UK Future Fighter
 

Give the recent dummy spit by Airbus, I have been wondering about the possibility of a successful resurgent British aircraft industry or a new commercial alliance between like minded countries. A UK / Canada / Sweden triumvirate could produce something quite interesting.

With BAe as a F35 "tier one" supplicant the link up with LM should be obvious.....

I imagine the main problem will be convincing any potential partners of the UK's commitment in the long term.
Countries such as Canada and Sweden may be reluctant to partner with a country who's GDP, and thus defence budget, is likely to be in free fall for the next decade.

Additionally, just how much will the UK be able to bring to the table? The former Ferranti, who contributed Eurofighter Radar, HUD, Helmet etc is now foreign owned!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selex_ES Would a company that is essentially Italian be welcome in such a project?

when? and at what cost? and who would buy it?? We can hardly afford 48 F-35's... between all tehree countries you'd be lucky to sell 120 new jets

And there's the Brexit delusion, right there - you have nothing beyond pie-in-the-sky wishful thinking. Meanwhile, companies that employ thousands of UK workers and which contribute billions to the country's GDP tell it how it really is, and you dismiss it as dummy spitting. God help us.

Well what is it? A measured commercial decision by a major manufacture with a global market summarily chopping off one of its production arms?

A measured commercial decision by a major manufacture with a global market summarily having one of its production arms chopped off.


- fixed it for you.

It is interesting to note that the barriers to frictionless trade that are being blamed for the tsunami of briefings about pulling out from the UK this week appear to originate primarily in Brussels. There is little discernible reason to impose tariffs and extra customs demands on goods and services, other than at the behest of the EU Commission. Strangely this appears to be exclusively the fault of the UK for having the temerity to express a desire to leave the EU construct. A situation resulting in what has been described as a punishment beating - or at very least demanding money with menaces, which only reinforces the decision in this reluctant leaver to vote leave in the first place.

Were it not for the utterly shambolic state of party politics at the minute, one suspects HMG would have a more robust position than it is currently deploying. It is a fact that trade with Asia and the Americas can be made relatively frictionless, given a desire to make it work, what possible difference can there be with the EU?

Public opinion may also be somewhat shambolic.

As regards defence sector and threat to GDP I wonder if defence as it stands has a net benefit to GDP - I don't believe it consumes UK taxpayers' money effectively and I suspect that if the capabilities were used in other sectors they wouild generate at least as much for the GDP.

If I was looking at a future fighter then I'd want to avoid long timescales and massive costs and I'd be having a chat with Sweden about participating a next gen Gripen to get an aircraft that had some capability and get them in reasonable quantity to actually act as a reasonable deterrent or threat to any adversary. Frankly I don't think that Brexit would have any net effect - the Swedes would probably be more wary of a larger partner and be concerned about the complicatons of a multinational project with costs being ramped up and all the bad stuff that seems to come with the likes of gettiing Tornado, Typhoon, and Lightning into service.

And the moment the other potential EU partners and the US got wind of such a deal with Sweden kicking off then there would be a whole load of counter-offers ..... none of them would want the lack of UK taxpayer money and they wouldn't want another competitor on the market.

Would this be airbus which has hoovered up British largesse in the form of subsidies and now threaten to clear off to that Jewel in the EU crown China or some place? I can certainly see the logic.

Best Regards,

FB

either way it was not us

Good grief!

The British government says that it is planning for a no-deal as that is the prudent thing to do. Airbus says that it too is planning for a no-deal and Brexiteers are apoplectic with righteous indignation - "How dare they?!"

As for the EU, it is protecting its interests - what did you think was going to happen?

Would be too funny if mine and everyone else's jobs weren't on the line. Dont imagine your pensions are safe either, by the way, when the EU taxpayers leave and the retired UK expats come back.

Pour encourager les autres as the French would have it - and I am/was a reluctant remainer

You paint an optimistic picture.

Aspirations

https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.gmf...db160cb0a3.jpg

Financial reality

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.gmf...cf21ed9050.jpg

Probable outcome...
https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.gmf...22d5f6fffc.jpg

Now that did make me laugh.... I know it's a lot more serious than that - in fact it's so serious its hard to imagine but........................