Boeing Tanker Protest Sustained!!!!!

[Mike Bates]

Boeing my not put in bid on new tanker deal.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26139441/

Mike

[The Inspector]

And with good reason! Now the Pentagon seems bent on giving the contract to NORGRUMBUS by continuing to diddle with the specifications and requirements (is anyone paying attention here?). This is pretty much what got the GAO's dander up just a couple of months ago, asking for a medium priced, medium sized airframe and then wanting to buy the next bigger thing and darn the logistics. Boeing delivered the specified, as requested vehicle plan, NGA has not. It appears to some that perhaps the entire contract bidding process should be scrapped and revamped. When (as an example) there were 4 or 5 companies providing ammo for the A-10 gun, the price was a reasonable amount of dollars per unit, then some genius at the Pentagon deided to 'single source' the rounds and the cost skyrocketed, I can see exactly the same thing happening in this situation.
The A 330 is too big for 99% of military ramps, it won't fit into 90% of the available hangers for maintenance, that means an excessive number of
TRILLIONS of dollars we don't have to upgrade all the facilities used by our military around the world to accomidate this white elephant. It's too slow for refueling some of the current inventory, it won't slow down enough for another part of the inventory, in an emergency break away with the 330, bring a book!

How many current GUARD pilots are rated in the 757/767 (dual rating because of similarities in design) as opposed to the number of NWA and US SCARE pilots who are rated in the 330.

The additional cost in fuel burn to fly the 330 over the life of the airframe also seems to have been conveniently over looked by the Pentagon in their headlong rush to give this project away. The pressure on the Pentagon from the politicos in Alabama must be pretty intense, or someone has pictures of someone in bed with small animals to get the Pentagon to lay down and roll over this easily.

One of my original questions is still out there and no one has the guts to answer it-what happens if the French Government (or Airbus)gets a knot in it's thong and does a soup nazi on us 'NO PARTS FOR YOU" (they do do that to some customer carriers to keep them in line)Additionally, no one has yet had the nerve to address the question of why is our Government negotiating with another Government that is under WTO investigation? That is a violation of our laws!

I'm sure someone will try to bring up 'Condit and Druen" those morons are already in jail or have lost their careers long, long ago, no one has the guts to address the insider trading sacndal @ Airbus and dis that bit of legalistic flim flaming when it looked like the 380 was tanking last year, in fact, aren't some of those guys in jail and the rest facing European court judgements right now??

Right now portions of the Airbus Conglomerate aren't speaking to each other so needed parts for the Luftwaffe can't be sourced from the French side of the house, does that make you feel all warm and snuggly?

[skymstr02]

Report: Boeing May Opt Out Of Rebidding For KC-X
Tue, 12 Aug '08

Calculated Ploy... Or Capitulation?
Representatives with Boeing KC-767 tanker team met with Pentagon officials Tuesday to go over specifications for the oft-contested KC-X contract bid... but there are murmurs Boeing may opt to cede the competition to rival Northrop Grumman and EADS.



Citing reports in an industry trade journal, the Wichita Eagle states Boeing may be considering withdrawing from the competition outright, in response to the Pentagon's revised list of criteria for the bid. As ANN reported, those specs, issued by the Pentagon last week, place greater emphasis on aerial refueling duties, and capabilities above and beyond the Air Force's original plan.

That bodes well for Northrop Grumman and EADS, whose KC-30 offers greater fuel capacity than the smaller Boeing KC-767. The KC-30 won the original KC-X bid in February, but Boeing protested to the Government Accountability Office on the grounds the Air Force showed favoritism to the larger aircraft, despite the fact the KC-767 more closely adhered to the Air Force's original proposal.

The GAO upheld that protest... and in July, the Pentagon threw open the bid once again, although on an accelerated schedule. The Pentagon also stripped decision-making authority from the USAF.

Boeing says it will wait for the Pentagon to release its final requirements for KC-X, before making a decision on whether to back out. Officials with the Department of Defense met with both Boeing and Northrop/EADS on Tuesday, ahead of the deadline this week for each party to submit their revised bids.

This could be a calculated ploy on Boeing's part; after all, Northrop/EADs made a similar threat to back out of the original KC-X competition in January 2007. Those parties later agreed to bid the contract, after the Air Force added language to the plan, that considered the KC-30's greater fuel capacity as a selection point.

Should Boeing opt out of the deal, it would leave the Pentagon with the admittedly easier -- but politically thorny -- choice to award the de facto sole-source contract to Northrop.

The Pentagon could also once again revise the requirements for KC-X to give Boeing greater parity, or time to develop a larger 777-based offering for the contract. Considering that Northrop/EADS already won a recent competition, however -- combined with the USAF's desperate need for new tankers to replace aging KC-135s -- it's less likely the DoD would take that route.

As for Boeing, it has other options, too. The company could protest the Pentagon's final Request for Proposals, or opt to bid for the contract anyway... hoping to either win, or force another stalemate on protest should Northrop win once again.



Kansas Congressman Todd Tiahrt, a staunch Boeing advocate, told the Eagle he met recently with Boeing executives and told them "one of the options they have to consider is just walking away from the deal."

But Tiahrt has a hole-card to play in that scenario, as well. Even if Northrop wins the second bid -- outright, or in competition -- the House and Senate defense appropriation committees "could just cut the funding off until they do it right," he said.

[Mike Bates]

Tanker contract put on hold. Looks like our guys and gals in the tanker fleet will have to wait even longer.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/09/10/pentag ... index.html

Mike

[bdk]

Not everything goes Boeing's way though...

Court overturns KC-135 PDM contract award

The U.S. Court of Federal Claims in Washington, D.C., late Tuesday ordered the United States Air Force to cancel and rebid a 10-year, $1.1 billion contract to The Boeing Company for KC-135 Programmed Depot Maintenance, which was awarded in September 2007.

A judge issued the ruling in response to a case filed by Alabama Aircraft Industries Inc. (AAII), one of the losing bidders in the KC-135 PDM contract award process. The judge upheld a single issue in the AAII case. He ordered that the contract award be terminated and that the Air Force re-solicit with explicit instructions on how that issue will be considered.

In June, the Government Accountability Office denied the second of two protests filed by AAII over the contract. The GAO had previously requested the Air Force to review cost data of the original award. The Air Force complied with the GAO request and in late February, upheld the award to Boeing, which led to the second AAII protest action before the GAO.

"We will review the court’s ruling before commenting on any specifics. However, it should be noted that the KC-135 Programmed Depot Maintenance Contract was upheld by the Government Accountability Office. We continue to believe that the Air Force correctly chose Boeing for this vital sustainment work to keep the KC-135 fleet flying and battle-ready for our nation’s warfighters,” Boeing said in a statement.

[CAPFlyer]

I have a problem with a Federal Court other than the Supreme Court overrulling a GAO review. The GAO has proven several times in recent history that they do a good job of reviewing these things and if they don't have a problem with the award, then I have an issue with a company going to a civilian court to handle a military (and government) matter, something that smacks of trying to usurp the proper progression and checks & balances.

[bdk]

This action ought to heat up the Airbus subsidy debate!

Airbus Buyers Get French Aid
The Wall Street Journal 01/27/2009
Author: David Gauthier-Villars
(Copyright (c) 2008, Dow Jones & Company, Inc.)

PARIS -- France plans to offer €5 billion, or about $6.5 billion, in loans on preferential terms to help airlines buy Airbus jetliners at a time when many banks have closed the credit spigot, a French Finance Ministry spokesman said Monday.

Under the proposed plan, the French government will raise funds using its strong credit rating, and then channel the funds to French banks such as Crédit Agricole SA and BNP Paribas SA. These banks will then provide loans to customers that want to buy Airbus planes, the spokesman said.


The goal is to ensure that banks quickly get back in the business of lending money for airplane purchases. Airbus parent European Aeronautic Defence & Space Co. has said that a portion of its business was at risk because many airlines are struggling to arrange financing to buy planes.


"Banks are not doing their job," EADS Chief Executive Louis Gallois told a news conference last week.


Airbus hopes this year to maintain jetliner production near its 2008 level of 483 planes despite the sharp global economic slowdown. Achieving such output will require significant funding assistance to customers from Airbus itself and specialized financing agencies.


Customers, such as airlines and leasing companies, pay more than half the price of a plane around the delivery time, but few have the necessary millions of dollars in cash on hand. In recent years, commercial banks and capital markets have provided the funds, but lending through both of these sources has slowed to a trickle. Airbus has said it plans to increase significantly its own customer financing, as it did during past downturns in the cyclical aviation business.


Export credit agencies such as France's Coface and the U.S. Export-Import Bank, which can provide guarantees to support loans from commercial banks taken by customers with questionable credit, also have said they will ramp up their level of activity. The U.S. Export-Import Bank said last week that this year it could double its 2007 volume of guarantees on Boeing Co. exports, to as much as $9 billion.


Boeing declined to comment on the French plan.


Airbus expects a comparable jump from European export-credit agencies. Nigel Taylor, Airbus's senior vice president for customer finance, told a conference on aviation finance last week that the agencies could underwrite as much as 50% of Airbus deliveries this year, up from at most 20% in recent years.


The new French plan would come in addition to Coface and traditional export-credit financing, which involves stepping in with cash payments only when a borrower defaults on a loan.


The French government plans to refinance banks' loans for Airbus purchases through a body it set up late last year to channel preferential loans to industry, Société de Financement de l'Economie Française, or SFEF. SFEF also is providing loans to car makers Renault SA and Peugeot SA.

France denies bank plan is state aid to Airbus
The Daily Telegraph (London) 01/27/2009
Author: Alistair Osborne
Copyright (C) 2008 The Daily Telegraph; Source: World Reporter (TM)


France has denied it is giving state aid to Airbus after ordering its banks to lend €5bn (£4.7bn) to help airlines buy European-built planes as a condition for taking an extra €10bn of government capital.

The country's latest bank recapitalisation plan was seen by many as surrogate aid to Airbus, which faces a revenue shortfall as airlines struggle to obtain finance to pay for a back-log of aircraft orders.


An official quoted in France's financial daily Les Echos said: "This will permit us to respond to the difficulties of plane manufacturers' clients who can't find the financing."


France has already told its banks they must set aside €7bn to support French exports. The €5bn aviation package is expected to be drawn from that sum.


Shares in Airbus parent EADS rose 53 cents to €13.13 but French trade minister Anne-Marie Idrac denied the plan distorted competition.


"The French state is not giving money to Airbus," she told Reuters. "It's not a subsidy, which would distort competition, it's a question of fluidity in the financing of Airbus clients, where it is needed, and this in co-ordination with other countries who are stakeholders of Airbus."


The European plane maker is already the world's leader, having relegated US rival Boeing to number two. Boeing had no comment until the "terms and conditions" of any such plan are clear.


The pair are already in dispute at the World Trade Organisation, with each accusing the other of taking illegal state handouts.


Both companies are braced for a tough year. Airbus chief executive Thomas Enders warned this weekend that demand for new aircraft could plunge by 50pc-60pc in 2009.

[bdk]

Abercrombie: Hill Action Coming On Tanker Split Buy
Defense Daily 03/12/2009
Author: Emelie Rutherford


The head of a key House panel reiterated his call yesterday for the Pentagon to buy versions of the Air Force's new aerial refueling tanker from both competitors, saying "a consensus is developing" among lawmakers to support a split buy.


Rep. Neil Abercrombie (D-Hawaii), chairman of the House Armed Services Air and Land Forces subcommittee, told defense-industry officials at a Washington conference that the current Eisenhower-era tanker's replacement should face no further delays.


"My view is very simple: We're going to split the buy," Abercrombie said at the Defense Technology and Requirements conference hosted by Aviation Week and McAleese & Associates. "Each of the tankers from each of the consortiums does different things. I understand that some [go] further, some [are] bigger, some [are] faster, it can go on different runways, all the rest of it. Buy them and use them where it's appropriate. We need to replace those tankers."


Defense Secretary Robert Gates canceled the politically charged tanker competition last September, leaving it to be restarted in the Obama administration. The Pentagon had pulled a February 2008 award to a Northrop Grumman-European Aeronautic Defence and Space Co. (EADS) team after the Government Accountability Office (GAO) sustained losing bidder Boeing's [BA] protest.


Yet while Abercrombie and House Appropriations Defense subcommittee (HAC-D) Chairman John Murtha (D-Pa.) have been calling for a tanker split buy, other powerful lawmakers including Senate Appropriations Defense subcommittee member Patty Murray (D-Wash.) and HAC-D Vice Chairman Norm Dicks (D-Wash.), both Boeing backers, and Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) Ranking Member John McCain (R-Ariz.) have been opposed. While the fiscal year 2009 defense appropriations act directs the Pentagon to consider a dual procurement, Gates in a letter last year said he would "strongly oppose" one, pointing to billions of dollars in addition costs it would generate (Defense Daily, Sept. 26, 2008).


Abercrombie said yesterday he has "spoken to all the principles involved, at least legislatively speaking, in the House and some in the Senate."


"I think that a consensus is developing; I won't say it's there," Abercrombie told reporters.


Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) and SASC Chairman Carl Levin (D-Mich.) have declined to share their opinions on the split-buy concept with reporters.


Abercrombie said he has "a good sense that the Senate Armed Services Committee wants to come to a conclusion (on the tanker) as well, and collaboratively I expect that this year we will."


As chairman of the House Armed Services Air Land subcommittee, one of the first panels to review the Pentagon's budget proposal, Abercrombie said he will recommend the dual procurement.


"Whether it will prevail, I don't know," he said.


Saying lawmakers on both sides of the issue "have perfectly legitimate cases to make," he argued a split buy is unavoidable.


"It seems to me that both (competitors) have acted in good faith and put forward a proposal that they believe was in line with what the Pentagon was requesting, what the Air Force was requesting, and they both believe that they fulfilled that," he said during his speech. "The problem, of course, became that we didn't have a conclusion that was sustainable--by either the GAO or possibly going to courts and all the rest--as to whether the acquisition process, and the contracting process that determined the acquisition, was adequate."


Abercrombie also noted the jobs that would be supported by two tanker programs


"This is trying to make a decision that is in the strategic interest of the nation and at the same time accommodates both the political and economic interests of the nation," he told reporters. "That's a pretty good outcome."


The congressman added the days of spending money on programs without seeing any results are over, and argued that budget pressures mean the tanker matter "is coming to a head."


Asked how he would justify the additional logistics and maintenance costs associated with have two fleets of Air Force tankers, Abercrombie said: "How do we justify the cost of saying we needed to have a tanker seven or nine years ago and the explosion in cost since then just by not doing it?"


"I justify everything on the basis of meeting the strategic interest of the nation," he said. "The cost should be commensurate with meeting the need. If you have a mission and you agree that that's what the mission is, then you pay for it."


Abercrombie declined to comment on whether he still would push for a split buy if the Pentagon's detailed budget due in April seeks to delay the tanker procurement, an option the Obama administration has considered, according to news reports this week.


SASC member Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.), also speaking at the National Press Club conference, said such a tanker contract delay "concerns me to no end."


"We're flying on these 50-year-old airplanes right now," Chambliss told reporters about the tankers he used to see a regular basis. "I am very concerned about delaying it."

[The Inspector]

It appears that John Murtha of Penn. has agreed that dual purchases from NORGRUMBUS and Boieng would be counterproductive, and will now drop his suggestion that AIRBUS equipment be purchased as part of the Tanker program-

[jtramo]

Well I wonder whats gonna happen now that a 330 "computer jet" seems to have crashed cause unknown?

[The Inspector]

Boeing has announced today in Everett that it is entering the 777 into the mix for the new tanker by working up a proposal to present to the USAF dependant upon which sort of airframe the DoD and USAF decide they really want.

Quoting Boeings Jim Albaugh in a copywrited story by reporter Michelle Dunlop in todays Everett HERALD, "We don't know if there's going to be a requirement for a larger airplane or a smaller airplane".

Depending on the Air Forces requirements, Boeing is ready to put forth either the 777 or 767, Albaugh said. "If they want a larger plane with maximum fuel off - load, then we've got the 777, if they are seeking a smaller, capable flexible airplane, we've got the KC-767" Albaugh said.

Boeing has redubbed the program KC-7A7.

Keep in mind, when it comes to sizes and models, th 767 comes as a -200 passenger, -200PF freighter, -300, -300ER and even a -400. The 777 can be had as a -200 passenger, -200 PF, -300PF, -300ER, &-400 passenger, sort of the local HONDA Dealership as far as models and equipment.

[CAPFlyer]

Ummm....there's no 777-400. In addition, there's only 1 freighter - the 777F, which is a 777-200LR with a Freight Door and strengthened main deck floor with a cargo handling system.

Thus, 777 family is as such: -200, -200ER, -200LR, -300, -300ER, F

If they enter a 777 Tanker, it will be based off the 777F most likely. The -300 only has more volume in the cabin, not more fuel tank space, so the stronger gear and floor of the 777F will equate to the minimum modifications needed as they can add bags to the lower holds if extra fuel is needed.

[The Inspector]

Yeah, I fat fingered the 777-400, but there has already been preliminary discussion for a 777-300 box hauler.
As far as fuel upload, theres plenty of room in a 'trip' for rubber bags full of melted dinosaurs.
And the 777-300ER does hold several time/distance/duration records by a very wide margin set within the last few years, like 23+ hrs in flight, operating for several hours @ cruise speeds and altitudes with one engine purposely shut down, etc.

[cco23i]

Tanker contract put on hold. Looks like our guys and gals in the tanker fleet will have to wait even longer.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/09/10/pentag ... index.html

Mike

All well, less than 1 year 6 months and "poof" I am out. Heck after being soaked in Jp-4 and 8 for years and all the rubber I have been around I can't touch an airplane now and NOT break out! I guess I'll see the new tanks from the ground!

Scott

[Oscar Duck]

how does the 777 work when one of Boeing's sale pitches on the 767 was that it could access more airfields than the A330??