By Marina Malenic
The Defense Department has instructed the Air Force to move ahead with a multibillion-dollar satellite program restructure, admonishing the service for poorly running the program to date.
A first Transformational Communications Satellite (TSAT) should be launched no later than Sept. 30, 2019, according to instructions contained in a Dec. 3 acquisition decision memorandum signed by chief Pentagon arms buyer John Young.
“This time, act immediately on this direction in order to make progress on TSAT and stop poorly using taxpayer dollars,” Young tells Air Force officials in a handwritten note on the memo.
Young has been critical of the service in the past, accusing officials of “playing games” with important military satellite acquisitions and intentionally “short-sheeting” space programs more generally (Defense Daily, Nov. 3).
Lockheed Martin [LMT] and Boeing [BA] were in competition for the TSAT contract. However, Young’s office scrapped the competition in October and called for a restructure of the program.
Earlier in the fall, an Air Force official admitted his concern that the service’s efforts to “protest-proof” the competition might lead to an award delay (Defense Daily, Sept. 26). The service has presided over a number of large, troubled acquisition programs in recent years and was loathe to avoid another embarrassment along those lines, according to the official.
The new constellation was being designed to provide military users with secure communications on the move via lasers instead of radio waves. Senior defense officials decided in October to scale back the vision and use conventional radio waves after all.
“The TSAT program office developed system technical and performance increments to respond to shifting external demands,” Young explains in his memo.
“I direct the Air Force to immediately restructure the TSAT program in accordance with the results of the October 17, 2008 Deputy’s Advisory Working Group and Joint Requirements Oversight Council,” it adds.
A potential contract for the system had been said to be worth some $10 billion.
An Air Force spokesman was unable to say when a revised request for proposals would be released.