The Arrow versus the F35? Tell me it isn't so.

Lewis Mackenzie is not my favourite retired Canadian officer, that would be General Richard Rohmer; mostly, because Lew is a self-promoter, while Rohmer is a behind-the-scenes-get-er-done kind of guy.

But every so often Lew gets it right, even if his idea is pie-in-the-sky.  Take for instance the article in the Arguments section of today's Ottawa Citizen.

Lew is making a case for the Avro Arrow design to be updated into Mark 3 and Mark 4 models and built of today's materials here in Canada.  Instead of buying the F35; spend the money in Canada, reboot the Canadian aerospace industry and get a better aircraft for the effort.

For guys like me, and there are many of us, this is music to our ears.  All in the CF105 was the class act of fighter/interceptor air craft when it was designed and built in the 1950s.  The decision to scrap it was a political one made for political reasons.  These things happen.  Read my article on the Burnelli lift-body design that never flew for political reasons (http://www.mysteriesofcanada.com/Canada/Canada_Car/ccf_part_3_CBY3.htm).

For the same reasons that the Burnelli designs were never built, the CF105 will never be built in any Mark format.

Nice idea, Lew, but it just won't fly (sorry for the pun).

Perils in the North

It has been almost two years since the Russians last threatened to invade Canada.

You remember the period, don't you?  It was July 30, 2010 when a Russian TU-95 long-range bomber flew within 56 km of Canadian air space and were intercepted by Canadian F-18 jets.  The F-18s shadowed the Russians until they, the Russians, gave up and went home.

About a month later, F-18s again intercepted, this time, two TU-95s.  "At no time did the Russian military aircraft enter Canadian or United States sovereign airspace," said NORAD spokesman Lt. Desmond James, a Canadian naval officer. He went on to say... "Both Russia and NORAD routinely exercise their capability to operate in the North. These exercises are important to both NORAD and Russia and are not cause for alarm."

It is possible that the Russians and NATO talk about these "exercises" before hand but DND will not confirm that.

I think it is great that we hold these exercises even if they are focused on practicing for an invasion.  But I can't help thinking back to the 1950s when Canada was developing a Mach 2 high altitude Interceptor designated the CF-105, the AVRO ARROW, the role of which would be to intercept Russian bombers.  The military geniuses at the time were fast coming to the conclusion, based on what facts... we don't know, that future warfare would include intercontinental missiles and not piloted bombers.  Therefore our collected wise-guys talked PM Diefenbaker into cancelling the 105 program in favour of Bomarc missiles, and nuclear-tipped ones at that.

So here we are in 2012.  The Bomarcs were decommissioned years ago and never replaced as a defensive asset and Russian piloted bombers are still testing our defenses.

It is enough to make you cry.