Comments by "" (@tomk3732) on "F-35 or Gripen for the RCAF…Or Perhaps Something Else?" video.

  1. So you think US will junk these F-15EX anytime soon? Nope. Once airspace is mostly clear there comes in missile truck.
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  2.  @jaknayree2000  Saab obviously has no clue about Canadian politics. They should advertise Quebec all the time. JT would have zero choice.
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  3. Canada has zero capability to do so. Only chance would be to rebuild it with Gripen.
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  4.  @Marcus_Sylvester  First of all no one yet build a quantum computer as having real one would render most cryptography dead. We certainly would know about it. 2nd a lot of places are doing that research. Third, there is rather big difference between the two. Fourth, our build ability died with the arrow project. Fifth, Canada never was strong in manufacturing especially one that was not in heavy cooperation with the US.
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  5.  @Marcus_Sylvester  I wish Canadian industry actually ever made some good tools but even 100 year old anvils are crap. So bad they make China today look good. Hence for many people have been making their own stuff in Canada for a while.
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  6.  @Marcus_Sylvester  OK, I now understand who you are so I explain in more basic terms. English is also not my native language but I grew up in Canada. Usually people in Canada say things such as "we now do not make anything in this country, everything is made in China". Implication is that we did something in this country in the past. This is indeed true, we did make a lot of things in Canada. But my anvil example from Berlin, Ontario (renamed to Kitchener - WWI issue) is (among other things) of that when we did things in Canada we did not exactly do them well. Usually old stuff was super expensive at the time so it was made to last. But not Canadian things - they were usually made cheap and of poor quality. This was a bit of a shock, but many old timers (i.e. old people) confirmed that this has been the case in their youth. The point is we do not have manufacturing tradition in Canada to lean on - we always were a colonial style economy of resources and only closeness to US made us "make things" of decent quality in cooperation with the US. Our small growing fighter jet industry got killed off with the "Arrow" that was a good jet, but not "great" or "wonderful". This is not uncommon for satellite country to be treated like this. My home country of Poland had great aircraft (fighter) industry before WWII - they even won awards and records in early 1930s. After WWII our "owner" Soviet Union did not want "competition" so Poland was tasked with... agricultural planes. Even after fall of communism in 1990s there were plans for good jets, mockups were made & even non flying prototypes - but it was crashed again - this time not by Soviets but the west that did not want competition. The point is that sometimes your "friends" may "hinder" your plans to have certain industries. Even today US is pushing the 12000 USD rebate for only US made in union plant electric cars - such thing would ruin Canadian auto industry which is more or less the "top" of Canadian industry. Canadian aerospace is ... in Quebec and thus subject to dirty internal politics. Bombardier survives only b/c it is in Quebec. So to even have fighter industry with a chance it would have to be in Quebec & given that we "forgot" anything from the arrow program and would have to start from scratch a better financial idea would be to buy plans for something to get us going - like Gripen - even that would be a huge challenge given that we "forgot" how to build such aircraft. On the plus side we are better off by far then say Australia - they have no US close buy and our industry, as small as it is, dwarfs theirs - they have almost none.
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  7. Do you know why??? Canada and Russia have almost identical geography. All Russian weapon systems fit Canada like a glove. They are like custom made for Canada.
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  8.  @Maple_Cadian  LOL, I watched that video and commented some time ago that Russians don't just have their own targeting pods... they got imported ones as well ;) This is rather easy to google. Don't trust everything you watch online! Go to 7:03 LOL! The French reported the sale ... guess French are lying.
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  9.  @FallenPhoenix86  F-15EX is to F-15 what Su-35 is to Su-27. Sure they are upgrades but still they cannot go > 4.5 gen. Also F-15EX is very expensive, it is almost as expensive as F-35 - difference in total project cost is minimal. So cost should be taken out of consideration here.
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  10. @Drew Peacock Just use drones - way cheaper for surveillance. Canada has hard time putting few platoons up north so forget about any radar sites or missile sites. Besides we cannot buy S-400/500 in Canada due to politics and range on western made stuff is pathetic. Also cost of what you ask is way more - look at what Poland got & they spend billions. Even US does not have anything close. Heck, the leader of missile defense is not even close to covering whole country. But lets be realistic. We cannot put more then a company for patrol duty. There never be any air defense assets. There never be any radar stations. We may have few drones. Besides - why would anyone care - what they going to do up north? Bomb our bears? There is no one to defend! If say Russia flies 1000km deep into Canadian north there will be nothing to attack. No targets. Nothing. Just tundra if they are lucky.
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  11. Gripen is about 5x to 4x program cost cheaper then F-35. So we could get 280 Gripens (!!!)
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  12. Hey, durable, Po-2 are the most produced biplane and used in both WW. Backbone of women's combat aviation! Diversity!
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  13. Well Canada certainly does not have technology or educated workforce as it would get it from Saab. What Canada has is a huge tender for aircraft that will be biggest sale Saab made outside of home or maybe even bigger then at home.
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  14.  @billwhitis9997  Not only I live in Canada but I even was briefly in uniform.
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  15. Without knowing details there is no way to tell. Some equipment can be heavily subsidized. So if you end up with F-35s for the cost under a Gripen its a good deal. Total program cost would still be higher but more capability.
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  16. F-35 will win b/c otherwise ... sanctions! Gripen is 1/2 cost and around 1/4 running cost (or less). Total cost of the same number Gripen full project cost is maybe 15% - 20% of F-35. Not to mention tech transfer. Not to mention making them in Canada - probably closer to 15% using economic bonus. Imagine what could be done with all that extra $$$! Drones. Radars. Cash for alcohol for officer's mess! As for F15EX it is quite expensive project - it is only a bit cheaper program cost vs. F-35. Say 80% maybe more.
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