Let’s hope, for the sake of the country, that the biggest Air Force procurement blunder in memory can be blamed on mere incompetence.
The alternatives – corruption, or anti-Boeing prejudice strong enough to compromise national security – are almost too painful to contemplate.
On Wednesday, the Government Accountability Office lived up to its name, excoriating the Air Force for violating its own procurement rules on the way to ordering $35 billion worth of new aerial-refueling tankers. It had passed over Boeing in February to award the contract to the European Aeronautic Defence and Space Co. and Northrop Grumman Corp.
The Air Force had bungled an earlier attempt to lease new tankers from Boeing; that deal collapsed five years ago in a corruption scandal. USAF procurement officers should have had every incentive to get it right this time.
Astonishingly, the new EADS-Northrop contract has turned into another shocking debacle. Since February, U.S. Sen. Patty Murray, Rep. Norm Dicks and other Boeing allies have been asking pointed questions the Air Force hasn’t been able to answer. Boeing officials, convinced they’d been wronged, protested the decision to the GAO.
The GAO focuses on the legalities, not the policies, behind government contract decisions. It does not often side with the losing party. That makes its call for redoing the entire bidding process all the more stunning.
The GAO found that:
• The tanker version of Boeing’s 767 met more of the military’s technical requirements than the proposed Airbus 330A.
• The Airbus could not, apparently, actually refuel all USAF aircraft, a fundamental requirement. The 767 could.
• The Air Force played favorites, giving EADS-Northrop more information than Boeing about their developing proposals.
• The service miscalculated the relative “life cycle costs” of the two tankers – yet another mistake that somehow favored EADS-Northrop.
Murray and her allies have raised other issues, including the safety and versatility of the larger, heavier 330A. But you don’t have to go beyond the GAO’s findings to see that this was a disastrously mismanaged decision.
Did the responsible officers simply make staggering mistakes – or were they so biased against Boeing that they were willing to saddle the military with a more expensive and possibly inferior tanker? The former would be inexcusable; the latter, unconscionable.
Either way, the Pentagon must reopen the bidding and let Boeing compete on equal terms. This blunder is of such a magnitude that the people at the very top, the Air Force secretary and chief of staff, ought be cashiered.
Oh yes – they were booted out just two weeks ago, ostensibly over lax oversight of nuclear weapons. Defense Secretary Robert Gates may have been merciful to them get out of town before this scandal broke.
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