Mutley's Hangar Forums

Fueling Around in Washington
By John Allard – March, 2009

US military aircrews are flying 50 year old air refueling tanker aircraft, venerable Boeing KC-135s, every day. Many of the planes have been upgraded with the new CFM engines and certain other improvements but it’s still a 50 year old aircraft. The Air Force first placed the order in 1954 and the KC-135 Stratotankers began to enter military service as the first jet-age tankers in 1957. Of AC types currently in service, only the venerable B-52 has a longer service record with the US military and fewer than 10% of the original BUFFs (B-52s) are still flying. In the case of the tankers, there has been no such dramatic drawdown of the fleet. Most are still flying. [Note: The U2 was introduced at about the same time as the KC-135 and is also still in operation, but was not operated by the military until later in its career.]

The KC-135, based on the Boeing 707, was a marvel and has served the country (and other countries) very well. On the list of military aircraft from which the US taxpayers truly got their money’s worth, the Stratotanker has earned a high place. Along with the B-52 and the C-130 and a handful of others, the 135s soldiered on in large numbers long past their anticipated life expectancy. That’s a tribute to Boeing and to those who have maintained and operated them over the years. It was a great design which was well taken care of and gave good service – continues to give good service. There are also a few dozen KC-10 Extenders in service to help shoulder the load, but they are too few and too old to be considered a replacement for the 135s. We can’t buy those any more either, nor should we.

Nothing lasts forever. If there are ever any exceptions to that generalization, it’s not going to be airframes. It’s time for the tanker fleet to be replaced. The Air Force has been painfully aware of that for some time and in early 2007 released a Request for Proposal, essentially a formal call for bids.

This came in the aftermath of a tanker aircraft procurement scandal in 2004. That concerned the leasing of 767s owned by Boeing and converted to tankers. The mess ended up involving Boeing executives and a corrupt government procurement office official (who later landed a plum job at Boeing) and ended with resignations, firings and at least one prison sentence. Individuals on both the Boeing and the government side acted unethically in the tawdry affair, but the Air Force, who were not complicit in any of it, received no new aircraft.

Following that the AF and the Defense Department resolved to make the new tanker acquisition program a model of fairness and transparency. They worked very hard at it and nearly succeeded, but they didn’t quite. The bids were eventually received and evaluated and in 2008, the Air Force announced that the Northrop Grumman/EADS submission, based on the Airbus A330 airliner had been selected as the winner over the Boeing entry, based on the B-767.

Predictably, the lid blew off. Many in Congress, on Wall Street and on Main Street were livid, their hair on fire with outrage. Never before had such a major procurement contract for US military hardware been awarded to what was essentially a foreign company. Though the Northrop Grumman/EADS partnership gave it a domestic face, the design and much of the product were foreign and much of the proceeds and benefits of the $40 Billion contract for the first phase would accrue to foreign entities. Oh, the agony!

Congressmen speechified; media outlets editorialized; suppliers and unions advertised; Boeing proselytized and in parallel, lawyered up and formally protested the outcome. The Defense Department, reacting with a classic deer-in-the-headlights posture…defended. They had done an exhaustive technical and economic evaluation of the two submittals and the Airbus was the better choice for the Air Force, by a fair margin.

Congressmen and Senators, particularly those from Kansas, Washington (state) and Illinois, where by the wildest of coincidences Boeing has its largest facilities, managed to unleash the US Government Accountability Office on the situation. The GAO sorted through a few tons of paper and found the hoped-for technicality that provided a rationale for setting aside the DoD’s decision in favor of Airbus. Some relatively minor economic data in the Northrop Grumman submittal was determined to be inaccurate and the original determination of the winning bidder was declared null and void.

The outgoing Bush administration, which might reasonably have been expected to view the actual needs of the Air Force somewhat favorably, consciously and conspicuously reneged. They announced that they would not make a determination on what to do next, deferring instead to the new administration. That’s where it stands today, back at square one.

In looking at the bid submittals, the purchase price does not appear to be a deciding factor for either option, though over the life of the aircraft seems to favor the A330. Instead, it’s the nature of the two proposed AC that makes all the difference. The A330 is a much more modern design, is larger, has longer range and larger payload and is less expensive to operate. In addition, its production line is not facing an imminent shutdown if the Air Force contract is not awarded. In fact, if they win the contract, Northrop Grumman/EADS has stated that the AC will be built at a new facility that will be raised in Mobile, Alabama.

From a performance perspective, the A330 based tanker is equal or better in virtually every category to the 767. The B-767, on the other hand, is an older, smaller design that was nearing the end of its manufacturing life cycle. In fact, the production line was originally to be shut down in 2009 until the prospect of foisting a few hundred more on the government to the tune of about $40 billion raised its head.

The KC-10s might have provided a lesson if anyone had looked at it. They too were procured near the end of their production cycle. Even though they’ve proved to be pretty decent aircraft, there’s no opportunity to buy more because the production line has long since been dismantled and replacement parts become increasingly more scarce and expensive.

If Boeing had bid the aircraft that the Air Force needed rather than the one it happened to have with a looming production line shutdown, this all might have been avoided. Boeing might well have been chosen on the merits of the offered aircraft rather than for their mailing address, as they hoped would happen. Boeing probably believed that they were a shoo-in; that the government would not dare go outside the country with a major procurement contract. They may yet be right about that.

I have mixed feelings about this whole thing. Like most Americans, I would much prefer to see a wholly American company get this contract and have the bulk of the defense dollars remain in the US economy. If that were the only consideration, this would be an easy call. If, however, that comes at the cost of sticking the US military with the wrong airplane for the job, well, maybe the price is too high. The current economic crisis strengthens the case for “Going Boeing”, but still… $40 billion for the wrong airplane doesn’t seem to make any more sense than lending money to folks who couldn’t afford to pay it back, or giving away taxpayer money by the billion to those who did the boneheaded lending. Is that really the way out of all this?

So, in effect, we’re still in 2007, with two bids in the hands of the Air Force who will no doubt be instructed to evaluate them again, but likely enlightened with some new direction as to what’s important and what’s not. What has changed in the meantime is that the roughly 500 airframes are two years older and there’s a new Sheriff in town. I wouldn’t’ care to predict the outcome the second time around, but what was President Obama’s home state again, and where is Boeing’s headquarters?

Excellent article John.
If you look at it from one point of view, no matter who the contract is awarded to it will create jobs in America for those building the aircraft, wasn't that one of President Obama's aims once he got into office.
Also it would make more sense to use an aircraft that top trumps the other one in all the right areas, as you say, $40bn is a lot to spend on the wrong aircraft. I don't think people would be too happy if 10 years down the line they were having to pay out another $40bn for the right aircraft. They might as well get it right first time, even if it does push a few noses out of joint in doing so.

More political shenanigans, with the new Air Force tanker as pawn... again!

There's not much in any of this for anyone to point to with pride, however the Air Force did their best to put together a fair and open bidding process. They naively neglected to consider the effects of politics, however. Now that the contract is a political football, both sides are playing games, all of which are self-serving. In the ranking of issue priorities here, the legitimate needs of the Air Force for a tanker to replace the 50+ year old KC-135s sometime soon is coming in dead last.

One of these days we're not going to be able to support an important strategic mission because the tanker support needed is simply not available. It will be sad but inevitable to see how Congress and the White House will heap the blame on the military when that happens.

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id ... _article=1

John

Nortrop drops out because the new bid spec is biased toward Boeing...

The next chapter...

viewtopic.php?f=8&t=4137

It's stupid. If we look back 50-odd years, the Americans bought Canberras, but they were bui;lt in America. Surely the same thing would happen now?

More recently we bought Harriers. Those were built here too.

I'm generally in agreement that the bulk of our military equipment should be designed, purchased and constructed domestically. There are a number of perfectly valid and important reasons for that. It's equally true for any large country with a sizeable military and the necessary technical and manufacturing base to support it.

In the odd case, however, and I believe this to be one of them, there exist some very strong arguements for going outside the borders in order to get the best available option. If the difference between the competing options is small, buying domestic is a valid, definsible and ethical weighting factor. The larger the disparity in the competing options, however, the smaller the "buy domestic" factor becomes. At some point, clinging to that rationale to justify saddling the military with inappropriate or inferior equipment becomes unethical. When jobs and votes trump the assured capability of the military to accomplish its mission, serious questions arise.