a contender under any circumstances...period. Second, I don't buy the argument that we have to have a 5th generation fighter. The Air Forces of the entire western world will not be flying F-35's exclusively and it's not like they will be operating alone, so other equipment will be made interoperable if it isn't already. Stealth is a waste of money for what we need the airplane for - simple as that.

Given that there is the Super Hornet, Rafale and Typhoon. All of them face termination of their production runs if new orders aren't secured, but if they are I see no reason they can't continue and receive hardware and software upgrades to make them effective far into the future. The idea that the F-35 is the only option available from a military standpoint is false. The French have also said the Rafale would result in much more guaranteed industrial offsets than the potential ones (to be negotiated) that the F-35 offers.

There are many other considerations and priorities only the government is privy to though and this is only my opinion.

[Spokes]

Thanks for the Answers Rockie. I get the whole single engine multi engine issue. That argument seems to be as old as time on AvCanada. However Some of your points need examining I think.

First of I do realize Aurora's are doing arctic patrols now. They are not doing enough (or were not last time I was involved in that kind of thing). I dd plenty in the 80's But they seem to have tapered off. I don't expect them to do intercept type stuff, the same way I don't expect Fighters would do long range arctic patrols. If there is a serious need to put fighters in the arctic to deal with air threats, then they should be staged of course at strategic places to effectively carry out this task. This could then be coupled with an effective SAR capability. The 91 crash is exactly the reason I attended the arctic survival course in 92. There really was no SAR capability in Alert at that time. After having said all that, I do still get the one engine two engine argument. I also get that putting a lot of SAR up with remote camps like that is a big expense to support an operation based on a one engine plane. isn't that something to be decided by a completion? How much SAR is needed for two engine aircraft? I believe the Herc has 4.

I believe that the three aircraft you have listed are all basically 90's era aircraft. Your arguments are good, particularly the one regarding the Rafale and the spin off contracts. I watched these guys sometimes coming and going in Kandahar. Pretty slick looking jet. My question is how you feel about our new fighters being Almost 20 year old technology?

Thanks for indulging me,
Mike.

[Rockie]

The technology won't be 20 years old though. They've upgraded the CF-18's technology over the years and my understanding is it's a very different jet than when I flew it, the problem is that the airframes are almost 35 years old.

Any of the other choices will have the latest gear, they'll be brand new airframes and as far as performance goes they give nothing up to the F-35 from what I've read. For what our priorities are we don't need the most expensive weapon in history that has what in my mind an unredeemable deficiency, even if they got it to work and we could afford it.

[AuxBatOn]

The price we will pay to keep the jets up to date will be greater than whatever we would pay for the JSF.

If it was just me, I'd get F-15E, but the pricetag is way more expensive than a JSF.

[Troubleshot]

The price we will pay to keep the jets up to date will be greater than whatever we would pay for the JSF.

If it was just me, I'd get F-15E, but the pricetag is way more expensive than a JSF.

OK I'll bite, why is the F-15E more expensive than the F-35?

[Spokes]

Thanks for the insight Rockie.

ABO:
"The price we will pay to keep the jets up to date will be greater than whatever we would pay for the JSF."

I suppose that will be the type of thing settled in a completion. There is that and a whole lot of other variables involved. Not the least of which will be maintaining a SAR presence in the arctic supporting what ever is up there.

There seems to be a lot of discussion of these jets "patrolling" in the Arctic. Sounds like it would be closer to "stationed up there" and doing intercepts as required. Still, having spent a week in an igloo I built up there, I sure would not be happy ejecting after my only engine died.

[AuxBatOn]

The price we will pay to keep the jets up to date will be greater than whatever we would pay for the JSF.

If it was just me, I'd get F-15E, but the pricetag is way more expensive than a JSF.

OK I'll bite, why is the F-15E more expensive than the F-35?

3100 JSF to be built vs 400 F-15E ever...

[AuxBatOn]

Thanks for the insight Rockie.

ABO:
"The price we will pay to keep the jets up to date will be greater than whatever we would pay for the JSF."

I suppose that will be the type of thing settled in a completion. There is that and a whole lot of other variables involved. Not the least of which will be maintaining a SAR presence in the arctic supporting what ever is up there.

There seems to be a lot of discussion of these jets "patrolling" in the Arctic. Sounds like it would be closer to "stationed up there" and doing intercepts as required. Still, having spent a week in an igloo I built up there, I sure would not be happy ejecting after my only engine died.

Single engine doesn't worry me. The only times I landed single engine was when I shut an engine down precautionarily.

I built the igloo as well and slept a couple of days outside in -50. I was warm and comfortable in the snow cave. I would never build an Igloo by myself.

We have SKADs we can drop to a survivor with some warm kit. We bring them up North with us.

[Rockie]

Thanks for the insight Rockie.

ABO:
"The price we will pay to keep the jets up to date will be greater than whatever we would pay for the JSF."

I suppose that will be the type of thing settled in a completion. There is that and a whole lot of other variables involved. Not the least of which will be maintaining a SAR presence in the arctic supporting what ever is up there.

There seems to be a lot of discussion of these jets "patrolling" in the Arctic. Sounds like it would be closer to "stationed up there" and doing intercepts as required. Still, having spent a week in an igloo I built up there, I sure would not be happy ejecting after my only engine died.

Single engine doesn't worry me. The only times I landed single engine was when I shut an engine down precautionarily.

I built the igloo as well and slept a couple of days outside in -50. I was warm and comfortable in the snow cave. I would never build an Igloo by myself.

We have SKADs we can drop to a survivor with some warm kit. We bring them up North with us.

The reason you do a precautionary engine shutdown is to prevent catastrophic damage to it - and isn't it nice to have that option? I've shut one down as a precaution as well but it was trashed anyway and all I did was prevent a fire. In my case having another engine turned a probable parachute ride and loss of a jet into a minor event.

You and others have repeatedly said the risk doesn't bother you but you're forgetting that it's not your call. I'm not prepared to risk your life sending you up there in a single engine jet with no SAR coverage, nor am I willing to risk losing an extremely expensive asset because we lacked the foresight to get something with engine redundancy. The government should be thinking along the same lines.