National Post (National Edition)
Dassault urges open contest for fighters
French aircraft maker, Das
sault Aviation, is urging the Canadian government to have an open contest for replacing its aging fleet of Mcdonnell douglas CF-18 hornets, arguing its rafale fighter jet is a perfect fit.
The procurement of a new fleet of fighter jets erupted into a national scandal after the auditor general raised a red flag on a the sole-sourced contract. The department of National defence awarded Lockheed Martin the contract in 2010 for 65 of its F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Force fighters for the royal Canadian Air Force. But when the price tag attached to helping develop the plane and servicing it caused the overall price to skyrocket, the scandal erupted into a firestorm.
yves robins, dassault Aviation senior vice-president of eu and NATO affairs, says he believes the federal government should open the process to other bidders. Mr. robins said dassault has been asked by Ottawa to provide it with some information on the rafale for a risk-assessment study to determine whether there are other options than the F-35 to replace the F-18s.
“We believe that rafale is an aircraft that meets all the Canadian requirements, and in some cases, exceeds them,” Mr. robins said.
“We are not in a competition yet. But we think it may be valuable for the Canadian economy and the Canadian defence to open a competition, and we would welcome it,” he said.
The Government of India recently embarked on negotiations with dassault in a deal valued at $15-billion for 108 of the rafale twin-engined fight jets, and Mr. robins said he would like to see Canada open up its own competition as well. he said he has seen all the mission requirements defined by the Canadian Forces.
“The rafale meets all of them,” he said. “It also has the big advantage of the rafale already [being] there. It is existing, and it’s a risk-free program at a fair price.”
he said the order could be filled very quickly with the average production time for the plane about three years from the time of contract start to delivery.