[Rod]

Pity. I was hoping the F-22 would be kept in production. R&D and tooling costs have already been paid. Each additional aircraft will be cheaper and we need more aircraft after extensive hours have been put in our current airframes due to the GWoT.

http://www.bloomberg...6...&refer=home


Gates Proposes Ending Lockheed F-22, VH-71 Helicopter (Update1)

April 6 (Bloomberg) -- Defense Secretary Robert Gates is recommending the U.S. cap purchases of Lockheed Martin Corp.’s F-22 fighter jets at 187 and cancel the company’s VH-71 presidential helicopter and a new Air Force communication satellite.

Four more of the F-22 fighters will be bought out of the 2009 war supplement for a total of 187 aircraft, Gates said at the Pentagon news conference today. He recommended terminating the presidential helicopter program because “it runs the risk of not delivering the required capability.”

Boeing Co.’s anti-missile Airborne Laser program made with subcontractors Northrop Grumman Corp. and Lockheed should be limited to one test aircraft, a person familiar with the decision said. The recommendations must be approved by the White House and Congress. Gates briefed members of Congress and their staff on the proposals earlier today before a news conference at the Pentagon.

The changes “collectively represent a budget reshaped to reflect the priorities of America’s defense establishment,” Gates said. “If approved they will profoundly reform how this department does business.”

Gates, in a prepared statement to reporters at the Pentagon, is also recommend proceeding with buying three DDG- 1000 destroyers to be produced by General Dynamics Corp. at Bath, Maine, and may continue the older DDG-51 destroyers built by Northrop Grumman Corp. Ship Systems at Pascagoula, Mississippi.

War Costs

The recommended cuts in weapons programs come as U.S. defense spending is set to reach $654.1 billion for the fiscal year 2009, including war costs, a 72 percent gain since 2000. President Barack Obama assigned Gates, who took office during the Bush administration, to rein in spending.

Standard & Poor’s Aerospace & Defense Index had risen 82 percent by the seventh anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks in 2008. Lockheed shares tripled in that time, making it the biggest gainer among the five largest U.S. defense contractors.

The recommendation to stop buying F-22s is a setback for Bethesda, Maryland-based Lockheed, the world’s largest defense contractor.

Bridging the Gap

The company wants to keep building the plane to bridge the gap until its new F-35 reaches full production. Gates would buy only four more than the 183 F-22s currently on order by using the forthcoming war spending, compared with the 60 more that the Air Force wants. He endorses continuing Lockheed’s F-35 fighter program.

The F-22, conceived at the height of the Cold War to take on the Soviet Union, was the focus of a lobbying campaign as Lockheed and its subcontractors said halting production at the 183 already on order could jeopardize 95,000 jobs in 44 states. At $354 million in inflation-adjusted dollars including research and development costs, it is the most expensive fighter in U.S. history.

Lockheed’s VH-71 presidential helicopter program based on a design by AgustaWestland, a unit of Finmeccanica Spa of Italy, is a fleet of 28 helicopters, whose cost has more than doubled to $13 billion since the company won the contract in January 2005. The original cost estimate was $6.1 billion. Obama has called it an example of a program “gone amok.” The current presidential fleet has some helicopters from United Technologies Corp.’s Sikorsky unit that are 40 years old.

Gates recommends canceling the Air Force’s Transformation Satellite Communication System program, which is intended to be a constellation of five satellites and ground stations to provide data and message services to ground forces throughout the world using laser beams. The program, expected to cost as much as $11 billion, was to be awarded this year. Boeing, Lockheed and its subcontractor Northrop Grumman have said their designs show that the technology is feasible.

To contact the reporters on this story: Gopal Ratnam in Washington at gratnam1@bloomberg.net. Tony Capaccio at acapaccio@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: April 6, 2009 13:57 EDT

[m4a1]

Sad. I prefered to close F-35, even knowing all the international consequences, maintaining this program is maintaning a fiction in which US can afford not-so-much battleworthy aircraft for itself and its allies at very high costs. And F-22 is better, as there are substantial costs to be paid for F-35 (R&D), and could be exported. F-35 might not be the weapon of choice for European countries, they might go for Tranche 3 EF-2000, or Gripen NG, as JSF has substantial shortcomings, that are well-known. Maintaining F-35 is a maintaining a fiction that USA can afford a not really needed fighter, inferior in many ways, and expensive, just to show that US can perform a programme for its Allies. In fact, this will happen simultaneously with decrease of USAF combat value, along with closing the possibility to afford F-22 for some of USA's allies (Israel, Japan...)
Damn.

This post has been edited by m4a1: 06 April 2009 - 1402 PM

[Rod]

Evem more troubling is the mention of the VH-71 program balooning to $13 billion given that we are only talking about 28 helicopters. Assuming the fly-away cost of a brand new F-22 at $200 million (R&D is already paid), the VH-71 program could easily be used to purchase 65 brand new F-22s.

m4a1, on Mon 6 Apr 2009 1454, said:

Sad. I prefered to close F-35, even knowing all the international consequences, maintaining this program is maintaning a fiction in which US can afford not-so-much battleworthy aircraft for itself and its allies at very high costs. And F-22 is better, as there are substantial costs to be paid for F-35 (R&D), and could be exported. F-35 might not be the weapon of choice for European countries, they might go for Tranche 3 EF-2000, or Gripen NG, as JSF has substantial shortcomings and those former are cheaper.

[Lampshade111]

What an ass! Go ahead and cancel the VH-71, but not the damn F-22. This fool will likely order the USAF to destroy all production tooling to ensure they can't get any more!

[Red Ant]

I'm disgusted. After 2 decades (3?) and billions spent, we will have NOTHING to show for it! If you're going to cancel a program, cancel it when it still makes sense to do so, not when the program is about to bear the fruits of reward! :angry: :angry:

[JamesG123]

Good money after bad.

Just because you have poured billions into a project does not mean its now or ever will be a good one.

[Hellfish6]

Rod, on Mon 6 Apr 2009 1147, said:

Pity. I was hoping the F-22 would be kept in production. R&D and tooling costs have already been paid. Each additional aircraft will be cheaper and we need more aircraft after extensive hours have been put in our current airframes due to the GWoT.

You're serious? The GWoT is running our F-22s into the ground?

Yeah, all those high-demand CAP missions to keep the Taliban air force out of Afghanistan are putting a serious strain on our fleet.

[Lampshade111]

JamesG123, on Mon 6 Apr 2009 1853, said:

Just because you have poured billions into a project does not mean its now or ever will be a good one.

I think it was a good program all along. Something had to replace the F-15 eventually. Now that we actually got this amazing aircraft into the production stage we should buy a decent amount of them!

Hell, it has had a less troubled development history than the V-22 which was fixed simply by "throwing more money at it."

[Red Ant]

JamesG123, on Tue 7 Apr 2009 0053, said:

Good money after bad.

Just because you have poured billions into a project does not mean its now or ever will be a good one.

What exactly is not good about the F-22 except the cost and schedule overruns?

[T19]

Lampshade111, on Mon 6 Apr 2009 1909, said:

I think it was a good program all along. Something had to replace the F-15 eventually. Now that we actually got this amazing aircraft into the production stage we should buy a decent amount of them!

Hell, it has had a less troubled development history than the V-22 which was fixed simply by "throwing more money at it."

Hell you guys are going to have your own Arrow!!!

That so sucks, and is hard to recover from

[JOE BRENNAN]

Red Ant, on Mon 6 Apr 2009 2235, said:

I'm disgusted. After 2 decades (3?) and billions spent, we will have NOTHING to show for it!

The F-22? We'll have 187 planes (purchased, one lost already) to show for it. The procurement had been officially set at 183 for awhile, though the AF wanted 60 more. People on web boards can propose whatever they want but there was no realistic chance recently of more than the extra 57.

Joe

[Ken Estes]

How strange. There is no reason to think that more F-22s will improve US capabilities. The F-35 replaces many other airframes, which will be up for discard in the next decade. VH-71 was wasteful from the beginning, but there is no reason to funnel its budget into other DOD programs, so why not take the economy?

What part of there is no money for US procurement since 1990 do we not understand? This is only the beginning of what has been required all along. Stand by for more heavy rolls!

At last, we have a SecDef worthy of the name. Now if he would only tackle the fiscal and inventory accountability, even though it cannot be finished during his term [or that of anybody else].

[Kenneth P. Katz]

Why do you say that? The V-22 had a troubled development history but was it atypical for a weapon system of its complexity, ambition and era?

Lampshade111, on Mon 6 Apr 2009 2309, said:

Hell, it has had a less troubled development history than the V-22 which was fixed simply by "throwing more money at it."

[Kenneth P. Katz]

Of course the F-22 improves American capabilities. You can argue that the capabilities are not particularly relevant and there are higher priority uses for those resources, but there is not a serious argument that it is worthless.

Ken Estes, on Tue 7 Apr 2009 0113, said:

How strange. There is no reason to think that more F-22s will improve US capabilities. The F-35 replaces many other airframes, which will be up for discard in the next decade. VH-71 was wasteful from the beginning, but there is no reason to funnel its budget into other DOD programs, so why not take the economy?

What part of there is no money for US procurement since 1990 do we not understand? This is only the beginning of what has been required all along. Stand by for more heavy rolls!

At last, we have a SecDef worthy of the name. Now if he would only tackle the fiscal and inventory accountability, even though it cannot be finished during his term [or that of anybody else].

[Tony Williams]

It will be interesting to see what they do about the Presidential helo. As I understand it, the huge costs were not caused by the airframe chosen, but by all the special equipment they wanted to fit to them. What they need to be looking at is the requirement for all that equipment, because while that remains, the cost of installing it in any helo will be just as great.

[Lampshade111]

Kenneth P. Katz, on Mon 6 Apr 2009 2144, said:

Why do you say that? The V-22 had a troubled development history but was it atypical for a weapon system of its complexity, ambition and era?

Well now that we got the V-22 working, it is an impressive machine and can certainly offer useful capabilities. Indeed, something so revolutionary was likely to run into many delays and problems. Yet I wonder if with the end of the cold war we should have ended that program and put all of that money and effort into other systems. Possibly give Boeing and other companies reasons to develop the technology, but not funding it on such a scale.

Just used my calculator and the 13 billion saved by cutting the VH-71 program could buy 98 more Raptors assuming the price averages out to $132 million per aircraft (current price is said to be $138 million.)

I don't see a reason why the VH-60 type Blackhawks can't serve on for longer. Besides for that either upgrade the VH-3D, or buy two or so basic S-92 (or a similar aircraft in production here) and outfit like the VH-3D instead of trying to turn it into a helicopter AWACS. Was the production line for the AW101/US101 ever setup here or was that "still in progress"?

[JamesR]

Any chance they open the F22 for export to a select few countries?

[Exel]

Axing the F-22 and committing to buy the DDG-1000? WTF?

F-22 is the dumbest cut the DoD could ever make.

[Lampshade111]

Gates really has a grudge against the USAF...

Turns out the FCS vehicles are cancelled... Yet what will he have us get in place of FCS? I don't believe continually upgrading old vehicles is an effective solution.

This post has been edited by Lampshade111: 07 April 2009 - 0803 AM

[Rod]

Not F-22s, but F-15s. F-16s and F/A-18s. Keeping them flying in CAP missions non-stop is accelerating the use of their airframes life. Eventually they will have to be refurbished, money that could have been better spent buying more F-22s AND the upcoming F-35s.

The F-22 in particular is an asymetrical weapon system that single-handly can change the strategic scenario in a comparo of say US. vs. China. With China increasingly spending more of their trillions of dollars into their defense forces and upgrading their Air Force and Air Defense with the best that Russia has to sell, more F-22s increase our overall air supremacy.

Hellfish6, on Mon 6 Apr 2009 1904, said:

You're serious? The GWoT is running our F-22s into the ground?

Yeah, all those high-demand CAP missions to keep the Taliban air force out of Afghanistan are putting a serious strain on our fleet.