Paranoid Thought re: Boeing vs. Bombardier

[dewline]

Putinists might be more than a little pleased with this consequence of DT-45's installation as US president.

Why?

Because Bombardier is Canada's main aircraft manufacturer. And it's headquartered in Montréal, Québec. One of its main extranational plants is in Northern Ireland. Both QC and Northern Ireland are national unity faultlines of their respective "parent" nations. (Yes, I am using "parent" in a dangerous way here. Understood. Let's move on for now.)

If Bombardier gets killed as a company because of this mess, that means major high-tech job losses in Canada and the UK, each in their respective national unity "faultline" zones. Which can lead to NATO's internal political cohesion taking a hit due to Canadian and British resentment of Washington's siding with Boeing.

So, two NATO countries internally disrupted, resenting a third which is itself already disrupted. Defence supply chains within NATO also messed up.

Am I wrong about this theory?

Comments

[kaffy_r]

Unfortunately, it makes a lot of horrid sense to me.

[agoodwinsmith]

Argh.

[agoodwinsmith]

Still argh, but especially argh since it has been common practice forever for international companies to have offices in other countries and buy their goods in the country which gives the best deal - and then use the goods where needed. Even Delta planes could be registered in another country. If this is also no longer true, this destabilizes a lot of things.

[dewline]

The oddness of Boeing doing this with the US Commerce Department's assistance is that Boeing wasn't even bidding on this particular Delta contract.

[thewayne]

I was listening to a report on this yesterday on NPR, and on the additional silliness that Boeing does this all the time. Classic double-standard. It's like when "45" was in Saudi Arabia and was offering them such a great deal on a weapons buy. Apparently he and I have different definitions on what constitutes a 'great deal', because in my book, that means low prices for a buyer, which means less profit for the seller. That seems counter-productive for the MAGA concept.

[autopope]

I don't think we can directly blame Russia for this; Boeing did it all by themselves (see Boeing/Airbus lawsuits passim for more of this monopolistic litigious crap). Boeing is as much a beneficiary of state subsidies as Bombardier; they just have a bigger legal department and more expertise at concealing it. (Airbus do this too.)

The real interesting WTF?!? factor is that this is a significant hit to the economy of NI ... and the UK would be in a much stronger position to fight back if not for Brexit. So this may in the long term turn out to be a nail in the coffin of Brexit.

[jeffreyab]

Especially when you consider May owes her majority to the support of a NI political party.

[dewline]

You're almost certainly right about Boeing being the primary author of this set of misfortunes. They just took advantage of the present circumstances. Or what they believe to be their advantage.

Speaking of Airbus, I note a CBC item detailing how Boeing management may well see Bombardier as "the next Airbus" unless they stop it now.

Dare we hope for le morte du Brexit as a consequence? I would hope that such a consequence wouldn't have its own set of "monkey's paw" complications.

[jeffreyab]

Also the fuselages come from China and the engines from Connecticut.

So destabilizing all round so Boeing can be a bully.

[dewline]

Oh bloody...