Cancellation of the F-35 contract is now a necessity: when and how, not if

myata · March 10

It really can't work any other way at this point: the credibility of the U.S. as a trusted security partner will take decades to recover, in the very best, absolutely best scenario. Threats to NATO allies, Denmark and Canada? New territorial claims? Who, with a grain of a sound mind would dismiss them as some sick jokes. The U.S. can control these assets, the episode with Ukraine showed it clearly, and it's a clear weakness and a huge risk to national security to acquire them now. There's no avoiding this argument. The contract will be cancelled, one way or another.

Army Guy · March 10

Why would we cancel a program for the air force that is a 5th generation aircraft, that is now the cheapest and best on the market, the only NON american fighter that is worth anything is the Euro fighter which is far more expensive , and is only a 4.5 generation which it's replacement is being worked on as we speak.

This has the makings of some dumb liberal decision, like our canceling our maritime helicopters contract or justins saying no he would not buy f-35 in the first place...., it would take years to pick a new fighter and get a place on the production line, at double the costs....why would that make sense.... because you don't like trump, he is going to be gone before our first F-35 aircraft is operational.

myata · March 10

44 minutes ago, Army Guy said:

Why would we cancel a program for the air force that is a 5th generation aircraft, that is now the cheapest and best on the market, the only NON american fighter that is worth anything is the Euro fighter which is far more expensive , and is only a 4.5 generation which it's replacement is being worked on as we speak.

If your adversary can disable them in few keystrokes, what would be the point of the cost? You seriously can't think clearly any longer only in cliches?

ironstone · March 10

2 hours ago, myata said:

It really can't work any other way at this point: the credibility of the U.S. as a trusted security partner will take decades to recover, in the very best, absolutely best scenario. Threats to NATO allies, Denmark and Canada? New territorial claims? Who, with a grain of a sound mind would dismiss them as some sick jokes. The U.S. can control these assets, the episode with Ukraine showed it clearly, and it's a clear weakness and a huge risk to national security to acquire them now. There's no avoiding this argument. The contract will be cancelled, one way or another.

Sounds like you want it cancelled purely because of your intense hatred of Trump.

And if not the F35, what is a better choice?

TreeBeard · March 10

6 minutes ago, ironstone said:

Sounds like you want it cancelled purely because of your intense hatred of Trump.

And if not the F35, what is a better choice?

Do you think it is wise to have fighter jets where another country has total control of the software? Including disabling them?

SpankyMcFarland · March 10

1 hour ago, Army Guy said:

Why would we cancel a program for the air force that is a 5th generation aircraft, that is now the cheapest and best on the market, the only NON american fighter that is worth anything is the Euro fighter which is far more expensive , and is only a 4.5 generation which it's replacement is being worked on as we speak.

This has the makings of some dumb liberal decision, like our canceling our maritime helicopters contract or justins saying no he would not buy f-35 in the first place...., it would take years to pick a new fighter and get a place on the production line, at double the costs....why would that make sense.... because you don't like trump, he is going to be gone before our first F-35 aircraft is operational.

You live in Canada, right? Saying it’s about not ‘liking’ Trump does not in any way describe the crisis he has caused between our two states and the lack of trust that has resulted. Are you even going to address Trump’s outrageous recent behaviour?

Doowangle · March 10

But what would the point of that be? If the US is actually invading, does it make a difference if they disable the jets or just shoot them out of the sky? Let's be logical here...if the US invades, they are going to take the capital almost instantly regardless of what jets are used or disabled. Now you can argue about prolonged occupation vs a guerilla campaign (wouldn't really apply due to the close proximity of the US and annexation as the goal, but I digress.

The jets would be the least of the worries

Dougie93 · March 10

9 minutes ago, SpankyMcFarland said:

You live in Canada, right? Saying it’s about not ‘liking’ Trump does not in any way describe the crisis he has caused between our two states and the lack of trust that has resulted. Are you even going to address Trump’s outrageous recent behaviour?

F-35 is hardly the only platform for Canada which the Americans control,

most of Canada's kit and all of Canada's logistics are totally reliant upon the Pentagon,

extricating Canada from American control would be a generational project lasting decades

Dougie93 · March 10

2 hours ago, Army Guy said:

Why would we cancel a program for the air force that is a 5th generation aircraft, that is now the cheapest and best on the market, the only NON american fighter that is worth anything is the Euro fighter which is far more expensive , and is only a 4.5 generation which it's replacement is being worked on as we speak.

This has the makings of some dumb liberal decision, like our canceling our maritime helicopters contract or justins saying no he would not buy f-35 in the first place...., it would take years to pick a new fighter and get a place on the production line, at double the costs....why would that make sense.... because you don't like trump, he is going to be gone before our first F-35 aircraft is operational.

naive Canadians are now confronted by the fact that they outsourced their defence to America long ago,

turning that ship around in short order just ain't going to happen, no matter how butt hurt they are

SpankyMcFarland · March 10

6 minutes ago, Dougie93 said:

F-35 is hardly the only platform for Canada which the Americans control,

most of Canada's kit and all of Canada's logistics are totally reliant upon the Pentagon,

extricating Canada from American control would be a generational project lasting decades

We have to start somewhere and we now know we can’t trust them.

ironstone · March 10

26 minutes ago, TreeBeard said:

Do you think it is wise to have fighter jets where another country has total control of the software? Including disabling them?

Countries that currently have operational F-35's: UK, Italy, Netherlands, Australia, Norway, Israel, Japan, South Korea.(And of course the US)

Countries awaiting delivery: Denmark, Singapore, Belgium, Poland.

I'm no expert in aviation, but it is likely that every new generation of fighter aircraft has loads of software that would be under the control to some degree from the country of origin.

Dougie93 · March 10

3 minutes ago, SpankyMcFarland said:

We have to start somewhere and we now know we can’t trust them.

Trump will be long gone by the time Canada made any progress in that direction,

far more likely that the Canadian political class will simply try to wait Trump out

TreeBeard · March 10

2 minutes ago, ironstone said:

I'm no expert in aviation, but it is likely that every new generation of fighter aircraft has loads of software that would be under the control to some degree from the country of origin.

It’s not just Canada with this concern.

There are also major issues with F35 development.

If Canada doesn’t blow up the deal for those reasons, we should certainly make it a bargaining chip with the tariff situation.

SpankyMcFarland · March 10

Just now, Dougie93 said:

Trump will be long gone by the time Canada made any progress in that direction,

far more likely that the Canadian political class will simply try to wait Trump out

Trumpism looks like it will outlast the Trump presidency. There’s no guarantee the US will ever be quite the same again.

ironstone · March 10

2 minutes ago, TreeBeard said:

There are also major issues with F35 development.

There is a lot of military hardware that is extremely hi tech and so of course there are going to be issues to overcome.

The Israelis seem to approve of their F-35's and they have come in VERY handy as of late.

Dougie93 · March 10

33 minutes ago, SpankyMcFarland said:

Trumpism looks like it will outlast the Trump presidency. There’s no guarantee the US will ever be quite the same again.

okay, well you'll have to cancel the Type 26 Destroyers already in production

because those are all reliant upon Lockheed Martin,

you'll have to replace all the LAV's in the Canadian Army, because those are General Dynamics

the Chinooks have to go, those are Boeing, the Cyclone helicopters for the navy too, those are LockMart

the Griffon helicopters are American too ; Bell Textron

C-17 Globemaster & C-130 Super Hercules, your entire airlift fleet has to go, $5 billion worth

practically every missile system Canada operates, air & sea, is made by Raytheon

the Boeing CF-18's are no more free from American control than the F-35

it's not just software,

all this American equipment is totally reliant upon American defense contractor supply chains

and anything which contains any American military tech at all is subject to American ITAR restrictions

once you drill down on how much American tech the CAF relies upon,

you're pretty much talking about replacing everything,

at the cost of hundreds of billions, taking decades to implement

are Canadians prepared to increase the defence budget to 5% GDP therein ? Yeah, okay, sure

doesn't matter how butt hurt you are, you outsourced your defence to the Americans decades ago

and now they've got you by the balls therein, because there is no affordable quick fix

Edited March 10 by Dougie93

herbie · March 10

Oh FFS look at the code and hack if you have to. You seem to think Cdn IT people are dumber than US & Chinese ones.
Scared they're gonna sue if they do find a kill switch or we modify or replace it for our own needs?

Dougie93 · March 10

10 minutes ago, herbie said:

Oh FFS look at the code and hack if you have to. You seem to think Cdn IT people are dumber than US & Chinese ones.
Scared they're gonna sue if they do find a kill switch or we modify or replace it for our own needs?

the F-35 code is encrypted to prevent that very outcome,

if the Chinese could hack it, they would have by now,

furthermore, hacking it doesn't give you the necessary software updates

in terms of what you should be scared of, that would be the Americans hacking you,

there's lots of things the NSA could shut off in Canada at the flick of a switch if they wanted to,

anything Canada does to attack America, that would come back upon you many times over

you don't think the NSA & CIA has plans for what to do if Canada goes rogue ?

it's not like America trusts Canada to be a reliable partner

Edited March 10 by Dougie93

herbie · March 10

3 minutes ago, Dougie93 said:

the F-35 code is encrypted to prevent that very outcome

OMG it's encrypted! We're doomed then, nobody can break encryption....

Dougie93 · March 10

18 minutes ago, herbie said:

OMG it's encrypted! We're doomed then, nobody can break encryption....

breaking the encryption on the jet itself is useless,

it's all cloud computing now, run centrally from America ; Operational Data Integrated Network ( ODIN )

it's like an iPhone from Apple, if you don't get every single software update, the plane shuts down

beyond the software tho, how would you even supply the parts for the jet ?

you might as well try to invent your own stealth fighter at that point, which is what China did

Lockheed Martin considered all of this beforehand,

the F-35 is perfectly constructed to prevent countries from escaping from American control

that's literally the whole point of F-35 from the beginning ; market dominance

meanwhile you are crowing like Canada is highly capable,

when Canada couldn't organize a gangbang in a whorehouse,

Canada is utterly pathetic when it comes to state capacity, the most feeble in the world comparatively

Edited March 10 by Dougie93

suds · March 10

Do the countries such as the U.K. and Israel actually 'own' their F-35's? Because if they owned them, shouldn't they be able to sell one or two of them to the Russians or Chinese which I'm fairly sure they can't do. Or is it closer to leasing them? Having some kind of 'kill switch' sounds like a decent idea especially if an F-35 fell into the wrong hands. In that event my kind of 'kill switch' would blow the aircraft to smithereens.

myata · March 10

1 hour ago, ironstone said:

Sounds like you want it cancelled purely because of your intense hatred of Trump.

Look you must have missed all the news, the threats against Denmark, a NATO ally; threats against Canada, NATO founding member and a long-time ally. Territorial claims against Canada, most recently.

The conclusion: people like you are either permanently disabled in all senses, or they have to be permanent, patented !diots. I've no idea and not a slightest wish to know how you got to that state. But you made it, done deal and so I have no intent to discuss anything with the likes of you because it makes no rational sense. You can't talk to a wall. And there's no point in talking to an !diot. Makes sense?

Dougie93 · March 10

23 minutes ago, suds said:

Do the countries such as the U.K. and Israel actually 'own' their F-35's? Because if they owned them, shouldn't they be able to sell one or two of them to the Russians or Chinese which I'm fairly sure they can't do. Or is it closer to leasing them? Having some kind of 'kill switch' sounds like a decent idea especially if an F-35 fell into the wrong hands. In that event my kind of 'kill switch' would blow the aircraft to smithereens.

again, it's like an iPhone ; entirely software driven

there's no "kill switch" other than you have to receive continuous software updates from Lockheed Martin,

and that's not like once a year, more like once a week,

for example the F-35 relies on an Automated Logistics Information System ( ALIS )

the jet is constantly communicating with Lockheed Martin in order to keep it systems working,

if you cut the ALIS off from LockMart, the jet just shuts itself down

hacking the jet wouldn't make any difference, because again, its all in the Cloud these days

LockMart has a network of servers to run the jets called ODIN

you can't access that network from the jet itself, just like you can't hack Apple's Cloud from your phone

perhaps CSE could target Lockheed Martin with cyberwarfare, but what would be the point ?

never mind that the NSA would retaliate in ways which could render Canada itself into a disaster

Edited March 10 by Dougie93

ironstone · March 10

5 minutes ago, myata said:

Look you must have missed all the news, the threats against Denmark, a NATO ally; threats against Canada, NATO founding member and a long-time ally. Territorial claims against Canada, most recently.

The conclusion: people like you are either permanently disabled in all senses, or they have to be permanent, patented !diots. I've no idea and not a slightest wish to know how you got to that state. But you made it, done deal and so I have no intent to discuss anything with the likes of you because it makes no rational sense. You can't talk to a wall. And there's no point in talking to an !diot. Makes sense?

I have to be honest. I feel the same way talking to people like you.

The difference between you and I is that while I may troll here occasionally, I refuse to resort to personal insults.😇

Michael Hardner · March 10

3 hours ago, Army Guy said:

Why would we cancel a program for the air force that is a 5th generation aircraft, that is now the cheapest and best on the market, the only NON american fighter that is worth anything is the Euro fighter which is far more expensive , and is only a 4.5 generation which it's replacement is being worked on as we speak.

This has the makings of some dumb liberal decision, like our canceling our maritime helicopters contract or justins saying no he would not buy f-35 in the first place...., it would take years to pick a new fighter and get a place on the production line, at double the costs....why would that make sense.... because you don't like trump, he is going to be gone before our first F-35 aircraft is operational.

This also makes sense.

A cancellation would send a clear message though.

2 hours ago, Doowangle said:

But what would the point of that be? If the US is actually invading, does it make a difference if they disable the jets or just shoot them out of the sky? Let's be logical here...if the US invades, they are going to take the capital almost instantly regardless of what jets are used or disabled. Now you can argue about prolonged occupation vs a guerilla campaign (wouldn't really apply due to the close proximity of the US and annexation as the goal, but I digress.

The jets would be the least of the worries

So we should cancel the order and not order anymore? 🤔