It depends
Fighters come in different shades of grey
From 2012-2014, I served on a panel reviewing the options to replace Canada’s CF-18 fighter aircraft. It was a formative experience for me. I learned a lot about fighters, capability sustainment, the way deputy ministers operate, and how ministers tend to think. Odd as it may seem, the biggest source of knowledge wasn’t the fighter information itself. If anything, I walked away from the panel far less confident about all things jet.
The people I worked with were the real treasure troves. My fellow panellists were founts of wisdom. Serving with them was incredibly humbling. The officials and officers we interacted with were just as impressive. I wasn’t surprised when I saw many of them climb to the upper echelons of the public service and armed forces.
One defence department official left a special mark on me. Whenever we thought we’d arrived at a definitive conclusion, he would caution us with two words: it depends.
What he meant was that our conclusions depended on different variables, many of which have a tendency to bounce around. He rarely let us get away with a question or comment that rested on all things being equal. He always insisted on giving us nuanced responses.
Nuance isn’t too popular these days; conviction is what’s prized. Even academics criticize it. Like many overconfident profs, I often lack nuance, gravitating toward definitive statements (I’m working on it, I promise.)
Yet nuance is a must when evaluating complex things like defence procurement. When I say nuance, I don’t mean skepticism (we can’t be sure of anything), negativity (that’ll never work), or accusations of bad faith (they’re lying and hiding things). I simply mean that we need to be aware of subtle factors that affect outcomes and findings.
How does this apply to our seemingly eternal fighter saga?
Do we know that 5th generation fighters are technically superior? Sure. Are 4.5 generation ones always worse and doomed against our adversaries? It depends. What are you asking them to do and in what contexts?
Mixed fleets are super expensive, cumbersome, and should be avoided by medium powers like Canada, right? It depends. What are the Canadian government’s goals? Maximum military efficiency and effectiveness, or a combination of military, diplomatic, and commercial objectives? What the government’s goals should be, moreover, is a different question, one best answered by those who hold the confidence of the elected house of Parliament.
Okay, but isn’t the Trump presidency a fleeting phenomenon? Won’t Canada-United States relations revert to normal in a few years? Probably. There’s no guarantee, though. Regardless, surely the United States would never use a core military capability that it’s exported to allies across the world as leverage? That is, indeed, highly unlikely. That said, some may have a different levels of risk tolerance when it comes to low probability, high impact events.
Am I saying that’s there an easy answer here? Well, it depends.
Finally, a piece that sets out fact that there is no definitive best answer….and that decision-makers have a super hard assignment coming to the ‘right’ answer. BZ Philippe.
Philippe you are exactly right. It depends on priority of missions sets, the potential enemies, their capabilities and the region of operations, who your allies will be, how you will integrate with them and what your military and political end objectives are. There is no 'perfect' fighter, helicopter, patrol plane, ship, submarine. There are always compromises to any design and its implementation.
This very public debate sees numerous inconsistencies, assumptions and biases being bandied about, including people who formerly served and bring with them their own perceptions based on their experiences.
Ultimately Canada will hopefully get a fighter(s) in the near term to replace the aging CF-18 (though still capable 'depending' on the assigned mission). The fighter will include more advanced capabilities than what we currently have, and its 'degree of perfection' will depend on perspective against numerous perceptions of what was the ideal. There is no perfect aircraft, but almost always there are aircraft that are good enough depending on the conditions of employment and the outcomes desired.