Involved in the process. But NOTHING Druyun was involved in had ANY bearing on ANY DECISION reguarding what the new tanker would be.

NOTHING Druyun did convinced ANYONE in the USAF/DOD that the KC-767 was the right tanker. Quite the opposite. The USAF/DOD determined that the KC-767 was the right tanker & tasked Druyun with getting the deal done so that the USAF would get the KC-767.

‘Boeing prepared briefing materials that Druyun presented to lawmakers while seeking congressional approval of the deal and worked with Druyun to refine the wording of legislation that specifically named the company as the beneficiary of the deal. Roche and Sambur later cited that language as the prime reason for favoring Boeing.’

‘Druyun “was accountable for manipulating the congressional language,” the report states.’

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/06/AR2005060601715_pf.html

For what it’s worth, I was actually okay with the “lease” plan, because it got the tankers out the gate more quickly. Failing to recapitalize the fleet is a cost, and it’s a cost that’s very seldom included in analyses; people seem to just assume that our advantages happen because of Magic Freedom Power and we’ll always have them.

So, really, the issue isn’t that the lease was a bad deal. The issue is that everyone in the process assumed that it was a done deal, and it didn’t matter how they did things because everyone would just agree to whatever they said.

Go back & read about the USAF’s tanker recapitalization (which accumulated in the tanker lease & then the KC-X debacle) PRIOR TO 9/11/01!

Druyun played NO ROLE IN ANY DECISION MAKING UNTIL AFTER THE KC-767 HAD BEEN SELECTED. The only role Druyun played in terms of ANY DECISION was on price.

We have something in common then.

Bottom line in my thinking is: US needs to spend more like the Euro zone on things like this. There are no resources.

I am oppoosed to congressman Murtha’s view.

‘How much of Airbus’ “price advantage” comes from the socilaized economies in EADS where they don’t have to cost in employees benefits?‘
Fair point but is hardly Airbus’ fault. Outside of the ‘socilaized economies in EADS’, are Bomardier or Embraer paying the same level of benefits?

The Euro countries will buy new tankers whenever the need arises. UK has bought the A330s, Germany has converted A310s into MRTTs and France may issue an RFP for their Air Force.

If early indicators are correct, painful budget cuts are coming. It makes absolutely zero sense to have one dollar of tax payer money spent on providing EADS the wherewithal to set up facilities in the U.S. to compete with one of our largest exporters–to the detriment of Boeing workers in Kansas and Washington state.

The AMC commander even said he didn’t care which tanker he got, as long as he got one!

At the end of the day, as I noted earlier, this will come down to cost and politics, with a very heavy dose of the latter swaying the decision.

If Murtha is the mood to craft grand political compromises, why not give Alabama a share of the work on the Boeing tanker and buy off Shelby and Sessions?

USAir or whatever it was is called, went Airbus in the late 1990’s, I was doing a bit of consulting in the industry then.

Their financial issues predate the current effects.

I could provide an even better lesson in total ownership costs, and large loads never booked or earning revenues, but I will save my typing.

How much of Airbus’ “price advantage” comes from the socilaized economies in EADS where they don’t have to cost in employees benefits?

I think if aerial tankers have such military utility and the Airbus is such a good solution why don’t the Euro zone nations buy say 60 each and offer to lease them to the USAF?

OK, loggie, now this is freaky… ‘How are you doing?’ Fine, you? Why would I be holding stocks in any US airline? But for your information US Airways is operating A330-300s and had ordered A330-200s in 2007 because ‘The A330-200 with its superior range relative to our existing fleet will allow US Airways to continue international expansion’. Looking simply at trip cost is entirely wrong in assessing the aircraft capability. For example, an A330-300 has lower trip cost than 777-200ER. But the 772 allows to lift higher payload and longer range, returning a bigger profit per trip. Now, you are singling out USAir, specifically because they are operating the A330s, and during the period of the biggest down turn in aviation history where all major US airlines are making a loss, you are asking me how they are doing? That is a bit desperate…

Thank for the physics lesson.

You fail to realize Druyun’s position in the system. SHE HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH THE SELECTION! Her job was to negotiate the details AFTER the selection — or “more accurately” to make sure the deal gets done. You need to go ‘higher up the food chain’ than her to get to someone who truly has ANY influence over the selection process…

Where was Druyun in 1996–2000 (even early 2001) when the USAF was working on a KC-135 replacement?

Before, I left honest employment to do 25 years in acquisition I worked around SAC, and MAC (AMC). I know a little about supporting the tanker and airlift missions, neither are done well by hybrid airplanes like either of the choices. Or the KC 10.

The USAF may want a new tanker/cargo plane, I will refer to as a canker, McCain wants an Airbus canker for his Northrop and former Sen Lott ties, and many want a Boeing canker for jobs in the US.

However, there is no need for either canker to replace the KC 135 tanker for at least twenty years.

The measures of durability on heavy airframes has nothing to do with years, they are cycles and flight hours.

Qantas is flying a 707 airframe with well over 80,000 hours and there are airframes flying with 3 times the cycles that the average KC 135 has done.

The new airplanes are cankerous ‘desires’ to send US taxpayer money needed elsewhere to McCain and Murtha’s PACs. They need to be bought quickly before the reasons for their existence are proven false and the Reaper et. al. eliminate the need for manned attack aircraft.

Murtha is pushing for billions more in unnecessary payments to contractors.

He has been at it for as long as I can remember.

I am not repeating Boeing propaganda.

There is a thing an English fellow named Newton observed in the 17th century, called garvity.

Gravity drives a law of cost: that being; the heavier thing you put in the air the more the things costs to buy and the more it costs to supply with fuel, supply things as well as maintain it.

Something to do with mass (m) times gravity (g).

As to Airbus costing more per flight do you hold stcok in USAir? How are you doing?

Like Spanky I have been around US DoD acquisition for some time say a quater century. Mass is directly proportional to all costs related to aerospace vehicles.

So, when the 25 % heavier Airbus 330 design was claimed to be equal cost, I had to conclude that something was very awry with the USAF Aeronautical System Center calculations.

I had pointed out that you are wrong that Druyun had ‘ZELTCH ZERO NADA to do with the KC-767 being chosen’. You had clearly not read the link I provided. She played a key role BEFORE and DURING the selection. What happened AFTER the selection, was just a ‘thank you’ from Boeing for what happened BEFORE and DURING. Please read a digest the article. Here are a few extracts.

According to an October 27 Washington Post article, Boeing executives met with Darleen Druyun, a senior Air Force acquisitions officer, on September 25, 2001, to discuss how the company could sell the tankers even though the Air Force did not have the funds to cover the deal.
“Druyun agreed at the meeting, according to notes taken by Boeing, not only to promote the leasing idea on Capitol Hill but also to find needed money by cutting back a comparatively inexpensive modernization program for existing tankers’.
——–
“She also said ‘work placement could help’ [promote the deal], meaning that Boeing should ensure that subcontracts were awarded in the districts of key Congress members, according to the notes.”
——–
As the negotiations developed in 2002, Druyun functioned essentially as Boeing’s agent inside the Air Force. This is clear from internal company e-mails obtained by Senate Commerce Committee chairman John McCain, an opponent of the contract.
——–
In a June 2002 e-mail, Bob Gower, Boeing’s vice president for tankers, wrote: “[The] meeting today on price was very good. Darleen spent most of the time bringing the [US Air Force] price up to our number… It was a good day!”
——–
Other e-mails indicate that Druyun had given Boeing information on an Airbus offer to supply tankers to the Air Force at several million dollars less per plane. Divulging such an offer to another contractor is a violation of government regulations.
——–
In October 2002, Druyun took her role in the Air Force negotiations to its logical conclusion, entering into employment discussions with Boeing’s then chief financial officer Michael Sears.

Why is it that people like you ignore that anything happened with the USAF’s tanker recapitalization plans PROPR to 9/11/01?

Druyun was in charge of negotiating the DETAILS of the tanker lease AFTER the KC-767 had already been chosen. Druyun had ZELTCH ZERO NADA to do with the KC-767 being chosen.

***

JB,

No I do not live in Seattle.

I am NOT wrong.

The PRIOR to 9/11/01 Boeing offer of the KC-767 was refused because the USAF wasn’t planning to begin receiving new tankers until 2012. Then AFTER 9/11/01 the US USAF sought to “jump-start” its tanker recapitalization due to a (then) recent study into the KC-135E & the higher than normal operations tempo of post-9/11 operations. If you ready through the documents from 2001 (BOTH before & after 9/11) it is CLEAR that the USAF had already all-but chose the KC-767 having worked towards replacing the KC-135 since 1996. IT WAS THE USAF (October 9, 2001) WHICH ASKED CONGRESS TO INCLUDE “NEDED SUPPORTING LANGUAGE” IN THE 2001 APPROPRIATIONS BILL FOR ITS PLAN TO LEASE KC-767s! And despite the “language” including the KC-767 in it, THERE WAS STILL A COMPETITION FOR THE LEASE IN 2002! The Airbus/EADS KC-330 proposal was rejected becasue it DID NOT FIT the requirements, was too expensive & too risky.

No the NG/EADS offering IS NOT sitting on the tarmac. The NG/EADS KC-30 IS NOT IDENTICAL THE OTHER KC-30’s! If it were it would have ZERO SDD costs.

***

Taxpayer,

No the KC-X Source Selection Team admitted (coincidentally just days before the GOA ruling) that it had errored in its calculation & that the Boeing offer was in fact LESS expensive.

And lest get ANOTHER thing straight. Senator McCain’s concern was with the higher overall cost of the lease vs a straight purchase & that that higher cost was not CONTINUED WITH LATER PROCURED TANKERS.

Sorry but BOTH offers recieved the same risk rating. :)

The GAO DID NOT GO OUT LOOKING to overturn the selection. QUITE THE opposite in fact. THERE ARE VERY STRICK guidelines as to what the GOA can & can not overturn a decision over. That is whay, for example, the GAO included a number of ADDITIONAL concerns over the selection that it did not directly site as a point of sustainment of the protest. AND the GAO was specifically asked about the 8 sustainment points vs the 100 points of protest & it explained NOT ONLY its limited authority but that IT does not look at protest in such as way BUT for those who whish to look at it that way the 8 points the protest WAS sustained over encompass MANY points of contention in the protest. OF course the point that you seem to be incapable of realizing is that JUST AS THE GAO said, if not for the error BOEING COULD HAVE WON but the unfairness of the selection made it such that it could not!

I’m not privvy to which aircraft is better, but I have been involved in Air Force Acquisition Logistics for a few years. The real arguement should be against this crazy idea of buying two different tankers. I guarantee this will more than triple the cost of this program. Not only do you have to buy two sets of everything (support equipment, technical data, spare parts) but you lose out big time on price reductions for “economies of scale” (buying in bulk). This is where the american taxpayer will really take it in the shorts.

Either of these aircraft will do the job. The debate comes down to cost (acquisition and life cycle) and politics.

If the USAF realistically wants a tanker before 2020, the only way forward I see it is to sole source the first hundred or so to Boeing. Airbus and its supporters in Congress simply don’t have the votes. The attendant acrimony, controversy, and sheer ill will generated by another “competition” will divert resources and energy from other pressing matters. There will be a lot of hurt feelings, but it is the only way I see to get a majority of Congress to support funding a new tanker.

By the way, see the latest (un)employment numbers? Want to hear Congressmen Tihart and Dicks rail about the “stimulus package for France”? Think that wouldn’t play in the press?

I don’t but I am not the one implying that:
’…25% heavier Airbus’ has higher ‘supply and maintenance costs’. Hence I asked you about the figures. Since you obviously have none, then I guess you are simply repeating the well established Boeing propaganda. Perhaps the answer to your original question ‘How can an aerospace vehicle which is 25% heavier be cheaper?’ lies with Boeing and you could ask them why they had set out to over charge the US Government, twice.

The Airbus logistics are very well run and their operations of shipping the sub assemblies to China for the A32X and Toulouse for the A380 has given it the necessary experience to repeat the operation for the Mobile FAL. As far as the ‘no existing workforce’ is concerned, I think they have proved that training is extensively covered by their experience of setting up FALs in Hamburg and China.

Jetmech,
’The 727,737,747,757,767 and 777′ s that I worked on were almost indestructible.‘
You mean like if somebody plants a bomb under the plane they will remain intact? Or ‘Wolverine’ like indestructible?
All types of planes are designed to the same set of FAA and EASA requirements, to which they are subsequently certified. I wasn’t aware that ‘indestructibility’ of one of the requirements.