Thanks for the article Jonathan!
via GlobalPost.com
Time for a little truth telling.
When the Marine Corps finally nutted up and admitted that the Marine Personnel Carrier was going to be "delayed" I went ballistic. But more importantly I expected the manufacturers to be pissed. I wrote expecting some fire and brimstone but got nothing. It was all diplomatic talk about how they looked forward to working with the Marine Corps on future politics.
Who would have thought that it would take some fucking Frenchmen to have the balls to say what needed to be said.
The USMC has been jerking industry around on the Amphibious Combat Vehicle, the Marine Personnel Carrier and the AAV Upgrade for the last 3 plus years. It would be nice if industry got the balls to call them on it....they won't but it would be nice if they did. Nexter did what the entire Defense Industry wants to do....hold government responsible for their part of the dysfunctional procurement process.
via GlobalPost.com
Nexter lamented the time and money it spent on the cancelled bid.Read the entire article here, but its regarding the canceled Canadian Close Combat Vehicle Competition.
"Nexter has invested a great amount of time, energy and resources in the CCV program over the past four years," company executive Patrick Lier said in a news release.
"Millions of dollars have been spent because we believed the competition would be fair, open and provide a rigorous assessment of the candidate vehicles with a view to acquiring the best possible medium weight infantry fighting vehicle for Canada."
Nexter also said it wants the Canadian government to compensate it for the cost of its bid.
"It would be our expectation that the government would compensate industry bidders for the cost of their bids," he said.
"No company can afford to make such considerable investments only to have the process produce no result."
Time for a little truth telling.
When the Marine Corps finally nutted up and admitted that the Marine Personnel Carrier was going to be "delayed" I went ballistic. But more importantly I expected the manufacturers to be pissed. I wrote expecting some fire and brimstone but got nothing. It was all diplomatic talk about how they looked forward to working with the Marine Corps on future politics.
Who would have thought that it would take some fucking Frenchmen to have the balls to say what needed to be said.
The USMC has been jerking industry around on the Amphibious Combat Vehicle, the Marine Personnel Carrier and the AAV Upgrade for the last 3 plus years. It would be nice if industry got the balls to call them on it....they won't but it would be nice if they did. Nexter did what the entire Defense Industry wants to do....hold government responsible for their part of the dysfunctional procurement process.
Nice new blog pic. Is that a Leopard 2?
ReplyDeleteLooks like Canadian Leopard 2A6M CAN in Afghanistan.
DeleteYou know, the sad thing is the Canucks learned the hard way that wheeled vehicles have difficulty in cross-country mobility. It's why they reversed their decision to dump their tanks and replace them with Leo2.
ReplyDeleteNow what's going to accompany the Leo2's? LAVIII? bullshit, it couldn't keep up because it was wheeled. don't care how good the VBCI or updated LAVIII are, they would have been just as bad.
And why didn't they decide to lease the Dutch CV90s that are stuck in a warehouse.
That is not quite true ,wheeled APCs' up to cca 15 tons oupreform their tracked eqvivalents is past 20 tons where tracked gains over wheeled but there are cosniderable downsides to tracks cca 2$/mile on LAVIII vs 14$/mile on tracked vehicle in same weight class.
DeleteCanada bought tanks for firepower and armor and in the way they are used now i so no problems with an 8x8 following them.
To be fair, the army offered the CCV up for sacrifice some time ago, right around the time the government started talking about cutting some of the big training operations. When it comes down to a choice between a vehicle that you've largely done without in the past, or maintaining the capabilities that you just spent ten bloody years gaining, which would you choose. Not that I think it's right, just not surprising. Also not surprising that Nexter is standing up to the Canadian government. We're not exactly talking about taking on Goliath here. The entire Canadian Armed Forces (army, navy, and air force) are smaller than the U.S. Marine Corps. Even if they do burn this bridge, it's not like it's one they've spent a lot of time on.
ReplyDeleteWait Sol, wait for the moment when Federation will cancel the ATOM IFV. We will see if frogeaters will have the balls to tell that to Russians.
ReplyDeletehehehe, that will be fun to watch.
DeleteAn IFV with a staggering 80 rounds for its 57mm main gun.... what idiot thought that was a good idea. There is NOTHING wrong with a 30mm main gun.
80-100 in unnamed turret and 100 in hull, they said that ammo in turret will be replenish in real time from hull magazine, but I have no idea how. The gun is design as cooperation between army and navy, some kind of standardization. Russians like big guns, and there is also nothing wrong with 57mm main, you outgun almost every IFV on the world. Programmable ammo, longer range, high velocity ect. but true, 200 projectiles is rather small number and would need a extensive support service.
DeleteLOL you said did the guy asked a question and proceeded to post no question. *smh What a clown. -grin-
ReplyDeleteThe recent threats of the Canadian government to abandon the CH-148 Cyclone helicopter after years of development delays have been rumored to be "political theatre".
ReplyDeletehttp://blogs.ottawacitizen.com/2013/12/18/was-the-harper-governments-claim-to-be-looking-for-a-new-maritime-helicopter-simply-political-theatre/
This is why Saab left Canada's fighter selection process. They still believe the process is rigged and not worth their time.
http://www.sunnewsnetwork.ca/sunnews/politics/archives/2013/05/20130531-120613.html
Eurofighter has been mostly quiet about the whole thing, while Boeing and Dassault are making the most waves, calling for a true competition process.
That CV 9040 is an awesome vehicle. Its not perfect for the US way of doing things, but it makes me want the ground combat vehicle. LOL if it was up to me I'd put 120 mm on half of the future ground combat vehicle fleet.
ReplyDeleteThe people not griping about the postponement of the MPC because know that they will eventually sell the US something anyway.
I have to be honest about this though, with as much cooperation the french defense contractors are giving the Russians I couldn't give two shits if the Canadians offended them ROTFL. Go Canada.
Mistral carriers, APC, french land warrior tech they shared all of that for a dollar today at the expense of three allied dollars tomorrow. But Three dollars tomorrow is good for a civilian contractor now isn't it. To heck with that.
To be fair to the french people their contractors aren't alone our contractors are guilty too. humvees, blackhawks and jet turbine manufacture in china. I just think that if the capitalist side of defense is going to screw more money out of the world's population by racing military technology forward on both sides of the blue and red that we shouldn't be worried if they lose a buck here and there in the process for being greedy.
40mm has too little ammo for sustained ops. Plus, the CV90 still only caries 8 men, less than 1 full Army squad.
Deletemost CV90 buyers us a 30mm or 35mm cannon.
True, its not perfect for the US. Its kind of thin skinned for the niche the army wants to fill too. I read in the evaluation of it that they liked not having to dismount when they encountered armor.
DeleteI still would like the 120 mm on some of the GCVs. maybe like a Meggitt 120 mm auto loader like the meggitt 105 on the Stryker should hold about 16 in the turret. Its not a lot of ammo but the M1 turret just weights too much. LOL, use the spot on the turret for ATGM for a couple of stinger missiles. Although that won't work on the meggitt 120 mm.
Speaking of stingers, we should upgrade it when we get a chance, its had several upgrades in the past all relating to the seeker. It only weights 37 pounds so there is room to play with and it still be a MANPADS. With only a 3mi range it cant really catch a jet flying directly above it at altitude, so I was thinking if we add 23 pounds to the flight motor, we would get a much more usable missile. Most of the stinger supply stays on the avenger vehicles so the weight isn't the top priority like it was when the stinger replaced the redeye. I think those changes would yeild a 6-7 mile stinger. since most of the non fuel weight is in the front and back, not the shaft that stores the fuel.
Sol a little late the party but I can answer why the companies did not bitch when the USMC cancelled the MPC program. We fully paid for all of those vehicles and development. So every bidder was able to increase their profit by participating in the program even when we cancelled it.
ReplyDelete