Peter Zeihan again: and also other thinkers:

RobertDyck · 2025-02-01 23:29:37

CBC News: Trudeau hits back at the U.S. with big tariffs after Trump launches a trade war

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced late Saturday the federal government will hit back against the U.S. after President Donald Trump launched a trade war this weekend with punitive tariffs on all Canadian goods.
Trudeau said Canada won't stand for an attack from a country that was supposed to be an ally and friend.
...
To start, Canada will slap 25 per cent tariffs on $30 billion worth of American goods coming into Canada as of Tuesday. The tariffs will then be applied to another $125 billion worth of American imports in three weeks' time.

The news web page has video clips of Trudeau speaking. As he said, we're friends and allies, this is disappointing.
Mexico also announced retaliatory measures. China did too, but Mexico is part of the USMCA.

kbd512 · 2025-02-02 03:04:48

RobertDyck,

Would you rather have a very small nuke detonated several miles above Canadian soil, likely many dozens of miles from a city, or would you rather have a megaton class Soviet nuke surface detonated on top of a Canadian city or military base?

Those were your realistic choices when your military was limited to 1950s radar guided missile electronics, as all military forces were during the 1950s and 1960s. The exact same weapons were also deployed on American soil to protect much more densely populated areas.

This is as succinct an explanation as I can provide about what the Canadian government understood in the 1950s:

The Boeing / Michigan Aerospace Research Center's IM-99A/B missile's designation was changed to CIM-10A/B in June of 1963, so you will see literature using a different designators for the weapon if it was written before that date.

Avro Arrow AN/APQ-41 Radar Tracking Range: 27.6 miles
CIM-10B Bomarc AN/DPN-53 Radar Tracking Range: 38 miles

DPN-53 was the first airborne pulse-doppler radar created by the US, likely the first of its kind in the world, and certainly the first used operationally on a guided missile. DPN-53's tech was also the basis for initial AWACS radar tech.

The Arrow could have been equipped with the more advanced radar from the Bomarc, but how much would that cost and how long would it take?

Missile Body Diameter:
AIM-7 Sparrow: 8 inches <- Reason Sparrow's kill rate was <10% inside of 8 to 10 miles, relying upon the launching aircraft to paint the target
CIM-10A/B Bomarc: 35 inches <- Reason Bomarc's radar was functional using 1950s vacuum tube tech, and started tracking its target at around 38 miles

Max Range at Max Speed:
AIM-7 Sparrow: 16 miles (for later variants used during the Viet Nam War)
CIM-10B Bomarc: 430 miles <- Double the interception radius of an Arrow using afterburner
Avro Arrow: 410 miles (radius is half of range, assuming you want to reuse your Arrow)

We fired off 25,000 Sparrows during the Viet Nam War. About 10% of them hit their target. Throughout its operational service life, Sparrow's hit rate was never higher than about 15%.

If that was the missile you were betting the lives of your fellow Canadians on, then you'd better have hundreds of Arrows and thousands of Sparrows.

Flight Speed:
AIM-7 Sparrow: Mach 2.5 (motor burnout)
CIM-10 Bomarc: Mach 2.98 (cruise speed using ramjets)
Avro Arrow: Mach 1.98 (actually achieved)

Cost Per Vehicle:
AIM-7 Sparrow: $125K (avg cost during Viet Nam War)
CIM-10B Bomarc: $2M (what Canada's government ultimately paid, per missile, for the complete SAGE / Bomarc system)
Avro Arrow: $12.5M (late 1950s)

Canada spent $200M on a SAGE installation and 100 CIM-10B interceptor missiles. For the same money, they could buy 16 Arrows. That means they could equip 1.5 squadrons with aircraft, but no missiles or fuel for pilot training included, and then they'd have a good chance of downing 4 Soviet bombers using Sparrows, if all 16 Arrows ripple-fired all 3 of their Sparrows at an incoming Soviet bomber formation.

RobertDyck · 2025-02-02 04:02:18

I would rather have an Avro Arrow fire AIM-7 Sparrow, mark 2, medium range missiles with active radar guidance. That's what Arrow was designed to fire. Sure, the AIM-120 AMRAAM is more advanced, but it wasn't available at the time. Sparrow missiles were.

When Arrow was under development, the American manufacturer of Sparrow missiles had tried to develop a fire-and-forget guidance system but failed. They gave up. Missiles in the 1950s were guided by the fighter pilot like a drone. There was a small joystick for the fighter pilot to radio control the missile into the target. Part of the Arrow project was to complete the self-guidance system that the American manufacturer gave up on. Canada would have sold the design back to the missile manufacturer, but again Americans at the time were aghast that Canada could complete a weapons upgrade that they found too difficult. After Arrow was cancelled, the Avro company went bankrupt. NASA got first pick of Canadian engineers. They developed the Gemini spacecraft so American engineers could focus on Apollo. Some of the remaining engineers went to Europe to work on Concord, and later the Eurofighter Typhoon or French Dessault Rafale. Many engineers were hired by American companies. There's a reason the manufacturer of Sparrow missiles was able to complete the guidance system. And why American fighter jets got better in the early 1960s.

So again, if you want to argue missile accuracy, you have to look at Sparrow missiles of the mid-1960s, and look at accuracy against large targets with low maneuverability. How accurate early Sparrow missiles were against fast nimble fighter jets is irrelevant. Arrow was designed primarilly to shoot doen Russian bombers. Initially the Tu-95 Bear bomber. Tu-22M Backfire wasn't introduced until 1972, so you have to compare that aircraft to missiles of that same time. And Tu-160 Blackjack bombers were introduced in 1987. Arrow could shoot them all down using missiles available at the time of the respective bomber.

kbd512 · 2025-02-02 06:43:22

RobertDyck,

Canada would have sold the design back to the missile manufacturer, but again Americans at the time were aghast that Canada could complete a weapons upgrade that they found too difficult.

Canada must have found active radar homing too difficult as well, because they never completed Sparrow II development work. Canadair was given the contract to continue development work on the Sparrow II in April of 1958, after the US Navy pulled the funding plug for lack of progress. The Canadian government then proceeded to cancel their Sparrow II development contract with Canadair on September 23, 1958, before the Arrow was cancelled the following year. The Bendix DPN-21 active radar guidance section from Sparrow II was 86 inches long, but the missile was only 148 inches in total length.

Sparrow III entered service with the US Navy in 1958, so the guidance system for the semi-active radar homing model was already in operational service before the Arrow was cancelled. Canadian engineers moving to America definitely weren't "the reason the guidance system was completed".

The British also tried to develop an active radar guided missile (Red Dean, then Red Hebe) in the 1950s as well. Their missile was 1,330lbs and 15 inches in diameter and up to 22 feet long, so much larger than the Sparrow II or GAR-9 / AIM-47 / AIM-54. Multiple contractors, to include Folland, Vickers, and GEC gave up on the active radar guidance system because it was unworkable with the electronics of the time.

GEC's active radar guidance system weighed more than any version of the Sparrow missile, but they were never able to make it work.

So again, if you want to argue missile accuracy, you have to look at Sparrow missiles of the mid-1960s, and look at accuracy against large targets with low maneuverability. How accurate early Sparrow missiles were against fast nimble fighter jets is irrelevant. Arrow was designed primarilly to shoot doen Russian bombers.

Do you think the Sparrow was never tested against bomber-sized targets flying along a predictable flight path?

RobertDyck · 2025-02-02 08:28:21

kbd512 wrote:

Canada must have found active radar homing too difficult as well, because they never completed Sparrow II development work.

You know better than that. You're an adult. Now demonstrate you're an adult by explaining why your argument is stupid.

Calliban · 2025-02-02 12:51:59

Trump placed Tariffs on Canada because he claims it is being used to traffic fentanyl and its precursors into the US. He also claims that Canada has become a back door for illegal immigration into the US. If the Canadian government cared about Canadians it would have stopped these sorts of practices a long time ago. If Canada had a conservative government this sort of thing would not be happening. The current spat is a direct result of Trudeau's mass immigration policies.

I don't think tariffs are the right tool to use in these circumstances. The fact is that there are millions of Canadians that want rid of Trudeau and are looking for a more conservative government. Trump should have allied himself with those people and should have done everything he could to help Canadian Conservatives. He should have presented himself as an ally to working Canadians in contrast to Trudeau, who wants to replace them. Tariffs threaten to sour Canadian sentiment against him. It will be difficult for even the most conservative minded Canadian to be in favour of good relations with US is they have lost their job because of Trump tariffs. Trump risks making Trudeau look like the hero of the hour, an honour that he definitely doesn't deserve. The situation needed to be handled with better strategic thinking. It cannot be resolved until there is political change in Canada that sweeps away marxists and globalists and replaces them with sensible patriotic people. The present government is not rational and cannot be bargained with.

Last edited by Calliban (2025-02-02 12:53:46)

GW Johnson · 2025-02-02 15:54:04

There is, and never was, any serious threat of Fentanyl from Canada, crossing the northern US-Canada border. There is, and was, such a threat crossing the southern border with Mexico, but that that threat is of the same order of magnitude as the threat of US arms crossing that same border into Mexico to fuel the cartels.

Failing to take those facts into account are a systematic error on the part of right-wing, and far-right-wing, media on the internet and social media, that are totally unpoliced for truth.

GW

RobertDyck · 2025-02-02 17:00:24

Peter Zeihan pointed out making fentanyl require high school chemistry and a garage with a hotplate. Ingredients can be ordered from China and they're legal because they can be used for legitimate purposes. Zeihan claimed ingredients come in a container the size of a water bottle aka 1 litre. If you block the border, they'll just setup within the US.

And yes, fentenyl from Canada is 0.2% of what enters the US. I have to ask how much fentanyl enters Canada from the US. A few years ago it was more than Can-to-US.

kbd512 · 2025-02-02 19:00:37

RobertDyck,

Now demonstrate you're an adult by explaining why your argument is stupid.

You're upset over the fact that nobody was able to make something work that you thought should've worked, but didn't because the tech wasn't as capable as required. You've made a lot of assertions about development work that was never completed by anyone, anywhere, until the 1980s. I'll assert that the Arrow could've gone to production by the early 1960s, perhaps 1962 or 1963, which seems reasonable from looking at other American, British, and French interceptor development programs of that era. After the rest of those programs achieved first flight, they went to production in 2 to 3 years.

You and everyone else would then have to wait another 20 years before the electronics tech existed to do what you thought should've been done with Sparrow II development. Whatever effect you think Canadian aerospace engineers had on missile tech development, that effect didn't take the form of usable active radar guided missiles for another 20 years, unless we're talking about the much larger and heavier AIM-54, which was also an operational failure due to immature electronics tech. AIM-54 only worked to the extent that it could be fired beyond visual ranges and successfully guide itself to the target under ideal conditions. In realistic testing, whether or not the missile would actually hit its intended target had a probability roughly equal to a coin toss.

Historically, the F-4's replacements were already lined up by the early 1980s- the F-14, F-15, F-16, and F/A-18. That means the Arrow would've been replaced during the 1980s as well. Canada would have been stuck with a handful of expensive interceptors, armed with some variation of Sparrow III or Sidewinder or Falcon (all fired at very short ranges), just like every other NATO nation, for the majority of its operational service life. I can see the airframe life being extended to 30 years, but not much beyond that. That means Arrow would've been retired by the 1990s, just like the F-106, which was already operational when the Arrow was cancelled.

Canadair built 200 F-104s for the RCAF after Arrow was cancelled.

If someone had given me authority over late-1950s Canadian military procurement decisions, what would I have done differently?

1. Complete development of the Orenda Iroquois engine. Offer the Iroquois engine for sale to allied air forces.
2. Modify the CF-104 to accept the Iroquois engine. This would produce the most performant interceptor available- well in excess of what the historical CF-104, F-106, and J-75 equipped Arrow prototypes were capable of. A CF-104 so-equipped would climb as fast or faster than any modern twin engine fighter- initial rate likely near 70,000fpm. I'd have to wait for electronics tech to catch up to incorporate the advanced avionics features of the Arrow into the CF-104, namely the computer flight control system.
3. Continue development work on the DPN-53 radar tech, apply it to the CF-104s, and redirect missile guidance system work towards longer-ranged IR-guided missile tech using data links. To this end, integrate an EO/IR sensor slaved to the radar, in order to identify targets at longer ranges. This worked quite well using 1950s to 1970s tech. Certain variants of the F-4 had such a system installed to accurately identify and track aircraft at distances beyond what the SARH Sparrow III could successfully engage targets within using radar alone. It didn't work in cloudy weather, but neither did the Sparrow II.

That is a simpler plan, one with a higher probability of providing usable results than clean-sheet interceptor airframe and missile guidance system development with limited resources, and one more likely to produce results in years rather than decades. Historically, this was done elsewhere. The US, UK, and France all worked on improved engines for existing fighter designs, as well as various IR guided weapon improvement programs that greatly extended engagement ranges and envelopes.

RobertDyck · 2025-02-02 23:20:01

The Arrow mark 1 was a test only. It used an engine from an older Canadian fighter jet. It was under powered, but proved the airframe was airworthy. The mark 2 was always what was intended for production. Supercruise at mach 1.5, top speed with afterburner mach 2.5 in flat level flight at 50,000 feet. Yea, the F-22 raptor can do that, but the other aircraft you named cannot. Requirements by the Canadian air force written in 1953 required supercruise at mach 1.5 and top speed with afterburner of mach 2.0. So Arrow exceeded required top speed. There are few fighters that can supercruise at mach 1.5 today: F-22, Eurofighter Typhoon, Russian Su-57. The French Dessault Rafale can supercruise at mach 1.4. But none of the '80s planes could. Do you think an F/A-18 Hornet could intercept a Tu-160 Blackjack?

RobertDyck · 2025-02-02 23:29:40

For the last couple years I have followed Jake Broe on the war in Ukraine. I repost with a summary in an internet group with a lot of MAGA people. Started doing this when some of them repeated Russian propaganda. Today's video covers the trade war with Canada and Mexico.

YouTube: Can Russia Survive a Global Trade War?

RobertDyck · 2025-02-03 04:06:34

Robert Zubrin on Facebook:

The purpose of the trade war is to destroy the western alliance.
The purpose of demanding Greenland from NATO ally Denmark is to destroy the western alliance.
The purpose of cutting off arms from Ukraine is to destroy the western alliance.

Trump's tariffs are incredibly stupid. By increasing the cost of raw materials from Canada, Trump will not just increase the cost of American products to Americans. He will increase the cost of American products worldwide. This will crush American exports to Europe, Asia, and everywhere else, destroying jobs and massively increasing our trade deficit.

kbd512 · 2025-02-03 05:38:33

RobertDyck,

Better climb performance is quite useful for an interceptor. Supercruise has not proven to be a particularly useful feature for a fighter jet. The primary issue with flying faster than Mach 1 is how fast the engine(s) consume fuel. Bombers like the F-111, B-1, and Tu-160 can fly at speeds above Mach 1 for extended periods of time because they have the aerodynamic optimization to do that and carry a lot more fuel than a typical fighter jet. Realistically speaking, neither the F-22 nor the Arrow can "chase down" a Tu-160. If the Tu-160 knows an interceptor is in the air and roughly where they are, then it has both the range and speed to evade.

Internal Fuel Capacities:
Tu-160: 42,150 gallons
Arrow: 3,000 gallons
F-22: 2,650 gallons

Even if you're already airborne, that doesn't mean you're close enough to engage. The major problem with the Arrow and Sparrow II solution was how close you had to be to fire at enemy bombers, and the total cost of that solution per kill realistically achievable. Sparrow II / AIM-7B had a max engagement range of only 4 miles. You may as well carry greater numbers of the much cheaper Sidewinders. Historically, Sidwinders were better weapons than Sparrows at close ranges, because they could lock-on much faster than any early version of the Sparrow. Prior to solid state electronics, for all intents and purposes you were closing to within visual range before you were close enough to successfully engage using any early version of Sparrow or Sidewinder. This was 8 to 10 miles for a large enemy bomber under unrestricted visibility conditions, although EO systems could pick them up at distances of up to 70 miles. By the time the G model of Sidwinder became available around 1970, you could launch from as far as 11 miles and had a 50/50 chance of hitting the target.

Perhaps the pure speed of the Arrow would help extend missile range by adding kinetic energy, but only to a point, because you'd rapidly overshoot the target and may not have time for the range gate of the Sparrow to adjust itself appropriately, as this process took 4 to 6 seconds or so. Sparrow II's rocket motor was tiny because the guidance system filled more than 50% of the missile body. The F model of Sparrow III, which entered service in 1976, used all solid state electronics, and had a max range of about 44 miles. It was more reliable than prior versions and its miniaturized electronics allowed fitment of a longer / more powerful rocket motor inside the missile body to provide Mach 4 burnout velocity.

In short, you either need additional fighters to work with, to help you to "box-in" the bomber, or you need accurate long range high speed missiles that overtake the target fast enough to make speed and evasive action less of a factor.

You asked how I could engage a Tu-160 from a Hornet, so I'll address that since it's now relevant to the looming conflict with China:

Let's say a land-based radar site picks up a Tu-160 roughly 300 miles from my present position, inbound to whatever I'm protecting. If I scrambled to get airborne as fast as I can, then I have another 30 minutes of flight time on internal fuel only. If I have a pair of large tanks under my wings, then I have 1 hour of flight time remaining. I want to maximize my time aloft to provide protection for my asset for as long as I can. Anyone coming to attack has to come towards me at some point. If they can fire from far enough away so that my plane or my missiles cannot realistically reach them at my best cruise speed, then my job involves shooting down whatever missile they've launched. The goal is protection of my assets. Destruction of enemy assets is a bonus.

The US Navy has recently repurposed its VLS-launched RIM-174 (SM-6) as the air-launched AIM-174B. While I know full well that I can't "chase down" a Tu-160 in my Super Hornet, if it's crew is unaware of my presence and they venture close enough, my missiles certainly can. If I launch a missile from 40,000ft at my normal high subsonic cruising speed, then it has a range of about 250 miles and a motor burnout velocity near Mach 4. That means it will reach a target 250 miles from my present position in about 5 minutes. There are no fighters or bombers that can cover 250 miles in 5 minutes.

SM-6 / AIM-174B has a data link capable of obtaining guidance updates from multiple sources, rather than the launching platform only, so I will opt to use SPY-6 (part of AEGIS, ship and shore versions), both to offset the detection and tracking range limitations of my Super Hornet's radar, and to conceal the fact that I took a shot at the bomber, by not going active myself. At 250 miles, the Tu-160 probably hasn't detected me, nor the fact that I already fired and my missile is inbound. By the time my missile's radar "goes active", if said Tu-160 is still inbound, then it no longer has enough time to turn and run away, so it must defeat the missile by evading it (using terrain features at low level) or using countermeasures (jamming, decoys, chaff, RCS-reducing airframe geometry and materials).

That's how a subsonic fighter jet can successfully engage a supersonic bomber. The maximum speed of the fighter is far less important than the maximum number of fighters in the air or on alert status. My network of sensors and the missiles do the heavy lifting. My fighters are airborne / mobile missile trucks that I can reposition to "block" ingress or egress routes to whatever I must protect. My ship and shore missile batteries are also part of my air defenses, and much cheaper to operate 24/7/365 than aircraft. I'm better served by having greater numbers of subsonic airborne fighters equipped with long range missiles. I can better protect my nation by refraining from purchasing small numbers of egregiously expensive supersonic fuel guzzlers that look great on paper, but are ultimately limited by the capabilities of my radar and missile electronics, total number of fighters and missiles available at any given time, and all the networked sensors of my air defense network used to guard against surprise attacks. This is defense-in-depth, and the fighters are only a part of it.

Even with short range missiles and Cold War era radar networks such as SAGE, I would still be better served by having much greater numbers of fighters with shorter range missiles, because I can use them to visually identify what they're shooting at, and if there are significant numbers of enemy bombers headed towards whatever I'm protecting, then I can use my greater number of fighters to fire volleys of lower cost missiles at them, which I can procure at scale because they cost less. I'm overwhelming the more limited numbers of inbound bombers using more firepower and ground-based direction of missiles and fighters, which is what SAGE was designed to do, and why our own F-106 interceptors were equipped with short range IR-guided missiles throughout their service lives. The wide open spaces were covered by ground-based Bomarcs and Nike missiles which were roughly the same size and weight as small fighter jets.

Basically, I'd rather spend money on greater numbers of lower cost but still effective planes, missiles, and sensors. Spending all the money on larger / faster fighter jets is better for bragging rights than combat logistics and defense-in-depth. It's a shiny object of affection that costs a lot of money, but only delivers limited effectiveness. Our F-22s are relegated to defending the hinterlands. F-22s can theoretically launch at targets 100 miles away, but in reality we use them to close to within visual range of Russian bombers and little else. F-22s have become our 21st century F-106s, because after much combat testing, they're not terribly cost effective for much of anything else. F-14s and F-22s are hangar queens- beautiful to look at, objects of little boy wonderment and affection, but I wouldn't want to try to use them to defend an objective from a concentrated or sustained attack, because they're too few in number due to their outrageous unit cost and require too many maintenance hours for that sort of tasking.

If I have to choose between stealthy supercruising F-22s with AIM-120s, or RIM-174s (SM-6) ship / shore batteries and AIM-174s mounted to non-stealthy subsonic dusty old A-6s, I will choose the latter option, because I will have much better defense-in-depth per dollar spent.

Calliban · 2025-02-03 06:47:16

Opinions seem to vary on the severity of the Canadian fentanyl problem.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/fentan … -1.7030758

At any rate, this problem needs to be dealt with. People in Canada are dying from overdoses at a shocking rate, dozens every day. This is Chinese payback for the opium wars. I agree with Zubrin that a trade war between NAFTA members is a bad way of dealing with the fentanyl and immigration problems. As China declines and globalisation unwinds, North America needs to build integrated supply chains. Disrupting trade between NAFTA members is counterproductive to that. Canada is a bulk supplier of commodities to the US. In the years ahead, the US will come to rely upon it more and more. Easing trade restrictions is essential at this point.

On the plus side, the CANZUK alliance is looking more politically favourable to everyone involved. It is only leftwing politics that has prevented it from happening already. Left wing politics is going out of fashion very fast. People are realising that communist utopians like Starmer and Trudeau have nothing to offer them.

Last edited by Calliban (2025-02-03 06:57:04)

RobertDyck · 2025-02-03 08:04:44

kbd512,
Avro Arrow was designed to Canadian requirements, not American. If the US in the 1950s didn't want to buy it, that's one thing. But threatening Canada's allies to not buy it was completely out of line. Those requirements included intercepting Russian bombers across Canada's vast northern territories where there are no air bases. American radar at the time sent data from the aircraft to an air base on the ground, computers.would process that data and radio results back for display to the pilot. But the Arrow was designed to operate out of radio range of any air base. That meant all onboard computers. And yes, it did have them. They worked and were confirmed on the mark 1. The mark 1 didn't have Iroquois engines, but did have the electronics. The Arrow also had fly-by-wire. The first US fighter to have that was the F-16, which first flew in 1975. But you mentioned supercruise. That was necessary to catch a Russian bomber flying at mach 0.85 and skirting the nearest Canadian air base by a thousand km (621 miles) or more. I'm sure American combat operations against tiny third world countries don't find that useful. It's not for attacking third world countries, it's for intercepting Russian bombers over Canada.

RobertDyck · 2025-02-03 08:34:35

Fentanyl flow in the US, according to the DEA. Yes the American agency. Notice it flows from China to Canada, not from Canada to the US. It's a 4-page PDF.
Fentanyl Flow to the United States

Void · 2025-02-03 11:03:17

I like this guy so far: https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/r … ORM=WRVORC Quote:

The great Donald Trump RESET!
YouTube
Jeff Taylor
8 views
3 hours ago

You can sell your market, and you can sell your productive excess.

Robots.

Ending Pending

If taxes are shifted from income to importers, do we hurt the poor? Well, we don't so much need to import bulk foods that our poor might eat, then a bed to sleep on, hygiene needs. But the country is not only to be run for the poor, but also for the useful citizens. Many things that might be imported are nice but perhaps not necessary.

Ending Pending

Last edited by Void (2025-02-03 11:10:08)

Calliban · 2025-02-03 12:19:32

This latest article from Tim Morgan explains why the world is now shifting towards economic protectionism. It isn't long and is worth reading.
https://surplusenergyeconomics.wordpres … e-unfolds/

To summarise: Energy cost of energy is increasing. Whilst economic growth appears to be continuing at a healthy rate, inflation (which is underestimated in official figures) is eating away at prosperity. The average person in the US is gradually getting poorer and they feel it. The demographic crisis is not discussed by Morgan, but is part of the problem. The energy problem is likely to be misunderstood by most people, because there is no obvious shortage. But production costs have risen across the industry and the most promissing new oil plays are in places like the Arctic or deep offshore. Energy is gradually getting more expensive to produce, because ECOE is rising and EROI is falling.

Last edited by Calliban (2025-02-03 12:23:28)

kbd512 · 2025-02-03 12:37:22

RobertDyck,

But threatening Canada's allies to not buy it was completely out of line.

To my knowledge, there is no evidence that Canada ever offered the Arrow for sale to any countries except the US and UK. The US already had the F-106 in service. The UK had the English Electric Lightning in an advanced state of flight testing. Therefore, no foreign orders would be forthcoming. If Canada ever offered the Arrow for sale to other countries, there are no records of such offers.

The UK evaluated the Arrow and wasn't interested. The UK already had their own English Electric Lightning, another twin engine / short range / ridiculously fast interceptor that wasn't good for anything else.

The US Air Force officer corps was interested in purchasing the Arrow, but Deputy Secretary of Defense Donald Quarles and Secretary of Defense Neil McElroy were not. All they eventually stated in their meetings with Pearkes was that America already had its F-106 in service, and our Air Force would not be buying any Arrows as a result. They also intimated that they were increasingly concerned about ICBM threats, and would prefer that Canada cease development of the Arrow to refocus on major component development, like radars, avionics, computers, engines, missile components, and the like. Between Sputnik in 1957 and 1959 when the Arrow was cancelled, "the bomber gap" rapidly turned into "the missile gap". By 1960, everyone was far more concerned about the number of ICBMs that Russia was building, and bombers became a distant secondary consideration to missiles that could cross continents in 15 minutes, against which there was no credible defense and very little warning.

They offered technology sharing with the Canadians as compensation for not purchasing any Arrows and removal of tariffs, which they did provide. Canada was given access to the latest and greatest American computer, sensor, and weapons tech, to an extent that not even the British had access to. We also killed our XF-108 development program around the same time that Canada killed their Arrow, which meant the US was no longer as fixated on addressing "the bomber gap" with large twin engine interceptors, since it never actually existed to begin with, which Canadian Intelligence figured out before American Intelligence finally did.

The YF-12 was a true Mach 3 capable aircraft with vastly greater range and carrying capacity than the Arrow. Since the YF-12 program was deemed technically unworkable and unworkably expensive, because it was, what chance did the Arrow realistically have of filling that same role?

The Arrow also had fly-by-wire.

The Arrow had electrically-operated flight controls that used electrical signal input and a primitive analog computer to operate its hydraulic flight control surfaces, and to provide simulated haptic feedback to the pilot in the absence of normal hydraulic force feedback. The F-16 had a digital computer with full authority over all flight control surfaces and use of electronic sensor air data input. The pilot uses the controls to input commands, and then the computer decides how to execute them, or if it will execute them if the pilot would otherwise exceed a structural limit. Beyond that, the F-16's flight control system also prevents the jet from flipping nose-over-tail, because it is inherently unstable, so its computer automatically enters hundreds of minor control correction inputs per second, irrespective of pilot input, to keep the nose pointed where the pilot wants it. If you want to get real technical, I believe the Viggen was the very first fighter to have a full authority digital flight control computer in the air, which was followed very shortly thereafter by the F-16.

But you mentioned supercruise. That was necessary to catch a Russian bomber flying at mach 0.85 and skirting the nearest Canadian air base by a thousand km (621 miles) or more.

The Arrow could not possibly fly 621 miles from its base and return if ANY supercruising was involved. I provided direct evidence of this by doing a very simple math calculation on the Iroquois engine's fuel burn rate. You can play with the number any way you like. The reality is that at 700mph, Arrow has 1 hr and 10 minutes of flight time at subsonic speeds, but far less in actuality because it first has to climb to altitude. If it does any supercruising at all, then it has even less time aloft. RCAF had no tankers in the 1950s and the Arrow was never equipped for aerial refueling as a result.

"R of A" = "Radius of Action" (how far the Arrow could fly from its air base and still return, i.e. "not crash" after running out of fuel):
main-qimg-ef7e4c258d3b697d7223e100039f4600

Void · 2025-02-03 13:06:35

Wow! Just like that! https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/do … 1843&ei=12
Quote:

Donald Trump makes major U-turn on Mexico tariffs
Story by Claire Anderson & Emily Hodgkin • 3h • 2 min read

It looks like the Mexicans have some good heads on their shoulders. It is a thing to appreciate.

Ending Pending

Last edited by Void (2025-02-03 13:07:47)

RobertDyck · 2025-02-03 18:25:47

One video from a Canadian politician.
YouTube: Dear America, remember Canada is your ally and friend

And a reaction video to the above video. This guy is an American, his channel is all about reacting to various things Canadian.
YouTube: American Reacts to Dear America, Remember Canada is Your Ally and Friend

The politician cited US government agencies to provide real statistics, real numbers.

RobertDyck · 2025-02-03 18:47:58

kbd512, you continue revisionist history. Arrow was offered for sale to the US, Australia, New Zealand, UK, and all NATO allies. France was interested, but decided to order Iroquois engines to upgrade their Mirage fighters. It was a more powerful engine than anything France had at the time so would give their fighters more power. This was before eastern Europe joined NATO.

kbd512 · 2025-02-03 21:47:40

RobertDyck,

kbd512, you continue revisionist history.

Can you present any evidence that the US government threatened any NATO allies over purchases of Arrow interceptors, Iroquois engine, or any other piece of tech related to the Avro Arrow program?

Forgive me if I don't take your word for it, but thus far you've engage in a lot of pointless name calling and some of your claims don't withstand simple math checks, such as your claims about the Arrow's range. Since you couldn't be bothered to do a simple multiplication problem to know why your claim wasn't valid, I'm wondering about what else you never bothered to check.

RobertDyck · 2025-02-04 05:27:38

You realize Arrow's combat range was as great as a Eurofighter Typhoon. No more. But it had to do that while flying fast enough to intercept a Tu-95 Bear bomber. A fighter aircraft cannot fly any significant distance while using afterburner. So it had to fly fast enough to intercept a Bear, and do so without afterburner. Why is that hard to believe?

Avro Canada CF-105 Arrow 2

kbd512 · 2025-02-05 11:12:56

RobertDyck,

So it had to fly fast enough to intercept a Bear, and do so without afterburner. Why is that hard to believe?

I don't know if you'll bother to read any of this, but the required technical detail and basic math is there for anyone to understand why the Arrow, XF-103, XF-108, and YF-12 Mach 3 interceptor projects were all abandoned.

I absolutely believe that was the RCAF requirement, but I also believe that requirement was unrealistic, or the Arrow was poorly designed to meet it, or both. The fuel burn rate associated with supercruising 1950s turbojet engines is beyond what the Arrow can carry. If the Arrow's fuel capacity was more similar to the F-111 (5,000 gallons) or YF-12A (9,785 gallons), then it might be possible to meet requirements in a way that doesn't limit the utility of the capability to such an extent as to render it functionally worthless to have.

The Arrow's cruising range (825 miles, 3,012 gallons of internal fuel) is nowhere near that of the Typhoon (1,800 miles, 1,642 gallons of internal fuel and 822 gallons of external fuel). The F-22 burns about 2,647 gallons of fuel to fly 685 miles. The Arrow would burn about 2,500 gallons of fuel to fly the same distance at best cruise speed and altitude. If you gave the Arrow the same 2,647 gallons of fuel that the F-22 carries, then it can fly 725 miles. Aerodynamics for the win! Something seems to be missing here, though, and that's equalizing weight. If you load each fighter roughly equally by adding a pair of 6,000 gallon fuel tanks to the F-22, then the F-22 suddenly has the range advantage over the Arrow, even with 115 miles of supercruise, at 863 miles. Either way, it still looks like neither fighter has enough range to chase down a bomber. If the bomber is a mere 300 to 400 miles away, we're not going to chase it down by supercruising, because we'll be out of gas and end up crashing our expensive interceptor before making it back to base.

The F-22 and Arrow were optimized to convert fuel into noise, but they're not very efficient at doing it. In both cases, their range is so limited that "chasing down" a bomber moving at high subsonic speed is grossly impractical. If the bomber is flying towards them, then we're intercepting, not chasing. In the 1950s, radar and missile tech limitations made that proposition impractical for reasons unrelated to jet aircraft performance.

Lockheed-Martin F-22 Raptor - 2000s Interceptor Tech
Internal Fuel: 2,647 gallons
Pratt & Whitney F-119 SL Static Thrust: 26,000lbf (mil); 35,000lbf (burner)
Pratt & Whitney F-119 SFC: 0.61lb/lbf/hr (mil power; cruise speed and alt.)
Range on Internal Fuel: 685 miles (subsonic; 3.86gal/mile); 530 miles (115 miles of supercruising)
Radius on Internal Fuel: 342.5 miles (subsonic); 265 miles (115 miles of supercruising)
Armament: 6X AIM-120 AMRAAM (~100 mile range; 360lbs) and 2X AIM-9 Sidewinder (~10-20 mile range; 200lbs)
APG-77 Radar Detection Range vs a Bomber: ~320 miles (524lbs)

Avro Arrow - 1950s Interceptor Tech
Internal Fuel: 3,012 gallons
Orenda Iroquois SL Static Thrust: 22,000lbf (mil); 30,000lbf (burner)
Orenda Iroquois SFC: 0.85lb/lbf/hr (mil power; cruise speed and alt.)
Range on Internal Fuel: 825 miles (subsonic; 3.65gal/mile); 670 miles (115 miles of supercruising)
Radius on Internal Fuel: 412.5 miles (subsonic); 335 miles (115 miles of supercruising)
Armament: 8X AIM-4 Falcon (~6 mile range; 135lbs) or 3X Sparrow II missiles (~4 miles range; 390lbs)
APQ-41 Radar Detection Range vs a Bomber: ~40-50 miles

YF-12 Radar / Armament:
ASG-18 Radar Detection Range vs a Bomber: ~100 miles (2,098lbs)
GAR-9 / AIM-47 Falcon Range: ~100 miles (818lbs; semi-active radar homing with terminal IR guidance)

Let's assert that Arrow also gives up 155 miles of range by supercruising for 115 miles. Arrow (optimized for speed) has better drag than F-22 (optimized for stealth), SFCs of these engines are very different (F-119 is markedly better in cruise, but burns more in burner), different diameters (F-119 is larger, which helps efficiency and thrust), different OPRs (F-119 is more than 3X higher than Iroquois), turbojets do become more efficient than turbofans at Mach 1.5-ish (benefits Iroquois, but only when operated near this speed), but the F-119 makes a lot more thrust at mil power and burner (which burns more fuel, but is also why we can push a less aerodynamic jet to Mach 1.76 w/o burner), so we'll assert for sake of argument that all these variables ultimately "wash out" because the net-net is that both engines are overall similar enough, both jets will be at similar weights, and when operated within this special "supercruise" regime, both will produce similar fuel burn rates and flight speeds (because it takes fuel to make thrust and it take thrust to overcome drag). With all those considerations, there is no precise apples-to-apples to be had here, but we can say as a general statement that turbojets are somewhat less efficient than turbofans outside of a supercruise regime, so wherever we gain with one tech we lose with the other, and vice-versa. Both are large engines, made with a lot of Titanium to keep weight in check, and produce big power numbers for fighter jet engines, so they're very thirsty.

Can you spot any potential problems with 1950s radar and missile armaments that might limit their effectiveness during an intercept attempt against a bomber, even if they worked flawlessly?

From where I'm sitting, to launch against an enemy bomber in the 1950s and 1960s, it looks like you either need a big radar paired with a big missile, or you need to be well within 10 miles. There's not a lot to choose from. Everybody's 1950s missiles have ranges of around 10 miles. The British Red Top missile used by the English Electric Lightning had a 7.5 mile max range. Sparrow III did have a longer range, but is not active radar homing, and GAR-9 / AIM-47 (AIM-54 precursor) did not have active radar homing, either. The US Navy's Terrier (RIM-2; 1,180lbs) missile did not have active radar homing, but it had a great big rocket motor and warhead (218lbs), and were carried by Phantoms as ARMs during the Viet Nam War. So... Nobody had a working active radar homing missile in the 1950s, unless it was the size of a fighter jet, like the Bomarc, or had very limited range. The AIM-54 (976lbs) development program, which ran from 1960-1966, finally developed an active radar homing missile, but the AWG-9 radar was huge, the AIM-54 was huge, and neither performed well in realistic testing. Phoenix missiles were operational failures. I would further assert that Sparrow III was mostly an operational failure based upon lots of combat usage data. The very last versions of Sparrow were acceptable. Sparrow II was not good enough to become an operational failure. I consider launching 2 missiles per target to be acceptable. Any more than that is not practical. AIM-9 and AIM-120, with improvements, became acceptable combat weapons.

Tu-95
Internal Fuel: 21,787 gallons (primary reason we won't be "chasing down" a subsonic jet-powered bomber)
NK-12 SFC: 0.36lb/hp-hr
Range on Internal Fuel: 9,300 miles
Armament: 1X Kh-20 cruise missile (26,000lbs; ~370 mile range; Mach 2 speed; 3 megaton thermonuclear warhead)

Our fighter-interceptors simply lack the fuel capacity, whether we're talking about an Arrow or F-22, to realistically "give chase" to a strategic bomber moving at high subsonic speed, unless the bomber is coming straight at us or is within 300-ish miles of our position, but then we're not actually "chasing it down", we're both flying towards each other. Only the YF-12 (not a real fighter, much like the F-111) has enough onboard fuel to truly "give chase" to a strategic bomber.

If you decide to "supercruise" your Arrow for 115 miles following a scramble, can you still close to within 4 miles of a Tu-95 to fire missiles at it, before it gets close enough to launch that massive Kh-20, and still make it back to base before running out of fuel?

The answer is either "no" or "just barely" if that Tu-95 ventures a little closer than it should.

If you were a wise Arrow pilot, then you would fly out at your best cruise speed and altitude to meet that Tu-95, which gives you enough onboard fuel to overtake it and shoot it down before it can launch that 3 megaton city killer its carrying. You might even come around to accepting the wisdom that knocking it out of the sky using a 10 kiloton warhead on a Mach 3 missile is an entirely appropriate defensive measure that economizes on money / fuel / time / training, all at the same time. If the Russians flew too closely to each other in formation, then you might even manage to kill 2 or 3 Tu-95s per Bomarc, because close still counts when it comes to nuclear warheads.

If you were a wise RCAF Procurement Officer responsible for drafting design requirements for interceptors, then you'd probably drop the supercruise requirement or insist that the Arrow be redesigned to carry a lot more fuel than 3,000 gallons. I would want closer to 5,000 gallons of fuel if I was drafting the requirements (F-111 carried about 5,000 gallons of internal fuel). Lockheed went one better with the YF-12 and equipped it with 9,785 gallons of fuel because they thought that was the amount required to cruise at Mach 3 using afterburner, and it had a range of 3,000 miles. YF-12 / SR-71 was not merely "technically capable" of Mach 3, it was intentionally designed to cruise at Mach 3 over most of its flight duration. That's still not enough fuel to make it all the way across Canada, but much closer than the Arrow or F-22. From perhaps 4 to 6 air bases, you could reach any point in Canada, well before an enemy bomber was within range to launch its weapon. At Mach 3, the YF-12 would cover 300 miles in 6 minutes, which was as fast as a Bomarc.

RCAF requirements went beyond what 1950s tech could deliver. Development of the XF-103, XF-108, and YF-12 was dropped as well, because they went beyond what 1950s to 1970s tech was capable of providing in a realistic way. The XB-70 and Tu-4 Mach 3 bomber projects were abandoned because they were equally impractical, but in different ways. Nike Zeus hit targets moving at Mach 3 at 80,000ft. We figured that if we could do that, then the Soviets could do it, too. That turned out not to be the case for several more decades, which is why we operated the SR-71 until the Cold War ended, but nobody knew with any certainty whether or not the SR-71 would be shot down just as easily as the U-2 was, given more advanced radar and missile tech.

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