This was always the correct decision, even if the government tried to ignore reality
Defence procurement in Canada has long been marked by failures and poor outcomes. Where the CF-18 fighter jet replacement plan is unique is that no program has been the subject of so much political interference. After 2010, at nearly every step of the way, governments made decisions based more on political perception than fundamental realities, leading to a lamentable series of events that finally concluded with Monday’s announced selection of the F-35.
Between 2007 and 2010, the Canadian government’s preliminary analysis found that the F-35 was the most suitable for Canada’s military requirements at the lowest lifecycle cost. It was also the best option economically, in part because Canadian companies were producing components and providing service for nearly all F-35s built worldwide. Due to Canada’s participation in the Joint Strike Fighter program, all of these these factors were largely fixed and unlikely to change. Based on this analysis, the government pursued a sole-source acquisition to avoid the significant cost of a competition.
While this decision set up nearly a decade of strife, those fundamental realities have not changed over the past dozen years. If anything, the intervening time has only shored up the original analysis made by the bureaucracy, as evidenced by the fact that in the past four years, four countries (Poland, Finland, Switzerland and Germany) launched and completed competitions that selected the F-35. In Canada, even the competition that ultimately selected the F-35 had requirements that looked remarkably similar to 2010 — the changes made were largely to enable less capable aircraft the opportunity to compete against the F-35.
In short, the answer has not changed — rather, Canadian politics had to adapt to it. As is well documented, the 2010 decision quickly became politically untenable.
Critical reports by the Parliamentary Budget Officer and the Office of the Auditor General led the Harper government to scrap the purchase over concerns over cost. However, over time the original Department of National Defence estimates have proven more accurate.
The government then conducted an independent review by the National Fighter Procurement Secretariat, which returned with the same answer, leading the Conservatives to decide to acquire the F-35s a second time in 2014. That decision was postponed, as the government prepared for the upcoming election, after details were leaked in the United States.
While the F-35 was raised as an issue in the 2011 federal election, this paled in comparison to the 2015 campaign announcement by now Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. The Liberals promised that they would not purchase the F-35, instead announcing the intention to select a less costly jet more suited to Canada’s needs through a competition. This was a fiction that would essentially guide the federal government’s next seven years of defence policy. Upon entering office, the Liberals were confronted with the reality that no part of their campaign promises could be achieved. It is illegal in Canada to bar a competitor from a competition, especially one that was likely to win.
Instead of acknowledging that reality, the government created a new fiction — the so-called “capability gap,” which claimed that Canada could not meet its NATO and NORAD defence commitments simultaneously. According to the government, this required the immediate sole-source acquisition of 18 F/A-18E/F Super Hornets. While intended to be an interim buy, it would have likely locked the fighter as the CF-18 replacement in a competition. This would have allowed the Trudeau government to do an end run around a proper competition that likely would have chosen the F-35.
However, the interim buy collapsed a year later — partly due to a trade dispute between Boeing and Bombardier, as well as the exorbitant cost of a the small number of Super Hornets, which was two-thirds of the cost to acquire a full fleet of 65 F-35s. Instead, Canada acquired surplus 40-year-old Hornets from Australia to bolster the Royal Canadian Air Force’s aging CF-18 fleet. Canada is now suffering the very capability gap the Liberal government sought to avoid with the interim purchase, but it has conveniently ignored the fact it can barely meet Canada’s northern defence needs (much less a NATO one), because it does not fit its political needs.
Given the fundamentals outlined above, that the competition selected the F-35 Monday should not have been a surprise. The ministers who announced the decision were at great pains to point out the integrity of the “process” in selecting the F-35. However, that ignores all of the events that led to this point. The government could have made a decision as early as December when the bureaucracy’s analysis was completed, but it chose to delay the announcement for nearly three months. In some ways, the politics surrounding the fighter acquisition changed following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine — it was now politically untenable to not acquire an effective fighter capability, especially in the face of numerous allies making that decision.
While many lessons can be gleaned from this series of events, perhaps the most important is how the deep expertise was ignored for superficial political considerations. It has cost Canada billions of dollars and left our country much weaker as a result.
Richard Shimooka is a Senior Fellow at the Macdonald Laurier Institute.
PHOENIX (AP) — Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a prominent proponent of debunked public health claims whom Donald Trump has promised to put in charge of health initiatives, said Saturday that Trump would push to remove fluoride from drinking water on his first day in office if elected president.
Fluoride strengthens teeth and reduces cavities by replacing minerals lost during normal wear and tear, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The addition of low levels of fluoride to drinking water has long been considered one of the greatest public health achievements of the last century.
Kennedy made the declaration Saturday on the social media platform X alongside a variety of claims about the heath effects of fluoride.
“On January 20, the Trump White House will advise all U.S. water systems to remove fluoride from public water,” Kennedy wrote. Trump and his wife, Melania Trump, “want to Make America Healthy Again,” he added, repeating a phrase Trump often uses and links to Kennedy.
Trump told NBC News on Sunday that he had not spoken to Kennedy about fluoride yet, “but it sounds OK to me. You know it’s possible.”
The former president declined to say whether he would seek a Cabinet role for Kennedy, a job that would require Senate confirmation, but added, “He’s going to have a big role in the administration.”
Asked whether banning certain vaccines would be on the table, Trump said he would talk to Kennedy and others about that. Trump described Kennedy as “a very talented guy and has strong views.”
The sudden and unexpected weekend social media post evoked the chaotic policymaking that defined Trump’s White House tenure, when he would issue policy declarations on Twitter at virtually all hours. It also underscored the concerns many experts have about Kennedy, who has long promoted debunked theories about vaccine safety, having influence over U.S. public health.
In 1950, federal officials endorsed water fluoridation to prevent tooth decay, and continued to promote it even after fluoride toothpaste brands hit the market several years later. Though fluoride can come from a number of sources, drinking water is the main source for Americans, researchers say.
Officials lowered their recommendation for drinking water fluoride levels in 2015 to address a tooth condition called fluorosis, that can cause splotches on teeth and was becoming more common in U.S. kids.
In August, a federal agency determined “with moderate confidence” that there is a link between higher levels of fluoride exposure and lower IQ in kids. The National Toxicology Program based its conclusion on studies involving fluoride levels at about twice the recommended limit for drinking water.
A federal judge later cited that study in ordering the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to further regulate fluoride in drinking water. U.S. District Judge Edward Chen cautioned that it’s not certain that the amount of fluoride typically added to water is causing lower IQ in kids, but he concluded that mounting research points to an unreasonable risk that it could be. He ordered the EPA to take steps to lower that risk, but didn’t say what those measures should be.
In his X post Saturday, Kennedy tagged Michael Connett, the lead attorney representing the plaintiff in that lawsuit, the environmental advocacy group Food & Water Watch.
Kennedy’s anti-vaccine organization has a lawsuit pending against news organizations including The Associated Press, accusing them of violating antitrust laws by taking action to identify misinformation, including about COVID-19 and COVID-19 vaccines. Kennedy is on leave from the group but is listed as one of its attorneys in the lawsuit.
What role Kennedy might hold if Trump wins on Tuesday remains unclear. Kennedy recently told NewsNation that Trump asked him to “reorganize” agencies including the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health, the Food and Drug Administration and some agencies under the Department of Agriculture.
But for now, the former independent presidential candidate has become one of Trump’s top surrogates. Trump frequently mentions having the support of Kennedy, a scion of a Democratic dynasty and the son of former Attorney General Robert Kennedy and nephew of President John F. Kennedy.
Kennedy traveled with Trump Friday and spoke at his rallies in Michigan and Wisconsin.
Trump said Saturday that he told Kennedy: “You can work on food, you can work on anything you want” except oil policy.
“He wants health, he wants women’s health, he wants men’s health, he wants kids, he wants everything,” Trump added.
Danielle Smith receives overwhelming support at United Conservative Party convention
Americans and Canadians are cousins that is true. Allies today but long ago people were at loggerheads mostly because of the British Empire and American ambitions.
Canadians appreciate our cousins down south enough to visit them many millions of times over the year. America is Canada’s largest and most important trading partner. As a manufacturer, I can attest to this personally. My American clients have allowed our firm to grow and prosper over the past few decades. There is a problem we have been seeing, a problem where nationalism, both political and economic has been creating a roadblock to our trade relationship.
Both Democrats and Republicans have shown a willingness to play the “buy only American Made product” card, a sounding board for all things isolationist, nationalistic and small-mindedness. We all live on this small planet, and purchase items made from all over the world. Preferences as to what to buy and where it is made are personal choices, never should they become a platform of national pride and thuggery. This has brought fear into the hearts of many Canadians who manufacture for and service the American Economy in some way. This fear will be apparent when the election is over next week.
Canadians are not enemies of America, but allies and friends with a long tradition of supporting our cousins back when bad sh*t happens. We have had enough of the American claim that they want free trade, only to realize that they do so long as it is to their benefit. Tariffs, and undue regulations applied to exporters into America are applied, yet American industry complains when other nations do the very same to them. Seriously! Democrats have said they would place a preference upon doing business with American firms before foreign ones, and Republicans wish to tariff many foreign nations into oblivion. Rhetoric perhaps, but we need to take these threats seriously. As to you the repercussions that will come should America close its doors to us.
Tit for tat neighbors. Tariff for tariff, true selfish competition with no fear of the American Giant. Do you want to build homes in America? Over 33% of all wood comes from Canada. Tit for tat. Canada’s mineral wealth can be sold to others and place preference upon the highest bidder always. You know who will win there don’t you America, the deep-pocketed Chinese.
Reshaping our alliances with others. If America responds as has been threatened, Canadians will find ways to entertain themselves elsewhere. Imagine no Canadian dollars flowing into the Northern States, Florida or California? The Big Apple without its friendly Maple Syrup dip. Canadians will realize just how significant their spending is to America and use it to our benefit, not theirs.
Clearly we will know if you prefer Canadian friendship to Donald Trumps Bravado.
China, Saudi Arabia & Russia are not your friends in America. Canada, Japan, Taiwan the EU and many other nations most definitely are. Stop playing politics, and carry out business in an unethical fashion. Treat allies as they should be treated.
Steven Kaszab
Bradford, Ontario
skaszab@yahoo.ca
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