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F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF)

  • Thread starter Thread starter Sharpey
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Transporter said:
Nice thought, but not possible.

In the realm of aerial combat, if you're flying the second best aircraft, it usually means you're dead. It's not necessarily the air frame that wins, but the technology in it. If you don't have the latest, you may as well stay home... and then what's the point of having any at all?

While I would tend to agree, I also meant that why need a F-35 when say a small stealthy attack aircraft can do the job for a 5th of the cost. Some technologies while new and very sensitive aren't to much ahead of whats currently used. I would rather a mixed fleet of hundreds of cheap aircraft that can do the same job of a handful of expensive aircraft with all the bells and whistles.
 
MilEME09 said:
Some technologies while new and very sensitive aren't to much ahead of whats currently used. I would rather a mixed fleet of hundreds of cheap aircraft that can do the same job of a handful of expensive aircraft with all the bells and whistles.

If you honestly think that the F-35's technology is anywhere close to whats being used today, you've bought the Boeing propaganda hook, line and sinker.
 
PuckChaser said:
If you honestly think that the F-35's technology is anywhere close to whats being used today, you've bought the Boeing propaganda hook, line and sinker.

i was referring in general about the type of aircraft im describing and in no way suggesting the F-35 is at the cutting edge of aircraft technology
 
From Fridays National Post, an article not only about Dassault's bid to sell the Rafale to Canada, but also, that DCNS is pitching their FREMM frigate as a possible contender for the Canada Surface Combatant contract. Reproduced under the usual caveats of the Copyright Act.

Breaking Lockheed Martin’s inside track at DND

Michael Den Tandt | July 10, 2014 8:04 PM ET

A phalanx of major French defence firms is lining up to provide Canada with new warships and planes, in hopes of prying a share of the biggest Canadian military hardware bonanza since the Second World War away from U.S. industry heavyweight Lockheed Martin. In the process the French appear to be offering the Harper government a timely and politically saleable off-ramp from its multi-year, multi-billion-dollar procurement mess.

What remains to be seen is whether Prime Minister Stephen Harper and cabinet have the wit and wherewithal to seize the opportunity, or whether they will submit, as in the past, to the forces of inertia within the Defence department, which perennially favours Lockheed.

At issue are two massive contracts — $9-billion (or $46-billion, factoring in all life-cycle costs) to replace Canada’s aging fleet of Boeing F-18 A jet fighters, and $26-billion for the Canada Surface Combatant ships, to replace the Royal Canadian Navy’s three ancient Iroquois-class destroyers, and 12 Halifax-class frigates built in the 1980s. Together, these two contracts amount to a complete rebuild of the “sharp” edges of both the Royal Canadian Air Force and the RCN.

Throughout the Harper government’s difficulties with its F-35 purchase, announced with great fanfare in 2010 and abruptly shelved two years later, French consortium Dassault has been quietly positioning its Rafale twin-engined fighter as an alternative, while also lobbying for a competition on the contract. Recently Dassault has moved into a more aggressive phase of its lobbying, with senior company executives pitching a “Canadianized” version of the Rafale, major components of which could be built in Canada by Canadian workers.

At the same time, French naval defence giant DCNS is now campaigning for a large piece — industry sources say as much as 70%, or $18- billion worth — of the build awarded to the Irving shipyard in Halifax in the fall of 2011. At issue are hull design, weapons and communications systems. DCNS argues, in an internal document obtained by Postmedia News, that its FREMM multi-purpose frigate could be adapted to Canadian needs, at significant cost savings. In language similar to Dassault’s, DCNS also argues for a competitive bidding process.

The shipbuilder’s leading competitor for much of this work? Lockheed Martin. As with the F-35, there is a view within Canadian defence circles that the U.S. defence juggernaut has the inside track at DND, for reasons that include the long-standing close technological and tactical co-operation of the Canadian and U.S. militaries, but extend beyond that to how its new weapons systems operate.

Industry sources say Lockheed Martin’s ship systems are designed to allow what’s known as Cooperative Engagement Capability, essentially the tactical integration of sensory and weapons systems across a fleet. All Lockheed’s new weapons systems, including the F-35, effectively transform individual weapons platforms into linchpins in a far-flung sensor array. The appeal for Canadian military brass weaned on inter-operability with U.S. forces is obvious: They want to be at the table for a share of the information treasure trove these globally networked systems will yield.

The counter-argument from DCNS, and also Dassault, is simply this: French military platforms are clearly interoperable with U.S. systems, as has been proven in numerous North Atlantic Treaty Organization military engagements. And, unlike Lockheed Martin, the French are willing to share their source code, as well as allow for construction in Canada. In a speech in Ottawa last November, then-DCNS chief executive Patrick Boissier promised 10,000 jobs over 10 years, should Canada opt for its FREMM frigate design.

It’s unrealistic to imagine that, in the year before a federal election, the federal government will overturn 30 years of joined-at-the-hip Canada-U.S. military doctrine. But it’s equally unlikely now to entertain a scenario in which the Harper Conservatives can be seen to award any major sole-source contract (that is, with no open, competitive bidding process) to Lockheed Martin’s advantage.

Moreover, there are new political doctrines to bear in mind: Both the Emerson Report and the Jenkins Report that followed urged Ottawa to pay more heed to Canadian industrial benefits — in shorthand, jobs — when making procurement decisions, and the government pledged to do so.

Finally, as an outrider, there’s the stalled Keystone XL pipeline, and the developing Canada-European free trade zone. Rarely has the Canada-U.S. strategic relationship been more frayed, and rarely has there been more reason for a Canadian government to make a gesture of openness to European competition on major federal government contracts.

Taken together, it amounts to this: The weight of political pressure on the Harper PMO to force all this extraordinarily expensive, time-consuming and important work up for competition, rather than allow any of it to be sole-sourced to any one supplier, is nigh overwhelming.

DND earned itself no brownie points with the F-35 imbroglio. It will be no surprise at all if, whether on ships, planes or both, the brass is soon told to go pound salt, and a rigorously transparent, competitive bidding process is put in place, once and for all. Given the enormous sums at stake, and the political dynamic, it becomes increasingly difficult to imagine another outcome.

Postmedia News

Article Link
 
SupersonicMax said:
Oh, it is WAY ahead of what's used today, at least in our inventory.

especially in the "starting on fire" area!

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/f-35-fighter-jets-grounded-in-u-s-until-engine-inspections-complete-1.2696032
 
100 of the anticipated fleet of 2000 to 3000 aircraft have been built.  That equates to 3 to 5% of the production fleet.

An equivalent situation would be a navy planning to build 50 LCS or 80 Arleigh Burkes and treating the first 2 or 3 of each class as prototypes that will be brought up to final design standards and operated through a 25 to 40 year life cycle.

Before we go off half-cocked about the problems of putting a new system into service (F35 or LCS - or for that matter CH-148) it might pay to look at the development history of "legacy" systems like the Arleigh Burke (weapons, radars, propellers and hull all have had to be "modernize" "strengthened" "upgraded") or the CF-188 (airframes, wings, weapons systems all upgraded and the aircraft still don't have the life expectancy promised out of the box).

The Low Rate Initial Production fleet is intended to find problems while they can be fixed at a manageable scale (fix 100 AC instead of 3000) while increasing the sample size of the "prototype" fleet.  A larger "prototype" fleet increases the probability of locating design defects before 3000 AC have to be grounded simultaneously.  All the "prototypes" will be kept in service, as the navy usually does with its ships, instead of being discarded, as the air force used to do with its aircraft. 

Of course an F35 is closer in cost to an Arleigh Burke or LCS than it is to a P51 or a Tiffie.
 
Kirkhill said:
100 of the anticipated fleet of 2000 to 3000 aircraft have been built.  That equates to 3 to 5% of the production fleet.

An equivalent situation would be a navy planning to build 50 LCS or 80 Arleigh Burkes and treating the first 2 or 3 of each class as prototypes that will be brought up to final design standards and operated through a 25 to 40 year life cycle.

Before we go off half-cocked about the problems of putting a new system into service (F35 or LCS - or for that matter CH-148) it might pay to look at the development history of "legacy" systems like the Arleigh Burke (weapons, radars, propellers and hull all have had to be "modernize" "strengthened" "upgraded") or the CF-188 (airframes, wings, weapons systems all upgraded and the aircraft still don't have the life expectancy promised out of the box).

The Low Rate Initial Production fleet is intended to find problems while they can be fixed at a manageable scale (fix 100 AC instead of 3000) while increasing the sample size of the "prototype" fleet.  A larger "prototype" fleet increases the probability of locating design defects before 3000 AC have to be grounded simultaneously.  All the "prototypes" will be kept in service, as the navy usually does with its ships, instead of being discarded, as the air force used to do with its aircraft. 

Of course an F35 is closer in cost to an Arleigh Burke or LCS than it is to a P51 or a Tiffie.

I know it's still in development....

 
When talking about Dassults heavy push for a piece of the pie, they have offered a full technology transfer, as reported in god only knows how many pages back in this thread
 
Of course they'll give us a technology transfer, its 30 year old technology. Almost 40 years since its first flight by the time we take delivery.
 
And for those who think French fighters or ships are instantly a good idea, I have two words for you:

1. LG1
2. Eryx
 
SKT, was that Giat's and Mistral's fault, or were their products affected the same way Iveco's well-respected product was 'Canadianized' into the LSVW?

Regards,
G2G
 
To the best of my recollection, both of those systems were built in France, to French specs.

French fighters and ships may be a good deal for Canada, but if I worked in some sort of directorate that managed procurement for the CF, I sure as hell would do a lot of due diligence...
 
I can tell you that Eryx was a politically driven project, top to bottom. It was purchased despite there being no Army requirement and despite Engineering Branch's vociferous objections on technical grounds. Does the name John Killick ring a bell?
 
E.R. Campbell said:
I can tell you that Eryx was a politically driven project, top to bottom. It was purchased despite there being no Army requirement and despite Engineering Branch's vociferous objections on technical grounds. Does the name John Killick ring a bell?

Nope.
 
SeaKingTacco said:
To the best of my recollection, both of those systems were built in France, to French specs.

French fighters and ships may be a good deal for Canada, but if I worked in some sort of directorate that managed procurement for the CF, I sure as hell would do a lot of due diligence...

LG1's were definately built in France (Canada has no capability to forge gun barrels at this time) but interestingly were never put into service by the French  army.

Either way, every military has produced some dud equipment. British, Americans, Germans, French, Russians, etc. We need to evaluate the Mirage against what Canada needs vs what the F35 provides and determine what gives the best bang for the defence buck. Perhaps it comes down to a lesser gen 4 Mirage capability that can be purchased in slightly larger numbers, is cheaper to fly (more flight hours for training, etc) and provides an adequate level of Link 16 interoperability vice the sweetheart system. Perhaps we decide that we want the more expensive option, purchase fewer, and take the risk on less pilot and FAC training hours (perhaps using simulation vs real time flight for currency of FACs and pilots  ???) to mitigate the higher per hour flight costs.

Each option has an advantage. If another A-stan flares up and the money goes to the army again than what is the impact on a $50,000/hour (last figure we got from the FAC cell at the RCAS) plane's training and flight schedule? Qui sais.....
 
E.R. Campbell said:
I can tell you that Eryx was a politically driven project, top to bottom. It was purchased despite there being no Army requirement and despite Engineering Branch's vociferous objections on technical grounds. Does the name John Killick ring a bell?

No it doesn't but I sense a good story here......
 
Sorry  :highjack:

Jim Seggie said:
No it doesn't but I sense a good story here......


No, only that he was much admired feared hated resented in NDHQ and in official Ottawa.

I first stumbled into him when I was a quite lowly minion in DLR and he was Chief of Supply and he insisted, very properly, on adequate provisions being made, right up front, for logistics stocks and life cycle management costs when we conceived projects. He got his way by using his bureaucratic authority with considerable skill, regularly foiling attempts by the DCDS to stretch the budget to get more "bang" from it. Mr Killick, again very properly, insisted that we had to be able to sustain the things we bought; he was quite right and many of us low level folks came to admire his point of view.

He went on to become ADM(Mat), and in that post he displayed an overwhelming sense of the superiority of his own, personal judgment over that of his own subordinates and, indeed, of the entire defence staff and of the central agencies. ADM(Mat) was powerful in official Ottawa, he had his finger on very large pots of discretionary spending, and he could use and misuse that power in various ways. In my experience most ADM(Mat)'s used their considerable influence wisely and prudently. I'm not suggesting that Mr Killick misused it, only that he really enjoyed using it, maybe enjoyed the power a bit too much. From my seat then, as the sort of chief of staff to one of his major branch chiefs, I saw him more closely and I admired him far less than I had in the past.

Anyway, the Franco-Canadian deal wasn't his baby, it started in the Langevin Block, in the mid 1980s (Brian Mulroney's government), as another (failed) attempt at the elusive Third Way of the Trudeau era. But Mr Killick was sent to Paris and he returned with a very senior French official (called DGA, if I recall, which meant something like Director of Armaments) and the two of them had already hatched the scheme that included Eryx. The Army was upset, as were the Army's engineering folks, who worked for my boss, a Navy RAdm. But the trivial objections of both groups - we don't need it; it is, technically, a piece of crap flawed - were brushed aside in a flurry of policy bromides. I learned from the one star who was in the privy Council Office that, in fact, Eryx was not "directed" from outside DND - the central agencies were as surprised as was the Chief of Land Operations and the Chief of Engineering. Was it part of a deal made between one of our ministers and his French opposite number? I'm not sure. Or was it something Mr Killick cooked up with his French  confrère? I don't know that, either, but it's the way my guessing leans.
 
SeaKingTacco said:
And for those who think French fighters or ships are instantly a good idea, I have two words for you:

1. LG1
2. Eryx
3. Sperwer
 
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