[Newsbot]

Title: DND denies misjudging supply ship cost even though price tag jumped to $4.1 billion | Ottawa Citizen
Category: Military
Posted By: Freakinoldguy
Date: 2020-07-02 22:11:55
Canadian

[Freakinoldguy]

This is more than a little disconcerting given the unexpected increase in cost is equivilant to half of a new type 26 destroyer. It's time to tear down the Department of National Defence Equipment Procurement and Capital Acquisitions and start over from square one because something isn't right and this ridiculous and costly crap has been happening for more decades than I've been alive.

[bootlegga]

Well of course the cost has gone up - the first of these ships were supposed to in the water BEFORE the Protecteur was decommissioned (around 2012), but the government cancelled the planned order of three in 2008, then took years to restart the process and only ordered two of them in 2014/15.

Yet another screw-up on the defence file that lands at the feet of the previous government.

[BartSimpson]

$4.1bn for a friggin' cargo ship????



One of our most recent replenishment ships is the USNS Cesar Chavez and fully outfitted with anti-piracy defense systems it came in at US$474 million.

[BartSimpson]

bootlegga bootlegga:

Well of course the cost has gone up - the first of these ships were supposed to in the water BEFORE the Protecteur was decommissioned (around 2012), but the government cancelled the planned order of three in 2008, then took years to restart the process and only ordered two of them in 2014/15.

Yet another screw-up on the defence file that lands at the feet of the previous government.

As I often say, Canada always has plans for a great navy.

[Freakinoldguy]

bootlegga bootlegga:

Well of course the cost has gone up - the first of these ships were supposed to in the water BEFORE the Protecteur was decommissioned (around 2012), but the government cancelled the planned order of three in 2008, then took years to restart the process and only ordered two of them in 2014/15.

Yet another screw-up on the defence file that lands at the feet of the previous government.

Actually the "screwup" hasn't landed at the feet of the current Liberal gov't so much as it's coming home to roost. Both gov't have been extremely lax and uncaring when it comes to the acquisition of military hardware and the cost overruns show this haphazard method of decision making.

$1:

A tortured history

It was 1994 when the replacement program was first discussed. The deficit-slashing years of that decade meant the plan was shelved.

Resurrected in 2004, the Liberal government of former prime minister Paul Martin hoped to have the ships in the water by 2008 to replace the three-decade-old supply ships the navy had been operating.

Faced with cost estimates well over what they had expected, the Conservative government of former prime minister Stephen Harper shelved the Liberal plan on the eve of the 2008 federal election.

More than five years later, the navy was forced to retire both aging supply ships after one of them was crippled by a devastating fire.

The absence of replenishment capability led the Harper government to lease a converted civilian supply ship from a private company, Federal Fleet Services, which operates out of the Davie Shipyard in Levis, Que.

That plan led to a political and legal scandal when the former commander of the navy, Vice-Admiral Mark Norman, was accused of leaking cabinet secrets related to the plan. The Crown withdrew the charge a year ago after a protracted pre-trial court battle.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/supply ... -1.5612770

Given the cost overruns to date and the increases which are likely to continue maybe we shouldn't be building these joint support ships at all and should be leasing ships converted like the MV Asterix. They could then be crewed with mixed crews which would be a great help given the recruiting issues the military is having.

[bootlegga]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

$4.1bn for a friggin' cargo ship????



One of our most recent replenishment ships is the USNS Cesar Chavez and fully outfitted with anti-piracy defense systems it came in at US$474 million.

Acutally, it's for two replenishment ships, but yeah, it's hella expensive!

[bootlegga]

Freakinoldguy Freakinoldguy:

bootlegga bootlegga:

Well of course the cost has gone up - the first of these ships were supposed to in the water BEFORE the Protecteur was decommissioned (around 2012), but the government cancelled the planned order of three in 2008, then took years to restart the process and only ordered two of them in 2014/15.

Yet another screw-up on the defence file that lands at the feet of the previous government.

Actually the "screwup" hasn't landed at the feet of the current Liberal gov't so much as it's coming home to roost. Both gov't have been extremely lax and uncaring when it comes to the acquisition of military hardware and the cost overruns show this haphazard method of decision making.

I agree that both governments have bollixed up defence procurement, but this happened on the Conservatives watch - the Liberals started looking for replacement AORS in 1999 and had a plan to replace them before the existing AORs were decommissioned.

As your article notes, the Conservative government cancelled the project in 2008 and delayed the entire thing. Had they followed the Liberal's procurement plan, we would have had these in the water before we had to retire both AORs.

And let's be honest, Harper inherited a $14 billion surplus in 2008, but chose to use that for a tax cut instead of funding the Navy properly.

Harper loved to wrap himself in the flag and pretend he spent big on the armed forces, but under his government, defence spending fell even farther than it did under Chretien - Chretien averaged 1.23% per year, while Harper averaed only 1.17% per year, with two years (fiscal 2103 and 2014) at a 1.0% per capita spending. Those two years are the LOWEST years for defence spending since before World War 2. Even beatnik JT has averaged 1.275% per year since he got into office.

But somehow it's only the Liberals who don't fund the armed forces.

Freakinoldguy Freakinoldguy:

Given the cost overruns to date and the increases which are likely to continue maybe we shouldn't be building these joint support ships at all and should be leasing ships converted like the MV Asterix. They could then be crewed with mixed crews which would be a great help given the recruiting issues the military is having.

I disagree - if we're going to maintain blue water capability, then we should build the right vessels and crew them with RCN sailors, not convert civilian freighters into half-baked abortions and use mixed crews.

What we should have done was build them in South Korea like New Zealand did with their AOR:

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/121951 ... ives-in-nz

Their new ship is roughly the same size and weight, but carries a slightly different load-out than the AORs we're building, and are much cheaper and would have allowed us to build 4 or 5 for the same price (instead of 2).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMNZS_Aotearoa

[llama66]

If we did it that way, shit would get done. No, we can't have that.

[Freakinoldguy]

llama66 llama66:

If we did it that way, shit would get done. No, we can't have that.

There is one small matter with that line of thought. Not every shipyard can build a warship because of the trade and technical skills required. So when your country loses it's shipbuilding capability by buying off the shelf, it's pretty guaranteed to be gone forever. Besides the technical aspects the cost and time to construct shipyards to supply warships during a crisis would take far to long and the cost would likely bankrupt our country.

So I can understand why our gov'ts both Conservative and Liberal in the past have had the foresight to see this and keep our shipyards building Canadian warships. But with that being said the cost to do so shouldn't become a drain on the military and gov'ts budget like it seems to be everytime we let a contract for new ships out.

And while we don't have the clout to be a big player and design our ships from scratch we can still buy them off the shelf build them here and make them meet Canadian requirements and standards. But that doesn't include the gong show we've seen in the past where every acquisition runs over budget and costs the taxpayers a small fortune because that's a recipe for disaster and does nothing but turn the public against any new purchases.

One other small matter though is manning these ships. Our military is having a tough time filling the boots for the troops we require. So, while it would be nice to have brand new Canadian built tankers the problem is that when the new destroyers come on line we may not be able to cover the manning issues which is why I suggested the RN Rover Class and USNS model of mixed crews. The MV Asterix is doing a decent job and the Naval personnel serving on it seem to have no problem with a mixed crew and actually like serving on her. So it's not so far fetched to say that if push comes to shove that may be what we have to do to service the fleets.

[Sunnyways]

Generally speaking, I would prefer to see us buying foreign ships. They're tried and tested, much cheaper and take a lot of the local shenanigans (you know who you are) out of the bidding process. More broadly, we must agree that military procurement cannot be a political football. These are long-term projects for our country that should not be changed every time a new crowd wins an election in Ottawa. The delay in replacing our helicopters, submarines, ships and fighter aircraft has been a bipartisan disgrace.

[llama66]

We were going to buy the Mistral Class. But then politics got involved.

[uwish]

The Liberals added 250B this quarter alone to our debt, what's 5 B? I say buy 200 F-35's and some super hornets and why not a 'real' submarine or 5...just another 100B...

[bootlegga]

llama66 llama66:

We were going to buy the Mistral Class. But then politics got involved.

We were offered the Mistral class, but they are amphibious assault ships, not AORs, so there was little reason to buy them in my opinion.

They would have stressed our personnel shortages and meant we'd have to give up some other naval capability - likely the AORs themselves. They also were configured for Russian helicopters and vehicles and would have needed significant refits to operate the Cyclones.

[bootlegga]

uwish uwish:

The Liberals added 250B this quarter alone to our debt, what's 5 B? I say buy 200 F-35's and some super hornets and why not a 'real' submarine or 5...just another 100B...

That spending, like the $100 billion or so Harper added in 2008 - 2010, was necessary to avoid a major recession.

Having said that, I wouldn't have a problem with adding another $20 billion to the debt to build new equipment in Canada, be they planes, ships or vehicles.