Canadas military...awesome AIN'T it??

imactheknife · Oct 6th, 2004, 08:28 PM

geeez yet another museum piece to bring home and plant in our archives of dicrepit eyesores we call our navy.

Oh but this time it needs to kill someone first on it's maiden voyage from Britian to celebrate it's new life in Canada.

Is it Only Canada that spends hard earned dollars on it's military...or I mean hardly any money on it's Military and when it does spend the money it's not money well spent?

and Yes I know AIN'T isn't a word to you inglis majors... [img]tongue.gif[/img]

Fink-Nottle · Oct 6th, 2004, 08:53 PM

Yes, this is looking more and more like a bad decision... even though they were cheap (about 1/4 the cost of buying or building a new sub). They're not really museum pieces though... the were built in the 1980's but taken out of commission as a cost cutting measure when the RN decided to standardize on the Trafalgar class nuclear subs. The problem is that these subs have been mothballed for over a decade and no one (the British or us) have experience in taking a mothballed sub out of drydock and rendering it operational again. Obviously a major refit is required, but Canada understandably wants that refit to happen here rather than in the UK. So they are forced to cross the Atlantic in a sub which may or may not be seaworthy. Perhaps we should have paid a little more and had them delivered. Better still, we could have bought something newer.

TroutMaskReplica · Oct 6th, 2004, 09:04 PM

the fire on board originated in the captain's quarters. he could have been smoking in bed for all we know.

SINC · Oct 6th, 2004, 11:10 PM

	Quote:
	the fire on board originated in the captain's quarters. he could have been smoking in bed for all we know.

OK, but smokin' what?

Cheers

MacDoc · Oct 6th, 2004, 11:22 PM

THIS is what Canada needs to spending scarce money on not idiotic......and ancient......... submarines.

50 hours on patrol without a refuel.

	Quote:
	The gangly Altair, which is about the size of a fighter jet, will be tested by the military in a series of missions scheduled to begin Sunday. Gen. Ray Henault, chief of defence staff, said the $4.5 million experiment is part of a bid to modernize the Canadian military. "We need to implement these new technologies that are out there," Henault said Thursday as he briefed reporters in Ottawa.

ain't that the truth

and this

	Quote:
	What Maritime Staff probably has in mind is a ship similar to the Danish Thetis-class frigates.*** Designed for use off eastern Greenland, the Thetis-class can handle high sea states and ice – the conditions the Navy would encounter on the Grand Banks or off Labrador. The Thetis also has a modest crew size and great endurance – features which would appeal to DND. Certainly the waters off Canada’s east and west coasts can be extremely rough in winter and ice will be found in the Arctic approaches year- round. But is it necessary to re-invent the frigate to fulfill this mission? Perhaps not – other navies and coast guards perform similar jobs in smaller vessels including those of Iceland out in the middle of the North Atlantic.

Submarines.......give me a break

Multiuse vehicles designed by Canadians, for Canadian conditions and BUILT IN CANADA......NOW!!

vacuvox · Oct 7th, 2004, 02:29 AM

What a terrible turn of events. My heart goes out to the family of Lieutenant Chris Saunders.

MacDoc said - Multiuse vehicles designed by Canadians, for Canadian conditions and BUILT IN CANADA......NOW!!

MacD, I strongly agree.

However...before launching any initiatives to develop our own solutions for patrol and defense, we must first protect ourselves from the formidable business practices of our good neighbours to the south.

recently declassified from the US State dept:
"MEMORANDUM ON PRODUCTION SHARING PROGRAM -- UNITED STATES AND CANADA"

"...following a visit of the President to Canada in July 1958, Canada took the following actions with the understanding that her defense industry depended largely upon the U.S. channeling defense business into Canada: cancelled the CF 105 (Arrow) and related systems contracts; decided to make maximum use of U.S. developed weapons, integrated into NORAD; worked with the U.S. toward a fully integrated continental air defense."

notice the date July 1958 - a year before the Arrow program was publicly cancelled in 1959.

Soon afterwards, Canada bought a few dozen "specially priced" (sound familiar?) Voodoos (half the plane the arrow was - and with chronic "pitch up" problems) from the US... for the same cost as a similar number of Arrows had they been put into production. It also cost Canada the loss of Avro, other associated industries and leading designers and engineers who were largely recruited by NASA.

win win deal for the US though.

In this light, it's easy to understand the current lack of domestic initiative to develop equipment to patrol and defend our own country.

This has nothing to do with defense or superiority. It's just business. The US corporate machine has to develop markets to sell their military hardware, they put their men in government. The US government buys the hardware and puts it through its paces. They also deploy envoys to bend the ears (and/or arms) of Canadian politicians - to make sure we're getting with the program and buying their stuff. It's all sales - not "safety".

The current missile defense program is nothing more than another absurd opportunity to channel vast quantities of money into large US/multinational corporations so they can lucratively escalate the arms race, and make this a more dangerous world.

Sorry to everyone who thinks this is America-bashing. It's not. It's just an audit. It's high time to rethink our accounting prinicples. We need to claw back a little sovereignty here.

vacuvox · Oct 7th, 2004, 02:55 AM

By the way MacNutt, I agree with you that Cretin cancelling Kim Campbell's helicopters was stupid, tragic and, probably, insane. Not however, I would argue, in the same league of stupid, tragic insanity as Kim's boss (who sold Canada) and Diefenbaker (who cut out our heart and sold our soul in 1959).

MacNutt · Oct 7th, 2004, 04:42 AM

No question that Diefenbaker was a tiny man overwhelmed by a big job that he couldn't handle. Guy was an unwitting tool, in my book.

But the helicopters were Brian Mulroney's idea...not Kim Campbell's. And they were the right helicopters to do the job, too. As several multi-million dollar Liberal-commissioned studies have clearly shown.

But we STILL don't have them!

Luckily, Jean Corruptien didn't abandon ALL of Mulroney's better ideas...like the GST and the Free Trade Agreement.

Even though Jean swore on a stack of bibles that he WOULD dump all of this stuff once he was elected.

Later on..after he was safely ensconsed in absolute power over all of us...he claimed it was just a "slip of the tongue" or a "misunderstanding".

A crooked and stupid little man covering his butt. While not wanting to kill off obviously good policies left by his conservative predecessor. Because, like it or not, this stuff is what has provided the prosperity that we now currently enjoy.

None of the "great ideas" that the Cretien/Martin crew have ever come up with on their own have ever done anything more than cost us vast amounts of wasted tax money. There is no exception to this. None at all.

No wonder they always steal their best ideas from the conservative side of the house.

Too bad the helicopters were such a sore point with Chretien that he decide to spend away billions of our tax dollars while NOT buying them...instead of admitting he was totally wrong.

Diefenbaker was a tool. Chretien was a FOOL. And a crook.

Of this, there is no doubt.

Fink-Nottle · Oct 7th, 2004, 09:26 AM

Hey Macdoc,

Actually I think it makes sense for us to have some subs, given that they are the only vehicle that can reliably patrol the Arctic. Thos Danish frigates look good too... and it makes sense to leverage the experience of another northern country. And of course, we badly need helicopters... that was a terrible decision by Chretien.

I would never make 'Built in Canada' a precondition for purchase though... we should be buying the best stuff we can for our troops, regardless of its origin. I'm sure some of it is Canadian, but I'm sure some of it isn't. When we use military purchases as 'make work' projects, no one wins in the long term; we pay more than we should, our companies are coddled and become uncompetitive, and our troops don't get the best stuff. Our companies should compete with everyone else.

rhino · Oct 7th, 2004, 10:55 AM

	Quote:
	Luckily, Jean Corruptien didn't abandon ALL of Mulroney's better ideas...like the GST and the Free Trade Agreement. AND None of the "great ideas" that the Cretien/Martin crew have ever come up with on their own have ever done anything more than cost us vast amounts of wasted tax money.

Isn't that like having your cake and eating it too? Enjoying the "benefits" of the GST and FTA as they fill the public purse then with filling your pockets and those of your cronies with wasted dollars.

Oh, wait a minute. Isn't that why Canadians voted Mulroney out of office? And then didn't we do the same thing to try and get the Liberals out of government too? History repeated itself with apparently no new lessons learned. The Canadian Democratic Dictatorship continues.