Posted on 03/11/2008 9:15:35 AM PDT by westcoastwillieg
Subversives cook the books so the French can build our aerial tankers
Being dependent on other nations for military hardware and allowing the French to build the next generation of Air Force refueling tankers is sheer lunacy but that’s what’s going to happen unless our politicians speak out.
Subversive bureaucrats have already succeeded in giving away our jobs and hollowed out our industrial base. Cooking the books so the procurement specs favor the French is the last straw.
Anyone with an IQ higher than a clam knows that our economy is slowing down. We can’t afford to lose the jobs the tanker will create if it’s built in the U.S.
Yep...The money being swaped around in the service industry will not last much longer. We better have something to sell to bring in new money.
I guess the thousands of jobs that will be created here in Alabama don’t count as jobs in the US!!!!???
". . . more passengers, more cargo, more fuel to off-load, more availability, more flexibility, more dependability and it can carry more patients.”
--Gen. Arthur Lichte, Air Force Air Mobility Command
I just read where the United Sates will see more jobs and more capital spent if the EADS group gets the contract.
And why the hell would you give a contract to a company that just got popped for a few billion in overcharges?
So in order to be patriotic, we have to allow a company to blatantly steal from the defense budget?
I’m not buying it.
Aren’t these tankers going to be built in Mobile Alabama - which currently resides in the US? I don’t like everything about this deal ether but lets be factual.
What a bunch of crap.
Our nation is being sold out by our own people. American military equipment should be made by Americans and controlled by Americans.
Financial Times
March 10, 2008
Defence Contract Was Won Fair And Square
By Richard Shelby
From the moment the US air force announced the decision to award a $35bn contract to supply aircraft-refuelling tankers to Europe’s EADS and its US partner Northrop Grumman, there were outcries from members of Congress whose parochial interests lie with the rival offering from Boeing.
The contract is the largest acquisition programme in the history of the air force. To have expected controversy not to follow, regardless of the winner, would have been foolish. What is unfortunate in the controversy is that the uproar is based upon mendacity, rather than logic and reason.
The objective of the acquisition was clear from the outset: acquire the best new tanker for the US air force. The air force, in a lengthy, full and open competition, determined that the KC-30 was superior to Boeing’s KC-767 and was the best tanker to meet its needs. To claim at this late date that our military will not be getting the best plane simply because the contract was not awarded to Boeing is illogical and ignores the facts. The KC-30 has more capacity to offload fuel, and carries more passengers and cargo, thereby giving the air force more capability, flexibility and dependability. It outperforms the KC-767 not only by industry standards but, most importantly, by the standards of the air force, which rates it superior in every one of the five categories used.
Charges have been raised that by awarding a contract to a foreign company, national security may be at risk because the US military would have to rely on foreign suppliers. Nothing could be further from the truth. The prime contractor of the team that won, Northrop Grumman, is no less an American company than Boeing. While Northrop’s proposal uses a European-designed airframe, a close scrutiny of the two competing proposals shows that the two have a similar amount of foreign content.
This is hardly the first defence programme to be awarded to a US-European team. Boeing itself was part of a team that recently won the army contract for the joint cargo aircraft – an Italian-built aircraft that will be assembled in Florida at a Boeing facility. There was no outcry at this award from Boeing’s supporters, even though it would seem that the joint cargo aircraft programme would similarly “take American tax dollars and build this plane overseas”.
The global environment makes it almost impossible for any major military product to be 100 per cent US-made – especially when our goal is to provide the best equipment for our war fighters. Moreover, US aerospace firms have supplied billions of dollars’ worth of equipment built by Americans to foreign countries.
As members of Congress, we are concerned about US jobs. But any assertion that this award “outsources” jobs to France is simply false. With a new assembly site in Mobile, Alabama, this contract will bring tens of thousands of jobs into the US. According to the job-forecasting tool from the department of commerce, Northrop Grumman will employ about the same number of US workers on the tanker contract as Boeing would have. The Northrop Grumman tanker team will employ about 25,000 US workers at more than 230 supplier companies in 49 states.
Congress must remain as objective as possible and insist on due process. Invalidating the award, starting the process again or inserting prohibitive language into legislation to block the tanker acquisition would be irresponsible and based on raw emotion. Should Boeing choose to protest, the Government Accountability Office will determine whether this award was properly executed and we must let regular oversight prevail.
This was a fair and open competition, and I do not believe a protest will be successful. If the original decision is ratified by the GAO, it is imperative that the air force not be forced to overturn a decision simply because there are some who do not like it. Politics should have no place in the Department of Defense’s acquisition process.
“Facts are stubborn things,” John Adams once said. If the US air force and members of Congress wanted the tanker to be a job-creation programme for Boeing, they should have eschewed a competition and sole-sourced the contract in the first place. Instead, the intent was to provide our soldiers in uniform with the best air refuelling aircraft in the world, at the best value for the taxpayer. In the final analysis, that is precisely what the air force did.
The writer is Senator for Alabama, senior member of the appropriations committee and a member of the appropriations subcommittee on defence.
You are an idiot. The Northrup-Grumman/EADS Tanker will be built in Mobile Alabama and will create 25,000+ U.S.Jobs. Quit listening to Boeing and Seattle Politician propoganda. It is true that some component parts will be built overseas, but that is equally true with the Boeing plane.
I think the 2004 contract was that gawdawful “lease to own” abomination that Sen. Daschle’s wife set up.
We should just make it a law, that the military has to buy from the highest bidder...that way, it will always go to a US company.
Because Boeing was trying to pop the taxpayers for leasing some planes at a higher price than buying the planes.
“I guess the thousands of jobs that will be created here in Alabama don’t count as jobs in the US!!!!???”
Alabama is non-union and in fly-over country, so it does not count as the USA to the press.
This bitching reminds me of the people who would rather drive a Mexican-made Chevrolet truck than a Texas-made Toyota truck.
I get the distinct impression that Boeing has a deliberate media campaign targetting the grassroots (blogs) with this sky-is-falling b.s. I would love to get my hands on the IP data for the original poster of the threads here and elsewhere.
They’ll be assembled in Mobile from a collection of parts, a considerable portion of which will be imported.
Yeah, like these planes made in Alabama at lower cost to the US taxpayer, who gets to keep their money and invest it as they see fit.
I think we are on the same page...I was referring to Boeing Also.
Yes, just like every big plane in the world. Parts from all over.
As I recall, it wasn't even “lease to own”, it was just "lease", with USAF paying to de-tankerize the aircraft at the end of the lease, converting them back to civil airliners.
I guess no one got the memo either that Honda, Mercedes and Hyundai are creating more jobs in Alabama than the “American” car companies combined. Just like they didn’t get the memo Mobile Alabama is going to boom because of a GERMAN steel company and a FRENCH tanker company.
I think its a HANDOUT to Sarkozy. Right Leaning Leader of France. This is a bribe to gain favor from them on WOT. As is obvious from Sarkozy’s TOUGHT TALK on Iran.
Since our major defense contractors -- the ones that make most of that military equipment -- are being forced to rely more and more on the ability to market foreign military sales to our allies, we have created an environment where we have to compete against foreign defense contractors in all markets (and in some cases team with them to win contracts). Therefore, the notion that all of our American military equipment can be 100% American-made is a notion that is lost in the 50's.
The tankers will be built in the US, Mobile AL I believe.
The lead system integrator will be Northrup Grumman.
This deal may lead to future exports of A330 based tankers made in the USA to elsewhere, since we are a highly competitive as a base of production, and EADS knows this too.
If the deal was good, give it to them. The USAF will benefit from more bang for the buck.
Boeing is damn near a single source supplier for larger airframes like the C17, KC10, KC135, etc. Keeping NG in the game is not a bad idea.
The only question which should be asked is if we are rewarding those parts of EADS/Airbus that through unfair trade have profited for years. I.e. state protectionism by their airlines, and subsidies to develop planes as well as unrealistic loans etc. The real issue is if we are more or less “rewarding” unfair trade practices by given Airbus this contract. The fact that it’s a pan-European based firm that is laregly state run is a side bar in this case.
You are correct. The Boeing plkan would have just as much foreign soirced parts as the Northrup-Grumann/EADS plane. Both would be assembled in the U.S. The big propaganda on this coming out of Boeing is to try and convince people that their bid would be an American made product and the other would be European. The truth is Boieng is a Chicago based Corporation and Northrup-Grumann is Los Angeles based, but EADS is French. Other than that, the Boeing plnae bid lost in every competitive area. It wasn’t even close.
Per the Air Force the KC30 is the superior aircraft at a better price. I have no problem with this.
However, if one considers this contract was bid in US dollars, Air Bus could take a bath on this contract as the US dollars is way down and still falling. That means whatever they procure outside of the USA will be expensive as hell. This also gives them motive to buy as much as possible of the aircraft parts and equipment here in the USA. The engines for the craft (the most expensive part of the aircraft) will be American.
McCain advisers lobbied for Airbus.Definitely some politics being played here, although the Dems tend to get burned when you point out that they generally vote against defense spending.
I get the distinct impression that Boeing has a deliberate media campaign targetting the grassroots (blogs) with this sky-is-falling b.s.
You are smelling the same rat I am. It’s the media’s standard big-lie technique.
Actually, the contract was awarded because they has the best product, at he lowest price for American tax payers, and would create more domestic jobs in non-union areas.
...and this list is not all inclusive.
Blame it on anyone you like but Boeing is at fault for not keeping on the cutting edge of technology. ...and I dont buy the un-patriotic argument against this either. If anything Boeing overpriced their stake in the US defense and got slapped for doing it.
I read the split is 60% U.S. - 40% Euro. 25,000 new jobs will be created in the U.S. for subcontractor work.
Northrup partnered with EADS for this deal and is responsible for quality control out of the Alabama manufacturing facility.
Anyway, Boeing kicked EADS behind with the 777.
So who are these “subversives?”
What books are they cooking?
If you’re going to post a vanity at least have some facts or places we can go for facts.
You posting what you suspect is worthless. And put “VANITY” in the headline. There’s rules you know.
Wrong on all counts Pal...
You mean to tell me that most Airbus’s out there use GE engines?
Next you’ll try to tell me that Boeing makes things in China?
Wait...... LOL
The big thing I worry about, and no one in the US ever seems to care about is if all this was more or less possible because of unfair trade. Boeing for years was getting shafted by European state run airlines that more or less only bought the state built plane (Airbus). Boeing had to operate in the real free market, while Airbus gets unrealistic loans and flat out start up monies to develop planes like mad (Not realistic financially unless they had money pumped into them) etc. The real issue is in the mirror (hindsight), not the present. -IMHO
Yeah right, we should just listen to Northrup and EADS to despin the story.
An Aircraft Carrier first on your list?
Heck Dubya just promised $30 billion to Africa for 'relief'.
Read an article today that specualted that Airbus may buy GE Engines. What would that mean? During a class in graduate school, a professor said the aquisition of American companies by foreign companies was a good thing. Brings all their money into the U.S. and if it became a national security issue at some future date, we just nationalize their companies and take them away.
Glad to see that you’ve identified youself as a Hussein supporter.
Washington Wire - WSJ.com (02Mar08) Sen. Barack Obama expressed his disappointment Sunday that Northrop Grumman and the parent company of Europe’s Airbus beat out Chicago-based Boeing Co. for a contract worth up to $40 billion for the next generation of Air Force refueling tankers.
Where do you get this stuff? LOL
NG won the contract, with a superior product, despite shenanigans from Boeing.
And there are no critical military elements being produced overseas.
Boeing, and the socialists in the NW, are pullin’ your strings and you’re falling for it.
You're correct. For example, the remote weapon station mounted on the Stryker, Hummvv and other vehicles, is from a company in Norway. The weapon station itself is assembled here, however, much the same as a Toyota, BMW or Mercedes.
The few U.S. companies that have tried to make a remote weapon station have fallen short.
Amen! During the hearings last week (and what a joke that was) everytime one of those idiots would say Alabama it was in the most derisive tone of voice!!! Hey, we pay taxes down here, we vote, and we are extremely patriotic.....Boeing (and WA dims) have the same sense of entitlement the clintoons do....unreal!!!
“The writer is Senator for Alabama”
Coincidentally where these tankers will be built.
But purely “coincidentally.”
And Obama’s against it.
Coincidentally, where Boeing is headquartered.
But purely “coincidentally.”
United States Attorney Paul J. McNulty announced that Michael M. Sears, age 57, the former Chief Financial Officer of the Boeing Company was sentenced today by the Honorable Gerald Bruce Lee, United States District Court Judge, to four months incarceration, a fine of $250,000 and 200 hours of community service.
Sears was a senior executive of the Boeing Company, one of this nation’s largest defense contractors. He served as the Chief Financial Officer of Boeing, and as a member of the Office of the Chairman, which consisted of the four senior executives of the Boeing Corporation. Sears pled guilty on November 15, 2004 to aiding and abetting acts affecting a personal financial interest.
From September 23, 2002, through November 5, 2002, Sears aided and abetted Darleen Druyun, then the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Acquisition and Management, in negotiating employment with Boeing while she was participating personally and substantially as an Air Force official overseeing the negotiation of a $20 billion lease of 100 Boeing KC 767A tanker aircraft.
You think Boeing doesn’t import parts for assembly here? Get real.
Who is Joe Lynch?
And is there a link with any facts to back up this claim of “subversives”, or is this just a rant?
....in France.
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