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New Canadian Politics Thread

I think he needs to seriously think about joining the EU and getting the protection under that asap. We know Trump is going to try to take Canada’s resources and/or territories in the upcoming months. I’m not sure there is any better protection than doing this (and of course get as many fucken drones prepared as humanly possible). Right now they will very likely just watch Trump take our land from Europe and do very little without becoming a part of the EU.

Need to look at true military alliances, not only trade. Countries that will go up against Trump. Any enemy country of Trump - worth looking at for support is there is any physical type of war. Like right now - need to take Trump and his cabinet’s words very seriously.
 
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Watched Carney's introductory presser as PM.

As far as news goes, these were the highlights from his Q&A:

  • Emmanuel Macron has invited him to to a visit in Paris. And after meeting Macron, he'll be meeting with Keir Starmer in the UK. Discussions will be focused on security in Europe & Canada, increased trade & economic links and the historic ties between our countries.

  • No plans to visit the United States, will talk to Trump at an unspecified future time.

  • He declined to answer when or if he'll be recalling the house, when he'll have an election or where he’ll be running for his own seat. He joked that they'd have an election "sometime before November" before saying more news will be coming out in the next few days.

  • Snapped at a bit at a reporter who'd asked basically if we'd seek public support/assurances of Canada's sovereignty & security from our allies. Said that "we are the masters of our own house" and that we're in charge of assuring our own sovereignty. That while “it’s nice if people say nice things about you”, we don’t need it and won’t be seeking it.



View: https://x.com/markjcarney/status/1900632949491691634?s=46&t=slvKDnX1n9ri7D4jpSVVzA

What are your overall impressions of him?
 
What are your overall impressions of him?


Seems pretty smart and self-assured. Very strong answers where Canada’s sovereignty, security, foreign policy and economy are concerned.

Seems like his approach is going to be just flatly refuse to engage with any of the 51st state stuff as a serious discussion.

When asked about Marco Rubio stating at the G7 that Canada would be better off as a state, his response was simply “It’s crazy. That’s it. Next question.” And I noticed Joly’s response at the G7 was similar, so those are probably the marching orders he’s handed out on the matter.

Struggled more on partisan stuff. When asked how he represented change when his cabinet is basically entirely composed of Trudeau ministers, he responded with some word salad about how it’s a smaller and more focused cabinet. He also tried to attack Poilievre on the security clearance stuff.

With regards to Trump, he went out of his way to be respectful. When a reporter asked him about “Trump”, he interrupted to correct him and say “you mean President Trump”. Praised him as a smart businessman. Highlighted that he’d worked with him before as a central banker during Trump’s first term and has had dealings with him in the private sector. Also gave a long speech about how, like President Trump, we take “the scourge of fentanyl” seriously.
 
My impressions of Carney:

1) not a fascist.
2) doesn't object to being vetted for security clearance.
3) inbred hillbillies and Freedumbers hate him.

He ticks all the boxes he needs to tick for me.
 

1742064373054.png


So I've been looking into this more over the last week, especially as more concrete statements about what the US can and can't do to the planes after delivery have come out this week.

I think a reasonable outcome here is to accept that we're stuck with the first 16 planes (my understanding is that we've already paid for them, not that we're just legally committed to buying them. Money has already changed hands I believe) and those are set to be delivered in 2028.

I think that cancelling the rest of the purchase and going with the Rafale is the way to go. It leaves us with a limited 5th gen backbone if anything comes up where we need a stealth platform, but a very good 4.5th gen to handle the majority of the heavy lifting. That contract should be 60-70 planes, and split between existing units that can be delivered soon so that we can start phasing out the old F-18's asap, and new units we would likely receive in 2029-2030.

The 'kill switch' issue with the F35 is more of a mix of limited capability & longer term forced obsolence issue apparently than a brick switch. The US has certain network access capabilities built into them that require ongoing support from the US and that they can turn off. This diminishes some of the capability of the aircraft, but doesn't brick it, alter it's ability to function as an aircraft, etc. It's kind of like having an android smartphone but google cancelling your gmail account and access to any google apps you're using on it. Your phone isn't bricked, you can just do less with it than you could before.

I've seen the long term issues explained similarly. If the Americans choose to lock you out of software updates you're stuck run the same firmware forever and slowly attrit capability vs potential threats. So it would be like owning an iphone 15, frozen in time with software from it's launch, in a world where your competitors might have the iphone 30.

With where we are now, there's no sense in not taking delivery of what's already paid for, but also no sense in paying for any more of them.
 

View attachment 25100


So I've been looking into this more over the last week, especially as more concrete statements about what the US can and can't do to the planes after delivery have come out this week.

I think a reasonable outcome here is to accept that we're stuck with the first 16 planes (my understanding is that we've already paid for them, not that we're just legally committed to buying them. Money has already changed hands I believe) and those are set to be delivered in 2028.

I think that cancelling the rest of the purchase and going with the Rafale is the way to go. It leaves us with a limited 5th gen backbone if anything comes up where we need a stealth platform, but a very good 4.5th gen to handle the majority of the heavy lifting. That contract should be 60-70 planes, and split between existing units that can be delivered soon so that we can start phasing out the old F-18's asap, and new units we would likely receive in 2029-2030.

The 'kill switch' issue with the F35 is more of a mix of limited capability & longer term forced obsolence issue apparently than a brick switch. The US has certain network access capabilities built into them that require ongoing support from the US and that they can turn off. This diminishes some of the capability of the aircraft, but doesn't brick it, alter it's ability to function as an aircraft, etc. It's kind of like having an android smartphone but google cancelling your gmail account and access to any google apps you're using on it. Your phone isn't bricked, you can just do less with it than you could before.

I've seen the long term issues explained similarly. If the Americans choose to lock you out of software updates you're stuck run the same firmware forever and slowly attrit capability vs potential threats. So it would be like owning an iphone 15, frozen in time with software from it's launch, in a world where your competitors might have the iphone 30.

With where we are now, there's no sense in not taking delivery of what's already paid for, but also no sense in paying for any more of them.
There y' go - see bolded.

Not up to your speed regarding options; just have heard (very much in passing) that Rafale rocks.
 

View attachment 25100


So I've been looking into this more over the last week, especially as more concrete statements about what the US can and can't do to the planes after delivery have come out this week.

I think a reasonable outcome here is to accept that we're stuck with the first 16 planes (my understanding is that we've already paid for them, not that we're just legally committed to buying them. Money has already changed hands I believe) and those are set to be delivered in 2028.

I think that cancelling the rest of the purchase and going with the Rafale is the way to go. It leaves us with a limited 5th gen backbone if anything comes up where we need a stealth platform, but a very good 4.5th gen to handle the majority of the heavy lifting. That contract should be 60-70 planes, and split between existing units that can be delivered soon so that we can start phasing out the old F-18's asap, and new units we would likely receive in 2029-2030.

The 'kill switch' issue with the F35 is more of a mix of limited capability & longer term forced obsolence issue apparently than a brick switch. The US has certain network access capabilities built into them that require ongoing support from the US and that they can turn off. This diminishes some of the capability of the aircraft, but doesn't brick it, alter it's ability to function as an aircraft, etc. It's kind of like having an android smartphone but google cancelling your gmail account and access to any google apps you're using on it. Your phone isn't bricked, you can just do less with it than you could before.

I've seen the long term issues explained similarly. If the Americans choose to lock you out of software updates you're stuck run the same firmware forever and slowly attrit capability vs potential threats. So it would be like owning an iphone 15, frozen in time with software from it's launch, in a world where your competitors might have the iphone 30.

With where we are now, there's no sense in not taking delivery of what's already paid for, but also no sense in paying for any more of them.



The only question I’d have about the idea of going ahead with the 16 planes we’ve already paid for, but cancelling the deal for the remaining 72 planes is—was there a volume discount in the original deal? And would we be asked to cough up more money for the 16 planes already paid for it we’re no longer buying all 88?

If the answer is “no”, then I agree. Go ahead with the 16 plane-order, hope for the best regarding them actually being delivered, then go for a non-American alternate for the rest of the fleet.

But if the US does come after us for more money for those 16 F-35’s, I’m not sure about the idea of throwing more good money after bad.
 
There y' go - see bolded.

Not up to your speed regarding options; just have heard (very much in passing) that Rafale rocks.

The Rafale seems pretty excellent and can do 99% of the things we would ever expect our airforce to do over the next 20-25 years. The only places it's not the ideal tool for is inter-state conflicts vs an adversary with modern anti air capability, but even then as we're seeing in Ukraine right now, you can make use of 4th and 4.5th gen platforms to deliver long range ordinance like storm shadows, SCALP's, etc without putting the plane at risk. For patrolling our airspace it's entirely fine and at worst on par with any Su-35's it runs into in the arctic. Cheap to operate, excellent readiness rates. Just a really good multi role fighter plane.

I don't hate the idea of having those 16 F 35's in house either as I want to believe that sanity will eventually prevail to the south of us and they really are a spectacular platform that puts us a step better than Russia, China, Iran, etc if it ever comes to crossing swords with them.
 
I don't hate the idea of having those 16 F 35's in house either as I want to believe that sanity will eventually prevail to the south of us and they really are a spectacular platform that puts us a step better than Russia, China, Iran, etc if it ever comes to crossing swords with them.
If for nothing else, telling Governor Abbott that he'll have to sell a shit-ton of cotton tshirts to make up for the lost F35 contract.


View: https://x.com/GregAbbott_TX/status/1885887426222039080
 
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