Human Events yesterday published an extremely important article by Retired General John Handy, former Commander of both TRANSCOM and Air Mobility Command (AMC). In it Gen. Handy provides compelling rationale on why the KC-135 replacement program should be based on small to medium size aircraft.Like most of us General Handy was "a bit surprised" by the decision to buy the KC-30 and even more shocked by the "unusually harsh language used by the Government Accountability Office" in its recommendation that the contract be rebid. He says that the harsh GAO language:
...compels me to do something I've never done before: to speak out publicly. I am not employed by either Boeing or Northrop-Grumman. But the service I've devoted most of my life to appears to need a bit of help.General Handy lays out what he believes are the three major requirements for the KC-X tanker:
Somewhere in the acquisition process, it is obvious to me that someone lost sight of the requirement. Based on what the GAO decided, it's up to people such as myself to remind everyone of the warfighter requirement for a modern air refueling tanker aircraft.
1) The ability to deploy and bed down in sufficient numbers in order to accomplish all assigned tasks.
2) The tanker must be survivable and provide the crew with superior situational awareness.
3) The ability to integrate in the current defense transportation system. That means 463L compatible pallets; floor loaded on a freighter capable floor all compatible with the current modern airlift fleet.
General Handy concludes that:
Now, if you look at these rather simple requirements and look at the previous offerings from industry, you might agree with me that the KC-767 more closely meets these needs than the competition. If that's what the warfighters need, that's what they should get.We could not agree more with General Handy's assessment that Air Force procurement lost sight of the requirement. In our view, the pressure to have a competition was so great that the Air Force was forced to make changes to the RFP to accommodate an larger aircraft that they did not want. These changes, both pre and post final RFP, tilted the metrics of the competition toward a larger tanker.
It almost seems as though the goal of the SSA became having a competition, and not getting the best tanker for the mission. (As we have previously pointed out, the pressure that led to this was constant and irresistible.)
Competition is a good thing. But, when it becomes the ends, and not the means, thereby causing one to lose sight of the requirement; well, the whole procurement process is worthless.
Stumble It!
3 comments:
As an Air Force retiree, my initial tendency was to rally around the service when this controversy broke. It was painful to believe that the Air Force I love could have gotten something this important wrong...again.
I'm not sure what has happened to the Air Force in the last ten years...where it went wrong or why this administration has been so slow to address it.
I don't understand where standards went when a senior procurement official could conspire with senior Boeing people in the tanker lease deal. How did she ever get in that sort of position of authority? Did no one notice her failings of personal ethics earlier?
Flying nuclear weapons around on B052s in violation of treaties is bad...not even realizing you are doing it is worse...leaving the aircraft unguarded on the tarmac overnight is criminal.
And how do you let one of your contractors (EG&G) send nuclear detonators to Taiwan ... by mistake?
So when this happened, I really wanted to belief that the Air Force had gotten it right and it was just a bunch of xenophobic old farts who didn't want a tanker built by "cheese-eating surrender monkeys,' who just couldn't accept that the American company had lost in a fair and open competition.
But the more one looks into it, the more one realizes that so many standards were ignored, so many procurement rules...and laws...were ignored, that the Air Force has screwed up again, bigtime.
I think if there is going to be a follow-on procurement for a KC-10 replacement, the A330 airframe may well have a shot, but there is now no way to salvage this particular contract.
If the mission really is a medium tanker, the KC-45A is a dead tanker walking right now today, and if the mission is not for a medium tanker, the contract needs to be reworked from the ground up.
But whatever happens, something needs to be done about the US Air Force. Firing the Secretary of the Air Force and the Air Force Chief of Staff was, perhaps, a good start, but we need to do more.
We need a Curtis LeMay type ... someone with bulldog determination, a devotion to the mission, and a willingness to promptly terminate the careers of anyone who doesn't put the integrity and mission of the Air Force above all else.
The US deserves that. That's what the Air Force is all about.
We need a Curtis LeMay type ... someone with bulldog determination, a devotion to the mission, and a willingness to promptly terminate the careers of anyone who doesn't put the integrity and mission of the Air Force above all else.
Curtis LeMay the biggest of all Boeing cronies?
The general who ordered KC-135 instead of the competition wining Lockheed L-193?
This man may had ordered several KC-45 already.
Curtis LeMay the biggest of all Boeing cronies?
The general who ordered KC-135 instead of the competition wining Lockheed L-193?
This man may had ordered several KC-45 already
When you want the best yuou buy Boeing. As for the Lockheed L-193 don't think so as the only other airplane was the DC-8 at the time and it was too heavy.
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