Moderator’s Note: This article was original published in The Chronicle Herald on 12 February 2012. Many of you who have followed the National Ship Procurement Strategy (NSPS) announcements will no doubt have heard that the first contract to be negotiated will be for a new class of ship, the Arctic/Offshore […]
icebreakers
5 posts
As a Canadian citizen living in the US, I am appalled that the government of Canada would promote a concept for 'defense' of the Arctic that has no visible purpose! Delivery of as-yet not designed, prototype naval vessels with pop-gun armaments for gun-boat diplomacy, at some indeterminate time in the […]
In my post of 27 February I stated that it was not clear whether the view that ice breakers were needed "rather" than strengthened arctic patrol vessels was Mr. Byers' personal one or the collective view of all the negotiators. So I interviewed one of the participants, Rob Huebert, who […]
The problem [of acquiring nuclear submarines, as suggested by Keith Spicer,] is not so much the acquisition cost as it is the cost of training, infrastructure and operating the boats. The political aspects cannot be ignored either. The result I suspect is that the nuclear submarine becomes as onerous to […]
Neil Reynolds, in his column "Bring back the mighty ship Labrador" (Feb. 14), writes that "Canada could very quickly deploy heavy Arctic icebreakers that function simultaneously as armed naval patrol vessels." But there is no national or military need for navy icebreakers. As Mr Reynolds notes, the Canadian navy has […]