Canada ends NATO surveillance drone deal

(L-R) NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, Canadian defense minister Peter Gordon MacKay, US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, Advisor, speak with Afghanistan's Defence Minister, General Abdul Rahim Wardak on the second day of talks on February 3, 2012.

On March 17, 2012 David Pugliese of The Vancouver Sun reported that "Canadian Forces hope to save $90 million a year by pulling out of NATO programs operating unmanned aerial vehicles as well as airborne early warning planes. Defence Minister Peter MacKay said it will free up 142 Canadians assigned to NATO for new jobs."
"The shutdown of Canada’s contribution to NATO’s airborne warning aircraft, known as AWACS, will save about $50 million a year. Another $40 million a year will be saved as a result of Canada’s withdrawal from NATO’s Alliance Ground Surveillance Program. Canada has been involved in NATO’s AWACS program for more than 25 years and the aircraft were seen as key to the alliance’s success during the recent war in Libya."


(Heron 1 UAV, Canada)

"U.S. unmanned aerial vehicles, or UAVs as they are known in military parlance, were also used to gather intelligence information during the Libyan conflict. NATO wants to ease the strain on the U.S. UAVs by having a pool of Global Hawk unmanned aerial vehicles at the alliance’s disposal.
Canada’s pull out from the UAV program will be done by the end of April, the Defence Department confirmed."
I think this is some amazing technology and it's too bad that we are ending our contribution with NATO and the Countries we have previously had partnerships with.


(Global Hawk unmanned aerial vehicle, U.S.)