Ottawa expected to announce final talks underway to procure F-35 fighter jet: sources – National
The Canadian authorities is anticipated to announce on Monday that it’s shifting ahead with finalization talks in the direction of procuring Lockheed Martin’s F-35 fighter jet, in keeping with an business supply.
The Canadian Press additionally revealed a report citing each authorities and business sources.
The announcement isn’t anticipated to be a proper contract award however strikes the decade-long technique of changing the nation’s ageing CF-18s into the finalization stage, the place talks slim to at least one most popular bidder.
The competitors narrowed to simply two ultimate candidates in December 2021 as Boeing exited the competition, leaving Lockheed Martin’s controversial F-35 and Saab’s Gripen jet because the remaining bids.
The anticipated announcement comes amid escalating questions in regards to the calls for positioned on the Canadian Forces within the midst of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
That invasion, billed by Canadian and Western leaders as an existential menace, has renewed considerations about Russia’s intentions in a remilitarized Arctic and about Canada’s capacities to satisfy rising calls for by way of each the NORAD and NATO navy alliances.
Canada’s fleet of Boeing CF-18 fighter jets are ageing and when asserting the launch of a contest to exchange them in 2017, the federal authorities additionally mentioned it could purchase 25 used jets of the identical mannequin from Australia as a bridge in the direction of a long term fleet alternative.
However with elevated calls for on the Canadian navy, strain has continued to mount on the federal government to hurry up procurement within the course of that has been underway for greater than 20 years.
Whereas the federal government has been in talks in regards to the F-35 for the reason that late Nineteen Nineties, the previous Conservative authorities formally introduced its intent to purchase 65 of the stealth fighter jets in 2010.
Deliveries had been on the time projected to start in 2016.
Excessive prices and considerations about inaccurate budgeting dominated headlines over the next years although, with the auditor common in 2012 criticizing the dealing with of the sole-sourced deal.
By the point of the 2015 federal election, then-Liberal chief Justin Trudeau vowed to desert federal plans to purchase the stealth fighter jet, saying the nation wanted a “extra reasonably priced plane.”
“A Liberal authorities will even do what the Harper Conservatives should have mentioned years in the past: we is not going to purchase the F-35 fighter jet,” mentioned Trudeau in September 2015 marketing campaign speech. “As a substitute, we’ll launch an open and clear competitors to exchange the CF-18s, preserving in thoughts the first mission of our fighter plane is the defence of North America.”
Regardless of that promise, the federal government didn’t exclude Lockheed Martin from getting into the competition for a alternative fleet, even because it overtly deprived the bid by Boeing — the producer of the CF-18.
That call got here after Boeing launched a separate commerce tribunal problem towards Bombardier.
The choice weighed closely on the Boeing bid, with the agency notified late final yr that it could not be shifting ahead within the course of. That left simply Lockheed Martin and Saab as contenders.
Extra to return.
