Headline could use a B.
ETA: NM. Youâre on it.
Maybe NOW they will do something that is costing the US real money. What will they do instead? Sabotage the deal with Saab so they go back to Boeing. Wait for it.
And thereâs accidentally an âeâ in Boing?
A small price for one company to pay for eternal vigilance against Amercaâs enemies!
Twelve years to negotiate the contract?!
Brazilâs buying $4.5B worth of fighter jets. And rather than buy them from American military-industrial complex go-to Boeing, theyâre buying them from Swedenâs Saab. Why? A contract with Boeing is synonymous with NSA surveillance. Multiply this by every country in the world and you start to get a sense of the cost of letting the NSA run around without any adult supervision.
So it would be better if NSAâs surveillance wasnât so overreaching because then the U.S. military-industrial complex could be further fortified by billion dollar fighter jet orders from Brazil?
Having a hard time wrapping my head around that one.
Also, thatâs not even the weirdest thing about the Brazil dealâŚthe weirdest thing is that since it will take awhile for the fighters to be produced, in the interim Brazil is LEASING 10 fighter jets from Saab.
Who knew you could lease weapons of war? I mean, itâs like thereâs some sort of international Rent-A-Center out there which, for the low-low price of a couple hundred million per week, will let you assemble your own modern military with nothing down.
Who does Saab call if Brazil defaults on its payments and they need to repossess them? Does Dog the Bounty Hunter do those kinds of jobs?
What kind of freaking crazy world do we live in?
I owned a pre-GM Saab 9s and that shit was in the shop far more than it was on the highway. Jus sayin. My advice, Brazil: spend a bit for the technical manual and invest in really good Swedish mechanics (shout out to Robby at Saab Replay in Berkeley).
Why does Brazil need $4.5B of fighter jets anyway? Theyâre not going to get into a war with the Chinese or invade Uruguay or Argentina. I assume itâs just to keep their military happy so they donât overthrow the government?
The Grippen is a different airplane philosophy than the big long range expeditionary warfare inspired American or Russian fighters available today. It is small muti-mission attack plane like an A-4 Skyhawk but with mach-2 category speed and radar of a fighter. It can be maintained by a small crew of draftees and is designed around using short bits of road when airfields have all been bombed to hell. The Draken is consistent with the Swiss and Swedish model of neutrality in strength, it by design remains a threat even when the supply train is interrupted by something crazy like invasion by a world power. American cutting edge aircraft cease to be useful months to years after the US decides it is time to list you an the axis of evil.
They have lots of things they need to protect. Like their oil fields. Or their airspace against drug runners. A few years ago they had a big operation bombing illegal airfields.
Damn straight. The only things good about SAABs were: for a 2wd car, they handled snow great. And they were among the few cars with heated seats back in the day. Otherwise? Errh, they had nice airplane-style dashes and seats and stuff. But crap crap crap reliability. They were not reliable cars.
Well done everybody. A reference to a 1960 French farce in the correct context.
âWed Dec 18, 2013 6:21pm ESTâ â A bit late?
What else Iâve learned: If you want to be a whistle blower, go underwater. Boeingâs jet, which likely had mechanical/technical/wiring problems, canât communicate from within the Indian Ocean.
Donât worry USA. Australiaâs still buying your expensive planes. $12billion of them apparently; announced by a conservative government thatâs spent the short time its been in office telling us the previous mob screwed our economy so bad that weâre all going to have to feel some financial pain for a few years while they âfixâ things.
So how did the first draft read? razilâs ? $4.5 fighter jets? built by oeing ?
NSA spying means Brazilâs $4.5 fighter jets wonât be built by Boeing
