[Zptmsemk]

Basically this one has it all. Protectionism, government corruption, shady backroom deals, and international drama.

Of course the reason Gates has said his office and not the Air Force will decide this contract is because the Air Force actually decided based on the airbus costing billions less and not how much money Boeing gave Congressmen. It's a joke. A transparent joke.

[occafeVes]

"I think it's better," said Rep. Norm Dicks, D-Wash. "No one has any faith in the Air Force." Yeah, those guys at the Air Force, what to they know about buying planes?

[malishka1025]

Originally posted by Mr Snuggles

Get ****ed. The Air Force is clearly simply incompetent, they go with whoever gave the most money. If there's systematic issues, then it should go to someone else.

I'm no fan of the administration but you're just being a dick here. I'm not just blaming the administration. I'm also blaming the Congressmen involved like the Democrat from Washington who's finger prints are all over this. Bottom line both planes work well for the intended purpose and the Airbus costs billions less. We should go with the cheaper plane.

[KRbGA0Bg]

Originally posted by Oerdin


I'm not just blaming the administration. I'm also blaming the Congressmen involved like the Democrat from Washington who's finger prints are all over this. Bottom line both planes work well for the intended purpose and the Airbus costs billions less. We should go with the cheaper plane. The Day it was officially awarded I remember seeing the Senators from Washington whining about how the USAF didn't take "jobs" into consideration when they made their decision. One of the Congressmen said that it was a Republican conspiracy(because McCain's investigation killed the boeing deal, and Northrup Plant would have been opened up in a Red state).

Raytheon did the same when L3 was awarded the LCA aircraft contact as well.

[WXQMQFIr]

Yep, as long as military projects are treated like pork to be doled out, you're going to have massive cost overruns and whatnot.

[Flalafuse]

Originally posted by Mr Snuggles
Disclaimer: Lonestar is a Northrop shareholder. I'm also an L3 shareholder.

[Discus]

When're you going to provide facts to back up your assertion, Oerdin?

[bomondus]

Originally posted by Mr Snuggles
There's a very famous very important person who once made a very insightful speech about the military-industrial complex...his wisdom was wasted in the US. Yea but that was back when it was a democrat institution.

Originally posted by Oerdin
Basically this one has it all. Protectionism, government corruption, shady backroom deals, and international drama.

Of course the reason Gates has said his office and not the Air Force will decide this contract is because the Air Force actually decided based on the airbus costing billions less and not how much money Boeing gave Congressmen. It's a joke. A transparent joke. I won't be thumbing up this one until it pulls through.

[zzquo0iR]

Originally posted by Lonestar

So was Northrup(In the Tanker instance). They never built a tanker before but Northrop is at least an aircraft manufacturer. Where as with that cargo plane deal you mentioned earlier neither of the bidders had ever actually made an airplane before and instead they were just reselling someone else's plane and putting different avionics or what not on it. It seems like it would be cheaper to just cut out the middle man and buy it direct from the manufacturer.

The Northrop-Airbus deal was much more direct. Northrop is to use its US factory to build an Airbus plane. Basically, Airbus has the plane but no domestic manufacturing plant while Northrop has the plant but no plane.

[illignocearia]

Where's the prices, beyotch?

[astonmartinrx371]

1.) The results of the audit were conducted by the GAO, not Congress.

2.) Even Senator Shelby from Alabama, the state that has the most to gain from Northrup getting the deal, said that rebidding was the right thing to do.

3.) This does not award anything to Boeing other than the ability to compete with Northrup on a level playing field. If Northrup has the better product then they should still get the contract.

4.) Oerdin.

[logpogingg]

Originally posted by Oerdin
....The Air Force stated the reasons Northrop-Airbus won was they were cheaper, their proposed production schedule was much faster, the airbus was a larger plane, and that the Air Force wanted to develop a competitor to Boeing's 50 year old monopoly on Air Force tanker contracts. ... I recall a news story at the time the contract was first awards saying that the Air Force had laid out five performance criteria, that Airbus and surpassed all five and that Boeing had failed all five. Is this incorrect?

While costs are important, the importance of costs is dwarfed by the importance of getting our service people the best quality equipment.

[Liskaspexia]

Yes, there's actually huge demand for that in Alberta due to oil sands development.

[carreraboyracer]

So what you're saying is it's a complicated issue and not cut and dry like Oerdin is portraying it? Interesting!

[quack!]

Originally posted by BeBro
On the plus side I read somewhere Boeing wants to develop a cargo zeppelin now http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1215...googlenews_wsj

[maysubers]

Any time the politicians get involved things will be complicated. I can't help but feel having to manufacturers competing for Air Force large aircraft deals is in the long term interests of the Air Force compared to the current state of affairs where Boeing is pretty much the only supplier.

[uaodnabnjz]

That's just one side of the story, of course. I'm sure you knew that. It's also old, from April 1st.

[largonioulurI]

Northrop built the plant there to manipulate the politicians there to play dirty.

[Corporal White]

Originally posted by Mr Snuggles
Northrop built the plant there to manipulate the politicians there to play dirty. Of that I have no doubt. In the defense manufacturing game the object has always been to spread the jobs around as many Congressional districts as possible so you have the highest number of Congressmen supporting your contract. It's political crap which no doubt increases costs.

[fenter1]

Originally posted by Oerdin


OK, didn't know that. I thought Northrop was using one of their existing plants. Believe it or not, Northrup doesn't have any manned aircraft fabrication plants up and running.