US breaks free trade rules - F35 engines

Hmm

Strangely the US is seeking to break the free trade rules it imposes on the rest of the world in overturning a decision on production of engines for F-35

More than 100 jobs at Rolls-Royce in Bristol could be lost if a valuable contract is awarded to a US firm.
Rolls-Royce won a £1.36bn deal from the US Government to develop engines for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter in August last year.

But the US Government now wants the work to go to Rolls-Royce's American rival Pratt & Whitney instead.

A Rolls-Royce spokesman said staff were "extremely disappointed" and planned to lobby against the decision.

news.bbc.co.uk...

One rule for USA / but a different one for everyone else

[edit on 8-2-2006 by Strangerous]

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[edit on 9-2-2006 by UK Wizard]

As I recall most American bids for EU defense contracts are skipped over because EU governments would rather the money stay in Europe. Take a look at the top 100 Pentagon defense contractors, and you will see that we are pretty fair when it comes to defense contracts. I wish I could say the same for you Europeans though. I guess you not only fear Muslims, but also American defense contractors.

2005 top 100

You recall incorrectly

In UK many of our defence facilities are owned (wholly or jointly) by US firms including our naval dockyards and the servicing of our 'independent' nuclear deterrent warheads

Your link gives the top 101 Defence Co's in the World - some of whom are not American and proves nothing more than some of the top 101 defence co's in the World are not American. Having carefully checked your source it's obviously not 'pentagon spending' - perhaps you should re-check?

US has a long history of protectionism - particularly in defence procurement - this is precisely why BAe and Smith's have taken over US concerns - without a US operation they are excluded from your contracts.

Point of the thread was that despite RR winning the contract (presumably a fair fight) your Pres has arbritarily overturned that decision despite US's insistance that 'free trade' must be applied by all other nations.

The F35 is the JOINT strike fighter - translation 'we build, you buy'

[edit on 8-2-2006 by Strangerous]

Originally posted by Strangerous
Point of the thread was that despite RR winning the contract (presumably a fair fight) your Pres has arbritarily overturned that decision despite US's insistance that 'free trade' must be applied by all other nations.

The F35 is the JOINT strike fighter - translation 'we build, you buy'

[edit on 8-2-2006 by Strangerous]

Maybe the P&W componant is simply a better product? God forbid there is not an injustice involved, but that wouldnt mesh with your agenda now would it?

If the RR kit wasn't the better option it wouldn't have won in the first place would it?

Apologies if that fact doesn't fit you agenda.

Point remains. There are rules for a contest, UK firm wins, US changes rules

The deletion of the alternative engine program for the JSF will affect just as many jobs in the US as in Britain, as GE Aviation is shouldering about 60% of that program.

The deletion of the alternative engine option will save the program about 1.7 billion dollars over the next 5 years, and may be necessary to ensure full and continuing funding of the entire program.

There are lawmakers on both sides of the pond who are upset over this decision, so lets not be too hasty with the "dirty Americans looking out for themselves" rhetoric and the "British engines aren't as good" nonsense.

Good point well made

Thanks

S

Strangerous,

1. The overall JSF program cost is 257 billion dollars. This is piddling nonsense compared to the total.

2. We just added 'another trillion' in national debt. Thanks largely to the U.S. playing World Guardian in a post Cold War order where _nobody_ else wants to take up the slack.

3. The JSF is worthless. It is designed solely for export and that means even 'special relationship' nations like the UK are buying it _because they can't swing the development independently_. We would be vastly better off dropping the whole effort and skipping ahead, straight to UCAVs. Something which all of the EU is /also/ doing now that both Flubber and the Rafale have failed, miserably, against existing designs. And they are all giggling at the 'real' price of the F-35.

4. The UK still manufactures the entire rear fuselage from the engine face aft and they are 'disappointed' that they cannot consortialize more frontend data from the Americans. Despite the fact that BAe is an element of EADS and EADS is a direct competitor to us in such things as mission systems and LO. If you can't build the mission end and Continental Closed Shop politics are demanding 'VLO or else' pried out of your supposed friendship with us, how bad do you think you look, begging for scraps of an engine which is ALSO not your's to own by majority funding?

5. The UK lost 100 jobs at BAe. Boohoohoo. Ford just announced /30,000/ jobs going away as a funciton of 14 plant closures. Guess which injury to our economy most Americans care more about bandaiding, 'free trade' be hanged. The defense industry pretends they contribute oodles for the jetset dole they receive. But the fact is, you have to build A MAJORITY OF ITEMS IN USE BY THE MAJORITY FOR THE MAJORITY OF THE TIME before you can say that and 1,500, 2,400 or 3,000, the JSF is a complete and utter waste compared to the MILLIONS of automobiles we need to yearly produce. Indeed, every military item ever purchased is _worthless_ except in case of war which we can already see is being handled 'so well' by our govenment. Spending 400 BILLION dollars with no Osama and the idiots in Iraq daily proving what savages they really are, biting the fingers of the people who want to give them a hand up, not a hand out. WHERE does the F-35 fit here? It doesn't. That's the problem.

6. American and United I think it is are suing the UK Heathrow establishment for making them suffer the majority of fuel rationing (they fly the longest flights, duhh, 'The Pond' being 3,500 miles across) because YOU had a major blowup at a Jet-A1 storage facility that is used as a feeder for the airport. What do you think happens when Euro airlines pull into a U.S. airport with more seat miles paid for on lower airframe fuel fractions because THEY don't have to worry about there 'not being any get home juice'? Should we punish all of them with higher fuel prices so that our 'free trade' (non subsidized) airlines can compete again?

Baaah. You understand so little of the building HATE in this country for the expectation of 'equal rights' in all things on the part of pissant city states -pretending- to be NATIONS of continental mass. As a people, we are sick to death of having our reputations trashed, our work product jeered and our politics laughed at while keeping you all SAFE to bend us over a 'trade agreement' table yet again.

You read this-

www.latimes.com...

And you realize the undercurrent of that article is actually: "You take away our youth. You make us look like /depraved sadists/ at Abu Ghraib. You fail, utterly, to continue the chase for UBL where it needs to go. You jack us up for BRAC'ian military base contributions to local economies, now you want MORE TOYS?!"

As a warning shot across the bows from the check signers of the taxpaying public. Bush' ignorance of which is driving U.S. towards a political meltdown not unlike that which followed Vietnam.

Which is /fine with me/ because I'd as soon cancel JSF entirely, send you your 2 billion dollars with interest and a note as to where to place it. And start turning this nation into a deeply 'protectionist' society bent solely on getting it's debt under control, it's jobs back solely at home for home use, it's energy requirements independent of some bearded Ali Baba's in the ME and a new look at a defense establishment ONE THIRD it's present bloated condition.

How's that you presumptuous tick? You go from losing 1 billion and 100 jobs in pocket money for a tiny piece of total program R&D that likely wouldn't be applied to the majority of 'just like USAF' jets purchased anyway. To being out fully 'the last third but still a third!' of 257 BILLION dollars worth of total programe expenditure for ALL sales.

It's just too damn bad I can't make it happen for you because I swear, U.S. wartoyz should not be built at the exclusive whim of a city-state that cannot afford to do it themselves. Most especially when 'the variant in question' has added billions and /years/ more to the R&D cycle for weight reduction on what remains less than 11% of the 'always a CALF' principle model.


KPl.

I've complained about the insult so won't respond (despite the temptation!!) on that point.

1. £1.36 billion isn't 'piddling'
2. Your national debt is due to many factors, defence is one but your motives are hardly altruistic. Don't blame us blame your Govt
3. You're spending $275Bn on something 'worthless'??!
4. The contract was awarded, then cancelled Pyros explained why
5. I suspect your job losses at Ford are related to the car market not this defence post. If you needed MILLIONS of cars presumably you wouldn't be cutting back @ Ford. Blame your DoD if they're spending too much on arms
6. Unrelated point, sure your airlines can claim the difference on the insurance if the claim's valid. BTW - think you'll find there are longer flights than trans- atlantic

After this you were rambling: 'pissant city states' - what do you mean?? We're the 5th biggest economy in the World.

I read the link - as instructed, didn't see your 'undercurrent' there at all - but by then you were really rambling.

You're a protectionist - I'm so surprised

You want to cancel a contracted arrangement with a key ally - thanks for that, it does impact on our plans for two new carriers but Hey so what , eh?

You're building the JSF solely on our whim? But not the one we want / have planned for.

It seems you value our alliance not at all - presumably it'd be OK with you if we stayed out of your next war / didn't use our influence to get our other allies to join in too?

"Breaks free trade rules", don't make me laugh. Do you even know what free trade is? I guess not, otherwise you would have changed the title of your thread.

Originally posted by ch1466
. Despite the fact that BAe is an element of EADS and EADS is a direct competitor to us in such things as mission systems and LO.

Errr NO???

the only connection between BaE Systems and EADS is that they both own shares in Airbus.

Strangerous,

>>
1. £1.36 billion isn't 'piddling'
>>

Compared to a trillion? Get real.

>>
2. Your national debt is due to many factors, defence is one but your motives are hardly altruistic. Don't blame us blame your Govt.
>>

'Theoretically' I _own_ my government. Which means I can do that very thing. The difference being that if I want to elect those whose cast a jaundiced eye at a 'defense' which doesn't pay for itself, any memory I have of whiners complaining about not being rich enough is going to effect my willingness to continue a defense program that does more for them (continuing the pretense of being a naval air power) than it does for U.S.

Suck it up.

>>
3. You're spending $275Bn on something 'worthless'??!
>>

You got it. Something of a shock, yes? Manned aircraft do not do the ONE things (achieve presence via range+loiter) that UCAV does as baseline. In trade for this, we get a system which costs 500% more for roles and missions that are hardly flown and then only by a fraction of the clean-underwear club.

I have nothing but contempt for our air services. And 'UCAVs for all' would be a superb way of making them suffer for want of competence in winning wars and finding criminals.

Honor is not a 'traditional' in the armed forces. Most especially when the real world has had to suffer downsizing beyond all realistic _peacetime_ sufferings of the many for the few so that they could continue to do what they do, so poorly.

>>
4. The contract was awarded, then cancelled Pyros explained why.
>>

Find a LINK.

>>
5. I suspect your job losses at Ford are related to the car market not this defence post.
>>

Only if you believe that foreign manufacturers are not grossly subsidized for technology base buy in and /vastly/ underpaid for their work product. Nobody likes seeing an American Fighter be 'second best alternate' in a direct comparison but /everyone/ is used to seeing Lexus, Mercedes, BMW, Volvo, even Nissan and Toyota do better than our vehicles in C&D. Why is that when war is abhorrent and yet wars only (seeming) purpose is to pay for the freedom to drive automobiles which are not only less soundly constructed by /vastly/ less efficient?

If American automotive industry was as tariff protected and as technology invested as Boing or Lunchmeats 'lets kill somone!' divisions, we would have the best damn car on the planet. And hey! Here's a thought, maybe they would be fuel-cell-now so that we could flip the Arabs the bird and stop 'ruining' their 14th century head-chopping morals with our need for the coc aine-as-petroproduct.

Duuuuuh.

>>
If you needed MILLIONS of cars presumably you wouldn't be cutting back @ Ford.
>>

No. If we had the ability to fund ten different prototypes on an ongoing basis as the Japanese do. If we hurt their balance of trade as they virtually blank-wall ours so that _their government_ couldn't /pay/ for their little experiments in rapid prototyping, maybe we wouldn't have fleets of 14-17mpg Minivans and SUVs and pickup trucks as the world instantaneously flips from buck thirty to three dollars per gallon gasoline prices.

The difference being that nobody has come up with a good reason to explain why 'free trade' means protectionism for nations with 1/10th the continental mass of people and resources we do.

Solely to 'make up the difference' in a market capitalism on imports. We can't buy the imports if we can't fight the labor and tech base investments on quality vs. price. And nobody I know is so in lust with capitalism AS democracy that we wouldn't prefer to Screw-u-2.

The bubble will burst anyway when nations like China and Malaysia have markets as large as ours and there is no longer any motivation to feed cheap goods into a bankrupt nation.

Because China will still be producing enough home goods to pay for her toys.

The difference /then/ will be that the defense hawks will be retired and living in Switzerland and Americans will wonder why the JSF which potentilly consumes the equivalent of 6 YEARS worth of fuel on every mission, was so damn important that we couldn't spend that money on making our economy self sufficient when the market edge goes bust.

>>
Blame your DoD if they're spending too much on arms.
>>

No thanks, I'll blame you for designing a cheap carrier and then demanding to populate it with STOVL airframes.

Because I can tell the Marines to take a flying leap at a rolling donut and they will still choose to fly /a/ manned airframe (F/A-18E or F-35C) rather than be rifleman. And if push comes to shove, they will /accept/ a UCAV which is superior to all three options.

But what the JSF represents is the latest 'don't forget the A-12!' shell game by which fraud in the inducement (selling a contract value for an airframe that is less than a third the total PAUC price) is commited to via /foreign/ investments whose contractual value is both pride and fiscal commitment beyond the level at which Congress will willingly say 'no, you can't do this'.

While I'm at it, I will also blame you for wanting VLO that you cannot develop in your own Gen-4 platform. While failing to realize that the very proliferation of that technology will only escalate the technology spiral of what _should be_ a DEAD ART.

Because, thanks Nuremburg, warfare can no longer be exercised as an act of state sanctioned tribute and pillage by which a nation enriches its own people by tying the fates of others to a greater whole.

>>
6. Unrelated point, sure your airlines can claim the difference on the insurance if the claim's valid. BTW - think you'll find there are longer flights than trans- atlantic
>>

No gumby, because as the media spins it here, when Jolly Ol' St. Blair went and made his 'personal appeal' and lost out. He then chose to become equally incommunicado to and in fact may have deliberately exacerbated, the fuel problems.

You mess with each other's heads on 'defense and statesmanship' and nobody cares because it's just a bunch of thugs trying to make themselves rich over somebodies future corpse.

You monkey with everyday commerce and you have now 'made it personal' with all the little working idiots who wonder why your spite has to make them suffer.

The difference being that 'defense' should be a minimum depletion auxilliary effort to the body-social's resources. Not something whose value is more than their own everyday existence.

Certainly not after such a 'marvelous effort' to make the ONE MAN who they couldn't catch in the act has failed so completely on grounds of incompetence in fighting the war-type which is 70% dominant throughout historical conflicts.

>>
After this you were rambling: 'pissant city states' - what do you mean?? We're the 5th biggest economy in the World.
>>

USA GDP $12.77 trillion
UK GDP $ 1,867,000,000,000

www.cia.gov...

By domestic product, you are the eighth. The JSF is a favor to you and indeed all our 'closest allies' as part of a larger U.S. effort to sustain our own force. An effort whose production harmonies (one line, one FACO) are largely assured 'for cost' by a very strict apportionment of sub contracts of which your's is by far the largest.

If we played Panavia or Euroflubber consortia games, the JSF would not cost 100 million bucks but 180. 'Just like the F-22'.

If you can't bring down the golden hind on your own, you shouldn't complain about the third of all table scraps given you.

Most especially since, if it were not for the /profit by proliferation/ (Vae Victis Vickers) our own investment in this worthless piece of filth would not be sized to keep the flyaway costs down. But to keep the total program costs in check. With say 500 USAF and 500 (single variant) USN/USM aircraft. TOTAL.

I see absolutely NO reason to ramp up the sophistication of threat technology by exporting VLO which we claim (since the JSF now costs more than either Flubber or Rafale) is 'so important' that we have had to keep it beyond top secret for 30 years.

Most especially I see ZERO reason for rearming our forces when they cannot do more than start wars they are unable to finish with a black balance sheet in terms of gained vs. spent resources.

I would rather put that money into reinventing our own civil production and infrastructure since at least that employs OUR population at work that cannot be criticized for want of interfering with /others/ countries destinies.

Problem: You cannot guarantee your own future without our agreeing to play the game with you. Which is why nation-states should only deal with those nation-states which have the mass to hoe their own row.

Israel, England, even NATO (such as it EU is), by playing pity games based on old memories of 'military tradition' we weaken ourselves supporting the underdogs.

>>
I read the link - as instructed, didn't see your 'undercurrent' there at all - but by then you were really rambling.
>>

No gumby, what is there is there, if you LIVE HERE. And frankly the concerns of 100 workers at BAe just don't come even close.

>>
You're a protectionist - I'm so surprised
>>

No but you are afraid. Because if we had done the RIGHT thing which was to supply NO ONE with arms in WWI, the world would be a vastly different place for Ol' Blightey.

City States manipulate bigger Nations by getting them to think that they have 'something to lose' should they not secure the world for free trade. When historical facts support the notion that small nations are only wealthy when they can play the trade game off everyone else.

Something you could not guarantee if you had to bear our defense burden.

OTOH, Nation-State mass becomes self balancing after a critical point ONLY if it remains exclusively set on self sufficiency to begin with.

We can secure our own resource access and trade rights with forces 1/3rd their present size. So long as force commitments are also 1/10th as large.

And that's the rub. Because protectionist and isolationist theory are NOT flip sides of the same trade coin. Where trade is based on need and quality of foreign sources for market goods. And market is guaranteed by self sufficiency in all but the items you /choose/ to import.

And we have failed to sustain this selfsufficient economic mass at the same time we have allowed ourselves to be hood winked by those who would have us think that the world is 'too dangerous a place' for us not to intervene on their behalf.

>>
You want to cancel a contracted arrangement with a key ally - thanks for that, it does impact on our plans for two new carriers but Hey so what , eh?
>>

Is that panic I hear? What you do with your carriers (I would crush them for scrap) is none of our business. If you want hind teat on 257 billion dollar program, then may I suggest you shut up, sit up, and pull your oar with the rest of us.

>>
You're building the JSF solely on our whim? But not the one we want / have planned for.
>>

No, really? So the tail truly /does/ wag the dog then? Snorts and Snickers.

I have nothing but contempt for a nation that intimidates others through the bullying of an elitist knights-class of warrior we call pilots. Most especailly when 99.999% of what they do could be accomplished by the very automation which has 'outmoded' the civillian economy of this nation.

If I have absolutely no intention of supporting the Air Farces of _this_ nation in their quest for ever more Platinum Bullets. BUT NOT AN END TO THE NEED FOR THEIR USE (Amalgamation as the leveraging of humanity into a global resource society).

What the heck do you think I care about yours?

>>
It seems you value our alliance not at all - presumably it'd be OK with you if we stayed out of your next war / didn't use our influence to get our other allies to join in too?
>>

The U.S. weak as we are, did not need a single ally to roll Iraq or AfG or both together. Alliances based on defense pacts create too much gravity based on past acts. Alliances based on trade assurances create too much negative flow from the large to the small to be safe for the former in supporting the 'separate but equal' lower economic mass of the latter.

I believe that America deserved to be attacked on 9/11. Because we were using our slaughter dogs as merc enforcer /thugs/ on behalf of Arab states who were 'so worried' about their security that they let us fly ONW/OSW on our own.

In the process, they got richer overproducing for an excommunicated Iraq. And we got buck thirty gasoline for a decades worth of cars that should have gone out of fashion in the 1970s embargo.

Since the Arab members of OPEC weren't interested in another embargo for our 'depraved actions' against a fellow Islamic nation.

ONE MAN stood up against the tyranny of his brothers to say "No. This is wrong. Iraqi civillians are dying and American Infidels are on our soil doing it."

And if he had turned his resources and brilliance on his own people, politically or by paramilitary action, I would admire him as a hero in the mold of Pancho and Robin and the Sons Of Liberty.

But he instead attacked U.S.. Which means that not only are we now paying through the nose for gasoline which will likely /never again/ be as cheap as it _still would be_ if we had just left the PG to it's own little head games.

But we must find, try and kill Osama Bin Laden so that the world may balance fairly, what he did, vs. why he did it, vs. what the consequences TO HIM were.

I don't see the Brits as having much say or use in that process. Indeed, the last time you were in a similar position, the Na Bob in question fled India and lived out his life laughing at you from the White Mountains we now hunt UBL in.

Assuming our military can find the balls to press across yet another 'innocent' border, once Osama is finished, it will be time for the so morally superior fools who judge our adventurism to put proof to the puddin' as they display the readiness of this world for a no-superpower period of independent city-state selfrule. So that we may come home and demobilize a Cold War force structure that should have been hacked in half 20 years ago.

CONCLUSION:
The JSF is a waste because it isn't /half/ the fighter that the F-22 is, at 90% of the cost. The JSF is a waste because it is no better a bomber than a UCAV, at 5 times the price. The JSF is a waste because it isn't a /quarter/ the scout platform that a UCAV is, at 5 times the price. The JSF is a waste because it exports a principal U.S. technologic advantage at 5 times the price that a /European/ UCAV is. The JSF is a waste because the only thing 'Joint' is the name as the basing mode and inventory shares are all secured by separation of variants which INCREASE (technology bed investments) each individual airframe's PAUC. Thus the JSF is a waste because it sustains that main-in-the-loop psychology by which our warrior class sustains itself, for itself. As an independent culture rather than simply shared-cogs in an automated warfighting system. The JSF is a waste because, for 257 billion dollars it doesn't secure our independence from oil while itself burning the equivalent of SIX YEARS worth of 20 gallon automotive fillups, on every mission. The JSF is a waste because it adds yet more to our internal deficit while doing nothing to promote 'free trade, the other way' as a function of every-day commercial product access to foreign protected markets to cancel out our enormous trade imbalance. Through better quality product and a cheaper industry as well as protectionist closing of our markets. The JSF is a waste because it cannot compete in a world where nobody wants to /buy it/ (at 3 times it's initial contracted cost) when they can dial up The World Cop to save them from the big bad wolf. Before complaining how badly we do it.

If _you_ want this damn hunk a junk on OUR taxpayer hook, don't stand up the nail to be hammered in the coffin of the program by pretending that the F136 or 1 billion dollars or 100 jobs in the UK evokes a single tear for U.S. 'Not even a drop in the bucket' compared to all our problems.


KPl.

Presumably you'll be fighting your wars on your own from now on then?

Originally posted by ch1466

No thanks, I'll blame you for designing a cheap carrier and then demanding to populate it with STOVL airframes.

Because I can tell the Marines to take a flying leap at a rolling donut and they will still choose to fly /a/ manned airframe (F/A-18E or F-35C) rather than be rifleman. And if push comes to shove, they will /accept/ a UCAV which is superior to all three options.

But what the JSF represents is the latest 'don't forget the A-12!' shell game by which fraud in the inducement (selling a contract value for an airframe that is less than a third the total PAUC price) is commited to via /foreign/ investments whose contractual value is both pride and fiscal commitment beyond the level at which Congress will willingly say 'no, you can't do this'.

While I'm at it, I will also blame you for wanting VLO that you cannot develop in your own Gen-4 platform. While failing to realize that the very proliferation of that technology will only escalate the technology spiral of what _should be_ a DEAD ART.

Because, thanks Nuremburg, warfare can no longer be exercised as an act of state sanctioned tribute and pillage by which a nation enriches its own people by tying the fates of others to a greater whole.

interesting so this is britains fault now is it. is that why america came up with the idea and asked for froign countries to join in. fact is britain has many other options other then the f35 but for some stupid reason our goverment has its head stuck up america's ass every day. we should tell america to go away and buy rafale or even better still make an allience with russia and help them with stealth aircraft projects and buy those instead.

remeber you can insult britian as much as you like but we still have some of the worlds best scientists and engineers on earth. don't want an alience with britain thats fine we can make alliences with your best frind china and russia and devolop projects with them.

Originally posted by ch1466

>>
After this you were rambling: 'pissant city states' - what do you mean?? We're the 5th biggest economy in the World.
>>

USA GDP $12.77 trillion
UK GDP $ 1,867,000,000,000

www.cia.gov...


By domestic product, you are the eighth. The JSF is a favor to you and indeed all our 'closest allies' as part of a larger U.S. effort to sustain our own force. An effort whose production harmonies (one line, one FACO) are largely assured 'for cost' by a very strict apportionment of sub contracts of which your's is by far the largest.

If we played Panavia or Euroflubber consortia games, the JSF would not cost 100 million bucks but 180. 'Just like the F-22'.

If you can't bring down the golden hind on your own, you shouldn't complain about the third of all table scraps given you.

the uk is smaller then most states in the U.S infact the UK is 1/10 of the size of america infact i think the whole of the uk is roughly the size of california now thats a powerfull economy for a country of that size.

your biggest problem is you assume britain needs america infact its the otherway around britain doesnt need you guys the only reason your country is super friendly towards britain is so we dont make alliences with russia and china and transfer our advanced technology to them.