Sorry fellas, I did comment on this before here and again: The F35s are way way more superior than the Gripens for any conflict that doesn't involve fighting the Americans.

If we have to fight the Americans, then we ain't winning with planes (regardless of whether they are gripens or F35s). In that case, we're winning with drones (a combination of Ukraine + Iran + Afghanistan).

Quite a few folks pointed to how F35s could be grounded simply by a potential remote kill switch. Again, if we have to fight the Americans, planes aren't going to be useful in any manner. Our airstrips, maintenance facilities, fuel depots, all of it would be targeted and destroyed first. Gripens, F35s, it doesn't matter - our planes would be grounded.

Ah sure, MOVING FORWARD, we should not make the mistake of purchasing American stuff again. But for the F35 program, backing out right now would hurt us more, no?

I mean the Danes have an even bigger reason than us to not buy F35s, and even they still went ahead with it in Oct 2025.

Now yes, using "we'll buy Gripens instead of F35s" as a bargaining tool for the tariffs nonsense is definitely a good idea. Cuz uk, the US defense manufacturers and the GOP are close, and a threat to the flow of money could be useful to make the negotiations happen in our favor.

But if we're looking at this from the standpoint of pure good faith, where we only look at defense capabilities for ourselves and NATO (through our armed forces), then the F35s are just better, no?

Sure, the SAAB offer to manufacture Gripens in Canada sounds really good. Better for our economy, our pockets. But in terms of raw defense capabilities? Not that much better, is it? Imo, it would just be a bad faith act to ourselves and our NATO allies, where we write "oooh we spent on defense" on paper, but didn't actually better our capabilities.

Again, please be kind in the responses. I'm NOT a defense analyst, professional or amateur. Knowledge in this matter is low for me. I'm just looking at different opinions presented online and synthesising my own understanding/opinion.

[–] ValueSubtracted@startrek.website 5 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

I’m NOT a defense analyst, professional or amateur.

Me neither, not by a long shot. From the various analyses I've consumed over the last few months, the suggestion is that the F35 is superior if you're attacking another country, but the Gripens just might have the edge defensively.

Our airstrips, maintenance facilities, fuel depots, all of it would be targeted and destroyed first.

This arguably gives the Gripen an edge, since its most famous feature is that it can be deployed relatively easily from highways and other non-standard surfaces.

But yeah, if you set aside the issue of American relations, there are some pretty big questions of doctrine to sort out.

[–] CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 4 hours ago* (last edited 4 hours ago)

but the Gripens just might have the edge defensively.

Under the very specific conditions where operating it out of the bush is worthwhile, maybe.

If we're fighting, I dunno, Algeria or Japan in Canadian airspace, the F-35 is still much superior. We have a good chance of defending our airfields against them, and once it's up the plane has been been compared to a soccer player that's invisible.

It's just that if we're defending ourselves (as opposed to Lithuania) against anything, it's probably against the US.

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