Sajjan not keen on 2nd Hand Fighters to Fill Capability Gap

By: David Pugliese, The Ottawa Citizen 

Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan continues to insist that the capability gap, supposed to be filled by the purchase of Boeing Super Hornets as an interim fighter, will still be dealt with.

The U.S. and Canadian governments are still talking about Super Hornets, although the Liberals have cut off Boeing from any discussions.

The Liberal government has taken that action in retaliation for a trade complaint that Boeing has filed with the Trump administration concerning what it claims is unfair subsidies awarded to Bombardier on its CSeries civilian aircraft production.

During his recent appearance at a defence and aerospace conference in Abbotsford, BC, Sajjan the Liberal government has “many other options, so that we can fill this capability gap.”

He, however, didn’t get into details.

“No decision has been made,” he added. “Discussions are still ongoing.”

But there have been suggestions in some quarters of the aerospace industry that the Liberals were considering the purchase of second-hand fighter jets to fill the gap.


Sajjan addressed that issue….somewhat.

“I’d prefer to buy brand new versus – versus used, but we are currently in the process, and we’ll make a decision to making sure that our members in the Canadian Armed Forces have the right tools necessary,” he said.