I do think its necessary to run a competition to see whats on offer, Norway is reaping the benefits of a competition by getting workshare from all competitors and the US has offered much more just because of the competition re JSF/Typhoon/Gripen.
Now whether Eurofighter would bother with Australia now is another matter!.
Offsets are yet another matter, Eurofighter offered a large offset to Australia, Boeing is offering zero, Eurofighter offered all source code to enable operation sovereignty, has Boeing, because its been denied to India??.
Now the whole deal with the US company starts to look less attractive the more you look into it.
Potentially billions missed in workshare, millions missed in competitive tenders, and operational sovereignty handed to a foreign power!!!..
I doubt an incompetent fool could have negotiated any more away
Hmm just reread this and it does sound a bit harsh, but thoroughly deserved.
Please tell me I'm wrong I'd hate to think Oz is that bad!
A fair appraisal of the situation by Andrew Davies here
Carlo Kopp, Peter Goon etc are quite famous in Oz for championing F111 and F-22's despite reality trying to tell them otherwise,
Cheers