![]() This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. "The F-35 is the best in the world, providing unmatched interoperability to America, Canada and the additional 15 nations that have selected the fighter. "Canada is our friend and a close ally," Schmidt said in a statement. Mike Schmidt, the senior American officer responsible for managing the stealth-fighter project out of the Pentagon. "So I'm confident after this open and fair, competitive process that the benefits to our country in terms of national security, as well as the benefits to our country in terms of economic security are going to persist and are present."Ĭanada's decision to buy the F-35 was welcomed by Lockheed Martin and U.S. By 2032, the CF-18s will have been around for 50 years.Īsked what benefit Canadians have gained from the 12-year delay in acquiring the F-35, Anand said voters can now have full confidence that the country is buying the right plane for its military while benefitting the economy. In the meantime, the government has been forced to spend more than a billion additional dollars on the CF-18 fleet to keep it flying until the F-35s have been delivered. ![]() The biggest cost difference is in air superiority fighters. Lockheed Martin in a statement said a total of nine nations are currently operating F-35s, with more than 890 jets in service today. The Marine Corps' F-35B costs 131.6 million each, way up from the 50 million AV-8B Harrier II and the 60 million F/A-18 Hornet. And we see now that many of our allies, eight countries in particular, are using the F-35." Pressed on the Liberal government's change of mind, Anand said: "The aircraft has matured. naval aviation strike warfare well into the 21st century. This aircraft will remain the backbone of U.S. The Boeing EA-18G Growler is an American carrier-based electronic warfare aircraft, a specialized version of the two-seat F/A-18F Super Hornet. Both the Super Hornet and F-35 were allowed to compete. The A/B evolved into the C/D Hornet in the 1980s and now the Super Hornet. Ottawa initiated the bidding process that led to the F-35 being selected in July 2019. The Liberals instead planned to buy 18 Boeing Super Hornets without a competition as an "interim" measure until a full competition could be launched - which some believed was intended as a first step to lock Canada into the Super Hornet.īut the government cancelled the plan after Boeing launched a trade dispute with Montreal aerospace firm Bombardier. The F/A-18 Hornet, an all-weather aircraft, is used as an attack aircraft as well as a fighter. Trudeau at the time suggested Canada did not need a stealth fighter, and that the plane did not work. Monday's announcement also represented a complete about-face for the Liberals, after Justin Trudeau famously promised in 2015 that he would not buy the F-35.
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