5
The Leaked Report Pushing Mark Carney Toward the F-35 Fighter Jet (thewalrus.ca)
submitted 11 months ago by to c/wildfeed@sh.itjust.works
comment fedilink hide all child comments
 

According to a June 2025 study by the US Congressional Budget Office, the F-35 achieves “mission capable” status between 50 percent and 60 percent of the time, well short of the Gripen’s availability rate of 80 percent to 90 percent (according to figures by Saab, the manufacturer of the Gripen, as validated by various air forces who have tested the plane, such as Switzerland and Brazil).

Though not directly related to mission availability, the cost per flight hour is also an important point of comparison as to how much an air force can be expected to actually fly an aircraft. The more it costs, the less flying you are likely to do. Here, according to sources such as the GAO and the RAND Corporation, the F-35 has a cost per flight hour of between $33,000 and $50,000 (US) (depending on the variant), while the Gripen has a cost per flight hour of $8,000–$12,000 (US).

no comments (yet)

sorted by: hot top controversial new old
there doesn't seem to be anything here
21 comments in c/canada@lemmy.ca view that post
[–] 18 points 11 months ago (2 children)

“Using bright colours to drive the message home for the hard of thinking”

Was it released by the conservatives?

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • hideshow 2 child comments
    •
    • [–] 11 points 11 months ago

    It is no secret that our DND likes the F35 a lot more for its capabilities...

    But do we want to tie our air force to another American digital subscription?

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
    •
    [–] [S] 10 points 11 months ago

    And as an fyi the National Security Journal jumped on the F-35 bandwagon just in time.

    Canada already has thousands of jobs tied to F-35 production. Splitting the fleet to chase industrial offsets would weaken deterrence and further erode Canadian credibility.

    https://nationalsecurityjournal.org/cancel-the-f-35-jas-39-gripen-fighter-would-cripple-canadas-air-force/

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
    •
    [–] 13 points 11 months ago (11 children)

    Canada should take all the money that's going to be spent on F-35s and use it to develop an autonomous drone swarm that can hunt and destroy F-35s.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • hideshow 11 child comments
    •
  • [–] 13 points 11 months ago

    Maybe we should do this anyway. Here is a thought:

    Can we build out competencies in drones and use them for cargo payload delivery in territories to subsidize delivery and drive down costs for food, medicine and other goods in the north?

    This wouldn't necessarily be cost effective for the Canadian government, but it would be strategic in that we would...

    be developing technologies (batteries, computer vision, flight),

    having utility and real world usage.

    expressing Northern sovereignty.

    A thought, I'm not fully versed in the logistic challenges in remote communities.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 7 points 11 months ago (7 children)

    You'll need a lot more money than that to develop a new airframe from scratch ....

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 7 child comments
    •
  • [–] 7 points 11 months ago* (6 children)

    We're talking somewhere over 50 billion dollars. It's not easy to do, but with that kind of money, money is not the problem. What's more, the profits will be enormous: There's a market for that product all over the world.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 6 child comments
    •
  • [–] 3 points 11 months ago (5 children)

    We’re talking somewhere over $200 billion dollars.

    That certainly would be enough, you'd need at least $100 billion to start developing a new 6th gen airframe.

    In contrast, the current deal for the F-35 is only for $27 billion.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 5 child comments
    •
  • [–] 5 points 11 months ago* (4 children)

    I revised it down to $50 billion after posting, having looked up the actual estimate I'd seen (74 billion), but either way it's plenty.

    I suspect that requirements for the airframe design for a swarm of drones that don't need to carry human pilots around can be made somewhat less than those for the most expensive airplane ever made.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 4 child comments
    •
  • [–] 5 points 11 months ago* (3 children)

    Yeah, no. Even if they were extremely efficient, 75 billion might get you a prototype or two, but you still haven't acquired a single plane or paid for its operating cost or maintenance. Developing an manned vs unmanned fighter also doesn't make much difference, though you will save on the cost of pilot training later.

    The F-35 contract includes all of that already.

    So no, just using the money that is set aside for the F-35 would get you nowhere. Especially considering Canada doesn't have much experience with developing domestic fighter jets and would also need to build all the infrastructure from scratch as well.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 3 child comments
    •
  • [–] 4 points 11 months ago (2 children)

    Unmanned makes a huge difference in many ways, surely. There are all kinds of constraints added by the need to carry around a squishy human, and evaluating what can be done without them is not something I'm going to attempt in a comment here but there are a whole lot of possibilities, many of which might not cost in the hundreds of billions of dollars. Starting from scratch is not necessary. Starting from the point of view of making fighter planes obsolete, rather than building the best possible one, is what I have in mind. Somebody is going to do it. Shame it won't be Canada. Even if the attempt failed it would be a better use of the money.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
    •
  • [–] 3 points 11 months ago* (1 child)

    Unmanned makes a huge difference in many ways, surely. There are all kinds of constraints added by the need to carry around a squishy human, and evaluating what can be done without them is not something I’m going to attempt in a comment here but there are a whole lot of possibilities, many of which might not cost in the hundreds of billions of dollars.

    We've been keeping squishy human humans alive in planes for a while, we already know how it works. An autonomous aircraft would require you to develop a high sophisticated computer/AI model that can do basic pilot tasks which will be a big part of your development cost. For now, sticking a human in his much cheaper. Sure, you might save money per unit and in the long run, but the development cost will most certainly be much higher.

    You also need a reliable way to communicate with them, so you'd want a constellation of military communication satellites. Not sure Canada currently has that, so factor in the cost for satellite development a bunch of rocket launches.

    Even if the attempt failed it would be a better use of the money.

    If the attempts failed, Canada would be left without a fighter jet. If that is an acceptable outcome to you, you might consider not spending money on it at all.

    But if you want to have an operational fighter jet in the short term, buying one is the only option.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment
    •
  • [–] 2 points 11 months ago*

    Exactly, software and algorithms would be a huge part of the challenge which is one reason I think Canada would be well positioned to be the nation to advance that technology. Communication via satellite is the obvious choice, but even just sitting here casually pondering it I can think of other options that might be worth considering, involving for example laser-based mesh networks between drones somewhat like what SpaceX has between satellites.

    And yes, it's true, not spending money on that sort of thing at all would also strike me as a better option than sending so many billions of dollars to the giant American defence contractors who are the primary beneficiaries of the F-35 contract.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 3 points 11 months ago

    This is nonsense. If you're talking about doing it in the air, then you need supersonic drones that can lock on, predict the aircraft's movement, and adjust during interception ... i.e. you're talking about a SAM system like the Patriot missile system or Russia's S400.

    If you're talking about hunting them down at base, then you need to be able to penetrate hundreds of kms of air defenses to make it to them in the first place, and you're just talking bout a cruise missile like the Tomahawk.

    Ukraine used the element of surprise with those box trucks, it won't be easy to pull off again.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
    • [–] 4 points 11 months ago (2 children)

    If the US moves to annex Canada, or if Canada starts making noises about enacting laws the US disagrees with, those F35s will come in handy

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • hideshow 2 child comments
    •
    • [–] 5 points 11 months ago

    Canada will absolutely buy the F-35 cost and capabilities are of little consequence. What matters is a bribe to trump.

    Only way Canada goes grippen is if the Canada pension plan makes a huge Blockchain investment in Melania and Trump coin.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
    •
    9 comments in c/boycottus@lemmy.ca view that post
    [–] 13 points 11 months ago (2 children)

    We already have some f35s, use those for their advantages. The rest of the fleet should be Grippens.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • hideshow 2 child comments
    •
    • [–] 6 points 11 months ago (2 children)

    The stealth factor of the f35 is by far the best and the importance of that is massive, when you have the perfect instance of you can see the enemy airplane and hit them but they still can't see you. But they already have f35s and you don't need the whole fleet to be stealthy. Having a larger amount of grippens might be better for an operational availability to field more missions at the same time.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • hideshow 2 child comments
    •
    • [+] 2 points 11 months ago (1 child)
    [deleted]
  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • hideshow 1 child comment
    •