Rafale multirole fighter pulled from Canadian contest...

via Defense News.

Dassault Aviation has withdrawn from Canada’s competition to buy 88 new fighter jets over concerns that interoperability and intelligence sharing requirements were too extensive, according to industry sources.

Dassault had been approved by the Canadian government for the competition and intended to offer the Royal Canadian Air Force the Rafale fighter jet.

A draft bid package for 88 fighter aircraft has been issued to companies for their feedback by the end of this year, said Pat Finn, assistant deputy minister for materiel at Canada’s Department of National Defence. From there, the final bidding instructions for the CAN$16 billion (U.S. $12.2 billion) procurement will be issued and bids required by May 2019, he added.

Dassault, however, reviewed the draft request for proposals and determined the Canadian requirements for intelligence data sharing and interoperability, particularly with U.S. forces, would be difficult to meet, sources noted.

Story here. 

Ok.  This is gonna piss some people off, especially my European readers but I gotta be actual and factual.

Not many remember but France has been identified as a major source of technical espionage being committed against the United States.  This was a at least a decade or more ago but I vividly recall talk of being a major "stealer" of US tech.

Now we see this as an issue?

I'm amazed.

All the aviation bubbas talk about the Rafale with stars in their eyes but it isn't getting traction and its development has slowed down.

For a top ten, some say top 5, airplane its future seems murky.

I'm calling this.

Another big win for SAAB!