Ms. Ambrose (Edmonton-Spruce Grove, Alta.) made the promise in Commons Question Period on Tuesday, when NDP MP Matthew Kellway (Beaches-East-York, Ont.) asked for a straight yes-or-no answer about whether the government intends to look at alternatives to the Lockheed Martin F-35, which Auditor General Michael Ferguson disclosed in April would cost a minimum of $25-billion to acquire and operate over 20 years.
The auditor general also said in a scathing report released in April that National Defence had withheld $10-billion worth of operating costs from Parliament when it presented a report to Parliament in March 2011, just prior to the federal elections.
Ms. Ambrose told the Commons that a secretariat the government has established within her department is responsible for ensuring all the steps in the procurement of a new fighter jet to replace Canada’s aging CF-18 are independently verified.
“Part of that is the costs, of course, which the auditor general recommended, but the other is to also look at a full range of options to replace the CF-18, so the answer is yes,” Ms. Ambrose said in the Commons.
Even though Mr. Kellway won kudos for extracting a definitive “yes” from a Cabinet minister, a leading critic of the F-35 program as well as the Liberal and NDP opposition parties later told The Hill Times that any reviews of alternative aircraft are doomed before they even take place.
That is because the Department of National Defence requirements for a jet to replace the 30-year-old CF-18s have not changed since 2010 when the two-year pitched battle over the acquisition began and only the Lockheed Martin Joint Strike Fighter F-35—its costs for Canada now having risen to an estimated $120-million per aircraft for a fleet of 65 fighter jets—can meet the National Defence requirements.
With National Defence insisting on maintaining the same operational requirements for an options analysis it must present to the Public Works Department before the acquisition can go ahead, the NDP and Liberal parties said Wednesday the government is back at square one, intent on going ahead with the F-35, despite Mr. Ferguson’s scathing report and the government’s promise of outside audits of the costs and its pledge to look at “all options” in terms of alternative aircraft.
An options analysis by the Department of National Defence is required under government procurement rules whenever the department procures new major arms and equipment through Public Works. But the 2010 options analysis it claimed to have done prior to convincing Public Works that year that the F-35 was the only aircraft that met Canada’s needs for a new fighter plane, and the multi-billion-dollar contract had to be sole-source with no competition, was at the centre of Mr. Ferguson’s critical report last April.
“Everything that has happened, over the last years, indicates that they are not moving off this,” Mr. Kellway told The Hill Times after pressing Ms. Ambrose for the second straight day in the Commons.
“It was their crusade, it was all that’s holy and decent, but they tell us they are doing an options analysis. That’s why we’re asking these questions in the House, to see whether this is real or whether this a tactical manoeuvre in the ongoing crusade,” he said in an interview.
National Defence recently confirmed to The Hill Times that the Statement of Operational Requirements for a warplane to replace the aging fleet of Boeing CF-18 fighter jets that is now posted on its website was first posted in November 2010, and has not been modified since then.
A key section of the document matches the stealth characteristics of the F-35, as well as its sophisticated computer sensor system for complete visual awareness and sight-lines for pilots, exclusively matches the Joint Strike Fighter F-35, under criticism in the U.S. and virtually all members of a nine-country consortium developing the plane with Lockheed Martin, the largest supplier of arms and equipment to the U.S. military, as the prime contractor.
The document says only a “fifth generation” fighter jet meets Canada’s needs. It goes on to describe the characteristics of a fighter generation warplane as including the ability for stealth flight, where the radar signature is virtually invisible to the enemy, and mostly used during attacks, has highly-sophisticated sensors embedded in the aircraft and “complete fusion of the sensor data and external information, automatically providing the pilot with a filtered and clear overview of the total tactical situation which allows the pilot to focus on timely, safe and effective tactical planning and action.”
Development of the sensor system, however, designed to be embedded in pilot helmet visors with 360-degree vision around and through the aircraft, has been one of the most troubled-plagued aspects of the F-35, and Lockheed Martin is developing a separate helmet design, without those sensor abilities, in case the original design fails.
“This thing only works, it’s only real, if they go back and review the statement of requirements,” said Mr. Kellway.
Ms. Ambrose’s media office referred questions to the Public Works media branch, and as of 4 p.m. Wednesday it had not provided responses.
Former National Defence procurement officer Alan Williams told The Hill Times that only the F-35 can meet the new fighter jet operational requirements that National Defence still stipulates.
“No aircraft currently meets the SOR [Statement of Operational Requirements], Mr. Williams, a former assistant deputy minister and expert on the F-35, said.
“As long as the SOR remains unchanged, the F-35 is likely the only aircraft with the potential to meet the SOR. As such, the government can claim that it is considering other options knowing full well that no other option is feasible. Without changing the SOR there cannot be a true competition. Finally, if the government was serious about undertaking an open, fair and transparent competition it would have clearly said so in it's famous seven-point plan. It did not do so,” Mr. Williams said.
Original Article
Source: hill times
Author: TIM NAUMETZ
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