National Defence committee  Indeed the numbers are classified, but we can say that the objective with a stealth aircraft is to be able, if necessary, to destroy the adversary aircraft before the adversary aircraft even knows you are there.

National Defence committee  Indeed we are miles ahead of where we were at the same time in our new fighter aircraft project in terms of the understanding of the sustainment costs. We have a concept we intend to pursue. We understand we intend to pursue this collectively, which will give us the best value op

National Defence committee  I don't know if I would describe it as “odd”; it's perhaps a bit frustrating. It's the discussion that went on today. We are a privileged nation among the other partners in the JSF program to have what's on offer. I often describe what's on offer as very impressive. I wish I cou

National Defence committee  Thank you for the opportunity to clarify my statement. What I said was that in reaction to the Canada First defence strategy, which provided us strategic guidance in 2006, the process was set up, and through the early part of 2010 the statement of operational requirements, includ

National Defence committee  It was finalized in the spring of 2010.

National Defence committee  Mr. Chairman, with your approval, I will use another couple of slides that I will be able to leave with you.

National Defence committee  There's been a lot of discussion about the nature of the differences between the F-35 and other options we were considering. We use slides in a briefing, obviously, and I've brought hard copies to show the nature of the difference. These aircraft are all in their combat-ready st

National Defence committee  It's called concurrency, and what is happening in this program, because of the validity of the modelling initially and the initial testing that showed the validity of the modelling...there is a rationale for moving ahead and buying production aircraft at the same time that the te

National Defence committee  We are working through the partnership process in different committees to understand clearly how we will do our pilot training and our technician training. We understand the timelines for bringing the aircraft to Canada and starting our operations, and we are confident that we wi

National Defence committee  We expect that the number of people who will be involved in JSF operations will be approximately the same as what we have in our fighter operations now. Some of the types of jobs will change, but we expect the total number to remain approximately the same.

National Defence committee  The answer is no, absolutely not. Our analysis has shown absolutely clearly that measured against the Canadian Forces requirements, the best capability and the longest life at the least cost are available only through the F-35.

National Defence committee  Over the years we have looked at a range of different options. Specifically, after the Canada First defence strategy was announced in 2006, the teams were established: the directorate of air requirements team to mature and advance the operational requirements, and the next-genera

National Defence committee  The data transfer capabilities available in the fifth-generation F-35 are unique to the F-35. The F-35 is interoperable with fourth-generation capabilities, understanding the limitations of that lesser interoperability. But in order to remain fully interoperable and operationally

National Defence committee  Thank you for the question. Indeed we did have a fairly significant challenge in the Kosovo campaign in that we had a type of radio that was not interoperable with the radios that were available from the other coalition partners. We lacked the Have Quick II capability. Unfortuna

National Defence committee  Mr. Chair, that's absolutely correct. The challenge we have is that while our roles will continue in both air-to-air and air-to-ground, the adversary and the capabilities of the adversary continue to evolve. What we need to do is put ourselves in a situation where we can evolve