I say Hooray for NG/EADS! Boeing need to stop bitching about "unfair" practices when it uses tactics that effectively locks out competition, more than a bit hypocritical. Daddy-DOD's plastic doesn't come with unlimited credit anymore. The USAF obviously made the better choice. I find it even more remarkable considering how Boeing itself has outsourced jobs for aircraft parts to Europe and elsewhere. Interesting article I dug up last night:
from 2004
WASHINGTON - The Air Force gave the Boeing Co. five months to rewrite the official specifications [...] so that the company's 767 aircraft would win a $23.5 billion deal, [...].
In the process, Boeing eliminated 19 of the 26 capabilities the Air Force originally wanted, and the Air Force acquiesced in order to keep the price down.
The Air Force then gave Boeing competitor Airbus 12 days to bid on the project and awarded the contract to Boeing even though Airbus met more than 20 of the original 26 specifications and offered a price that was $10 billion less than Boeing's.
[...]
But the e-mails and other documents show just how intent the Air Force was on steering the deal to Boeing, even though Airbus' tankers were more capable and cost less.
In one document, Bob Gower, Boeing's vice president for tankers, noted that one objective in rewriting the specifications was to "prevent an AoA from being conducted." "AoA" stands for "analysis of alternatives" or, in essence, a look at serious competitors.
[...]
"This was a negotiation between the Air Force and Boeing; they weren't giving it to Airbus," said Steven Schooner, [...]. "It definitely lends support to the generally accepted reflection that this was never intended to be an open competition.
"In a competitive procurement, you don't let one of the competitors write this because it gives them a competitive advantage," Schooner said.
Senate investigators have plowed through some 8,000 pages of Boeing documents that were so embarrassing and revealing that the company last year fired one of its vice presidents, Darleen Druyun. Druyun had been an Air Force acquisitions officer involved in negotiations on the tanker deal. Boeing also fired its chief financial officer, who had hired Druyun. Boeing chairman and chief executive Phil Condit also left the company in an attempt to help Boeing put the scandal behind it and get the deal back on track. "
I also find it hilarious how, despite Airbus being a European-wide consortium the French are always singled out. Last I checked, the French are using and holding on to their Boeing tanker aircraft, but you don't hear them screaming about it. The global market works both ways. Boeing shouldn't complain, it has enough orders on contract right now to keep it going quite safely for the next decade and beyond.
Besides, I doubt you hear the folks in Alabama and the Gulf region complain about their news jobs. Instead of rolling around and crying like little babies, perhaps Boeing could take this opportunity to straighten itself up a bit and find a better approach to things. Boeing dug it's own hole, so stop blaming Airbus/France/Europe for it's corporate problems. It's amazing to me why Boeing didn't push their new 777 for this project!
I can recall hearing on NPR last week a very interesting report on the run-up to the USAF decision, and Washington congressman Dick Norm, the "congressman from Boeing" as he is sometimes called, held a pro-Boeing rally. The audio clip was telling - Not really knowing how to begin, Rep. Norm decided to spend much of his opening monologue by whipping up the crowd with anti-French "jokes" and slurs.
how pathetic.