Saab had bundled its surveillance aircraft proposal in with its pitch to sell Gripen-E fighter jets to Canada and promised to transfer technology so both aircraft could be fully manufactured locally. Carney did not say anything about whether Canada will proceed with the Gripen and limit its purchase of American-made F-35 jets.

[–] Voroxpete@sh.itjust.works 2 points 2 days ago

This was kind of a given (what with it being built here) but it's a good decision even without the economic factors. NATO as a whole is basically standardizing on GlobalEye so even if Saab weren't building it on a Canadian platform there would good reasons to pick it.

[–] ryper@lemmy.ca 2 points 2 days ago (2 children)

Why "airborne early warning aircraft"? Isn't it already implied that an aircraft will be airborne?

[–] ValueSubtracted@startrek.website 3 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Airborne Early Warning and Control is a specific type of thing, so an AEW aircraft is a particular type of aircraft.

[–] cecilkorik@lemmy.ca 2 points 2 days ago

The airborne refers to the thing it is providing early warning of, it refers to its purpose and role, not its mode of travel. This is intended to identify potential airborne threats, like enemy aircraft, missiles, etc. Consider that aircraft can also provide early warning of other things, as widely varied as submarines (sonar) or wildfires, and the "airborne" part should make more sense. Alternatively, we also have airborne early warning radar that are on the ground and are not aircraft at all, and theoretically we could have ships or vehicles that do the same thing. This is the aircraft version.