By Emelie Rutherford
Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) has made no conclusions regarding the heated two-way competition for the Air Force aerial refueling tanker contract, though if elected would want to see a more-level playing field in the flawed contest, a campaign adviser said.
Some observers of the paused tanker battle between Boeing [BA] and a Northrop Grumman [NOC]-European Aeronautic Defence and Space Co. (EADS) team have questioned if either Obama or Republican nominee Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), if elected, would favor one competitor over the other. Because the Pentagon halted the solicitation last month, the next president will resume, and likely redefine, the competition.
Richard Danzig, a former Navy secretary and senior Obama campaign adviser, told defense reporters last Thursday that with the tanker battle “people are trying to read the tea leaves with difficulty because we haven’t made the tea.”
He said it’s “not appropriate for a presidential candidate to try and assess a contractual competition” and that he knows Obama “would not assert that as a presidential candidate he should have a view about” how the acquisition process is conducted.
Danzig noted flaws the Government Accountability Office (GAO) found in June with the Air Force’s now-halted February contract award to Northrop Grumman-EADS. The GAO upheld Boeing’s bid protest.
“We have the remarkable, excoriating comments from the GAO in the bid protest noting elemental errors in insufficiencies in the course of the procurement process,” Danzig said.
Asked just how Obama, if elected, would strive to level the playing field with the tanker competition–as some of the Democrats’ supporters have suggested–Danzig pointed to two things: the GAO’s findings and questions surrounding government subsidies awarded to the competitors.
“If you look back at the protest to the GAO and then what the GAO found, it’s instances where a competitor winds up being told one thing and then the evaluation includes other kinds of things,” he said. “It involves instances in which specs are asserted and then new variables are considered. And that creates a very unlevel playing field.”
Danzig also pointed to claims of illegal subsidies. Boeing and its supporters claim the Northrop-Grumman EADS team received illegal European Union (EU) subsidies, and the EU charges Boeing benefited from U.S. government support. The World Trade Organization has not issued decisions on either case yet.
“You need to get those sorted out as well,” Danzig said about the subsidy allegations. “I don’t mean that those need to hold up the tanker procurement, but it’s just another set of issues where we need a leveling of the playing field.”
Danzig said the tanker competition is one of many priorities for the next administration, and that “we would have preferred for this to be resolved earlier.”
Speculation is rampant about any predispositions Obama and McCain might have toward the tanker competition. McCain, notably, helped uncover the scandal earlier this decade related o the Air Force’s planned lease of Boeing aerial refueling tankers. Gov. Kathleen Sebelius (D-Kan.), at the Democratic National Convention in August, reportedly went as far as to say a vote for McCain is a vote against Boeing’s tanker bid. At the time she said Obama would not favor Boeing–which is headquartered in his state–but would level the playing field (Defense Daily, Sept. 2).