Switzerland also has an open fixed-price deal for 36 F-35s.
The US are trying to alter the deal and raise the price to ~1 billion USD more than agreed to.
I wish Switzerland would do the same and cancel the deal.
On top of that Switzerland should go a step further and impose tariffs on gold exported to the united states if they don't stop with their silly little 39% tariffs on imported Swiss goods. Just ridiculous and embarrassing to sever long running trade relationships out of ignorance.
mcmcmc · 7m ago
[delayed]
refulgentis · 2m ago
I'm American and kinda stunned how little salience the issue has. Please punish us as much as possible.
It feel like we're gonna full on Erdogan inflation speed run out of this. i.e. multiple years of lunacy, coupled to forced interest rate decreases that make the inflation worse. I have no idea why US markets rallied earlier in the week on the idea they'd be lowered. We're full on in "well, if Herr Daddy says he fixed it, we can all say it's fixed, in fact it'd be damaging not to" territory.
Edit: also, for the historians, it's absolutely stunning how little power the legal system has. This is obviously illegal, and yet, many months will proceed by the time it gets judge, appealed, and then a 65/35 shot at the court saying "well, gee, are we sure the constitution was against kings??"
mensetmanusman · 34m ago
Good, the EU needs its own defense industry.
zppln · 9m ago
More specifically, we could use our own engine. Gripen E still rely on the GE F414. Europe has nothing to rival the P&W F135.
cm2187 · 14s ago
My limited understanding is that the F135 is massively over-powered to be capable of VTOL + push through the bulky shape of the F35, resulting in a disappointing range. I don't know that it would make sense to use it on a different platform.
verdverm · 1h ago
A lot of countries are learning lessons from the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the world's reaponses
pimlottc · 1h ago
What do you mean specifically here?
glial · 52m ago
“Selling the F-35, or American systems for that matter, will certainly become more complicated for American companies,” said Gesine Weber, a Paris-based fellow at transatlantic think tank German Marshall Fund.
“An important factor in the purchase of the F-35 by European governments was the idea that European defense would be built on a transatlantic basis in terms of strategy, institutions and capabilities,” she said, adding that “the Trump administration is in the process of dissolving the transatlantic link, and the purchase of American systems will therefore no longer have any added value for Europeans.”
“If you keep punching your allies in the face, eventually they’re going to stop wanting to buy weapons from you,” said a Western European defense official, granted anonymity to discuss the matter candidly. “Right now we have limited options outside of U.S. platforms, but in the long run? That could change in the coming decades if this combativeness keeps up.”
It takes decades to build the companies and expertise required. But only a few years to destroy it. France kept its independent nuclear capabilities incase this day came. It came, 50+ years later.
The US should keep all this in mind. They're burning bridges that might take a century to rebuild.
Damogran6 · 22m ago
Alienate customers, punish colleges, cancel research, send smart folks running from your borders. Sounds like a pretty logical conclusion.
hervature · 8m ago
The point of his comment is that the statement is tautological regardless of the subjects.
"I could change in the coming decades."
"The most stable rock formation could change in the coming decades."
"Even under the best possible leadership, EU and US relations could change in the coming decades."
echelon · 10m ago
I think the comment is calling out how Europe can be slow or indecisive when it comes to building businesses, startups, industries, etc. Not that Europe doesn't have a desire to do so.
afavour · 30m ago
I can’t see a world in which this stuff isn’t considered on a decades long scale. It’s not like you go year to year ordering a couple of different fighter jets here and there.
jacquesm · 26m ago
It makes good sense though. International weapons systems integration has massive inertia. If not for that the US would sell a lot less than it does right now, people are not buying because they want to, but because they have to. There has been some progress on integrating more diverse systems but it is slow, the number of people able to do this work is not large outside of the circles where the systems were developed in the first place. But Europe has never really shut down its defense industry, and there has been a massive revival in the last couple of years. It is still ramping up as far as I can see and it will for the foreseeable future. No matter what the outcome of the Trump-Putin summit (I refuse to call it the Ukraine peace summit, just like I wouldn't call the Molotov Ribbentrop meeting the Polish, Latvian and Estonian peace summit).
bamboozled · 12m ago
The USA has left Ukraine in the lurch after signing the Budapest memorandum. They should’ve kept their Nukes and Russia wouldn’t have been able to invade and steal all their land, kidnap and auction off children , commit massacres etc.
Because America is currently an untrustworthy ally who is 100% American first and thinks deploying the military on home soil and applying harsh tariffs to its allies is more important than anything else, it’s best to countries no longer rely on the USA for basically anything. That will probably mean the end of the USD as a global reserve currency at some point too. Which is fine because it’s what the majority of voting Americans wanted. Isolationist, American first policies.
Go look at how Zelensky was treated in the interview with Trump and Vance and how the literal red carpet is rolled out for Putin and other world leaders with a brain see that and say, no thanks…
dh2022 · 33s ago
Re: Ukraine defending itself with the nukes it gave up as part of Budapest memorandum - the nuclear code required to activate the warheads never left Moscow.
Maybe the Ukrainians could have tinkered with these warheads and find out how to enable them.... but that is quite risky.
alephnerd · 1h ago
He's implying the Gripen deal was a result of Trump.
In reality, the US-Thailand relationship has been dead since the Junta took over in Thailand, and for domestic brownie points we decided to make an example out of them and Cambodia for democratic backsliding during the Biden admin [3]
Edit: cannot reply below (@Dang am I being rate limited)
The US has consistently rejected Thailand's F-35 request under the Biden admin [0][1]. If forced to buy a 4th gen jet, may as well buy the cheapest option on the market, which is the Gripen, as they have been using the Gripen for decades [2].
European affairs have little to do with affairs in Asia.
But Thailand is far from alone in this move away from US weapons. Spain cancelled their bid for F-35s and Switzerland is looking into doing the same. Denmark recently expressed regret over their purchase of F-35s. Portugal and Canada also both lost interest in American F-35s recently.
It could just be tariff backlash—aircraft have historically been the US' largest export. But I do wonder if the recent tests of US military tech in Russia/Iran had any hand in this
c420 · 43m ago
It seems the recent volatility from this American administration is being overlooked. They’ve turned their back on allies, resorted to bullying, and even issued outright threats, while walking away from commitments. Buyers may be weighing the risk that when they need service for their purchase, they could be strong-armed with threats of withheld maintenance — or worse, face a remote kill switch being activated.
bboygravity · 13m ago
Turned their back on allies?
That's a funny thing to say on the very day that Trump might've brokered a peacedeal that instantly would end the war.
Seems obviously more valuable to me than selling weapons to Ukraine for many years to "help its ally"?
onlypassingthru · 40s ago
That's wildly optimistic that Trump would convince Putin to admit his mistake and fully retreat from all of occupied Ukraine, but I admire the sentiment.
thebigman433 · 3m ago
There is nothing indicating a ceasefire, and Zelensky isnt even there. That is not helping an ally.
Ukraine also is not our only ally - the current administration constantly makes fun of our other ones
garbthetill · 53m ago
I still think US military tech is king, especially their fighter jets. eu countries cancelling or regrets is just geopolitics pandering
fighter jets are unicorns on the same level as chips you cant just procure 3nm chips tomorrow because you want too. I'm not super knowledgeable on them, but its interesting to see how difficult maintaining and making new gens are for example gripens still rely on US engine, china relies on Russian engines etc and the US seems to be always ahead
goyagoji · 36m ago
When you procure a 3nm chip you expect to keep it working as well as when you bought it, even if you block the management engine for privacy.
When you buy a fighter plane you should expect to not be able to fly for the full duration of a single conflict the manufacturing country disagrees about.
fooker · 30m ago
> When you procure a 3nm chip you expect to keep it working as well as when you bought it
Right: A powerful jet that can not be flown for lack of replacement-parts is worse than a mediocre jet that actually operates.
We've made great strides in reliability over the years, but planes are anything but solid-state like integrated CPUs are.
_DeadFred_ · 11m ago
Forget parts. Mission's can't be flown. Look up Mission Data Files and F35 Partner Support Complexes.
culi · 44m ago
Perhaps. But the US is less and less capable of producing them. Especially since the tariffs back-and-forth with China that lead to an exports control on rare earth minerals. Even before that, US manufacturers were consistently under-delivering and behind schedule on orders
Not to mention there are key areas that the US is widely considered to be behind on (e.g. hypersonic glide vehicles and drones) compared to the "Second World" powers. And there's been lots of talk—even from within the US—that drones have become more important to modern warfare than manned jets.
tim333 · 24m ago
US military tech is best but European stuff is pretty functional.
alexnewman · 32m ago
People think jets are things that should work even if they aren't supported by the manufacturer. Javelin and patriot don't work that way? How exactly does someone beside the us manage the hydrazine supplychain without usa logistics?
blibble · 25m ago
don't forget the Swiss too
who are livid after orangeman applied 39% tariffs because he doesn't understand the triangle trade of gold
impossiblefork · 10m ago
The advantage of the Gripen isn't that it's cheap. The F-16 is cheaper.
But Gripen has Meteor and can fly really well. Now, I'm a Swede, but there are claims of practical experiments in Norway trying out old some Gripen planes vs F-15C and F-16 have shown that the Gripen is simply better at air-to-air stuff.
The F-16 is obviously bigger though, so if you want to bomb somebody a lot and he doesn't have anything to put up against it then maybe it's reasonable to get one of those instead, but I don't think that's a problem Thailand has. I think they want an air force that can challenge another air force if required.
fabian2k · 53m ago
No idea what the reasons are in this specific case, but these kinds of military procurements are inherently tied to the political side.
Planes like this quickly become paperweights if you can't get replacements parts, support and ammunition. And most buyers won't be able to get significant parts of the construction into their countries. So you must trust the political stability of the country you're buying from, that they're still your friend in a decade or a few and support your planes.
Trump and his administration are anything but reliable partners.
alephnerd · 1h ago
Thailand wanted the F-35 [0], but the we will not give it to them given how close the Thai government has become to China after the junta [1].
Their junta and King wants to keep Thailand as an authoritarian illiberal democracy. The Biden admin on the other hand strongly opposed democratic backsliding in Thailand [2]
As a result, they - like Cambodia - decided to flip to China.
My brief research says Cambodia was using old Soviet and Chinese stuff, with some UAV support.
alephnerd · 1h ago
Yep! They are!
But in the 2010s we helped Cambodia transition into a democracy, build an independent press (a number of Cambodian journalists used to be HN users back in the day), invest in rural healthcare expansion, and even sponsored Hun Sen's son to study in the US.
The Cambodian leadership didn't want any of that. They wanted to continue to rule as an oligarchy, and Western development funds came with oversight requirements and American firms followed the FCPA.
On the other hand, Chinese vendors were fine paying bribes to leadership in Cambodia and ignoring rising criminality (it was a win-win for China as well - they were able to "convince" organized crime to leave China).
China's elite centric approach [0][1] to foreign relations is better than grassroots democracy promotion that a subset of Americans believed in.
If Cambodia or Serbia or Thailand's leadership want to remain a dictatorship or oligarchy, let them. It's not our problem. Our commitment to democracy should be within our borders. Let other countries be dictatorships or democracies as long as they align with our interests. This is what China and Russia does.
Yes, the Chinese are horrible people. Only if these countries could look into Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Vietnam, and on and on, they would realise that the Americans are indeed the trustworthy and reliable partner.
jacquesm · 22m ago
I don't particularly trust either.
regularization · 11m ago
> But in the 2010s we helped Cambodia transition into a democracy, build an independent press
History of US-Cambodia relations -
1970 - CIA aids Lon Nol coup against government. US invades Cambodia. US kills 4 student protesters against invasion at Kent State, 2 at Jackson State
1970-1973 Operation Freedom Deal, US drops 250,000 tons of bombs on Cambodia
1975 King Sihanouk, overthrown by CIA assisted coup in 1970 returns to power, in coalition with communists. The destabilization of the country by the US is what is seen to help bring the communists to power
1979 Split in Cambodian communists, Vietnamese-aligned side comes to power. US immediately begins to arm the coalition of Sihanouk and the so-called "Khmer Rouge". The US also fights to keep the Khmer Rouge coalition as Cambodia's UN representatives. The New York Times reports on the arms shipments in the early-mid 1980s
[...]
"2010s we helped Cambodia transition into a democracy"
Hikikomori · 1h ago
I for one welcome our new Chinese overloads.
alephnerd · 1h ago
It's a side effect of democracy promotion.
We the US cannot have a values based foreign policy - all that matters is power.
Cambodian and Thai leadership wants to retain power, so they decided to work with the Chinese - who don't care if you are an autocracy or a democracy, while we tried to make an example out of Thailand (and Cambodia) for regressing into authoritarian military governments.
We the US need to return to the same mercenary foreign policy. We are starting to do that again with rappoachment to Pakistan, shielding Israel, and arm twisting the Europeans.
Welcome to a multipolar world - only the powerful can set the rules.
Barrin92 · 30m ago
>arm twisting
This is exactly why countries are deciding to reduce their dependence on the US. If you're one president or one policy away from being cut off from technology, tariffed to death or otherwise bullied you're going to choose other partners.
Politics is about power, that much is true. But power exercised with restraint. China isn't increasing its influence by arm twisting but the opposite. Simply saying "we're open for business" and not interfering in the domestic politics of other countries as long as that's reciprocated. This is effectively a reversal of the Cold War, which they learned a lesson from. Acting like the Soviet Union isn't going to serve the US well.
The more you look like a desperate empire in its late stages losing its grip, replacing mutual benefit with brutality the faster you're done. That ought to be the lesson of the 20th century.
Cyph0n · 1h ago
No, it’s a side effect of US hypocrisy. We apply “standards” - or at least claim to - in some cases but not others. We apply or seek to apply international law in some cases but not others. There was never a true values-based foreign policy. It has always been nothing more than holier than thou posturing.
mensetmanusman · 35m ago
Any sufficiently complex system has hypocrisy.
Hikikomori · 45m ago
Crazy take if you know anything about Americas meddling in South America and other parts of the world.
daveaiello · 1h ago
This deal is for four (4) jets, according to the SCMP.
With respect to everybody reading this, I'm not prepared to read anything into a purchase of four jets.
John23832 · 1h ago
Total thai airfare is 112 capable aircraft. That includes the various types. 4 fighters in the context of a small airforce is a lot.
daveaiello · 57m ago
I can appreciate that perspective as well.
nxobject · 23m ago
Looks like Thailand's no longer in a rush to get a "final" tariff deal, even if we're stuck at a 19% rate. (I think our flag carrier might be refreshing its fleet exclusively with Boeing to sweeten the deal.)
Unclear if this is some kind of reactionary retaliation for perceived favorability toward Cambodia or if Trump’s apparently favorability toward Cambodia is retaliation for what he may have already known about Thailand’s shift toward EU weaponry. They’re hardly the first country to start shopping around, so the latter wouldn’t surprise me.
throwaway5752 · 27m ago
This is not some reciprocal action, it's just logical fallout that the US is no longer reliable as a military ally under this administration, and capable of electing similar leadership in the future. Much, much more of this is ahead. It will impact the USD.
deadbabe · 11m ago
How does one become a broker for military jets and does it pay well?
hunglee2 · 1h ago
You basically cannot trust the US at this point - Trump is so mercurial, that any possible scenario, however ostensibly unrealistic, now has to be factored into the equation. Doesn't get better when Trump gets removed in 3 years, it has been proven now that US democracy can produce any kind of result and hence persistent unreliability most now be the default
bamboozled · 2m ago
Will take decades to repair if that’s even possible, lots of reform. I can’t believe the USA could even have a king but here we are.
I wonder if some major states like California will secede eventually .
Fordec · 1h ago
If removed in 3 years. So many societal norms are being broken, what's one more. It sounds hyperbolic to say out loud because it usually is, but we're dealing with any possible scenario here.
rozap · 47m ago
It sounded hyperbolic for the 50 last newsworthy things he has done. Americans seems to think the current order is a given when in reality it's much more precarious.
RajT88 · 49m ago
Trump will be gone in 3 years, dead or degraded into a bowl of racist jello.
It seems clear that the plan is to game the system as much as possible before then so Republicans never have to win an election again. If they can do that, they don't need Trump - the Trump administration will live on.
dgfitz · 17m ago
If the Democratic Party can get their shit together, he will be a lame duck president in ~18 months.
Please note I am not planting a flag here, just making an observation.
tyleo · 38m ago
I agree with this though I wouldn’t be surprised if they can’t manage without Trump.
Republicans aren’t some consistent viewpoint. It’s a big tent that’s (somehow) united by Trump. Even if Republicans came to completely dominate politics, they may have their own schism and we end up back in two party land.
Thought that may still be a more chaotic two party land than we have today. Who knows what the future brings.
RajT88 · 1m ago
There's a strong possibility. He's a cult of personality, and really doesn't believe in the values of either party. The Republican establishment loves him, because he gets people out to vote, and he'll push their agenda as long as he gets his cut of the action. This is one model of understanding Trump anyways.
(There are many models, and all models are wrong, yadda yadda)
Hikikomori · 24m ago
It's not so much the republican party anymore, it's project 2025 people and the federalist society, Christian fascists funded by people like Thiel and built on the plans of Curtis Yarvin. They'll still be there after trump as they are his entire cabinet, Vance is in deep on it so succession is already secured, they'll rig or cheat elections to keep political power. Part of project 2025 was a CV database so they could insert sycophants in all levels of unelected government positions as well. They're entrenched and chipping away at election integrity every day.
Hikikomori · 29m ago
Personality cults rarely survive the first leader, though it has happened (munster Rebellion). But at that point the plans of Christo fascist like thiel and the federalist society have progressed so far it's too late that it doesn't matter. Maybe a military coup is all we can hope for now.
firefax · 26m ago
>If removed in 3 years. So many societal norms are being broken, what's one more.
Are you American? I don't think you understand our culture if you go down this road. Trump operates in the gray -- gray enabled in part by two Democratic presidents doing things like keeping the minimum wage low while painting themselves as progressive as being "soft" on immigration. Is it a kindness to create instability in one's homeland, then look the other way if they flee as long as they don't insist on the same legal protections as others?
Anyways, the two term limit is a very basic rule, one that would provoke an overwhelming response the likes of which I do not think anyone who contemplates such a move fully grasps, and one that is difficult to put into words without sounding theatrical or shrill.
dragonwriter · 7m ago
> by two Democratic presidents doing things like keeping the minimum wage low while painting themselves as progressive
Biden proposed and backed a boost of the federal minimum wage to $15/hr, it was defeated in Congress (he also unilaterally implemented a boost in the minimum wages under federal contracts, which did not require legislation, to create upward pressure on wages.)
Prior to that, President Obama also backed a federal minimum wage increase which, as well as boosting the wage would have indexed it to inflation going forward, this also was defeated in Congress (President Obama also unilaterally boosted the minimum wage under federal contracts.)
(OTOH, people pretending the President is a dictator and blaming him for failure to implement legislation when the President pushed for it but Congress refused to allow it to be passed is not entirely unrelated to the status quo where the President simply refuses to be bound by the law in his actions, though its not the main reason for that problem.)
> Anyways, the two term limit is a very basic rule, one that would provoke an overwhelming response the likes of which I do not think anyone who contemplates such a move fully grasps
The degree to which people are condifent and complacent that other people will spontaneously rise up and do something if Trunp crosses on red line or another is, perhaps, one of the significant reasons why people do not, in fact, rise up in any way that is effective as Trump crosses every red line that exists.
jacquesm · 20m ago
The USA already came within a hair of testing that boundary, outside of natural causes I think Trump will make a play for it. He's had zero respect for any rule, I don't see why that one would be different, especially not given what has already happened.
jeffrallen · 32m ago
Ooh, now do Switzerland! We stupidly chose the stupid F-35, an airplane that couldn't even fly even if the Americans ssh'd in to let it.
culi · 1h ago
Today, Thailand decided to go with Swedish Gripen jets over F-16s. A week ago, Spain chose the Eurofighter over the F-35[0] and Switzerland seems to be considering a similar move.[1] Before that the Pentagon halved its funding for the F-35 program.[2] Criticism of the F-35's status as a "hangar queen" have been around a long time[3] and seem to be increasingly prominent.
California—the world's 4th largest economy—'s biggest export is airplane parts.[4] Is California in for a reckoning as the world seems to be increasingly rejecting US weapons technology?
Brazil chose Gripen very soon after it Snowden leaks had revealed had intercepted Dilma Rouseff personal communications. I will be lazy here and paste a ChatGPT summary since I recalled the outline but not the details:
It’s very likely it played a significant role in the final choice — not necessarily as the only reason, but as a decisive tie-breaker.
Here’s why:
1. Timing was suspiciously close
Snowden’s NSA revelations came out in mid-2013.
Rousseff’s UN speech condemning U.S. spying was in September 2013.
Brazil announced the Saab Gripen NG selection in December 2013 — just three months later.
2. Boeing’s bid was politically radioactive
Even if the Air Force had rated the F/A-18 highly, the president would have had to approve the purchase. After the scandal, a U.S. fighter buy would have looked domestically like ignoring a national insult.
3. Public and congressional pressure
Brazilian media hammered the NSA issue for months, and opposition politicians would have used a U.S. aircraft deal as evidence of weakness or hypocrisy.
4. The other contenders were “good enough”
Gripen NG wasn’t the cheapest in sticker price (Rafale was more expensive), but it was competitive in capability and far stronger in technology transfer terms. That made it easy to justify dropping the U.S. option without taking a big performance hit.
My assessment: If the NSA scandal hadn’t happened, Boeing would still have faced challenges on tech transfer, but it would likely have been the Gripen or F/A-18 in the final decision. With the scandal, the F/A-18 had near-zero chance — the scandal probably moved the Gripen from “contender” to “winner.”
The US are trying to alter the deal and raise the price to ~1 billion USD more than agreed to.
I wish Switzerland would do the same and cancel the deal.
On top of that Switzerland should go a step further and impose tariffs on gold exported to the united states if they don't stop with their silly little 39% tariffs on imported Swiss goods. Just ridiculous and embarrassing to sever long running trade relationships out of ignorance.
It feel like we're gonna full on Erdogan inflation speed run out of this. i.e. multiple years of lunacy, coupled to forced interest rate decreases that make the inflation worse. I have no idea why US markets rallied earlier in the week on the idea they'd be lowered. We're full on in "well, if Herr Daddy says he fixed it, we can all say it's fixed, in fact it'd be damaging not to" territory.
Edit: also, for the historians, it's absolutely stunning how little power the legal system has. This is obviously illegal, and yet, many months will proceed by the time it gets judge, appealed, and then a 65/35 shot at the court saying "well, gee, are we sure the constitution was against kings??"
“An important factor in the purchase of the F-35 by European governments was the idea that European defense would be built on a transatlantic basis in terms of strategy, institutions and capabilities,” she said, adding that “the Trump administration is in the process of dissolving the transatlantic link, and the purchase of American systems will therefore no longer have any added value for Europeans.”
“If you keep punching your allies in the face, eventually they’re going to stop wanting to buy weapons from you,” said a Western European defense official, granted anonymity to discuss the matter candidly. “Right now we have limited options outside of U.S. platforms, but in the long run? That could change in the coming decades if this combativeness keeps up.”
[1] https://www.politico.eu/article/punching-allies-in-the-face-...
The US should keep all this in mind. They're burning bridges that might take a century to rebuild.
"I could change in the coming decades."
"The most stable rock formation could change in the coming decades."
"Even under the best possible leadership, EU and US relations could change in the coming decades."
Because America is currently an untrustworthy ally who is 100% American first and thinks deploying the military on home soil and applying harsh tariffs to its allies is more important than anything else, it’s best to countries no longer rely on the USA for basically anything. That will probably mean the end of the USD as a global reserve currency at some point too. Which is fine because it’s what the majority of voting Americans wanted. Isolationist, American first policies.
Go look at how Zelensky was treated in the interview with Trump and Vance and how the literal red carpet is rolled out for Putin and other world leaders with a brain see that and say, no thanks…
Maybe the Ukrainians could have tinkered with these warheads and find out how to enable them.... but that is quite risky.
In reality, the US-Thailand relationship has been dead since the Junta took over in Thailand, and for domestic brownie points we decided to make an example out of them and Cambodia for democratic backsliding during the Biden admin [3]
Edit: cannot reply below (@Dang am I being rate limited)
The US has consistently rejected Thailand's F-35 request under the Biden admin [0][1]. If forced to buy a 4th gen jet, may as well buy the cheapest option on the market, which is the Gripen, as they have been using the Gripen for decades [2].
European affairs have little to do with affairs in Asia.
[0] - https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/thailand-...
[1] - https://www.rfa.org/english/news/china/thailand-f35-02162022...
[2] - https://www.reuters.com/article/business/autos-transportatio...
[3] - https://asia.nikkei.com/politics/turbulent-thailand/thailand...
It could just be tariff backlash—aircraft have historically been the US' largest export. But I do wonder if the recent tests of US military tech in Russia/Iran had any hand in this
That's a funny thing to say on the very day that Trump might've brokered a peacedeal that instantly would end the war.
Seems obviously more valuable to me than selling weapons to Ukraine for many years to "help its ally"?
Ukraine also is not our only ally - the current administration constantly makes fun of our other ones
fighter jets are unicorns on the same level as chips you cant just procure 3nm chips tomorrow because you want too. I'm not super knowledgeable on them, but its interesting to see how difficult maintaining and making new gens are for example gripens still rely on US engine, china relies on Russian engines etc and the US seems to be always ahead
When you buy a fighter plane you should expect to not be able to fly for the full duration of a single conflict the manufacturing country disagrees about.
This seems like it’s being revisited.
https://www.theverge.com/news/719697/nvidia-ai-gpu-chips-den...
We've made great strides in reliability over the years, but planes are anything but solid-state like integrated CPUs are.
Not to mention there are key areas that the US is widely considered to be behind on (e.g. hypersonic glide vehicles and drones) compared to the "Second World" powers. And there's been lots of talk—even from within the US—that drones have become more important to modern warfare than manned jets.
who are livid after orangeman applied 39% tariffs because he doesn't understand the triangle trade of gold
But Gripen has Meteor and can fly really well. Now, I'm a Swede, but there are claims of practical experiments in Norway trying out old some Gripen planes vs F-15C and F-16 have shown that the Gripen is simply better at air-to-air stuff.
The F-16 is obviously bigger though, so if you want to bomb somebody a lot and he doesn't have anything to put up against it then maybe it's reasonable to get one of those instead, but I don't think that's a problem Thailand has. I think they want an air force that can challenge another air force if required.
Planes like this quickly become paperweights if you can't get replacements parts, support and ammunition. And most buyers won't be able to get significant parts of the construction into their countries. So you must trust the political stability of the country you're buying from, that they're still your friend in a decade or a few and support your planes.
Trump and his administration are anything but reliable partners.
Their junta and King wants to keep Thailand as an authoritarian illiberal democracy. The Biden admin on the other hand strongly opposed democratic backsliding in Thailand [2]
As a result, they - like Cambodia - decided to flip to China.
[0] - https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/thailand-...
[1] - https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/06/17/china-thailand-submarin...
[2] - https://asia.nikkei.com/politics/turbulent-thailand/thailand...
My brief research says Cambodia was using old Soviet and Chinese stuff, with some UAV support.
But in the 2010s we helped Cambodia transition into a democracy, build an independent press (a number of Cambodian journalists used to be HN users back in the day), invest in rural healthcare expansion, and even sponsored Hun Sen's son to study in the US.
The Cambodian leadership didn't want any of that. They wanted to continue to rule as an oligarchy, and Western development funds came with oversight requirements and American firms followed the FCPA.
On the other hand, Chinese vendors were fine paying bribes to leadership in Cambodia and ignoring rising criminality (it was a win-win for China as well - they were able to "convince" organized crime to leave China).
China's elite centric approach [0][1] to foreign relations is better than grassroots democracy promotion that a subset of Americans believed in.
If Cambodia or Serbia or Thailand's leadership want to remain a dictatorship or oligarchy, let them. It's not our problem. Our commitment to democracy should be within our borders. Let other countries be dictatorships or democracies as long as they align with our interests. This is what China and Russia does.
[0] - https://www.iseas.edu.sg/articles-commentaries/iseas-perspec...
[1] - https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/lost-translati...
History of US-Cambodia relations -
1970 - CIA aids Lon Nol coup against government. US invades Cambodia. US kills 4 student protesters against invasion at Kent State, 2 at Jackson State
1970-1973 Operation Freedom Deal, US drops 250,000 tons of bombs on Cambodia
1975 King Sihanouk, overthrown by CIA assisted coup in 1970 returns to power, in coalition with communists. The destabilization of the country by the US is what is seen to help bring the communists to power
1979 Split in Cambodian communists, Vietnamese-aligned side comes to power. US immediately begins to arm the coalition of Sihanouk and the so-called "Khmer Rouge". The US also fights to keep the Khmer Rouge coalition as Cambodia's UN representatives. The New York Times reports on the arms shipments in the early-mid 1980s
[...]
"2010s we helped Cambodia transition into a democracy"
We the US cannot have a values based foreign policy - all that matters is power.
Cambodian and Thai leadership wants to retain power, so they decided to work with the Chinese - who don't care if you are an autocracy or a democracy, while we tried to make an example out of Thailand (and Cambodia) for regressing into authoritarian military governments.
We the US need to return to the same mercenary foreign policy. We are starting to do that again with rappoachment to Pakistan, shielding Israel, and arm twisting the Europeans.
Welcome to a multipolar world - only the powerful can set the rules.
This is exactly why countries are deciding to reduce their dependence on the US. If you're one president or one policy away from being cut off from technology, tariffed to death or otherwise bullied you're going to choose other partners.
Politics is about power, that much is true. But power exercised with restraint. China isn't increasing its influence by arm twisting but the opposite. Simply saying "we're open for business" and not interfering in the domestic politics of other countries as long as that's reciprocated. This is effectively a reversal of the Cold War, which they learned a lesson from. Acting like the Soviet Union isn't going to serve the US well.
The more you look like a desperate empire in its late stages losing its grip, replacing mutual benefit with brutality the faster you're done. That ought to be the lesson of the 20th century.
With respect to everybody reading this, I'm not prepared to read anything into a purchase of four jets.
Unclear if this is some kind of reactionary retaliation for perceived favorability toward Cambodia or if Trump’s apparently favorability toward Cambodia is retaliation for what he may have already known about Thailand’s shift toward EU weaponry. They’re hardly the first country to start shopping around, so the latter wouldn’t surprise me.
I wonder if some major states like California will secede eventually .
It seems clear that the plan is to game the system as much as possible before then so Republicans never have to win an election again. If they can do that, they don't need Trump - the Trump administration will live on.
Please note I am not planting a flag here, just making an observation.
Republicans aren’t some consistent viewpoint. It’s a big tent that’s (somehow) united by Trump. Even if Republicans came to completely dominate politics, they may have their own schism and we end up back in two party land.
Thought that may still be a more chaotic two party land than we have today. Who knows what the future brings.
(There are many models, and all models are wrong, yadda yadda)
Are you American? I don't think you understand our culture if you go down this road. Trump operates in the gray -- gray enabled in part by two Democratic presidents doing things like keeping the minimum wage low while painting themselves as progressive as being "soft" on immigration. Is it a kindness to create instability in one's homeland, then look the other way if they flee as long as they don't insist on the same legal protections as others?
Anyways, the two term limit is a very basic rule, one that would provoke an overwhelming response the likes of which I do not think anyone who contemplates such a move fully grasps, and one that is difficult to put into words without sounding theatrical or shrill.
Biden proposed and backed a boost of the federal minimum wage to $15/hr, it was defeated in Congress (he also unilaterally implemented a boost in the minimum wages under federal contracts, which did not require legislation, to create upward pressure on wages.)
Prior to that, President Obama also backed a federal minimum wage increase which, as well as boosting the wage would have indexed it to inflation going forward, this also was defeated in Congress (President Obama also unilaterally boosted the minimum wage under federal contracts.)
(OTOH, people pretending the President is a dictator and blaming him for failure to implement legislation when the President pushed for it but Congress refused to allow it to be passed is not entirely unrelated to the status quo where the President simply refuses to be bound by the law in his actions, though its not the main reason for that problem.)
> Anyways, the two term limit is a very basic rule, one that would provoke an overwhelming response the likes of which I do not think anyone who contemplates such a move fully grasps
The degree to which people are condifent and complacent that other people will spontaneously rise up and do something if Trunp crosses on red line or another is, perhaps, one of the significant reasons why people do not, in fact, rise up in any way that is effective as Trump crosses every red line that exists.
California—the world's 4th largest economy—'s biggest export is airplane parts.[4] Is California in for a reckoning as the world seems to be increasingly rejecting US weapons technology?
[0] https://www.businessinsider.com/spain-rejects-f-35-for-europ...
[1] https://breakingdefense.com/2025/08/switzerland-weighs-cuts-...
[2] https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/us-slashe...
[3] https://web.archive.org/web/20210317192541/https://www.washi...
[4] https://www.worldstopexports.com/californias-top-10-exports/
It’s very likely it played a significant role in the final choice — not necessarily as the only reason, but as a decisive tie-breaker.
Here’s why:
1. Timing was suspiciously close
Snowden’s NSA revelations came out in mid-2013.
Rousseff’s UN speech condemning U.S. spying was in September 2013.
Brazil announced the Saab Gripen NG selection in December 2013 — just three months later.
2. Boeing’s bid was politically radioactive Even if the Air Force had rated the F/A-18 highly, the president would have had to approve the purchase. After the scandal, a U.S. fighter buy would have looked domestically like ignoring a national insult.
3. Public and congressional pressure Brazilian media hammered the NSA issue for months, and opposition politicians would have used a U.S. aircraft deal as evidence of weakness or hypocrisy.
4. The other contenders were “good enough” Gripen NG wasn’t the cheapest in sticker price (Rafale was more expensive), but it was competitive in capability and far stronger in technology transfer terms. That made it easy to justify dropping the U.S. option without taking a big performance hit.
My assessment: If the NSA scandal hadn’t happened, Boeing would still have faced challenges on tech transfer, but it would likely have been the Gripen or F/A-18 in the final decision. With the scandal, the F/A-18 had near-zero chance — the scandal probably moved the Gripen from “contender” to “winner.”