Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
Wall Street Journal
June 21, 2008
Pg. 3
By Yochi J. Dreazen and August Cole
WASHINGTON -- The Air Force is virtually certain to reopen its bidding on a mammoth tanker contract in the wake of a scathing government audit, which means that the service will be unlikely to meet a 2013 deadline for fielding the new planes, according to the Air Force's recently ousted civilian chief.
Departing Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne said he was surprised and disappointed by a Government Accountability Office report this week that found a "number of significant errors" in the Air Force's decision to award the $40 billion tanker contract to Northrop Grumman Corp.
Mr. Wynne criticized the GAO report as being unclear and overly subjective, but said the service would accept the congressional watchdog's recommendations about restarting the competition between Northrop and Boeing Co. Reopening the competition will push any decision about the tanker into the next presidential administration.
Mr. Wynne, speaking to a small group of reporters at the Defense Department, also gave an unusually blunt assessment of his tense relationship with Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who fired him earlier this month.
Mr. Wynne said that he fundamentally disagreed with Mr. Gates's insistence that the Air Force focus on the immediate needs of the Iraq war instead of focusing on possible future conflicts against major powers like Russia or China.
"I don't want anybody to ever think that we have shrunk our strategic margin to the point where they can take us," he said. "Unapologetically, I think about making sure that no one can catch us."
Mr. Gates sought the resignations of Mr. Wynne and Gen. Michael Moseley, the Air Force's chief of staff, following a high-level Pentagon investigation into the Air Force's accidental shipment of four nuclear missile fuses to Taiwan. The move marked the first time a defense chief had ousted a service's top two officials simultaneously.
"When you have a difference of philosophy with your boss, he owns the philosophy and you own the difference," Mr. Wynne said. "There were differences that accrued."
Mr. Wynne acknowledged that he had been "strident in challenging" Mr. Gates on a variety of fronts, most notably a bitter dispute over the next-generation F-22 fighter jet, which is made by Lockheed Martin Corp. at a cost of roughly $140 million per plane.
"I advised the secretary that I was not with him on the F-22 budget," Mr. Wynne said.
Mr. Gates and the Air Force chief differed over the size of the service's fleet of F-22 fighters. The defense secretary has argued that the planes aren't needed in Iraq and Afghanistan. Mr. Gates and his top aides belittle the Air Force's attraction to expensive, state-of-the-art fighters as "nextwaritis."
Mr. Wynne said advanced planes were necessary not just in case of war with a major power -- a prospect he acknowledged as remote -- but also in case smaller countries began using high-tech Russian or Chinese weapons systems. He noted that his brother's plane was shot down over Vietnam by a Russian-made missile fired by North Vietnamese forces.
In his session with reporters, Mr. Wynne seemed resigned to the fact that his legacy would be clouded by the controversy over the tanker contract, one of the largest awarded by the U.S. military.
The summary of the GAO ruling, released Wednesday, pointed out seven problems with how the Air Force ran the competition, from wrongly assessing Boeing's cost estimate in a manner that benefited Northrop to improperly giving Northrop extra credit for offering a plane that carried more fuel.
The GAO audit raised yet another roadblock in an already drawn-out process to replace the tanker fleet, on average more than 47 years old. The tanker program is the Air Force's top acquisitions priority.
Mr. Wynne said the Air Force would issue a new request for proposals from the two companies, which would involve re-evaluating the attributes the service wants in the new tankers. It would also likely mean revising the requirements for the competition itself, which would trigger rounds of complex, back-and-forth talks between the Air Force and the companies.
Carrying out these sweeping changes could take well over a year to implement, which means that the official who takes the reins at the Pentagon after the November elections will be charged with making the final decisions in a process that has dragged on for more than seven years.
Mr. Wynne said that he would leave the Air Force with no regrets and didn't take his firing by Mr. Gates personally, but he acknowledged that his wife had a vastly different reaction.
"She said, 'Well, it seems very personal to me,'" he said.
June 21, 2008
Pg. 3
By Yochi J. Dreazen and August Cole
WASHINGTON -- The Air Force is virtually certain to reopen its bidding on a mammoth tanker contract in the wake of a scathing government audit, which means that the service will be unlikely to meet a 2013 deadline for fielding the new planes, according to the Air Force's recently ousted civilian chief.
Departing Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne said he was surprised and disappointed by a Government Accountability Office report this week that found a "number of significant errors" in the Air Force's decision to award the $40 billion tanker contract to Northrop Grumman Corp.
Mr. Wynne criticized the GAO report as being unclear and overly subjective, but said the service would accept the congressional watchdog's recommendations about restarting the competition between Northrop and Boeing Co. Reopening the competition will push any decision about the tanker into the next presidential administration.
Mr. Wynne, speaking to a small group of reporters at the Defense Department, also gave an unusually blunt assessment of his tense relationship with Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who fired him earlier this month.
Mr. Wynne said that he fundamentally disagreed with Mr. Gates's insistence that the Air Force focus on the immediate needs of the Iraq war instead of focusing on possible future conflicts against major powers like Russia or China.
"I don't want anybody to ever think that we have shrunk our strategic margin to the point where they can take us," he said. "Unapologetically, I think about making sure that no one can catch us."
Mr. Gates sought the resignations of Mr. Wynne and Gen. Michael Moseley, the Air Force's chief of staff, following a high-level Pentagon investigation into the Air Force's accidental shipment of four nuclear missile fuses to Taiwan. The move marked the first time a defense chief had ousted a service's top two officials simultaneously.
"When you have a difference of philosophy with your boss, he owns the philosophy and you own the difference," Mr. Wynne said. "There were differences that accrued."
Mr. Wynne acknowledged that he had been "strident in challenging" Mr. Gates on a variety of fronts, most notably a bitter dispute over the next-generation F-22 fighter jet, which is made by Lockheed Martin Corp. at a cost of roughly $140 million per plane.
"I advised the secretary that I was not with him on the F-22 budget," Mr. Wynne said.
Mr. Gates and the Air Force chief differed over the size of the service's fleet of F-22 fighters. The defense secretary has argued that the planes aren't needed in Iraq and Afghanistan. Mr. Gates and his top aides belittle the Air Force's attraction to expensive, state-of-the-art fighters as "nextwaritis."
Mr. Wynne said advanced planes were necessary not just in case of war with a major power -- a prospect he acknowledged as remote -- but also in case smaller countries began using high-tech Russian or Chinese weapons systems. He noted that his brother's plane was shot down over Vietnam by a Russian-made missile fired by North Vietnamese forces.
In his session with reporters, Mr. Wynne seemed resigned to the fact that his legacy would be clouded by the controversy over the tanker contract, one of the largest awarded by the U.S. military.
The summary of the GAO ruling, released Wednesday, pointed out seven problems with how the Air Force ran the competition, from wrongly assessing Boeing's cost estimate in a manner that benefited Northrop to improperly giving Northrop extra credit for offering a plane that carried more fuel.
The GAO audit raised yet another roadblock in an already drawn-out process to replace the tanker fleet, on average more than 47 years old. The tanker program is the Air Force's top acquisitions priority.
Mr. Wynne said the Air Force would issue a new request for proposals from the two companies, which would involve re-evaluating the attributes the service wants in the new tankers. It would also likely mean revising the requirements for the competition itself, which would trigger rounds of complex, back-and-forth talks between the Air Force and the companies.
Carrying out these sweeping changes could take well over a year to implement, which means that the official who takes the reins at the Pentagon after the November elections will be charged with making the final decisions in a process that has dragged on for more than seven years.
Mr. Wynne said that he would leave the Air Force with no regrets and didn't take his firing by Mr. Gates personally, but he acknowledged that his wife had a vastly different reaction.
"She said, 'Well, it seems very personal to me,'" he said.