Canada Has a Clear Message for the F-35 Fighter

Summary and Key Points: The nearly $9 billion cost increase for Canada’s F-35 acquisition, bringing the total to $27.7 billion, is not the real scandal; it is a symptom of a deeper “strategy shock.”

According to a recent Auditor-General’s report, this “sticker shock” is less concerning than the fact that Canada lacks a coherent plan to support the jets.

A U.S. Marine Corps KC-130J Super Hercules aircraft with Marine Aerial Refueler Transport Squadron (VMGR) 152 refuels an F-35B Lightning II aircraft with Marine Fighter Attack Squadron (VMFA) 121, both assigned to Marine Aircraft Group 12, 1st Marine Aircraft Wing, during exercise Red-Flag Alaska 25, at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, Alaska, July 21, 2025. VMGR-152 partnered with the U.S. Air Force during Red Flag Alaska to enhance aerial refueling and assault support capabilities. Training in Alaska’s harsh environment sharpened the squadron’s combat readiness and lethality. (U.S. Marine Corps photo Lance Cpl. Cecilia Campbell)

Key basing infrastructure for the F-35s will not be ready until 2029, years after the first jets arrive in 2026, and the Royal Canadian Air Force already faces a severe pilot shortage, raising serious questions about the nation’s ability to operate its new fleet effectively.

Canada’s F-35 Message: We Have No Strategy for This Stealth Fighter

So now it’s official. Canada’s F-35 acquisition is going to cost nearly 50 percent more than originally advertised. According to Auditor-General Karen Hogan, the price tag has jumped from $19 billion Canadian dollars to 27.7 billion Canadian dollars – an $8.7 billion surge driven by inflation, foreign exchange pressures, and an overheated munitions and aerospace market. But if we’re being honest, the dollar figure isn’t the real scandal. The real scandal is that Ottawa has been caught flat-footed – again – without a coherent defense strategy, an adequate basing plan, or enough trained pilots to fly the very aircraft we’re buying.

Let’s be clear: the cost increase is not, in and of itself, a reason to panic. Everyone in the defense world knows what’s happening. You delay procurement during a global inflationary cycle, you wait until munitions markets are saturated with post-Ukraine demand, and you’re going to pay a premium. And Canada – thanks to nearly two decades of political waffling – has waited longer than most. While allies locked in orders early and began building operational experience, Ottawa shelved its commitment, restarted competitions, and pretended the F-35 was just one option among many. Now the bill has come due.

But this isn’t just a matter of budgeting. It’s a matter of readiness. According to Aviation Week, even as Ottawa prepares to accept its first F-35s by 2026, key infrastructure won’t be ready until at least 2029. That means pilots will be forced to operate from temporary facilities – likely compromising both the tempo of operations and the quality of training. Even more troubling, the RCAF is already facing a severe pilot shortage, with estimates suggesting we won’t have enough aircrew to fly the full complement of 88 aircraft when they arrive. The jets are coming, but we may have no bases to house them and too few pilots to fly them.

Maj. Kristin Wolfe, F-35A Lightning II Demonstration Team pilot and commander, performs the “high speed pass” maneuver at the California International Air Show, Salinas, Calif., Oct. 30, 2021. The F-35A Demo Team performed alongside the U.S. Navy’s F-35C Demonstration Team, showcasing two different variants of the 5th-generation fighter aircraft. (U.S. Air Force photo by Capt. Kip Sumner)

This is not a procurement story. It’s a strategic failure.

The F-35, after all, is not just a fighter. It’s the centerpiece of modern Western airpower, a data fusion platform that integrates air, space, and maritime domains. It’s interoperable with American and NATO systems, survivable in contested airspace, and indispensable to high-end warfighting in the Arctic, North Atlantic, and North Pacific. But to realize any of that potential, Canada needs to do more than buy aircraft. It needs to build doctrine, basing infrastructure, logistics pipelines, and force structure to support them. Right now, there’s little evidence we’re doing so.

Take the Arctic, for instance. Canadian sovereignty claims in the Far North are meaningless without the ability to project and sustain air power there. The U.S. has made clear that NORAD modernization will require forward basing, persistent surveillance, and rapid response capabilities across Arctic airspace. The F-35 is essential to that mission – but if Ottawa can’t even build facilities to house the aircraft in Cold Lake or Bagotville on time, how exactly does it plan to defend Iqaluit or Inuvik?

Then there’s the pilot pipeline. The F-35 is not a plug-and-play system. It requires highly trained aviators capable of operating in complex, high-threat environments. Yet Canada has consistently underinvested in pilot recruitment and retention, leading to a shortfall that is already impairing RCAF operations. If we can’t produce or attract enough pilots now, what happens when we try to stand up multiple squadrons of fifth-generation fighters?

And all of this is happening against a backdrop of rapid global rearmament – especially in the North Pacific. North Korea’s military modernization program is no longer just a regional menace. The DPRK has successfully tested solid-fueled ICBMs, unveiled tactical nuclear warheads, and is moving toward operational submarine-based delivery platforms. It has rehearsed first-strike scenarios and explicitly threatened the United States and its Pacific allies. Canada, with its Pacific coastline, shipping lanes, and intelligence-sharing role in the Five Eyes, is not immune. It’s a North Pacific state whether Ottawa likes it or not.

A U.S. Air Force F-35A Lightning II assigned to the 355th Fighter Squadron receives fuel from a KC-135 Stratotanker assigned to the 909th Air Refueling Squadron during a bilateral air exercise with Japan Air Self-Defense Force fighters over the Pacific Ocean, April 14, 2023. Bilateral operations exemplify the U.S. and Japan alliance’s ability to quickly and decisively respond to threats within the Indo-Pacific region. (U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Jessi Roth)

Meanwhile, the strategic map of the Arctic is shifting. Russia’s Northern Fleet remains dominant in the region, and China continues to invest in dual-use infrastructure and undersea surveillance systems that challenge Western assumptions about who controls the High North. The United States is responding with a renewed emphasis on Arctic deterrence, including the deployment of F-35 squadrons to Alaska and Norway. Canada, by contrast, is struggling to house a single squadron, let alone integrate it into a wider strategy.

And this is the crux of the issue: the F-35 price tag may grab headlines, but it’s only a symptom. The underlying disease is strategic incoherence. For years, Canada has drifted, pretending that its geography, alliances, and obligations could somehow be squared with a boutique defense posture. That illusion is now dead. The world is rearming. Strategic competition is intensifying. And Canada is being left behind—not for lack of money, but for lack of seriousness.

Even the United States is beginning to notice. Despite the polite noises made by Washington, the message is clear: if Canada cannot field a credible military, contribute meaningfully to continental defense, or meet its NATO obligations, then it will become a peripheral player in its own neighborhood. The F-35 program was supposed to reverse that decline. But unless Ottawa gets serious – about pilots, basing, munitions stockpiles, and strategic posture – it will simply add a fleet of hangar queens to an already threadbare force.

And if we’re hoping for relief under a different government, the news isn’t exactly encouraging. While Mark Carney’s circle talks a good game on defense, there’s little evidence of the political will necessary to execute a long-term military modernization strategy. That will require breaking with decades of political inertia, pouring resources into defense infrastructure, and articulating a grand strategy grounded in the realities of multipolarity – not the fantasies of middle power multilateralism.

250520-N-TW227-1112 EAST CHINA SEA (May 20, 2025) An F-35B Lightning II fighter aircraft from Marine Fighter Attack Squadron (VMFA) 242, prepares to land on the flight deck of the forward-deployed amphibious assault ship USS America (LHA 6) while conducting flight operations in the East China Sea, May 20. America, lead ship of the America Amphibious Ready Group, is operating in the U.S. 7th Fleet area of operations. U.S. 7th Fleet is the U.S. Navy’s largest forward-deployed numbered fleet, and routinely interacts and operates with allies and partners in preserving a free and open Indo-Pacific region. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Kenneth Melseth)

So let’s stop obsessing over the price. The real question isn’t whether Canada is paying too much. It’s whether Canada is finally willing to become a serious country – one that understands the difference between procurement and power projection, between aircraft and air power.

The F-35 won’t make Canada a serious defense actor. But it might, just might, expose how unserious we’ve become.

About the Author: Dr. Andrew Latham

Andrew Latham is a non-resident fellow at Defense Priorities and a professor of international relations and political theory at Macalester College in Saint Paul, MN. You can follow him on X: @aakatham.

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