USAF Awards Contract to Northrop Grumman/Airbus

[Tweek]

Well, I see your points, and I stick by my opinion. I shall leave it there.

[Hagar]

I'm playing Devil's advocate here. I can see both sides of the argument. Boeing will undoubtedly appeal against the decision & the outcome is by no means certain. Logically I should be supporting Airbus but I grow more cynical with age.

[expat]

That actually happened far more than you might realise.

I understand his point, totally. I just don't agree with it. It just seems a bit strange to say that your air force simply SHOULDN'T be ordering an aircraft, simply because it isn't built in your own country.

If your country has the capability (which the USA has) it's logical that it should produce all its own military equipment. Once you start relying on other countries you leave yourself open to political blackmail.

Good point.  And what about Espirit de Corps?  I know a few servicemen who will be wierded out about working with foreign aircraft.  The equipment will have to change (I assume an airbus uses metric), and there will have to be more training to learn the aircraft on account of airbus having different maintinence requirements

Air Bus uses the imperial standard for it's aircraft. In all my time on aircraft, I have only ever had one tool that was metric in my kit. It was a 10mm socket used to remove the electrical connection cover plate on the AC wild generator of ATR aircraft. As for maintenance requirements, to an aircraft tech it matters not one way or the other. Sure you will have your favorite's to work on, but having to learn new stuff, for me that is a challenge and not a chore. If it is a chore you are in the wrong profession. And as this is a military project more training and learning a new aircraft is irrelevant. Troop, Monday morning , this class, new course A330 end of discussion, don't like it, civy street awaits. If I was in the position of getting a new aircraft under my belt that could be transfered to the civilian market, I would jump at it. To date as much as I would love, I have found no civilian operators or Harrier, Tornado, Victor, Jet provost, or Jaguar

Matt

[C]

If you had been born on the other side of the pond, would your loyalties be different?  Would you want your country to have the jobs?  Would  you want your military to use aircraft built in your country?  Would you want it to be harder to get into the aviation business when you are spending thousands on college tuition to get an opportunity?

In that case, do you have a problem with the UK, Canada and Australia buying the C-17?

i dunno, does airbus produce an aircraft as capable as the C-17?

The C17 market (strategic/heavy tac airlift) really is a niche one, and as the MD/Boeing product was pretty good at what it did in the first place, there would be little commercial sense in subsequently producing a competitor when most nations do not need, or cannot afford the capability. A case of Boeing identifying the market first, and cornering the market with an excellent product. End of.

Hence Airbus is developing the A400M, which fits neatly in between the C130 and C17 in terms of payload and capability (a bit like tha An-70) - ideal for nations which do not need, or cannot justify the cost of a C17 purchase (the UK was in that category at one time), such as some of the larger (and smaller) European nations. Again a case of filling the niche with one aircraft which, in the medium term, probably won't face a direct western competitor (Russian and the former Soviet states produce some very capapble aircraft, but somewhat justifiably western nations tend to limit their use to charter, due to the problems of procuring and operating them themselves.)

Good point.  And what about Espirit de Corps?  I know a few servicemen who will be wierded out about working with foreign aircraft.  The equipment will have to change (I assume an airbus uses metric), and there will have to be more training to learn the aircraft on account of airbus having different maintinence requirements

Maybe to start with, but I'm sure as with any professional workforce, they'll come to love their aircraft. I'm sure the personnel of 99 or 216Sqn of the RAF operating the American C17 and Tristar don't suffer any more sleepless nights than those of 101Sqn working on the British (huzzah!) Vickers VC10.

Understandable indeed. I'd much prefer it if the UK had the booming aircraft industry it had in the 1950s, and we could manufacture all of our own aircraft. However, I wouldn't choose an aircraft based solely on it's 'nationality', especially if it was an inferior platform to a rival company's.

Shame no one noticed that when Panavia offered the RAF the Tornado F3! What a dog. Then again, that was a stopgap I suppose between the Lightning and Phanthom and the ECA, sorry EFA[/is], sorry [s]EF2000, sorry, Eurofighter Typhoon (2005!). Agian the Typhoon is a bit like the A400M - it fills a nice little capability gap between the F22 and F15 (and a 20 year younger airframe design than the F15).

[beefhole]

For the record, all the tanker guys in the AF love this decision.  They say the Airbus is, hands down, better in every way than the Boeing tanker.  As an added bonus, Airbus is much closer than Boeing to being able to provide the USAF with the number of tankers they require as fast as possible.  Who knows how much longer the -135s have before they start to evaporate!  A320 variant tankers are already in use with several countries and they have the prototype A330 already flying. As far as I know, Boeing isn't there yet.

The real surprise here is that the AF chose the better aircraft, especially one foreign built.  Generally speaking, the Pentagon bureaucracy goes with the status quo, what's safe and known.  Going outside the norm to pick the best candidate is something that only used to happen when a true warrior somehow weaseled their way into "The Building."  Hopefully this is a sign of change, but I'd bet more than a bit of cash that it's payback for the Boeing scandal--they'll be in the dog house for a while.

[The Ruptured Duck]

[quote]For the record, all the tanker guys in the AF love this decision.

[beefhole]

For the record, all the tanker guys in the AF love this decision.  They say the Airbus is, hands down, better in every way than the Boeing tanker.  As an added bonus, Airbus is much closer than Boeing to being able to provide the USAF with the number of tankers they require as fast as possible.  Who knows how much longer the -135s have before they start to evaporate!  A320 variant tankers are already in use with several countries and they have the prototype A330 already flying. As far as I know, Boeing isn't there yet.

The real surprise here is that the AF chose the better aircraft, especially one foreign built.  Generally speaking, the Pentagon bureaucracy goes with the status quo, what's safe and known.  Going outside the norm to pick the best candidate is something that only used to happen when a true warrior somehow weaseled their way into "The Building."  Hopefully this is a sign of change, but I'd bet more than a bit of cash that it's payback for the Boeing scandal--they'll be in the dog house for a while.

Boeing doesn't have a flying KC-767?  Hmmm, I wonder what that big  twin engine jet with a big boom out the tail was flying over my house this morning was then?

Ah yes, you are very much correct.  I misread info on another site--the gripe was that Boeing doesn't have a proven boom system.  It's done a couple dry contacts and actually passed fuel only once, whereas Airbus already has a proven operational boom system.

[OVERLORD_CHRIS]

We were just talking about this in my munitions class.

We all think Boeing got what they deserved after they tried to screw over the USAF a few years back, and now it is time for them to suffer. Every one knows about the inner job thing with the higher ups and how they got cough, but there was more to the screwed up deal:
-Pay to lease used air craft
-Pay to convert from passenger to tanker
-At the end if they decided not to buy, they had to pay to reconvert them back

They would have had the deal, if they did not try to get greedy, and no one would have cared, it would have been an easy sell.

And on top of that Boeing is running behind on the KC-767 for Japan and Italy. they have 2 built for each countries, and both of those were supposed to be delivered in late 2006 mid 2007, yet they still have them flying state side. While the working KC-30 on the other hand has been delivered to RAAF.

And I don't see how people keep saying the KC-767 was better then the KC-30. 767 holds 204,000lbs of fuel, while the A330 hold 248,000lbs of fuel, kinda important in a tanker when that is its primary mission. And the A330 can hold 32 pallets, vs the 19 of the 767, once again also important as this is its secondary roll.

If Boeing wants to redeem them selves, they need to prepare the 777 or 787 as a replacement for the KC-10, since the USAF AMC commander is interested in replacing those too.

Also, if we are good enough to sell to other countries, I don't see why we can't buy from other countries, we have done it in the past.

[expat]

Perhaps you are a boeing fan from Kansas that doesnt like airbus because they arent an american company.

Lets not forget who made the first fly by wire aircraft, and have the largest passenger airplane in the world.

Airbus clearly has improved on their military aircraft if they are good enough to be used in 'George Bush's army.'

Carry on like that and you will get a perfectly good thread locked

Matt

[beefhole]

Perhaps you are a boeing fan from Kansas that doesnt like airbus because they arent an american company.

Lets not forget who made the first fly by wire aircraft, and have the largest passenger airplane in the world.

There's nothing wrong with disliking foreign aircraft for one's own military.  I was genuinely surprised to find that just about all of the tanker guys in the USAF were ecstatic at the decision, and not just because we needed SOME tanker to replace the -135.

As for the first (digital) fly-by-wire aircraft, I assume you meant NASA in the US and its counterparts in Russia and the UK, which all flew test fly-by-wire aircraft in the early 1970s.  The space shuttle was operational with digital fly-by-wire controls ten years before Airbus ever produced a FBW aircraft, the F-117 about seven years.  They were certainly the first for commercial aviation, certainly not the first otherwise.

As for the largest commercial airliner, I am of the opinion that Boeing countered that brilliantly with the 787.

[OVERLORD_CHRIS]

There's nothing wrong with disliking foreign aircraft for one's own military.  I was genuinely surprised to find that just about all of the tanker guys in the USAF were ecstatic at the decision, and not just because we needed SOME tanker to replace the -135.

From the tanker guys that come through, I know most of them can't wait to get it. So far on the heavy side , only about 10% of the people I talk to don't like the idea. They kinda have 2 fears:
1. If we go to war with Europe, they could stop sending us the planes
2. It's foreign.

[beefhole]

There's nothing wrong with disliking foreign aircraft for one's own military.  I was genuinely surprised to find that just about all of the tanker guys in the USAF were ecstatic at the decision, and not just because we needed SOME tanker to replace the -135.

From the tanker guys that come through, I know most of them can't wait to get it. So far on the heavy side , only about 10% of the people I talk to don't like the idea. They kinda have 2 fears:
1. If we go to war with Europe, they could stop sending us the planes
2. It's foreign.

For point 1, since we're not going to war with Europe in any conceivable scenario in the next 20 years, it's a moot point.  Generally speaking for the military, all new aircraft are produced in the same production batch.  Basically, once a production line is shut down, it doesn't just start back up.  That's why we don't just build new F-15s to replace the aging ones--we literally can't.  Once the pipeline closes, that's that.  

Not sure about the availability of airbus parts statewide however, we wouldn't want to be like Iran with their F-14s!

[expat]

There's nothing wrong with disliking foreign aircraft for one's own military.  I was genuinely surprised to find that just about all of the tanker guys in the USAF were ecstatic at the decision, and not just because we needed SOME tanker to replace the -135.

From the tanker guys that come through, I know most of them can't wait to get it. So far on the heavy side , only about 10% of the people I talk to don't like the idea. They kinda have 2 fears:
1. If we go to war with Europe, they could stop sending us the planes
2. It's foreign.

For point 1, since we're not going to war with Europe in any conceivable scenario in the next 20 years, it's a moot point.  Generally speaking for the military, all new aircraft are produced in the same production batch.  Basically, once a production line is shut down, it doesn't just start back up.  That's why we don't just build new F-15s to replace the aging ones--we literally can't.  Once the pipeline closes, that's that.  

Not sure about the availability of airbus parts statewide however, we wouldn't want to be like Iran with their F-14s!

It does seem that all those people who have the daggers out for Air Bus for committing this heinous crime are most conveniently forgetting  that a very famous, long living American company is also in partnership with Air Bus. Why is no one giving Northrop a hard time here for backstabbing the US economy/US defense aircraft industry.
However it could be that you have a reliable company for the production and repair of spare parts in the name of Northrop thus not requiring a European link..............just in case you go to war with us

Matt

[DaveSims]

From what I hear through the aviation grapevine, Airbus is planning to move a lot of the production of the either the A-320 or A-330 to the Mobile plant once it gets up and running, which means more jobs there.  Maybe they need the room in Toulouse to build more A-380s.