Sadly Canada's situation is a complicated mess. For starters, these are some of the oldest, if not THE oldest Hornets left on the planet. Originally 138 aircraft delivered between 1982 and 1986. Lazily upgraded over the years to A+ to "A++" to ~"C+", with a big time fleet reduction in the early 90's to max 96 airframes, often even lower. In 2019, 18 used jets bought from RAAF for upgrade, plus 7 more for spares to help bridge the fleet. Prior Super Hornet and F-35 sagas in Canada are worthy of their own Wikipedia pages. Lots of excuses, but basically Canada balked at the insane amount Boeing wanted for 18 SHs. Politicians used the Bombardier spat as the excuse to back out. Now Canada is dovetailing on the USMC Hornet upgrade with mini- AESA, etc. But only for 36 airframes. Doesn't matter because we only have 50 combat capable pilots left anyway. Canada's major problem has been no direct threat, so no focused defence policy. Has tried to keep it's WWII / Cold War composition of jack of all trades but with ever decreasing funding. Gonky is correct when pointing to Australia's and USN's approach in 2000s. Had Canada bought Super Hornets in 2007 with Australia we wouldn't be in this mess. Made little sense to buy Super Hornets in 2023 when the F-35 was selected. Canada cannot afford to buy two sets of jet fleets within 15 years (will the SH really be effective beyond 2040?), so as Mover points out the RCAF needed to future proof with the only thing available. No way Canada can extend as far as 6th Gen deliveries at this point with the CF-18. What Canada needs should be reflected in a "Canada 1st" strategy rather than a "go everywhere and do everything" attempt. For the air side that means defending Canada's arctic as well as Pacific and Atlantic coasts. So that suggests an interceptor with range, speed and payload. Anti-ship would also be nice. F-15EX comes to mind, although the SH is the obvious little brother option. But as Gonky previously pointed out in another video, the SH lacks thrust which affects shot quality. This is particularly important taking out bombers before they can launch their cruise missiles. But with an F-15EX costing more than an F-35 now, does it really make sense? And again, how much beyond 2040 will it be relevant? So as the kids say, it is what it is. At the very least Canada will be able to integrate across the Arctic with the F-35s in Alaska and the F-35s from Denmark and Norway. Other than that, it's a lesson in what not to do.

Our CF-18s were ordered in the 70's and they started delivery in 82, they are old.

Our military has been using the Browning Hi-Power pistols they procured during WW2 until literally just this year. I'll be shocked if we don't weld two CF-18's together and try calling it a CF-36 just to keep them in reserve service in to the 2050's.

Canada had a problem with Boeing over the manufacturer's opposition to the Bombardier C series commercial jets and government subsidies.

I think the F-15EX would be the best choice for Canada. It’s got the top of the line avionics and sensors, a ton of range and is one of the best fighters ever built!

A lot of people still agree with Gonky. Two engines was a neccesity for a long time but the JSF investment made it so we kept getting roped in to Lockheed and Boeing tried to actively ruin Bombardier in court. Right when we'd almost bought into the Super Hornet. Now Airbus makes the Bombardier planes in the USA and Boeing has no fighter contract in Canada.

We operate about 80. 138 was the original order in the 80s. The Gripen made more sense as it can take off and land on remote northern airstrips. A mix of Gripens as interceptors, and F-35s for strike missions is really what we needed though.

Thing is Canada got a hell of a deal with the F-35s, with them getting the new Block 4 variant. Not even the RAF, RAAF or IAF will have such advanced versions of the F-35. Plus Boeing had at the time pulled a tremendously unfavourable decision to force the US government to impose a 300% tariff on the Canadian made Bombardier CSeries. That would have effectively killed the program had Airbus not stepped in to save the program. This essentially made the Canadian government retaliate by rejecting the Boeing-made Super Hornet, and likely would've also killed any prospect for the F-15EX. Block 4 F-35s isn't a bad option at all. Canada will the most capable F-35 variant. Yes, the issue now will be to keep the legacy Hornets flying until they are fully replaced.

As a Canadian, I WANT foreign people such as this channel to critique our military and its equipment - not only does it educate us but it highlights the short comings that we have so we can improve on that or get our marxist politicians to focus more on our military. Regarding Canada's Air Force, I will always contend that each nation should be developing their own military hardware, not only do you shield yourself from suffering from logistics headaches should war break out but you develop an industry in-house that will pay dividends in taxes, employment, education and urban development. I wish the Canadian Government never cancelled the Avro Arrow program. Canada would look vastly different today if it was never cancelled.

Canuck here. Canada, if going with a single engine fighter should have procured Grippens. Much better suited to our environment, our needs and our typical roll in conflict. 🇨🇦

Hey; Gonky and Mover! I'm fairly new to this channel. Just a disabled Canadian that has always loved everything to do with Aviation and Military. Been TRYING to learn DCS lately after a year of MSFS2020. SO glad that I found this channel. Watched your entire Mover ruins Top Gun Maverick series. I LOVED it and learned so much. Keep up the great work; fellas!

I’ve lived on Baffin Island for 35 years and the vast majority of Canadians, and all our politicians at the Federal level, do not seem to know what it is actually like up here. I’ve never been in the military, nor do I have any real aeronautical knowledge, but to me it was a no-brainer that Canada should have bought the Swedish aircraft for any number of obvious reasons.

The main problem with Canadian fighter procurement isn't production delays on the F-35 - over 1000 F-35s have _already_ been built and L-M has just now been cleared to go into high-rate production, so even with the production delays taken into account the RCAF will have their F-35s before they could plausibly have gotten Gripens. The real problem is that after the initial decision to buy F-35 back in 2010, multiple Canadian Governments (of multiple political parties - this is a political issue, but not a _partisan_ political issue) spent the next decade+ kicking the can down the road on procurement, "re-studying the issue" and even flat-out re-running the competition several times when whichever Government didn't like the result they got or just wanted an excuse not to pull the trigger on actually spending money on the Forces.

The original order in 1982 was 138 A & Bs (98 and 40 respectively) but avionics and radar upgrades over the years made them roughly equivalent of the late block C & Ds. Losses dropped then number to about 88 operational by the time they finally decided to look at new fighters, and then as Australia retired their similar legacy hornets Canada bought a couple dozen of those with the lowest airframe hours, several 20 foot containers of spares. 88 is the magic number needed for training, NORAD commitments and NATO missions. Hence the decision to order 88 F-35As (Block IVs as I recall complete with the six-pack racks to allow 6 internal AMRAAMs).

Thank you both for making this video today! I am not an aviator, but I am a Canadian taxpayer. Personally I would’ve gone with the Swedish product, but the super hornet also makes a ton of sense for a country that’s run hornets for decades. And yes, we do not need F 35s and I’m sure it was a political decision!

Even RCAF pilots are pissed that we're still flying this thing. While the CF18 WAS a bad as plane, it's almost as old as I am. That being said, nobody is really surprised that we're still flying them. We still fly the CF141 for the Snow Birds and that plane's as old as the T-38

We basically pick our plane based on how many jobs it will bring to the aero industry in Canada, We went with the F-35 basically because Canada was a partner in the F-35 program and makes parts and components for the F-35 supply chain. However it was made clear that if Canada didn't order the F-35 and ordered the Griffin or the Super Hornet the contracts and the jobs to make components and parts for the F-35 would be moved to another country So that was why the F-35 was chosen

The Canadian government has been a financial partner in the 5th gen program going back to the early 90's. Then Prime Minister Paul Martin Jr, spent 500 million dollars to be part of the new replacement program. In contrast, Prime Minister Brian Mulroney approved a program to replace the Sea King helicopters and when the next election came and the government lost, the new PM Jean Cretian cancelled the program costing taxpayers over 400 million in penalties for bailing out. We still don't have a adequate replacement for the Sea King 30 years later. I admire the people in the Canadian military as they have to put up with equipment from the last world war to fight the next war.

The F35 will have like 30 year of development particularly when Canada gets them in place. Fueling "enroute or while in play" will be coming as just what you have to do more of as "the rest of the world" can reach out and touch Canada - something people do not realize could be the norm. The F18s were for patrol and being utilized for projects "abroad" - with that diversity in equipment making that practical. The one engine or two debate - redundancy is a "mitigation extra engineering cost" in having that with a single engine design - making it more durable as a stand alone unit. Lots of advantages too with a single motor - comes down to the same thing - bigger opens more opportunity to just be a better unit at the same cost or lower cost and fuel use (maybe more range a more useful thing in Canada - it burns less, and you can carry more fuel with the weight and space saving over a dual motor - it is like battery range anxiety - range might be the main safety factor). The F35 is proving to be a good choice particularly as a "NATO deterrent". People forget that defense is crazy expensive until you compare it to the cost of a war - and suddenly it looks like putting pennies toward a tiddle wave in expense if something goes wrong and you get a war you are playing catch up on.

We are a small minded country with big ass terrain. No offense taken Mover!

Too many Canadians have fallen into the American trap of not thinking of our military's job #1 is defending Canada's borders. Job #1 and #2 for the RCAF (and RCN) must be defending Canada, not bunch of high-density countries in Europe that have higher per-capita GDPs than us. I was born in the UK and came to Canada as young kid. Even I can see that, in the event of conventional war, Europe is fully capable of defending itself if it wants to. The USA is there deter any European war going nuclear, and Canada and the USA are there to keep any European war totally one-sided against Russia. However, nobody but the USA and Canada are here to defend the USA and Canada. Job #1 is defending our homeland and Job #2 is defending our sovereignty. Job #3 is defending our allies. Jobs #4 and #5 are peacekeeping and humanitarian relief. Aiding "imperialism" (and we do need the diplomatic brownie points, so don't ignore it) is job #6. Sadly also, too many 'central' Canadians think Canada consists of Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver. (Places nowhere near Canada's center.)

Nearly = 50% flying and the rest in spare parts scavenging ;-) The Canadian joke from 1993 when they started the replacement program... and it was pushed back every year. Grippen would have been awesome. SuperHornet too... But no... F-35 came with incentives that never materialized. Pure politics.

We need to upgrade our Spitfire fleet, and if we do it fast enough we may even the get the original pilots to fly them.

Thank you! As a Canadian, I have met constant resistance to my view that Canada should have gone for the block III Super Hornet. The department of national defence low-balled the cost of the F-35 to parliament, then after it was passed, said ‘oh wait, we need the top-of-the-line F-35’. Then the gong show commenced. Canada starts its procurement process around when the current item is aging out…with bean counters running the show, slowing the process down to a crawl: “tomorrow’s dollars are not on today’s books”.

As a Canadian, I am grateful that you guys posted this video addressing what you guys think. And since I would like to join the RCAF I worry about the choices my government is making regarding its fleet. Thank you two!

To be honest, with drone capability and ability to saturate an area, you would think search and rescue is a prime area for modernization, utilizing the cheap and quick ability to locate and drop survival supplies.

As an ex RCAF comm/radar tech, I know that in the early '90s we were limiting the pilot's flying hours by imposing G limits. The avionics are fine since the midlife upgrade but they are still not allowed high G maneuvers. I agree that super hornets or Gripens would be a better choice. This upgrade program probably looks at some of the structural problems for a number of aircraft, but only a very limited number.

The super hornet would have been a great option, except that Boeing hamstrung a Canadian Aviation program. So, the Canadian public was against giving them billions of dollars.

Mover...the first ones arrived in 1982. They're tired. We need two airframes. F-15EX for NORAD. F-35 for NATO.

In terms of economics, the Grippen was the right choice. It's very unexpensive to run compared to everything else but it's very competitiive with Super Hornets and other 4.5 gen fighters.

Do some homework. Look up Sep 2017. Canada was single sourcing expedited purchase of stop gap F-18 block III when Boeing started a trade dispute with Bombardier around the same time that Canadian Aluminum was called a security threat by the White House. The contract was canceled. The C-Series is now the Airbus A-220. Felt like an Arrow mk.2 sucker punch.

Mover was totally right to call us a small country, we have a smaller population than the state of California. It definitely would have been nice to see the Super Hornets or at least F-35 C models as in addition to our inhospitable north, the majority of our forward operating bases for the Hornets have runways that are short enough to require arrester hooks.

The CF-18 Hornets were upgraded with new radar and avionics along with a centre barrel replacement in the early 2000s so they are still quite capable. The mission computers are the same as the block 1 super hornets. If Boeing hadn't filed a false trade dispute with Bombardier ove the C Series jets then Canada might have bought the Super Hornets. The mess that Boeing caused are it politically impossible the go with anything from Boeing. Having invested early in the JSF program early made it easier to select the F-35.

Why we went with the F-35 instead of the Super Hornet is beyond me. Why completely upend the support infrastructure that's been in place for a jet that's been in service for almost 40 years? The reason they landed on the Hornet back in the 80's was, concern over single engine reliability over the Arctic.

I'm from Canada and I was really hoping for the super hornet.... Abbotsford air show here. Had a demo between the two hornets and it was so clear the difference.

Just wanted to say, it's super weird to hear Cold Lake being mentioned, being from their and seeing the cf18s flying around myself. I've got family that work on the base👨🏽‍🎤

We’re lucky to have 50 qualified pilots at this point operating the 18…saw my first hornet in 83 in Shearwater, NS. The feds continue to mess it up.

Hey guys, we did buy 130+ in the 1980s, but have about 80 operational now. Waiting for our ordered 88 Block 4 F-35s. Boeing is persona non grata for their tariff battle with Bombardier over the CSeries/Airbus 220.

Hey guys - I agree 100% ... no idea why we went with the F35. BTW - we are large country with a small population - just went over the 40 million mark

splitting Gripen and F35 was the ideal answer. Super Hornets were never really considered

One yes we are a small Country and Two we needed the F-15EX not the Super Hornet.

Even though the Gripen is still to record an engine failure I totally buy Gonky's argument for dual engines. F-18 or F-15's...

As a Canadian sadly our procurements are always 2 decades behind. The Grippen or SuperHornets would have been a better choice.

These antiques are going to look sweet at wednesday night's show n shine!😂

Canada we do have smallish population but have many many air space to cover

Offsets play a pretty big role in aircraft selection per Gonky's point-politics.

Both the super hornet and the f-15x would have costs more per plane and more for maintenance due to low numbers being made while having no stealth. The latest f-35 are easily the best choice for Canada, especially considering all our allies have them.

Hey, I was serving in Germany from 84 - 88 when Canada moved from the CF-104 Star Fighter to the CF-18 Hornet. All of the 18's were built for Canada between 82 and 88 or 40 years old now.

I wish our RCAF had the budget and capacity to support multiple platforms. A twin engine fighter with super cruise is ideal for arctic intercepts, while the F-35 would allow us to integrate seamlessly with NATO allies for offensive capability. Let’s hope the best defence is a good offence. Shout out to our forces who are making miracles happen with 40 year old equipment!

Our bureaucrats and politicians are total losers!

Wow! Thanks for the info...

100% agree!! As a highly interested Canadian, I was convinced that they were going to buy the Super Hornet. It made the most sense. The CF-18 was originally chosen partly because it has two engines which increases survivability should one fail over the unforgiving Canadian wilderness. The Canadian CF-18’s are some of the most capable Hornets still in operation. This is thanks to Canada’s need to continuously upgrade the plane to keep it relevant while there were countless delays in new fighter procurement. The Block 3 Super Hornet more than surpassed the needs to the RCAF. Although it’s technically a “new” aircraft relative to the legacy Hornet, it would have been a virtually seamless transition. When the buffoons at the Liberal Federal government (no bias here…) discounted the Super Hornet - no doubt due to the issues they had with Boeing concerning Bombardier - I was certain that the Gripen was the choice. Again, IT JUST MADE SENSE! The highly capable 4+ Gripen E checked all the boxes. The thing is made for Canadian climates, it’s cost per flight hour is far less than the F-35, it’s a highly effective platform. Considering that the Trudeau Liberal government abandoned the original intention of the Harper Conservative government’s plan to buy the aircraft when they took office on 2015, I’m shocked that they chose it.

It seems to me Canada would get great use out of the F15X. Great range for the local defense patrols

You are absolutelly right. Canada chose the F-18 over the F16 because it has 2 engines and it's a security feature for where our pilots fly. I don't understand the choice of the F35 either. Granted it's a more capable aircraft with cutting edge technology, but the single engine thing is really bad for us. The funny thing is that we signed in to develop the F35, paid of the development, then the govenment cancelled the order. Then they decided to get in again later.

Wow! Thought Mover looked extra great tonight until I realized he'd shuffled the displays... :-)

Good video. Thanks.

The F-15EX wasn’t really planned at the time and was never part of the competition. In hindsight, I’d love for us to get the -EX due to its better radar and range than the SH. And no, we don’t need stealth (F-35 👎🏼). Plus, it’s just badass. 😁

Canada doesn't have Super Hornets because Boeing filed complaints involving Bombardier which is the largest aerospace company in Canada. When Boeing pushed its complaints through Canada did a 180 degree turn from the Super Hornet. Its possible that the switch from the original purchase of the F35 to being open with the obviousl pick being the Super Hornet was an attempt to appease Boeing so they would drop the complaints about what it considered improper funding of Bombardier against them.

Good Points. I'm a 50 year old Canadian and watching the political climate in Canada.. It's always been tough to sell military to the public here for any political party. "Why?" "We're Geographically Isolated" "Good luck making it past the Americans" is pretty much the tone for many decades. We're about to be the front line in the thawing arctic and we're falling behind in Nato contributions (other than cash).. and the wake up call is coming. Especially when military procurement can take a decade or more to establish and the world can change much quicker than that.

The biggest problem with the Gripen was Payload vs Range to patrol the artic. The second issue was future interoperability with USAF / USN NORAD & NATO commitments. Lastly, the JSF vs competition was a political fight based on numerous timelines that unfolded. Fast forward to today and the future of strategic and tactical air to air and ground warfare unfolding in Ukraine is the eye opening to military leaders.

Hey guy's, I'm Canadian eh !! I agree with you 150% that buying F-35 is overkill for us. They are still flying the Legacy which turned 40 years old in 2022 !! The super Hornet would have been a better choice for us, already knowing the Legacy inside/out. For me, I would have preferred the Gripen to the F-35. Much cheaper to fly than the F-35 and SAAB was going to have them build in Montreal's old Canadair plan. But I hate to say this, but it's true, Canada bought the F-35 to have a good relationship with US. Simple as that Cheers

Eurofighter was another one considered for replacing our aging CF-18’s. Canada’s competition for a replacement were heavily favoured for the F-35, the EuroFighter didn’t even wanna attend the competition. As a Canadian I’d would have liked to have seen the Eurofighter, especially over the F-35.

Great Show! I agree with the Super Hornet! Too bad they didn’t go that way! And, for your info, the first CF-18 was delivered in CFB Bagotville in July 1982.

Trivia fact: CF18's have tail hooks. They have cables rigged on the runway in the Cold Lake AFB to practice carrier traps. Bizarre... I do miss seeing how busy those runways were during Maple Flag. Working on projects in the Cold Lake AWR gave me the opportunity to see a lot of incredible aircraft from many nations strutting their stuff in the skies.

Better yet, the F15-EX...

We are still using the A variant (with some upgrades) Only a handful are operational parts, weapons, personnel etc. F-15 shoulda been our option.. Military in complete decline… Ask me how I know… 😢

Aerospace engineering student in Canada, you can't image how few R&D projects are out there in Canada. I don't know exactly where do our government put all their money into, but this country has no real tech and industrial development probably in the last 50 years.

The total cost of the HEP Phase II package was estimated by US Congressional Budget Office at US$862.3 Million: 50 x AIM-9X Sidewinder Block II tactical missiles; 38 x CA/APG-79(V)4 active electronically scanned array (AESA) radars; 38 x CA/APG-79(V)4 AESA radar A1 kits; 46 x F/A-18A wide-band RADOMEs; Upgrades to the Advanced Distributed Combat Training System; On-going Technical assistance to support the upgraded jets

Canada should of had new defence planes 30 years ago and every years since had some new planes added

I am a bit different. I think they should have gotten some F 35 and the rest Grippen.

I remember way back when, the RAAF were replacing Mirage and F-16 and F-18 were considered, one big + for the Hornet was the spare engine.

Fun fact: Canada has 138 CF-18s, but that's a gross over simplification since only 36 of them have AESA radars. A safe rule of thumb is to assume 1/3rd of your fighters will be inoperable at any given moment (that ratio is for well maintained and current airframes not 40 year old triple expected service life relics) lets call it 1/2 and that's generous. There are at most 18 air to air capable fighters available to the nation tasked with screening Russian nuclear bombers along the largest border on earth. It gets better, Canada does not disclose its air to air missile inventory but given 288 AIM-7s, 43 AIM-9s and 12 AIM-120s went to Ukraine and there hasn't been any major purchases in the last two decades.....well lets just say its unlikely those 18 active fighters can even be fully armed. They sure as shit can't be fully loaded with AIM-120s. Don't get me wrong me and every other Canadian with a brain knows our military procurement is a US patronage tool and not a series attempt at capability but sweet Jesus we don't even pretend anymore.

Super Hornet made soooo much sense

You guys are spot on with your comments. As a Canadian I couldn't wrap my head around the F35. Canada is a huge country but it's mostly empty. Any country big enough to attack us or the US is coming over the pole. The battlefield will be thousands of miles from most populated areas. We need aircraft with range and redundancies because if something gets damaged there's no place to land. The F35 is complicated, expensive and only has 1 engine. Super Hornets make so much more sense. The F35 just doesn't make sense to me. If it goes down in the arctic you lose a 100 million dollar airplane and an even more valuable pilot.

Thanks for the commentary about our laughingstock of a government. The fundamental problem is modern Canadian politicians don't take defence policy seriously, overestimate the security of our geography, and assume a strongly worded letter is sufficient deterrence. Our military funding has been consistently declining over the years even though the world is becoming increasingly hostile. Our military procurement process is THE WORST. Money constantly gets thrown away because every few years, a new minister decides to cancel previous contracts and "re-study" what equipment to buy. It took over a decade to decide what pistols to give our service men and women to replace 9mm Brownings that were built in World War 2, so you can imagine the frustrations of the process for more complex equipment like ships, aircraft, etc. Even when the procurement process identifies what equipment would be the best fit, the recommendations then get ignored by the government due to backroom politics.

I agree we are a small military and because whatever we buy is in such small numbers it doesn't make sense to buy F35 exclusively. Maybe a mix of F35 and F15 EX would make more sense for Northern patrols.

I have been ashamed of the way successive Canadian Governments have under funded our military , particularity the Navy and R.C.A.F. I know that while the U.S. would defend their allies like Australia or the U.K. to the hilt , they would not only do the same for Canada because we are an ally but would be compelled to because of geography . I am perpetually embarrassed that while many " smug , self-righteous Canadians " ( to quote Gordon Sinclair } take cheap shots at our friends , we hide beneath her " skirts ". I hope that a new conservative government , should we be lucky enough to get one , will make it a priority to expand our capabilities at least to the point where we can patrol and defend our own territory . And Thank You to our neighbors and friends in the U.S. for all they do .

Not sure why people are still against the F-35 buy for Canada...it was the best and only choice. Commonality with allies is important and the F-35 sensors alone opens up so much more capability for the RCAF. Gripen would have been a disaster for Canada because it would have left us with an orphaned fleet in 10 years and frankly, no one in our fighter community wanted the Gripen. We would have lost pilots had we gone with the Gripen...no joke. They don't want the F-35 because it's the cool new toy, but because it gets the job done and gives our pilots the best option to get them home safely...not to mention being safer in a high threat environment. As for the single engine fighter over the Arctic....the engine argument is a moot point...has been this whole time. Also....multi-engine was never a requirement for the new fighter. Not to mention that the US is flying the F-35s in similar conditions over Alaska and Norway is already operating the F-35 above the Arctic Circle. The F-135 engine is the best fighter engine going as far as thrust and reliability. F-35 was the only choice for Canada....full stop.

Good post, new subscriber!

We are a small country. Personally, I would’ve loved to see a fleet of super hornets with a squadron worth of growlers, but politics between Boeing and bombardier squashed that

The population of Canada is roughly that of Los Angeles; in military terms, we're a small country with a lot of territory. We are also, alas, used to having a big brother (first the Empire, now the Americans) to protect us so we can turn any military procurement issue into domestic politics, because there's no perceived urgency to get it done.

I agree the Super Hornet is what we should have ordered , two engines is definitely nice to have when flying over those desolate areas

Used to work on a couple of air bases and the common thread from the air force members I worked with was that these planes (and the seaking helicopters) needed to be put out of their misery and new ones commissioned. It's something wild like 6 hours of maintenance per hour of flight for the planes and 8 hours of maintenance per hour of flying for the sea kings.

Great video! Very interesting.

I feel Canada is in a rough spot right now militarily. Yes they are getting the newest block of the F35A's but when will they fill enough of the air force to be effective? I strongly agree that F/A-18E/F's Block III as an interim and immediate replacement in the interim makes sense.

The F35 definitely has some pretty cool EW Wizardry but everyone was surprised we picked the JSF. what you guys are saying for the most part was/is mutual in Cold Lake. The one thing you need to realize is how bad our procurement system is and how it knee caps us constantly. I was an Amourer on the Hornet at 401 for the better part of a decade. Just switched fleets this past summer...probs going to go back haha.

Being Canadian, I remember the CF 104 Starfighters that we had... A Single Engine fighter... Sheesh! I don't know if there were any sold or scrapped, because there were Crashes almost daily, in the news. Having a jet with twin engines could have saved many of our pilots... From my perspective, only a Twin Engine fighter will work for Canada, in whatever roll... Peace time or a conflict. Thanks for your perspectives 🙂

Damn, that was a great discussion.

Crazy idea from the hinterlands: keep the CF-18 airworthy until the TAI Kaan is ready. Twin engine and longer than an F-15 or F/A-18.

Clearly Canada should have an artic interceptor program to have 4.5 gen multi engine air plane for patrol and interception mission in the Artic.

We have fewer than 50 combat-ready pilots so really, we don't need anything. Having spent years flying the far north, in areas where NDB's are 800nm apart, there is no way we should have gone to a single-engine aircraft. It almost ensures a pilot's fatality. My ideal scenario would have been to separate the required strengths and purchase separate aircraft. The Super Hornets for the far North and the F-35's for NATO ops. There was a time we actually had strength and operated CF-5's, CF-101 and CF 104 aircraft. Let's get back to that. As Putin builds up the North, we ought to be building a response.

Ok big brother, I agree with the F18 choice and a few growlers also

I agree dual engine is the way to go for Canada. I know the current cf-18s well as I used to work on them and although they're older airframes, they have been heavily updated and are still very capable. I was responsible for many of the updates such as designing the autopilot system when they were getting GPS-IFR certified and have hundreds of hours of flight training in the fully articulated cockpit simulator.

I have a Sopwith Camel they can have to upgrade?

@C.W. Lemoine : 36 of those newly 96 ''NORAD'' upgraded jets will undergo a new combat capability. New mission computer, new sensors, APG-79(V) radar. The project will also deliver new weapons, including the Sidewinder AIM-9X Block II air-to-air short-range missile, the AIM-120D advanced medium range air-to-air missile, and the AGM-154 Joint Standoff Weapon (JSOW), an air-to-surface glide bomb, new helmets for pilots, new Lockheed sniper targeting pod. All theses upgrades are done in collaboration with U.S. Marine Corps and the U.S. Navy International Programs Office (NIPO). The Marines does exactly the same upgrades in their Legacy Hornets.

I'm headed to the CFASC today wish me luck!

As a Canadian, I was so upset we didn’t get the super hornet. For what we do it just makes sense. It’s cheaper meaning we can field larger numbers than the F-35 for the same cost, it has a lot of commonality in flight capability and layout as the legacy which reduces the retraining time for exsisting pilots. Two engine gives us better redundancy for over water and Arctic operations. And I feel that the superhornet brings more to the table. It’s a better ground strike aircraft, its a good fighter aircraft, it can be an electronic warfare and ELINT platform in its growler form, it can be an aerial refueling platform with the buddy tanking pod. Yes the F-35 has a better fighter and stealth capability….. and? Do you foresee Canada taking on SU-57s and S-400 air defence networks alone? No, if ww3 breaks out, we will be in a supporting role as always. The super hornet is potent enough that it can still deal with 95% of Russia and chinas jets, most of which are Flanker derivatives. We did not need the F-35

Agree with your assessments on this topic. As a Canadian and former service member; I am appalled at the decisions made by this government. What a great transition it would have been for our pilots to jump into the Super Hornet. “It’s not the plane, it’s the pilot Mav”. Yes, we have awesome, well trained pilots (although we just announced no longer training our own pilots). Lets give them the right aircraft for the job and to safely operate in the Canadian environment. Caving to the politics and special interests has been the hallmark of successive governments. We’ll continue to have a yard sale of equipment for the foreseeable future. Good grief!

Pete Mitchell have proved that the CF-18 is still a very good fighter.

I remember working on the agp65 radar in 1991-1992 / cold lake ab. Hasnt that jet had 2 life upgrades anyway? I hear the us will now be training our pilots after retiring the hawk and standing down 419 moose sqn. I also did periodic maint on 419s cf 5s. Also the cf 18 was carrier equipped.