When You’re a Jet…

Bidding on U.S. military technology is hardly about the money; it’s about the technology, and if you think that a government vendor bidding on a potential new weapons system is stuck with the dollar cap set out in the bid that may win the contract (where there even is such a dollar bid!!!), well… you would be wrong. The arguments against meeting their bids (again, if they even exist) given by such weapons designers/suppliers fall into any number of excuses… er… categories, but the three most common are (i) with experimental, cutting edge technology, there are always unexpected glitches and setbacks, (ii) these weapons are often profoundly complicated, relying on a synergy among myriad of parallel systems – from hardware to software – that must work perfectly together and are often supplied by different vendors, and (iii) there are always changes are redesigns requested by the military after they see the prototypes and initial design specs in operation.

So the general methodology, after the initial bids that were in the budget Congress voted on are set aside, the general path for advanced systems is a “cost plus” pay-as-you-go structure, hardly a structure that incentivizes budgetary sensitivity. Needless to say, this endless pursuit of complex, coordinated perfection is hideously expensive, even when new philosophies of “shared design and costs” – where different branches of the military adopt differing versions of the same basic technology and/or where our allies pick up some of these costs as well – are implemented. The overages over the initial estimates often skyrocket… not just 10-20%... but 100% or more. Our military cries out to replace aging existing aircraft and to remain competitive against Russian or Chinese advances, creating sneaky stealth planes that can penetrate enemy airspace and unleash pinpoint accurate smart bombs, eliminating strategic targets with little or no risk to the pilot. Or they can launch drones. Hmmmm.

The last fighter created for the new era was the F-22 Raptor, a weapon system caught in a time shift of historical proportions: “When concept development of that stealth fighter began in 1986, the Soviet Union was the enemy and the Air Force needed 750 of the planes for the air-to-air superiority mission. By 1991, when the first development contract was signed, the Soviet Union had collapsed . By 2006, the Air Force cut its needs to 381 F-22s and added air-to-ground attack and intelligence-gathering capabilities… In 2009, faced with several crashes and other problems, plus the oncoming F-35, [Defense Secretary Robert] Gates limited the purchase to 187 F-22s. Reasons given for ending the F-22 program were cost overruns and budget restraints.

“Ironically, the last F-22 came off the Lockheed assembly line [in mid-December] and is to be delivered to the Air Force [in 2012]. Considered a more capable air-to-air combat fighter than the F-35, F-22s have been sent to the Pacific, where their intelligence-gathering is considered useful. Air Force testimony on Capitol Hill in May put the cost of the last F-22s at $153.2 million per aircraft and noted that upgrades were still being made to the plane’s software.” Washington Post, December 23rd.

Ah yes, that F-35 Lightening II (pictured above), the F-22 replacement able to function as a carrier-based aircraft (in its “C” configuration for the Navy), a traditional stealth fighter for the Air Force (“A” configuration) and even a short take-off/landing aircraft for the Marines (“B” configuration). Some of the costs of this plane are being absorbed by our allies (like the U.K.), but it is still alarmingly expensive with $385 billion committed to date. We started off with an order for 3,000 of these expensive puppies, but the orders are tailing off, a little bit at a time. the Navy pulled back 400 of these esoteric planes, and it looks like there are even more reasons to expect further reductions.

The biggest issue it that the design is on-going, and with so many aspects of this plane yet to be finalized, folks are wondering why we are building aircraft now that will need to be retrofitted with these additions in the very near future? “A Government Accountability Office report from April said the forecast was for ‘about 10,000 more [engineering design] changes through January 2016.’ The GAO added, ‘We expect this number to go up given new forecasts for additional testing and extension of system development until 2018.’” The Post.

How do our Congressional experts see the program? “Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) took the Senate floor on Dec. 15 and described the F-35 fighter program as ‘a mess.’… What upset the senator was not just that the cost of each plane had risen nearly 100 percent from its original estimate of $69 million to $133 million today, or the fact that testing was only 20 percent complete while more than 90 planes had already been bought, or the fact that software — key to 80 percent of the stealth plane’s warfighting capability — wouldn’t be ready for another four years.

“McCain faulted the Pentagon for using what he called ‘a concurrent development strategy to procure a high-risk weapon system.’ Production of the first airplanes began as testing was in its infancy…. McCain said the Pentagon was attempting ‘generational leaps in capability’ but at the same time moving before the underlying design was stable. Developing needed technologies and being able to integrate them remain risky and manufacturing processes are still ‘immature,’ he said.” The Post.

Is there a solution to this excess, particularly since we appear to be moving over to a program of missile/smart bomb-carrying unmanned drones? “In his new book, ‘The Wounded Giant,’ Brookings Institution senior fellow Michael O’Hanlon calls for cutting the overall purchase to 1,250, canceling the more costly Navy version, reducing the Marine Corps F-35Bs by 10 percent or more, and limiting the Air Force to 800 F-35As. The difference would be made up by buying more F-16s and recognizing the role of unmanned aircraft.” The Post. Can we really afford to continue this tradition of building soon-to-be obsolete weapon systems on a “cost plus” basis? And what exactly are we not spending that money on that may in fact be necessary to sustain a nation worthy of such incredible protection? And exactly how does the new proclivity to fight wars with unmanned aircraft fit into this paradigm?

Feeling a little squirmy about your tax dollars? How about the Navy’s own estimates of the cost of the next generation of aircraft carriers, the Gerald R. Ford class (CVN-78 in Navy parlance), the first of six such vessels on order: “In 2008, the Navy projected $3.3 billion in research and development costs and $10.5 billion for procurement of CVN-78. The Congressional Budget Office put the procurement figure at $11.2 billion, while the GAO a year earlier said the ‘shipbuilder’s initial cost estimate for construction was 22 percent higher than the Navy’s cost target . . . [and] the actual costs to build the ship will likely increase above the Navy’s target.’…

“The Navy budgeted CVN-78 ‘to the 40th percentile of possible cost outcomes,’ according to former representative Joe Sestak (D-Pa.), who should know because he was at one time a vice admiral whose last major post was as deputy chief of Naval Operations for Warfare Requirements and Programs. Sestak further explained that the 40 percent confidence level meant ‘there is a 60 percent probability that the final cost of the CVN-78 will exceed the service’s estimate,’ something he had written in an article in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette in August.

“They have. The Navy’s projected cost for CVN-78 ‘grew by 10 percent between the president’s 2008 and 2012 budget requests’ and is now $12 billion — the amount CBO estimated two years ago. And cost growth is not over. A GAO report in March said that the 2010 shifting of the Ford-class program from a four-year to a five-year building cycle could increase costs ‘by 9 to 15 percent.’ But while increasing the cost of each ship, the Navy said the change ‘facilitates a reduced average yearly funding’ over a longer period of time… While a congressman, Sestak introduced legislation requiring disclosure of confidence levels for major defense acquisition programs. He included language that would require cost-estimation oversight if the confidence level was below 80 percent. It did not pass.” Washington Post, December 29^th.

So much for controlling costs! And that’s just jets and jet carriers. Can we really afford to continue spending like this? Does it really matter that the United States hasn’t won a major war since WWII despite spending 47% of the world’s military expenditures?

I’m Peter Dekom, and as much as our military claims we “need” such weapon systems, they may eventually bankrupt and thus destroy the very nation they were designed to protect.