While 16 F-35 fighters remain contractually committed for delivery starting this year, the full 88-jet procurement is stalled amidst trade friction with the Trump administration.
Rising program costs—now estimated at $30 billion—have reopened the door for Saab’s JAS 39 Gripen E.
The Gripen offers superior industrial benefits, including 12,600 domestic jobs and Arctic-optimized maintenance.
Ottawa must now balance the F-35’s unmatched NORAD interoperability against the Gripen’s economic sovereignty as the aging CF-18 Hornet fleet reaches its structur

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[–] Thedogdrinkscoffee@lemmy.ca 2 points 11 hours ago* (last edited 4 hours ago)

That's all it has ever needed.

I appreciate the truth of your comment, but respectfully disagree.

You don't build a defense force and strategy for the conflict you hope happens. Hubris kills.
Our needs include all of NATO's needs, and to a far far smaller degree, any UN peacekeeking or similar function.

A 5th gen stealth fighter presents desirable attributes for specific purposes, but to your point they aren't the bulk of the work to be done.

The cost saving of a single fleet of F-35 also inject various fragilities of their own. Not the least of which is the catastrophic losses from a single plane going down from anything ranging from enemy action to training accident to supply chains fuckery.

I won't shed a single tear for the F-35 if we cancel the whole lot. But having some 5th gen makes sense. We should be going with the Brit or French led consortiums of middle powers, not US, Russia or China.