This is part 1 in an ongoing Western Standard feature examining leaked F-18 fighter replacement program documents..OTTAWA, ON: The Western Standard has received an 800-page leak from the Department of National Defence revealing a bureaucracy defying the elected arm of government over the CF-18 fighter jet replacement. With tens of billions of taxpayer dollars on the line, the documents raise serious questions about Cabinet’s ability to manage major procurements. .The leaked Future Fighter Capability Project (FFCP) draft was received with a simple question attached, “does this look rigged for the F-35?”.The short answer is “yes.” The request for proposal (RFP) in the documents was rigged to benefit the Lockheed Martin F-35. This is another regrettable example of “Yes Minister” style antics in Canadian defence history, with top Defence bureaucrats leading the Defence Minister at best or openly defying his orders at worst. This could have been avoided if the younger Trudeau only followed his father’s example instead of repeating his mistakes. .The selection of the CP-140 under Pierre Trudeau in the 1970s did not go smoothly. Then Liberal Minister of Supply and Services Jean-Pierre Goyer accused one of the senior civil servants running the program of “gross negligence” and of “misinforming” cabinet before the minister had the civil servant removed from the project. Unwilling to repeat the mistakes of the CP-140 procurement, Pierre Trudeau put in place several checks and balances on the New Fighter Aircraft (NFA) program. The NFA was designed with the clear goal of replacing the fighter jets we had with a new jet that met the technical requirements of the missions we flew at the best value with full industrial offsets. .While the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) leadership insisted that the large and expensive F-15 was the right jet for Canada; the CF-18, the least expensive jet in the competition that met the minimum requirements, was selected as the winner. As history is fond of repetition, today’s RCAF clearly favours the F-35, the most expensive jet in the competition..The new RFP demands capabilities far beyond what the CF-18 can deliver, both at home and abroad. The strike mission scenarios represent an unreasonably high number of points, include missions we have historically left to the Americans, and are clearly biased towards the F-35’s passive stealth advantages. In short, this RFP looks like it was written with inflated requirements to minimize the points score of the least expensive jet in the competition: the Saab Gripen-E. I believe this was done so that the Gripen can’t win in Canada like it won in Brazil. . Harjit Singh SajjanLiberal Defence MinisterHarjit Singh Sajjan .In Brazil’s fighter competition, the Gripen-E was rated as slightly less capable than the first place French Rafale, but the Gripen won because it offered full industrial benefits, would be assembled in Brazil by Embraer, and was the best value with a total cost of ownership half that of the Rafale. The Brazilian contest clearly demonstrated that the Swedish Gripen is the least expensive jet that can replace the CF-18, saving the Canadian taxpayer billions of dollars..During the 2015 election, Trudeau promised to purchase a less expensive alternative to the F-35 and said that the savings would be directed toward Navy shipbuilding. While the CF-18 replacement program is ongoing, the Liberals have already increased shipbuilding commitments by tens of billions of dollars..Originally five manufacturers were invited to participate. Thus far, the French (Dassault Rafale) and the British (Airbus Eurofighter) have walked away from the competition over issues with the RFP being biased towards the American F-35. With a minority government, the opposition will have to hold Trudeau and the bureaucrats at the Department of National Defence (DND) accountable..The Green party made it clear that they would oppose any F-35 purchase. Early in the campaign, the NDP said that they would only support a fighter that was made-in-Canada. With the other Europeans out, the Saab Gripen is the only jet in the competition that would be made in Canada. Saab has an existing partnership with Bombardier and it’s likely that the Bloc represented riding of Mirabel would become home to a multi-billion-dollar Saab/Bombardier Gripen factory. With so many jobs on the line in Quebec, the Bloc has every incentive to pay close attention to this file..Defence scholars Anton Bezglasnyy and Douglas Ross warned that the F-35 has the potential of being “the plane that ate the Canadian Navy.” Respect for the taxpayer and respect for the military are not mutually exclusive concepts in Sweden. They shouldn’t be in Canada..This is part 1 in an ongoing Western Standard feature examining leaked F-18 fighter replacement program documents. .Alex McColl has a Master of Public Policy degree from the University of Calgary, where he wrote his capstone thesis “CF-39 Arrow II: A Swedish Solution to the CF-18 Replacement Problem” on the CF-18 replacement procurement.
