King Carl Gustav of Sweden will lead a delegation to Canada next week trying to seal a deal for Canada to buy a fleet of Gripen E fighters instead of 72 F-35s. Canada has committed to buying 16 F-35s and will take those aircraft but is not contractually bound to take the balance of an 88-aircraft deal that was negotiated over the last two decades. The Gripen E was the only other aircraft in a competition that ended in favor of the F-35, but a fractious trade war between the U.S. and Canada has Canada looking to wean itself from trade and defense dependence on the U.S. There are also concerns about the sovereignty of the aircraft, with Lockheed Martin maintaining most of the intellectual property control over the full international fleet of F-35s. Canada is also interested in Sweden’s special-mission surveillance aircraft based on Canadian-built Bombardier long-range business jet platforms.
Among the carrots the Swedes are dangling to sweeten the fighter deal is an offer to build Gripen Es in Canada, perhaps also including fighters that may be purchased by Ukraine. “Saab wants to do significantly more work in Canada in the near term,” Simon Carroll, president of Saab Canada, told the CBC. “Saab views Canada as an ideal partner, with the right, highly skilled workforce to support a massive growth in global demand.” Christina Keighren, of Business Sweden, said the trade mission’s goal is broader than one defense deal. “Both countries need each other, especially in this complex global landscape.”
As for the aircraft itself, the Swedes tout the rough-field capabilities of the Gripen, along with its much lower operating costs and its reliability, particularly in harsh northern environments. But the Gripen also lacks the stealth capabilities and some of the fifth-generation detection and targeting electronics that come with the Lightning II. But in the end, none of that may matter much. “The question is whether we want to be closer to the United States, or do we want to be closer to the Europeans?” an unnamed senior government source told the CBC.
And this is what a trade war gets us. More lost business with our nearest trading partner. There was no need to piss off Canada. They might be polite but don’t F with them politically or in the hockey ring.
I agree. The current administration is reeking havoc with relationships that take years to build and hurt both countries militarily and economically. While the Gripen is an extremely capable 4th generation fighter, it can not compete with the F-35 in terms of stealth and is more vulnerable to air and ground threats. The saying, lose the sight, lose the fight is relevant here.
Bah, in operational use these days the F-35 rarely reaches 50% serviceability. It is a sitting duck on the ground in pieces.
See, there’s the rub. Unless Canada was going to get into a shooting war with the US, it would not be going toe to toe with the F35.
that leaves the rest and true that next after the US are China and Russia, Russia’s a little busy right now (and I don’t think their producing 5th Gen fighters (that are any good)) and China, well it is a long way from China’s mainland to Canada so, maybe not a threat.
Besides, Canada is a part of NATO so if attacked, they get those F35’s for free (so to speak) defending the Leaf.
Something else for Canada to consider, as drones become more sophisticated on the battlefield, I would suspect and a drone swarm could take out even 5th fighters at far lower costs then one super expensive plane. Get the Gripen for the bargain and to make the Hawks feel good and just stop dealing with US fighters (and well, the US till we find adults to run then country and then, only when we strip Executive powers back to what they should be, co-equal).
Buy the Gripen E for use in the Americas and the north. Use the F35s for Ukraine and Baltic defence.
Unfortunately, Canada is not alone. Some European countries are on record as saying they will either cancel or substantially reduce their F-35 purchase – Spain, Portugal, Switzerland, Turkey and more to come. This, after years of procurement processes and negotiations and trying to sell the airplane’s high cost and poor maintenance record domestically. The stated reason is that the all maintenance and software updates have to come form the U.S. and that calls into question of the country’s sovereignty, especially when Presidential administrations seem to becoming unreliable.
90% of Canadians live within 30 miles of the U.S. border. Who is really defending Canada? The Canucks hold no cards in military operations.
LOL, you have forgotten how things went down in 1814. Why is the White House white?
Everybody forgets about the Canadian Caper, 1980. You know, when Canada was instrumental in harboring and then smuggling American diplomats back to the US during the embassy crisis in Iran during 1979-1981? I remember lots of “Thank you Canada” placards and stuff like that. Now many, if not most, Americans think that Canadians are something to be scraped from the sole of a shoe. How times change.
Your stats are almost correct, but that isn’t relevant. The new threats for Canada are the rights of navigation in a melting Arctic Ocean. China and Russia are trying navigate these waters close to Canadian shores where the ice is soft and breakable. The US doesn’t care about this, and in fact would like to have access to these passages too. It’s unlikely Canada would protest, but they want to asked.
The land up there is hostile and unforgiving. Very tough for the F35 to operate – it’s currently running at 55% operational efficiency and that’s in normal operating conditions. Canada needs the Grippin, it can land and be serviced on backroads and while not a stealth aircraft, it doesn’t need to be because it will be used used in a defensive role, not an aggressor. In the event Canada does need an aggressor aircraft, it will have a handful of F35s.
Lastly, the US government hasn’t given any of its allies the impression that it will be there when needed, so every allied country is re-considering its procurement needs.
There’s just to many issues with buying America! We would have no control over the aircraft and knowing how the U.S. thinks they would keep us in the dark about many things. They’d probably build into our aircraft the ability to ground them all if we ever got into a dispute. I believe that the Swedes however would be up front and honest with us in any issue! Also given that they offered to produce at least parts if not a whole assembly plant here and create 10,000 jobs, we’ll we’d be foolish to turn down that offer. As far as the Americans are concerned I wouldn’t trust them as far as I could throw them!!
Italy has built 90 F-35, including 60 A models and 30 B models. Japan has built 38 A models and 3 B models. Italy is the final assembly and test center for Netherland’s version. US final assembly numbers is 156 per year but that has been all over the board as the DoD has refused to accept delivery of built F-35’s because those did not have the promised TR-3 software packages that “guarantees” the promised stealthiness and ” hack-a-bility ” resistance. Add to the 3 final assembly locations, two overseas, and US TR-3 proprietary of it’s operating systems to a continuing, dismal 30-38% daily operational readiness record, ongoing supply chain issues, led by an administration whose foreign policy is surrender your national resources to the empire, privatize those resources to US conglomerates, or suffer regime change via sanction, tariffs, assasination, or at minimum coup de ta, installing a US chosen puppet who will be subservient to it’s US master by of all things, military intervention whose front line fighter is the F-35. Between the F-35’s two baptisms in war, Yemen and Iran revealed F-35’s stealthiness or lack there of, by locking on to the F-35’s long before entering their respective airspace’s causing them to wisely turn around or firing their missles early with no results. With this combo of less than promised performance, poor operational readiness, overseas final assembly, and limited production capacity in the US, with a trigger happy administration, led by leadership that actually thinks we have military superiority to the extant that war against Venezuela, Columbia, Ukraine/Russia, Nigeria, Yemen, Sudan, Iran, Syria, and Lebanon can be, and should be waged simultaneously for collective regime change … Canadiens should be strongly consider Sweden’s offer.
Canada leans to the EU, Latin America looks toward China and Russia… hmm.
Raf,
Canada is not leaning towards the EU. Sweden solicited Canada specifically for business. EU, specifically Great Britain, France, and Germany are flat-assed broke with no capacity to manufacture anything, especially a fifth gen fighter. For the same economic EU reality, Sweden is looking for customers outside of the EU knowing the only military hardware that the EU is allowed to purchase from is NATO headquarters in DC as per DJT. Now it remains to be seen if NATO member Canada will tow DJT’s marching orders after all the tariff bravo sierra plus the disrespect displayed by the POTUS offering Canada become our 51st state. With “allies ” like that, who needs enemies.
Latin America has been under US various economic threats, sanctions, military interventionand regime change attempts since WWII. However, today we stopped being covert. Now we just look at a boat, blow it up, killing most onboard, no matter what Latin country they from … as alleged drug runners. No trial only vigilante “justice “. Why would anyone trust Uncle Sam? We have no diplomacy, only death meted out disguised as our “war on terror “.
Agree. It looks like Canada is not putting all its eggs in one basket, and much of Latin America is looking to China and Russia.
If this happens, it will be on Trump. He has pushed Canada into the European orbit and made them highly distrustful of the American government. The problem is not so much the developmental difficulties of the F-35, or indeed even the ownership of the IP and software upgrades, as it is with simply no appetite to buy anything from the US. While the F-35 is superior to the Gripen (despite all of its issues), the population is incredibly angry and in no mood to send enormous defence dollars south. Those days are over. I don’t believe most Americans really understand that fact. Just lok at the decline in Canadian tourism to the US as measured in car traffic and air traffic. Not to mention a boycott of US alcohol and other goods.