Brazil closer to Boeing on jets deal after Biden visit

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SAO PAULO (Reuters) - Brazil is closer to choosing Boeing Co.'s (BA.N) F-18 for one of the developing world's most sought-after defense contracts after U.S. Vice President Joe Biden addressed the government's main misgivings during a visit to Brasilia, officials told Reuters.

Biden met with President Dilma Rousseff on Friday and assured her that the U.S. Congress was likely to respect Boeing's agreement to transfer sensitive technology to Brazil as part of the deal, three officials who were present said on condition of anonymity.

Rest of a lengthy article at the link.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/exclusive-brazil-closer-boeing-jets-220848439.html

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This isn't news. It's just more US marketing hype - and we've been here before, more than once.

Biden can't make the US congress agree to what Brazil wants, any more than the Bush administration could make it agree to what the Clinton administration had agreed with the UK over F-35. None of these agreements has ever been considered binding by the next lot of congressmen to be elected. They're always subject to the whim of the moment, events around the world, US internal politics, & the recipient being obedient. A trade disagreement, for example, could scupper it in an instant - and the US congress can initiate a trade disagreement at any time, to placate internal constituencies.

The guff about the US congress blocking the sale is just that - guff, totally irrelevant. The real concern is that the sale would be agreed, but that the technnology transfer agreement would then be torn up, leaving Brazil dependent on importing parts from the US that it had hoped to make, need to get the USA to integrate weapons rather have the access needed to do it itself, etc.

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This isn't news.

In my opinion it is a perfectly valid piece of news.

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Are those "officials" US or Brazilian officials?

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Biden met with President Dilma Rousseff on Friday and assured her that the U.S. Congress was likely to respect Boeing's agreement to transfer sensitive technology to Brazil as part of the deal...

Rousseff, a pragmatic leftist, has said the technology is even more important than the jets themselves because the deal must boost Brazil's own budding defense industry, including planemaker Embraer SA (EMBR3.SA), to be worth the price.

If TOT is the cornerstone of the deal a likely approval of that is not really good enough, is it?

Meanwhile, the government has been less happy with the other finalists. France's recent agreement to build submarines with Brazil has resulted in fewer technology transfers than expected, one official said.

Didn't do Dassault any favours holding back on TOT in the submarine deal. Would a deal with Dassault also result in fewer technology transfers than expected?

Not very appealing partners, US and France. The first cannot give cast iron guarantees over TOT. The second's attitude may be to transfer as little technology as possible.

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Are those "officials" US or Brazilian officials?

Not stated in the article. The only reference to the nationality of an official (Brazilian) is unrelated, though the positioning makes it possible for the careless reader to associate it with the three anonymous officials. This may be deliberate.

In my opinion it is a perfectly valid piece of news.

It reads like thousands of PR puffs I've seen, no more news than a company advertisement. Those officials are almost certainly US information management staff, who kept their nationality as well as their identities out of the piece in order to make it possible for the ill-informed or partial to imagine that they might be Brazilian. It's a standard ploy.

If I was running Reuters, I'd be asking my (Texan) Sao Paulo correspondent some hard questions about his biases.

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Didn't do Dassault any favours holding back on TOT in the submarine deal. Would a deal with Dassault also result in fewer technology transfers than expected?

Not very appealing partners, US and France. The first cannot give cast iron guarantees over TOT. The second's attitude may be to transfer as little technology as possible.


I think Snecma was involved in a deal with India to help them fix the issues with their Kaveri engine, however it seems it failed. Perhaps the French were not willing to share some key engine technologies with the Indians after all? I don't blame them though.

It's funny when somebody is claiming "full tech transfer"; I wonder who they are addressing? Certainly not the professionals, they know that there is no such thing...

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It reads like thousands of PR puffs I've seen, no more news than a company advertisement. Those officials are almost certainly US information management staff, who kept their nationality as well as their identities out of the piece in order to make it possible for the ill-informed or partial to imagine that they might be Brazilian. It's a standard ploy.

If I was running Reuters, I'd be asking my (Texan) Sao Paulo correspondent some hard questions about his biases.

Okay. So its all one big conspiricy. Got it ;)

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no, just the follow up of advertisements war that's going on over the brazilian deal since it started... remember how there were articles stating "from official sources" that the typhoon was the winner in india and would soon be announced as it was the best and blah blah blah...?

same thing here, working on the opinion, hoping to put the government under pressure...

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I think Snecma was involved in a deal with India to help them fix the issues with their Kaveri engine, however it seems it failed. Perhaps the French were not willing to share some key engine technologies with the Indians after all? I don't blame them though.

If you don't want to sell what a buyer wants to buy there are no grounds for a deal. If the buyer needs the deal to include X,Y and Z but the seller does not want to sell all those any further discussion is a waste of time for both parties.

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Okay. So its all one big conspiricy. Got it ;)

Are you trying to look stupid, or just trying to play a silly game? Where did you get that from?

The report looks to me like something written by a journalist who was happy to pass on the line he was fed, because it suited his biases. It's pretty common. No need to invent conspiracies. Clever publicists choose reporters to talk to who are thought likely to produce the sort of reports they want. Goes on all the time. Sometimes the journalists play along with it, sometimes they're dupes.

A more discerning, self-aware, or conscientious journalist would have questioned what he was told, interpreted it in the light of the aims of the people telling it to him, & written a report that reflected that. The publicists saw this one coming. The end result is a PR piece masquerading as news.

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The real power in negotiations is having the upper hand. If engine technology is all they can hold back then the deal is already in trouble. Brazil would be good with F/A-18A level technology at this point. They couldn't even field something to that level of complexity yet. AMX was a relatively light fighter in comparison. Rafale would fit their personality, but F/A-18E fits the pocketbook.

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The real power in negotiations is having the upper hand. If engine technology is all they can hold back then the deal is already in trouble. Brazil would be good with F/A-18A level technology at this point. They couldn't even field something to that level of complexity yet. AMX was a relatively light fighter in comparison. Rafale would fit their personality, but F/A-18E fits the pocketbook.

If that is true, then the Su-35S With its 117S engines would be a Perfect platform and advanced engines TOT. And much less strings Attached vs any SH deal.

Do i see a New FX** Tender on the Horison?

What are the Requirements b.t.w. ?
An Su-35S With its range would serve and protect the Huge Land areal and huge Sea Areal quite nicely.. so why aren't the Super Flanker in the race?
On top of that you get the capabilities to import weapons system like Brahmos etc.

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If that is true, then the Su-35S With its 117S engines would be a Perfect platform and advanced engines TOT. And much less strings Attached vs any SH deal.

Do i see a New FX** Tender on the Horison?

What are the Requirements b.t.w. ?
An Su-35S With its range would serve and protect the Huge Land areal and huge Sea Areal quite nicely.. so why aren't the Super Flanker in the race?
On top of that you get the capabilities to import weapons system like Brahmos etc.

The situation has changed. US is turned twrd Asia and Pacific in a containment policy (and not in a full-scale war as some would believe). Brazil is the industrial giant of Sth Am. With heavy fiscal restraints being now of a strategic interest for the US, hving a strong partner to survey the Eastt-South bound Atlantic axes might looks like way much more interesting than preserving not ultra-sensitive industrial technologies for the next then years or so (Even French assets would hve looks good in that vision for US interest until the F35 was mature enough - funny then to re-read the heated hatred rhetoric seen at the time).

I would expect a strong packaged deal with Brazil (although Argentina might be competing for the role despite some potential friction with UK doing so - hence the interest of some to heat-up the tensions with the Falklands/Malvinas).

Only assumptions of course . But somewhat in line with the above posted "news".

But Biden tan and smile might anyway get at least more attention in Brazil than some former presidents ;)

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Because ToT with the Russians is also not that easy unless you go the Chinese way. Brazil won´t decide anything before the MRCA deal is done anyway. This will be a benchmark for what Brazil demands.

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Brazil would be foolish to go with the Americans, but one cannot dismiss the possibility that the Brazilians are fools.

OTOH, if it is true that Brazil is dissatisfied with level of ToT cooperation from France re: Scorpene, then perhaps the French are fools also.

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The end result is a PR piece masquerading as news.

Again this is in your opinion. And besides, Bidens visit to Brazil to attempt to secure a SH sale is very much a relevent piece of history in the Brazilian fighter jet story that has been playing out over the years so it would follow that this is most certainly a piece of news worth reporting.

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If that is true, then the Su-35S With its 117S engines would be a Perfect platform and advanced engines TOT. And much less strings Attached vs any SH deal.

Do i see a New FX** Tender on the Horison?

What are the Requirements b.t.w. ?
An Su-35S With its range would serve and protect the Huge Land areal and huge Sea Areal quite nicely.. so why aren't the Super Flanker in the race?
On top of that you get the capabilities to import weapons system like Brahmos etc.

that my furry friend, is why you should follow aviation developments outside of one country. the world is interesting.
and FYI, Brazil did not short list the SU-35 twice.. the first time when Sukhoi made a special SU-35UB just for Brazil.. and the second time with the newer SU-35.

rumor is that given how long this is taking and new aircraft development.. i would not be surprise if they redid a tender with 5th gen fighters.. in which we'd see F-35 and Pak-fa on the table.
pak-fa would suit brazil well.

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rumor is that given how long this is taking and new aircraft development.. i would not be surprise if they redid a tender with 5th gen fighters.. in which we'd see F-35 and Pak-fa on the table.
pak-fa would suit brazil well.

Perhaps, but then again perhaps not -- if tech transfer is really critical then both F-35 and PAK FA may have some issues.

Besides, F-35 is quite expensive both to purchase and to operate. I would be very surprised if PAK FA is much cheaper...

It seems Brazilian economy is currently not very strong, and political will to invest in expensive military equipment is weak. Of course that could change after the election (the political will I mean).

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Brazil did not short list the SU-35 twice.. the first time when Sukhoi made a special SU-35UB just for Brazil.. and the second time with the newer SU-35.

Everyone knows that FX-2 is a political farce from the start, not even Su-35 licensed to Embraer would make it.

Rafale and F-18 are intended to be leverage tools for Brazilian politicians when trading with US or EU. For Brazil projecting an image of friendship and modernity to the population of those countries through a multibillion deal is more important than going on a buying spree to Russia and being called names.

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Again this is in your opinion. And besides, Bidens visit to Brazil to attempt to secure a SH sale is very much a relevent piece of history in the Brazilian fighter jet story that has been playing out over the years so it would follow that this is most certainly a piece of news worth reporting.

Given that Brazillian fighter procurement process has been a joke with no real government commitment, Biden flogging off F/A-18E/F is mere marketing.

Brazil's commitment to it's airforce's teeth has been F-5EM/FM and AMX upgrades.

M2000's are expiring at end of 2013 and we've not yet heard about any overhaul of these either.