Does Canada need 60 F-35's?

pla101prc said:

i am guessing that the arctic dispute could call for a need of new jets...but definitely dont need 60 of them. i say money is better spent elsewhere...

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The Canadian armys, must have bbeen on continuous active duty for what 10-15yrs+. Apart from the gear getting to worn out active duty must have exposed some weaknesses which need to be addressed.They can achieve this by halving the F35 purchases.

siegecrossbow said:

Sixty sounds a bit excessive. What immediate threats are there to Cannada?

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Those damn Russians! How dare they fly within 60 miles of their own border??

i am guessing that the arctic dispute could call for a need of new jets...but definitely dont need 60 of them. i say money is better spent elsewhere...

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Unless Canada wants to start bombing someone (you never know with the Harper government...), I don't see why they even need 1 F-35, nevermind 60!

I think the statement "unless you want to bomb your neighbour you don't need one plane" is pretty useless here. By that logic, probably 90% of the world's combat airforce fighters would be unnecessary.
The CFAC currently has 121 F/A-18s I think. So going to 60 F-35 would already cut the fighter force by halfe.
That number is probably enough to operate 2 operational wings (with 2 SQs each) and a conversion / training unit.
Each wing can then specialize towards a certain mission, e.g. A2A & A2G. From that, you can probably keep one SQ for each mission ready for deployment.
Training takes a lot of effort if you take it seriously. Of course you could just maintain a lot less planes with fewer pilots that are not so well trained to save money. But that will bite you back really bad when the time comes were you need your forces. And normally these challanges will not really announce themselves years in advance so you have time to reaquire the skills. But such skills can't be brought back within weeks.
Also, 60 total means there's less than 60 available for duty at all times as there will always be some planes undergoing scheduled (regular) and unscheduled (something broke) maintanance.
So, in the end, 60 planes is really not a high number if you want to maintain a comfortable air warfare capability.
The F-35 is also a plane that will be around in Canada's AF for probably about 40 years. The plane really has some nice features that will be of great use on a future battlefield as well. It's for sure not the only solution that made sense for Canada, there might have been better options. But it's really not a useless decission, either.

Scratch said:

I think the statement "unless you want to bomb your neighbour you don't need one plane" is pretty useless here. By that logic, probably 90% of the world's combat airforce fighters would be unnecessary.
The CFAC currently has 121 F/A-18s I think. So going to 60 F-35 would already cut the fighter force by halfe.

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Why would that statement be useless? If you're spending tax payers' money, you should be spending it on things that are actually useful. What use would even 1 F-35 serve, that's not already being competently served by the existing inventory, or by a cheaper alternative?

The purchase is currently billed at $16 billion, but we all know that government figures always end up much higher. With a population of only 33 million, that's 485$ for every man, woman and child, or near 2000$ for the average household. That's not even taking into account the real, final cost, which could end up twice that amount. Add to this the fact that we're already running a huge deficit in a time of troubled economy, and every Canadian household would be paying interest on that amount for years to come!

I know there are much better things I'd rather spend 2000$-4000$ on!

As a Canadian, I honestly don't feel threatened by the Russians challenging our Arctic sovereignty at this point. The money should be better spent on curing our $50B dollar government deficit and $500B government debt.

bladerunner said:

The Canadian armys, must have bbeen on continuous active duty for what 10-15yrs+. Apart from the gear getting to worn out active duty must have exposed some weaknesses which need to be addressed.They can achieve this by halving the F35 purchases.

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THAT'S EXACTLY MY POINT!!! i did a very conservative estimate (like...VERY conservative) and I concluded that if canada would halve this program and its associated cost and put part of the money saved into the army...then each regiment in the canadian forces would be able to get at least 1 million or couple million dollars extra every year for 10 years.plenty of things you can do with that money!!

solarz said:

Why would that statement be useless? If you're spending tax payers' money, you should be spending it on things that are actually useful. What use would even 1 F-35 serve, that's not already being competently served by the existing inventory, or by a cheaper alternative?

The purchase is currently billed at $16 billion, but we all know that government figures always end up much higher. With a population of only 33 million, that's 485$ for every man, woman and child, or near 2000$ for the average household. That's not even taking into account the real, final cost, which could end up twice that amount. Add to this the fact that we're already running a huge deficit in a time of troubled economy, and every Canadian household would be paying interest on that amount for years to come!

I know there are much better things I'd rather spend 2000$-4000$ on!

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Your family is spending that 2000-4000 over the next 3-4 decades so your nation can keep complete sovereignty instead of having to rely on others in times of need.
Even though there may never be an actual use of force, the implicit deterrent of one is necessary because disputes are a real matter.

Since we're talking about the F-35:



Delayed once again. Cost-hike once again as well.

I feel that the F15SE Silent Eagle is a better choice,

Combat radius is almost 25% further
twin engine with proven airframe.

The thing is Canada is a huge country it is almost 10 million square km(or 4 million square mile). having an aircraft which can only handle a combat radius of ~700 miles is a bit short.

The only country going to encroach on Canada is Russia and hopefully not the USA. In war, i doubt Canada can do much even with 60 F35. If the purpose is to enforce the borders - shouldn't navel icebreakers and more frigates be produced instead?

Canadian F-35s mostly won't be used to defend Canada, they'll be used to support the U.S. in its future wars. Basically, this is the price they pay for being under American military protective umbrella, this is their share of the cost.