Lockheed Martin launches Canadian PR campaign for F-35, starts with a $20m price hike - Polidicks

[QUOTE]Lockheed Martin, the giant U.S. defence contractor, is launching a cross-Canada publicity blitz to convince Canadians to buy its F-35 stealth fighter jet — but it's simultaneously raising the price by a hefty $20 million US a plane. Steve O'Bryan, Lockheed's vice-president for the F-35 program, said just 18 months ago that Canada would pay $65 million per plane. Now, O'Bryan tells CBC News the price is $85 million. It may not be the best time to mention that. The U.S. budget axe is hovering over the whole F-35 program and the Canadian government insists that it's no longer committed to buying the jet at all. Still, Lockheed Martin is fighting on, sending its executives and a working F-35 flight simulator to wow Canadians with the capabilities of its brand-new, high-tech stealth fighter. The simulator will be on show in Toronto today, and in Winnipeg, Vancouver, Montreal and Ottawa in the weeks ahead. Whether Lockheed Martin's pitch will work remains to be seen. It probably won't help to start out with a price hike of $20 million per plane. But don't count Lockheed Martin out. The company has proved adept at what Pierre Sprey calls "political engineering." He notes that work on the F-35 has been spread around 46 states. Which congressman wants to vote against that much pork? And Canada's share of F-35 work is already at the $450-million mark. Will Canadians feel confident that Boeing will share as much? So it's not over, just because the Harper government has "hit the reset button," as it often says, on the fighter contract. The Maple Leaf still flies outside Lockheed Martin headquarters in Fort Worth, Texas. Lockheed Martin's Steve O'Bryan calls Canada a "partner in good standing" in the program. Canada's still listed in the company literature as "under contract" to buy the plane. [/QUOTE] [url]http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/story/2013/04/07/pol-lockheed-martin-f35-pr-campaign.html[/url]

Yeah, good luck with that, LM. Our ageing Hornets do the job better.

This kind of advertising may work in the USA. But Canada?

LM is utterly mad if they think that a price hike will make Canada more likely to buy these planes when the high price was one of the main issues in the first place.

Canadians don't like the things already, all this will do is make us want them even less

"THINGS THAT COST MORE ARE INHERENTLY BETTER"

I remember reading about this back in 2008 when I was bored in my graphics design class. Back then it was supposed to be an advanced, yet affordable multirole fighter for all NATO nations to use. Now it's a colossal fuck up

They're late and overbudget. If ANYONE was sensible they would of ripped hte contract up by now to watch Lockheed slowly die inside.

Like a game of poker, they should have just accepted the loss and folded long ago.

Time to usher in the era of uncontested Canadian air supremacy for our limited foreign peacekeeping duties!

[QUOTE=MuTAnT;40250943]Like a game of poker, they should have just accepted the loss and folded long ago.[/QUOTE] With so much invested at this point, that isn't exactly an option. They'll get the problems worked out eventually.

[QUOTE=chimitos;40251045]With so much invested at this point, that isn't exactly an option. They'll get the problems worked out eventually.[/QUOTE] This is exactly the thinking that causes you to lose everything in a game of poker!

[QUOTE=chimitos;40251045]With so much invested at this point, that isn't exactly an option. They'll get the problems worked out eventually.[/QUOTE] Yeah, they'll realize they aren't charging nearly enough.

[QUOTE=hypno-toad;40250954]Time to usher in the era of uncontested Canadian air supremacy for our limited foreign peacekeeping duties![/QUOTE] And we'll do it by buying planes that don't work in the northern half of our country

[QUOTE=Zeke129;40256669]And we'll do it by buying planes that don't work in the northern half of our country[/QUOTE] Who needs airspace integrity when you have cool jets

[QUOTE=MuTAnT;40255878]This is exactly the thinking that causes you to lose everything in a game of poker![/QUOTE] ...this isn't a game of poker. If they don't deliver a worthwhile product in the end, they'll have very unhappy customers.

Just to be clear, is the price with the $20 extra in Canadian dollars? Because if so, it's probably still the same price as the US and none of you understand currency exchange.

[QUOTE=Emperor Scorpious II;40258466]Just to be clear, is the price with the $20 extra in Canadian dollars? Because if so, it's probably still the same price as the US and none of you understand currency exchange.[/QUOTE] It's referring to a raise compared to the way the price was before, when Canada was going to buy them originally. [editline]12th April 2013[/editline] [QUOTE=Zeke129;40256669]And we'll do it by buying planes that don't work in the northern half of our country[/QUOTE] Why does that seem a deliberate move? The US and Russia like to pretend that the oil-rich regions in Canada's north belongs to them, not Canada. The Canadian Forces have made a point of stepping up air patrols in that region.

[QUOTE=archangel125;40258566]Why does that seem a deliberate move? The US and Russia like to pretend that the oil-rich regions in Canada's north belong to them, not Canada. The Canadian Forces have made a point of stepping up air patrols in that region.[/QUOTE] While I may disagree with Harper on most everything, I'm a fan of his Arctic sovereignty policy, though that might just be the raging nationalist deep within me. That being said, is this really the hill Harper wants to pin his gov't to die on? The cat's out of the bag in regards to this boondoggle and I've seen elements in the Conservative media calling for a comprehensive review of all options. (My local Sun did a week-long report going over various options other than the F-35) I'd say pretty confidently that public opinion has swung hard against the purchase. With the NDP holding fairly steady in most polls and the Liberals making gains with Trudeau set to take leadership, blindly going through with the purchase could be very damaging for Harper.

[QUOTE=Kinversulath;40258725]That being said, is this really the hill Harper wants to pin his gov't to die on? The cat's out of the bag in regards to this boondoggle and I've seen elements in the Conservative media calling for a comprehensive review of all options. (My local Sun did a week-long report going over various options other than the F-35) I'd say pretty confidently that public opinion has swung hard against the purchase. [/QUOTE] I thought Ottawa already said they're not going to bother with the F35 anymore? [QUOTE=archangel125;40258566]Why does that seem a deliberate move? The US and Russia like to pretend that the oil-rich regions in Canada's north belong to them, not Canada. The Canadian Forces have made a point of stepping up air patrols in that region.[/QUOTE] I wouldn't think it's a deliberate move to prevent Canada from accessing oil, or whatever. I think it's just more that this is a traditional Western supplier who thinks they can sell their inadequate planes to us.

[QUOTE=DaysBefore;40258773]I thought Ottawa already said they're not going to bother with the F35 anymore?[/QUOTE] I'll be confident of that when we actually start to move forward in procuring another jet, not while Harper drags his heels and Lockheed-Martin launches a massive PR campaign to try and convince us that it's a grand idea.

[QUOTE=archangel125;40258566] Why does that seem a deliberate move? The US and Russia like to pretend that the oil-rich regions in Canada's north belong to them, not Canada. The Canadian Forces have made a point of stepping up air patrols in that region.[/QUOTE] No don't you see, the Conservatives have arctic sovereignty as one of their major platforms! They've never lied before or been held in contempt of parliament for lying or anything

Now's the best time to start mentioning that every kid in my school has had it drilled into them that the Avro Arrow sucked. There was even a small part of the final history exam that asked why the "incredible new plane" was a piece of shit. [url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avro_Canada_CF-105_Arrow[/url] most of everyone I know knows about plane debacles already, it's gonna be a massacre at parliament.

Considering a modern F-16 Block 60 with all it's bells and whistles is around 50-60 million dollars a pop, the F-35 going for 65 million was probably [i]a bit[/i] optimistic. Honestly, 85 million is amazing for what you get, but I know people here love to hate on the F-35 for stupid reasons. For comparison, the Rafale has a unit cost of 80-100 million depending on what's on it. The Eurofighter is 80-115 depending on who you ask. The program is a mess no doubt, but the fighter itself is an incredible piece of kit. That said, I am never above poking fun at it. [img]http://i.imgur.com/gJK4R60.png[/img]

I don't think Lockheed Martin is being honest about the true cost.. the pentagon has said it expects the price to rise over $110m, plus everything else related to the f-35 costs substantially more like repairs, maintenance etc. Do we believe the Pentagon or Lockheed PR?

These military companies are ripping off governments so hard and yet they continue to agree to no-bid contracts.. damn it Harper.. damn it Obama..

[QUOTE=laserguided;40259948]I don't think Lockheed Martin is being honest about the true cost.. the pentagon has said it expects the price to rise over $110m, plus everything else related to the f-35 costs substantially more like repairs, maintenance etc.[/QUOTE] The difference is that Lockheed has invested a ton of money in lessons learned from the F-22. There are a great many built in maintenance logistics systems that should keep the cost at around the same as any other conventional fighter would over the same amount of time. Whether that's true or not remains to be seen, but believe me there was a lot of thought put into keeping maintenance costs down.

[QUOTE=chimitos;40258411]...this isn't a game of poker. If they don't deliver a worthwhile product in the end, they'll have very unhappy customers.[/QUOTE] "too big to fall" Yeah bullshit. Though honestly, even i agree they should just finish the fucking thing right now. As soon as they missed the deadline with an obviously unprepared project, they should have just been booted off, but hey, we already spent money on it let's pump more. It'll get fixed up and it'll work, though right now, it seems to me that stopping the whole thing and finding another contractor would work better. Too late now though.

[QUOTE=Emperor Scorpious II;40258466]Just to be clear, is the price with the $20 extra in Canadian dollars? Because if so, it's probably still the same price as the US and none of you understand currency exchange.[/QUOTE] 1 USD = ~0.99 CAD at the moment. That means 85 million CAD is still above 84 million USD. [QUOTE=Zeke129;40258894]No don't you see, the Conservatives have arctic sovereignty as one of their major platforms! They've never lied before or been held in [B]contempt of parliament[/B] for lying or anything[/QUOTE] [URL]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contempt_of_Parliament#Contempt_citation_cases_for_governments[/URL] If you read between the lines, you'll realize that "Contempt of Parliament" is a subjective charge (no judiciary process) and decided on ultimately by a vote in the House. If the Conservatives were a majority they could have voted "no" and then they would not have been found in Contempt. The whole process for the Contempt of Parliament charge is a joke. Besides, the opposition parties were going to vote down the budget anyway. Anyway point of that blurb is that Contempt of Parliament is a fucking joke charge, so stop bringing it up. It is irrelevant.

[QUOTE=FlakAttack;40263217]1 USD = ~0.99 CAD at the moment. That means 85 million CAD is still above 84 million USD. [URL]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contempt_of_Parliament#Contempt_citation_cases_for_governments[/URL] If you read between the lines, you'll realize that "Contempt of Parliament" is a subjective charge (no judiciary process) and decided on ultimately by a vote in the House. If the Conservatives were a majority they could have voted "no" and then they would not have been found in Contempt. The whole process for the Contempt of Parliament charge is a joke. Besides, the opposition parties were going to vote down the budget anyway. Anyway point of that blurb is that Contempt of Parliament is a fucking joke charge, so stop bringing it up. It is irrelevant.[/QUOTE] I think the point he was trying to make is that the Conservatives lie. And they've been sellouts to the USA so far, working more for US interests than the Canadian ones.