Canada’s Globe &Mail newspaper is reporting the country’s new Prime Minister ordered a review of the Canada’s current commitment to the American made next-gen F-35 jet fighter immediately upon being sworn in. The order came a day after fellow NATO ally Portugal made a similar announcement.
Canada’s decision to purchase F-35’s was contentious in the face of a very strong competing bid from Saab’s F-39 Gripen — a fighter plane that was specifically designed for arctic conditions.
Canada is contractually committed to purchase sixteen Lockeed planes with deliveries beginning next year. The review will cover Canada’s option to purchase an additional 72 American planes over the next seven years.
Pundits and editorials started urging the Canadian government to abandon the F-35 after Trump revealed the full extent of his sympathy for Russia earlier this month and after he threatened to use economic pressure to “collapse the Canadian economy” in a effort to force Canada into accepting annexation as America’s 51st state.
Several NATO countries, including Canada, are concerned that the F-35 comes with an American based software “kill switch” that can remotely disable its armaments. This would impede their ability to independently undertake military action disapproved by President Nero and his puppet-master in the Kremlin -- a concern that never existed under any other American president.
Here is a link www.theglobeandmail.com/… to a “gift” of the Globe article (I’m a subscriber) Not sure if the gifting feature works in public forums.
Prime Minister Mark Carney has asked for a review of Canada’s plan to purchase a fleet of F-35 fighter jets.
The deal with Lockheed Martin and the U.S. government is for 88 planes at a cost of about US$85 million each.
A spokesperson for Defence Minister Bill Blair said Carney has asked Blair to look into whether the F-35 contract is the best investment for Canada, or if there are better options.
“We need to do our homework given the changing environment, and make sure that the contract in its current form is in the best interests of Canadians and the Canadian Armed Forces,” Blair’s press secretary Laurent de Casanove said.
Here’s a related afterthought: Switching to armaments made in Europe/Canada/Japan/Australia/S. Korea starts to create critical mass for the re-armament of democracy that must come now that the United States is no longer a democracy. (I’m sure that most kos members saw the poll a couple of days ago that 70% of those polled in Germany, France and Britain already consider him a dictator — and he’s just getting started!)
EXTRA: An interesting little FAFO graph for American tariff hawks — in the same newspaper:
40% 0f S&P 500 revenues are from outside the USA
