Canadian Military News, Reports, Data, etc.

Air Force Brat said:

No, whats worse than that is Canada failing to do their part to defend their own Nation after committing to be a full partner in F-35 production. Thats what you ought to be ashamed of!

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PiSigma said:

Should have stuck with f35 in the first place. Trudeau just wanted to stick it to the Conservatives, that why he changed in rules in the first place. Buying used f18s from Australia was the dumbest idea ever.

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pipaster said:

Obama's overseen 'economic depression', was largely the result of poor oversight during the W. Bush Administration. His management of the financial crisis whatever you think of it did result in stabilization and eventual recovery (that Trump has largely benefited from).

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pipaster said:

First off, Canada is committed to open a competitive tenders in all major procurement. This can be viewed with the Auditor General's comments and direction after the F35 was initially selected for the Future Fighter replacement project (under the Harper government). The interim replacement was supposed to be the F-18E, however with the tariffs threatened to be levied against Bombardier, the current government canceled this project, and hence the requirement for the Aussie Hornets (C/Ds). This is the process within the Canadian Government, and some poor politics on both sides.

The RCAF requires the 'old birds' to maintain Canada's NORAD, and international commitments until 2025 when IOC is expected.

Obama's overseen 'economic depression', was largely the result of poor oversight during the W. Bush Administration. His management of the financial crisis whatever you think of it did result in stabilization and eventual recovery (that Trump has largely benefited from).

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Air Force Brat said:

No, whats worse than that is Canada failing to do their part to defend their own Nation

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Jura said:

interesting to the point I'll repost the text despite no body will ever read it here

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Warship rejected by DND years ago will now be the backbone of Canada's future navy
The defence department noted that the Type 26 design could be modified for Canadian needs but concluded the 'technical and programme risk would be high'
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by the way, in the Australian context,
Jun 29, 2018

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The new generation of Canadian warships is expected to cost the federal treasury up to $14 billion more than the government projected in 2017, according to the latest report by the independent Parliamentary Budget Officer.

The updated cost estimate of the Canadian Surface Combatant (CSC) program, which will become the backbone of the Royal Canadian Navy’s fighting force, comes after the government selected BAE Type 26 design for its new warships last year.

The new estimate released Friday pegs the total cost of the CSC program at $69.8 billion over 26 years, including $5.3 billion in pre-production costs; $53.2 billion in production costs; and $11.4 billion in project-wide costs, said

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.

In comparison, the 2017 PBO report estimated a total program cost of $61.8 billion, $8 billion less than the updated estimation.

The report says the difference in these estimates is due to the fact that ship construction will begin later than previously estimated, thus increasing inflation costs, and the new ships will be larger than assumed in the previous report, which also drives up production costs.

The previous Conservative government had estimated the cost of the CSC program at $26.2 billion.

In 2017, the Liberal government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau nearly doubled that estimate to anywhere from $56 to $60 billion for 15 warships.

That means there is a difference of $9.8-$13.8 billion between the government and the updated PBO estimates, the report said.

Defence officials welcome the report
In a statement released on Friday, officials at the Department of National Defence (DND) said they welcome the PBO report.

Since selecting a design for the CSC, DND officials have recalculated their cost estimates based on certain weapons and support systems which are now known to be part of the CSC design, the statement said.

“After an initial review of the PBO report, we find that the vast majority of the difference comes from their decision to include taxes in their costing,” the statement said.

DND’s practice is to not include taxes in its budget or cost estimates because DND is not required to request funding for taxes from Parliament, it added.

“Essentially taxes flow immediately back into federal coffers at no cost to Canadian taxpayers,” the statement said.

“If you remove taxes from the PBO’s costing, our estimates are within 10 per cent of each other.”

DND officials said this variation is normal and expected when comparing independent cost estimates on a complex multi-decade project.

Cost estimates from other allied navies building ships based on the Type 26 design are also within a similar range, the statement said.

“While we remain confident in our estimate of $56 to $60 billion for the CSC project budget, we also recognize that even small differences in a project of this size represent hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayer money,” the statement said.

Lockheed Martin and Irving Shipbuilding team up
In October of 2018, the Liberal government awarded a consortium led by U.S. defence giant Lockheed Martin the first crack at inking a contract to design Canada’s fleet of next generation warships.

Government officials said the group’s proposed BAE Type 26 Global Combat Ship design beat out two rival submissions in what has been a long and extremely sensitive competition to design replacements for the navy’s ageing fleet of 12 Halifax-class frigates and three decommissioned Iroquois-class destroyers.

In February 2019, the federal government formally announced that Lockheed Martin Canada is the design team and Halifax’s Irving Shipbuilding Inc. is the project’s prime contractor.

The CSC program is currently in the development phase, the PBO report said. The government projects the acquisition phase to begin in the early 2020s with deliveries to begin in the mid-2020s. The delivery of the 15th ship, slated for the late 2040s, will conclude the procurement program, the PBO report said.

Adam P MacDonald, deputy director of the Centre for the Study of Security and Development at Dalhousie University in Halifax, said cost estimates are likely to continue to be in flux for the foreseeable future, specifically given the fact Canada has not conducted a large warship procurement process for almost two decades.

“With that said, I think that the range of estimates should be narrowing as we approach the start date of the program and it would be highly unlikely to see another major increase in estimates for these ships on the order of magnitude we’ve seen since the original 2008 estimate given that the life cycles of these assets has been included in these numbers,” MacDonald said.

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Jura said:

Feb 10, 2019
now
Canada’s new warships to cost up to $14B more than projected, says PBO

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The cost of the Canadian navy’s new surface combatant ships has further increased because of delays and changes in the size of the ship, according to a new report from the Parliamentary Budget Officer.

The PBO puts the latest cost estimate of the Canadian surface combatant ships at $70 billion, some $8 billion higher than its previous estimate from two years ago.

“The difference in these estimates is due to new information on project specifications provided by the Department of National Defence; in particular, ship construction will begin later (increasing inflation costs), the ship will be larger than assumed in the previous report (increasing real construction costs), and we exclude the cost of spares beyond the initial two years (reducing real program costs),” the report from Parliamentary Budget Officer Yves Giroux noted.

The updated estimate, released Friday, covers the cost of project development, production of the ships, two years of spare parts and ammunition, training, government program management, upgrades to existing facilities, and applicable taxes.

The Canadian Surface Combatant program is the largest single expenditure in Canadian government history. The project, being run by Irving Shipbuilding on the east coast, is to produce 15 warships to replace the navy’s fleet of Halifax-class frigates and the Iroquois-class destroyers the navy previously operated.

The Conservative government originally estimated the cost of the ships to be around $26 billion. The DND now states that its estimate is between $56 billion and $60 billion.

However, it could be years before the real cost to taxpayers for the mega-project is actually known as the project is just getting started.

The PBO report warned that any delays in building the first ship will be costly. A delay of one year, for instance, could increase costs by almost $2.2 billion, it added.

The federal government hopes to begin building the ships starting in the early 2020s.

Pat Finn, the head of procurement at DND, said the PBO estimates largely align with what the department figures as the cost of the program. He noted that unlike the PBO, the department does not consider tax in its cost figures. That is because those fees ultimately go back to the federal treasury.

But he also agreed with the PBO on the concern about added cost if the project is delayed. “That is a key one for us. It’s something we’re watching carefully,” said Finn, assistant deputy minister for materiel.

The CSC program is currently in the development phase. The government projects the acquisition phase to begin in the early 2020s with deliveries to begin in the mid-2020s. The delivery of the 15th ship, slated for the late 2040s, will mark the end of that project.

The Liberal government announced in February that it had entered into a contract with Irving Shipbuilding to acquire new warships based on the Type 26 design being built in the United Kingdom. With Canada ordering 15 of the warships, the Royal Canadian Navy will be the number one user of the Type 26 in the world.

The United Kingdom had planned to buy 13 of the ships but cut that down to eight. Australia plans to buy nine of the vessels designed by BAE of the United Kingdom.

The entry of the BAE Type 26 warship in the Canadian competition was controversial from the start and sparked complaints the procurement process was skewed to favour that vessel. Previously the Liberal government had said only mature existing designs or designs of ships already in service with other navies would be accepted, on the grounds they could be built faster and would be less risky. Unproven designs can face challenges as problems are found once the vessel is in the water and operating.

But the requirement for a mature design was changed and the government and Irving accepted the BAE design, though at the time it existed only on the drawing board. Construction began on the first Type 26 frigate in the summer of 2017 for Britain’s Royal Navy, but it has not yet been completed. Company claims about what the Type 26 ship can do, including how fast it can go, are based on simulations or projections.

The two other bidders in the Canadian program had ships actually in service with other navies so their capabilities are known.

Both Irving and the federal government have insisted the procurement was conducted in a way that ensures all bidders are treated equally, with no unfair advantage given to any individual bidder.

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Jura said:

Yesterday at 7:52 AM
related:
Cost of Canadian navy warship project increases to $70 billion, according to new PBO estimate

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is there a 'clasping hands' emoticon available?

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'Requirements reconciliation' isn't exciting - but it could decide whether the navy gets the ship it wants

By the standards of most people, what's going on this week and over the next few months in the back rooms of the navy, and at Irving Shipbuilding in Halifax, is pretty boring.

Civilian bureaucrats and military planners call it "requirements reconciliation." And even hardened military observers and procurement geeks will have a tough time getting excited about this laborious line-by-line review of Lockheed Martin Canada/BAE Systems' bid to design the navy's new frigates.

What is important — the reason why taxpayers should be paying attention — is the fact that with the stroke of a pen, hundreds of millions of dollars could be added to, or subtracted from, the cost of Canada's next generation of 15 warships.

It's something we were all reminded of with Friday's release of the latest Parliamentary Budget Office report, which projects that the cost of the program over 26 years likely will top $69.8 billion. That's $8 billion more than the watchdog's last estimate in 2017.

The reconciliation phase is, from the navy's point of view, the crucial period when a designer's promises of performance and capability are (or are not) turned into engineering reality.

A last chance for Ottawa to pinch some pennies
It's also the time when sticker-shocked governments seek to put curbs on the amount of pricey equipment that gets bolted to the hulls.

Parliamentary Budget Officer Yves Giroux said that if he "were a betting man," he would expect costs to go up as a result of the work being carried out now.

But there's precedent for trade-offs that could reduce the cost, or limit price spikes — through buying different equipment or materials, for example, or even through purchasing fewer ships.

The decisions made in the coming weeks will affect at least one generation of sailors (possibly two) that will crew these warships.

"We have a fairly good understanding of the areas we are looking at," said Pat Finn, a retired rear admiral who heads the Department of National Defence's procurement section.

The vessel the Liberal government has selected as Canada's next frigate will be based on the British Type 26 design, a warship that has yet to enter service (steel on the first ship was only cut in July, 2018).

Finn said that in some cases, the Department of National Defence is "re-looking at some of the requirements" the navy set for its warship.

That's significant news on several different levels.

One of the companies that lost the design competition — Alion Science and Technology Corp., along with its subsidiary Alion Canada — is suing in Federal Court, claiming that, among other things, the Lockheed Martin Canada design does not meet the navy's requirements.

One of the arguments underlying their complaint is that the Type 26 will not be able to meet the fleet speed requirements set out in the tender.

Defence expert Dave Perry, of the Canadian Global Affairs Institute, said he doubts the decisions being made over the next few weeks will put the federal government in any legal jeopardy.

Will the navy get what it wants?
But Finn's remarks do raise the question of whether the navy — and, by extension, the country — will get the warship it needs.

In addition to the U.K. and Canada, Australia also is in line to buy and build the untested warship.

The line-by-line review will, among other things, look for common requirements and design points among the three nations, said Finn.

"It could trigger some changes, and in some cases it could trigger some changes that align more with what the U.K. and Australia (are) already doing, which means it reduces some complexity because it eliminates the need to make some changes to what we call the parent design," he said. "And we're being very careful on schedule and, quite frankly, cost."

The pressure to not make too many changes at this stage of the procurement process is enormous from a business perspective, because Irving Shipbuilding already is facing a production gap between the new frigates and the Arctic Offshore Patrol Ships, which continue to be churned out in Halifax.

The more frigate design changes there are, the more likely a gap in production becomes — along with layoffs among shipyard workers as a consequence. (The federal government recently announced it will build a sixth patrol ship for the navy and two additional vessels for the Canadian Coast Guard to mitigate that shortfall. How that affects the proposed gap is uncertain.)

The last time the navy went through this kind of reconciliation exercise for a warship design was for the construction of the Arctic patrol ships.

'Penny-wise, pound foolish'
Critics have argued that, because of cost restrictions, the capability of those patrol ships was watered down to the point where some defence analysts have questioned their usefulness.

Perry said he doesn't think that kind of dynamic is at play with the frigate program, but the temptation to be "penny-wise and pound foolish" is out there.

"We're trying to make smart decisions for long-term, recognizing the costs are enormous, no matter how you slice it," he said. "I think we're in the appropriate space to not save every nickel we could, whereas that has definitely happened in the past."

Asked directly whether the navy will get the warship it wants, Finn was categorical in his answer: "We will ensure the navy gets the ship that it needs and the navy is at table with us. The changes and the work we do is signed-off by them."

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Jura said:

Dec 12, 2017
now Boeing still evaluating whether to bid for Canadian fighter contract
23 January, 2018

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• 09 July, 2019

After a news report that said it might pull out of Canada’s fighter competition, Boeing says it’s still participating in the process and hasn’t made any final decisions.

Boeing and Airbus, which are respectively offering Ottawa the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet and the Eurofighter Typhoon, have complained in letters to Canada’s Department of National Defence that its procurement competition is unfairly favouring Lockheed Martin’s F-35A Lightning II stealth fighter, according to a report by Reuters. Boeing declines to comment specifically on the reported complaints.

“We appreciate the transparent nature of this competition, specifically the multiple opportunities to provide formal comments to the government of Canada on draft request for proposals (RFP),” says Boeing. “We continue to be very confident in the Super Hornet Block III capabilities to meet the defence needs of Canada and Boeing’s ability to bring unmatched benefits to the Canadian economy through the aerospace sector.”

The company also noted its commitment to share part of the contract work and value – 88 jets for a reported C$15 billion to C$19 billion. As part of its offset policy, called the Industrial and Technology Benefits (IBT) Obligation, Ottawa plans to score bids partially based on their ability to funnel work to local businesses.

However, Lockheed Martin has argued that it cannot provide offset contracts to Canadian businesses because as a member of the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) programme the nation’s companies have already been given more than $1 billion contracts, and thus further accommodations would be in breach of the partnership agreement. Canadian F-35 suppliers include Curtis Wright Controls, which makes the aircraft’s radar single-board computer, and Magellan Aerospace, which makes the “A” variant’s horizontal tail.

Despite being a member of the Joint Strike Fighter programme and initially planning to buy the 65 examples F-35, Ottawa has dithered on whether or not to buy the stealth aircraft over the past decade. Nonetheless, the country has officially included Lockheed Martin as a qualified bidder in its latest fighter competition.

One other reported area of disagreement are Royal Canadian Air Force requirements that emphasise the ability to carry out first strikes on foreign targets, a role which favours the radar evading abilities of the F-35 stealth fighter. In place of stealth abilities, Boeing has pitched the F/A-18E/F’s longer, unrefuelled flight endurance and larger weapons carrying capacity as capabilities that enable the fighter to make missile strikes from stand-off distances, outside the range of enemy radar and air defences.

Ultimately, Boeing says its decision will be based on the final RFP, due out by the end of this summer.

“We look forward to continuing to provide comments, reviewing the final RFP, and determining next steps at that time,” says the company.

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