Canadian Defence News

[Dougie93]

9 minutes ago, Aristides said:

Great, one carrier and one sub to cover  three coasts.🙄

one CVN & at least six SSNs

neither the Chinese nor the Russians would ever tempt fate against it

can you imagine ?

No. 423 ( Eagle ) Squadron flying F-35C off the deck of CVN-23 HMCS Lester Boyes Pearson

SSN-880 HMCS Resolute in escort

come all ye bold Canadians\

 

[Aristides]

6 minutes ago, Zeitgeist said:

But shouldn’t we really have subs in the Arctic and a carrier for the Atlantic at the very least, as the unfrozen gateway to our vast northern waterways is in the northeast?  The northwest is guarded by Alaska.  It’s a start anyway. Smaller frigates and destroyers would have to suffice for the Pacific, for now.

Why a carrier? Carriers are for offensive operations, not defence. F-35C's also cost 20 million USD each, more than the F-35A's we are buying. Carrier battle groups also contain frigates, destroyers and subs to protect the carrier so you need to buy them anyway unless you are only going to operate with other navies that have those capabilities.

[Zeitgeist]

8 minutes ago, Aristides said:

Why a carrier? Carriers are for offensive operations, not defence. F-35C's also cost 20 million USD each, more than the F-35A's we are buying. Carrier battle groups also contain frigates, destroyers and subs to protect the carrier so you need to buy them anyway unless you are only going to operate with other navies that have those capabilities.

Well the point is to develop and retain the capacity to maintain defensive and offensive operations simultaneously on all coasts.  I realize that’s the military for a Canada of 50-60 million people, not 40, but we might as well start building the capacity, because by the 2040’s we’ll need it, maybe sooner.

Edited January 27, 2024 by Zeitgeist

[Dougie93]

1 minute ago, Aristides said:

Why a carrier?

why not go into the China Seas against our mortal enemy

with the upper hand ?

F-35C with B61-12 tactical thermonuclear bombs on the high seas capable of striking with impunity

the ultimate deterrent against the Chinese Communists in Beijing

the Chinese Communists only respect power

grovelling to them simply invites aggression

never mind being a fake country

seize your birthright, British North America

I mean, as long as you are spending $80 billion CAD

you'd might as well get your moneys worth

[Aristides]

11 minutes ago, Zeitgeist said:

Well the point is to develop and retain the capacity to maintain defensive and offensive operations simultaneously on all coasts.  I realize that’s the military for a Canada of 50-60 million people, not 40, but we might as well start building the capacity, because by the 2040’s we’ll need it.

Yes but not carriers. Even the old Bonaventure only had Korean War vintage Banshees for fighters right up until was decommissioned in 1970. If you want offensive nuclear capability, SSBN's make a lot more sense, they are a lot less vulnerable and can operate on their own, without escorts.

The Gerrald Ford cost just under 14 billion USD. You can add at least that much again for its air wing and when you are finished you have the most expensive warship in the world to operate.

Edited January 27, 2024 by Aristides

[Dougie93]

6 minutes ago, Aristides said:

Yes but not carriers. Even the old Bonaventure only had Korean War vintage Banshees for fighters right up until was decommissioned in 1970.

no, the Banshees were retired in 1958

after which the Bonnie was only employed as an ASW escort carrier with Grumman CS2F-2 Tracker patrol planes

Edited January 27, 2024 by Dougie93

[Aristides]

3 minutes ago, Dougie93 said:

no, the Banshees were retired in 1958

after which the Bonnie was only employed as an ASW escort carrier with Grumman CS2F-2 Tracker patrol planes

So no offensive capability at all.

[I am Groot]

37 minutes ago, Aristides said:

Great, one carrier and one sub to cover  three coasts.🙄

There's no need to compare the cost to American supercarriers. The cost we're paying for one frigate is roughly the same as the British paid for their new aircraft carriers a few years back. Which suggests we could buy a number of them. 

Finding people to operate them would be something else again. And we'd have to spend ten years on a bidding process to get any aircraft for them.

Edited January 27, 2024 by I am Groot

[Dougie93]

1 minute ago, Aristides said:

So no offensive capability at all.

ASW escort carrier against Soviet SSN's through the G-I-UK Gap & Atlantic Western Approaches

the role of the RCN being to facilitate the deployment of HM Canadian Army to Europe in the event of WWIII

 

[Aristides]

6 minutes ago, I am Groot said:

There's no need to compare the cost to American supercarriers. The cost we're paying for one frigate is roughly the same as the British paid for their new aircraft carriers a few years back. Which suggests we could buy a number of them. 

Finding people to operate them would be something else again. And we'd have to spend ten years on a bidding process to get any aircraft for them.

Not when you include the  65 aircraft including 35 F-35B's each will carry. You will still need anti aircraft and anti submarine frigates to protect them. 

[Dougie93]

15 minutes ago, Aristides said:

Not when you include the  65 aircraft including 35 F-35B's each will carry. You will still need anti aircraft and anti submarine frigates to protect them. 

Canada is going to buy 88 F-35's

simply alter the order to acquire two squadrons 32 x F-35C therein

423 ( Eagle ) Squadron

443 ( Hornet ) Squadron

then add 4 x E-2D Hawkeye

449 ( Unicorn ) Squadron

the Americans would provide all the logistics in the contract as a turnkey solution

in terms of escorts, once you are operating CVNs, allied countries join your coalition in escort

this is what it is to be a military power ; lesser navies flock to your arm of decision

Victoria Regina Imperatrix : Mother Canada

Edited January 27, 2024 by Dougie93

[Aristides]

16 minutes ago, Dougie93 said:

Canada is going to buy 88 F-35's

simply alter the order to acquire two squadrons 32 x F-35C therein

423 ( Eagle ) Squadron

443 ( Hornet ) Squadron

then add 4 x E-2D Hawkeye

449 ( Unicorn ) Squadron

the Americans would provide all the logistics in the contract as a turnkey solution

in terms of escorts, once you are operating CVNs, allied countries join your coalition in escort

this is what it is to be a military power ; lesser navies flock to your arm of decision

Victoria Regina Imperatrix : Mother Canada

Last time I looked F-35A’s were 80M USD each and F-35B’s were 109M. F-35B’s are 102M. The A is also a more capable aircraft than both if you don’t don’t need STOVL or carrier capability.

Edited January 27, 2024 by Aristides

[Zeitgeist]

We need to do this yesterday because the people keep coming.  The population boom for Canada is unprecedented.  Our assets — natural, manufactured, and human — require protection.

[Aristides]

2 minutes ago, Zeitgeist said:

We need to do this yesterday because the people keep coming.  The population boom for Canada is unprecedented.  Our assets — natural, manufactured, and human — require protection.

I’m not against increasing our military capability, just don’t believe carriers are the best way to do it.

[Dougie93]

1 minute ago, Zeitgeist said:

We need to do this yesterday because the people keep coming.  The population boom for Canada is unprecedented.  Our assets — natural, manufactured, and human — require protection.

once we were the best small military in the world, the consummate professionals

once we were the world's Peacekeepers

once we were the fourth largest military in the world

once we were the shock troops of the Empire

who won the Great War in a Hundred Days

if you are going to be Canadian therein

why not go all the way ?

Sic Itur Ad Astra : thus is the pathway to immortality

Alexander Muir's Maple Leaf Forever 

( Pipes & Drums of The 48th Highlanders of Canada )

[Dougie93]

8 minutes ago, Aristides said:

Last time I looked F-35A’s were 80M USD each and F-35B’s were 109M. The A is also a more capable aircraft if you don’t need STOVL,

the F-35C is more capable of holding the Chinese Communists at bay on the high seas

and $80 million USD is cheap by the standards of how Canada wastes money on being a fake country

a real country would seek arms of decision at the exclusion of pointless boondoggles

do you want to be a real country, or not ?

[BeaverFever]

1 hour ago, Aristides said:

Even the old Bonaventure only had Korean War vintage Banshees for fighters right up until was decommissioned in 1970.

Not even. The late 1940s-vintage Banshees were retired in 1962 without replacement. From then on the only fixed wing aircraft the Bonnie carried was the turboprop Grumman Tracker submarine hunter, in addition to Sea King helicopters. 

Edited January 27, 2024 by BeaverFever

[BeaverFever]

1 hour ago, Aristides said:

So no offensive capability at all.

Correct. Although I believe the primary purpose of the Banshee was fleet air defence, and only limited ground attack capability as a secondary role. 

[Dougie93]

54 minutes ago, Zeitgeist said:

We need to do this yesterday because the people keep coming.  The population boom for Canada is unprecedented.  Our assets — natural, manufactured, and human — require protection.

to the larger point, is Canada's total lack of imagination

in that, Canada spends the money to be a military power

Canada spends the money to have it all, CVN's, SSN's, DDG's

Canada for instance spent $600 billion on being a COVID lunatic asylum crippling its own economy

those are superpower defence budget numbers, spent on being a  totalitarian Communist shithole

hence why Canada is a fake country

a real country would have spend that sort of money on defending itself from the Communists, not becoming them

[BeaverFever]

58 minutes ago, Aristides said:

I’m not against increasing our military capability, just don’t believe carriers are the best way to do it.

Agree. Aircraft carriers are not needed to defend the North, there are RCAF Forward Operating Locations for NORAD fighters at Yellowknife, Inuvik, Rankin Inlet and Iqaluit, not to mention allied bases in Alaska and Greenland.

An aircraft carrier in the arctic is useless as it can’t break ice and AFAIK they haven’t invented an icebreaker large enough to break ice for a carrier  

 

Edited January 27, 2024 by BeaverFever

[Dougie93]

1 minute ago, BeaverFever said:

Agree. Aircraft carriers are not needed to defend the North, there are RCAF Forward Operating Locations for NORAD fighters at Yellowknife, Inuvik, Rankin Inlet and Iqaluit, not to mention allied bases in Alaska and Greenland.

An aircraft carrier in the arctic is useless as it can’t break ice and AFAIK they haven’t invented an icebreaker large enough to break ice for a carrier  

 

Arctic defence is nonsense

you said yourself; nobody is going to invade the arctic

Canada's military imperative has always been power projection overseas

on behalf of the British Crown in North America

from Vimy Ridge to Juno Beach

from Atlantic Western Approaches

all the way to Japan; where Robert Hampton Gray was awarded the Victoria Cross

flying his F4U Corsair off an aircraft carrier

there is no conventional military threat to Canada whatsoever

thus if you are not going to build a military to project power : there is no need for a Canadian military at all

which is why the Canadian military is collapsing into oblivion, becoming the armed civil service instead

[Zeitgeist]

30 minutes ago, BeaverFever said:

Agree. Aircraft carriers are not needed to defend the North, there are RCAF Forward Operating Locations for NORAD fighters at Yellowknife, Inuvik, Rankin Inlet and Iqaluit, not to mention allied bases in Alaska and Greenland.

An aircraft carrier in the arctic is useless as it can’t break ice and AFAIK they haven’t invented an icebreaker large enough to break ice for a carrier  

 

The North Atlantic at the entrance to the Labrador Sea is the gateway to our Arctic, Hudson Bay, and our Northwest Passage.  It’s not frozen but Canada already has ordered 7 Polar Ice Breakers to supplement its few aging icebreakers.   Obviously naval icebreakers are needed.

Nuclear subs can be the go to with the air defence you mentioned in the Arctic.  Air defence and more modest naval capacity on the Pacific.

It would be a major contribution to be able to deploy a carrier to the Middle East, Iran, and China. Halifax is a significant deep water base with a headstart to the east because of its eastern location.  Newfoundland too.

It would be something to see Canada have a foreign policy that other countries take seriously again, rather than continue to be the effete wet noodle we’ve become.

Edited January 27, 2024 by Zeitgeist

[Aristides]

1 hour ago, Zeitgeist said:

The North Atlantic at the entrance to the Labrador Sea is the gateway to our Arctic, Hudson Bay, and our Northwest Passage.  It’s not frozen but Canada already has ordered 7 Polar Ice Breakers to supplement its few aging icebreakers.   Obviously naval icebreakers are needed.

Nuclear subs can be the go to with the air defence you mentioned in the Arctic.  Air defence and more modest naval capacity on the Pacific.

It would be a major contribution to be able to deploy a carrier to the Middle East, Iran, and China. Halifax is a significant deep water base with a headstart to the east because of its eastern location.  Newfoundland too.

It would be something to see Canada have a foreign policy that other countries take seriously again, rather than continue to be the effete wet noodle we’ve become.

Why would we want have our most expensive to buy and operate military asset just to be used in places like the Middle East? Certainly not a major contribution to our own defence. We certainly don't need one in the North Atlantic, it is ringed by NATO countries. Russia has one carrier, a floating rust bucket that has been in drydock for two years.

[Zeitgeist]

25 minutes ago, Aristides said:

Why would we want have our most expensive to buy and operate military asset just to be used in places like the Middle East? Certainly not a major contribution to our own defence. We certainly don't need one in the North Atlantic, it is ringed by NATO countries. Russia has one carrier, a floating rust bucket that has been in drydock for two years.

True, we can send a beaver on NATO missions to show our symbolic support. It can swim ahead at the very front.  

[Army Guy]

3 hours ago, BeaverFever said:

Agree. Aircraft carriers are not needed to defend the North, there are RCAF Forward Operating Locations for NORAD fighters at Yellowknife, Inuvik, Rankin Inlet and Iqaluit, not to mention allied bases in Alaska and Greenland.

An aircraft carrier in the arctic is useless as it can’t break ice and AFAIK they haven’t invented an icebreaker large enough to break ice for a carrier  

 

The fact we really don't have any large or Artic ice breakers is telling.that has to give you an idea on how much we as a nation care about our artic sovereignty...All those artic fobs we were suppose to build never got built, we own the north but can only really vist in the summer...One of the reasons we built AOPs was to use those new Artic FOBS to patrol from...now we are stuck with AOPs that are nearly useless for naval use.