Politics at Play in Presidential Helicopter Fleet Program?

If George W. Bush wins re-election in November, odds are he could spend the last few months of his second term being ferried between the White House and Camp David in a largely European helicopter.

In March, the Navy opted to punt the hyper-politicized decision on choosing a company to build the new fleet of presidential helicopters until after the election because, according to service officials, more time is needed to assess technical risks associated with the two machines in the offing — the all-American Sikorsky VH-92 and the US101, a variant of Anglo-Italian AgustaWestland’s EH101. But some Washington insiders theorize the reason is less technical than political, and the hold-up may have more to do with the potential loss of popular support for an incumbent president in an election year.

If Bush really liked Sikorsky’s stars-and-stripes bird, they say, why would the Navy not have given its stamp of approval in April, when the contract was originally slated for award? Sikorsky is responsible for the current fleet of presidential Marine One helicopters and has been building them for more than 40 years. And while the president may be indebted to the United Kingdom and Italy for their support in Iraq, Prime Ministers Tony Blair and Silvio Berlusconi don’t vote in U.S. elections.

But how would it look if the Bush campaign had to defend a decision to send thousands of U.S. jobs and billions of tax dollars to a foreign manufacturer? In addition to the Marine One contract, the VXX design is a potential replacement for the Air Force and Coast Guard H-60 helicopters. The presumptive Democratic challenger, John Kerry, has criticized the president for exporting jobs overseas and could portray the decision as a blow to the working men and women at Sikorsky and its subcontractors.

This whole quagmire could have been avoided if Bush hadn’t put the Navy’s helicopter program on the fast track when he demanded a new presidential helicopter to fly around in. Now his decision to delay the award has endangered the program schedule, setting it back by almost a year, thanks to congressional opportunists who promptly raided the Navy’s fiscal 2005 VXX funding request following the contract’s postponement.

Senate defense authorizers trimmed $145 million from the program in May, a move the Navy says could set back initial operational capability to fiscal 2010. And in June, House and Senate appropriators cut $220 million from the Navy’s VXX request, citing the decision to defer the contract award.

Both Sikorsky and Lockheed Martin Corp., which teamed with the AgustaWestland consortium on the US101, were perplexed by the Navy’s decision. But they are using the extra time to build support among powerful politicians to lobby their cause.

Sikorsky’s helicopters are built in Connecticut, and the state’s congressional delegation, including Republican Reps. Robert Simmons and Christopher Shays, and Democratic Rep. Rosa DeLauro, are firmly behind it.

Lockheed Martin, which leads the multinational US101 team, plans to perform some of the work on its helicopter in Bush’s home state of Texas, as well as upstate New York, where the company has the support of Democratic Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, Republican Rep. Sherwood Boehlert and Republican Governor George Pataki.

Indeed, the stakes are especially high given that, in addition to the $1.6 billion price tag attached to the Marine One fleet, the winning bidder stands to gain another $40 billion in potential search-and-rescue helicopter contracts from both U.S. and overseas buyers.

Lawmakers Prepare to Battle Navy Submarine Decision

As the Navy crafts its fiscal 2006 budget plans this year, submarine proponents worry that an interim study by the Navy budget office could call for maintaining a fleet of fewer than 40 subs, rather than 54. Arguments against a larger fleet include the minor role of submarines in Afghanistan and a lack of funding support from top Navy and Defense Department leaders.

But lawmakers, including Rhode Island Democrats Rep. Jim Langevin and Sen. Jack Reed, are working to quell these concerns as they call for more subs, though they acknowledge the legitimacy of such criticisms given the Navy’s increasingly tight budget. Still, subs have many advocates among powerful lawmakers and military commanders in the field, who assert that submarines could provide more intelligence if the fleet was enlarged.

And while a plan for fewer boats in the future may not affect sub builders in the near-term, some lawmakers worry that fleet shrinkage could jeopardize sub bases in the upcoming round of military base closures in 2005.

CNO ‘Surprised’ by Virginia-Class Cost Growth

Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Vern Clark was “surprised” to learn of additional cost growth in the Virginia-class nuclear-powered fast-attack submarine program. The Navy estimates a $42 million “shortfall” in funding to complete the first hull of the new class, the Virginia. The cost of the second hull, the Texas, has grown an estimated $141.5 million.

The service attributed the rising costs to difficulties encountered during final assembly at General Dynamics Electric Boat in Groton, Conn., and at Northrop Grumman’s Newport News Shipbuilding in Virginia. The Navy also cited “unanticipated labor issues.”

Delivery of the Virginia now is expected early in October, more than three months off the planned date of June 30. Delivery of the Texas could be delayed six months beyond the planned June 2005 date.

While the delays are not expected to damage the new submarine acquisition program, the Navy is concerned about the implications of cost growth, particularly as the service is more than $1.3 billion short of funds to pay for ongoing operations.

“The Navy is determining de-scoping actions, work deferrals and other funding alternatives to mitigate the potential cost increases from within Navy budgets,” Navy spokeswoman Lt. Amy Gilliland told Sea Power.

The Navy is looking for $1.3 billion in fiscal year 2004 to pay the bills for Operation Iraqi Freedom. The service has robbed Peter to pay Paul, reprogramming “a couple hundred million” from the flying hours and steaming days accounts from fiscal year 2005, according to Clark. Also, the Navy has borrowed $300 million from shore structure and other accounts to defray some of the costs of the war.

Clark recently told members of the Senate Armed Services Committee that if the borrowed funds are not replaced in a “bridge to FY 2005,” more money will have to be programmed in the next year’s budget or “readiness levels will be impacted.”

Meanwhile the Joint Staff has a new study going on in undersea warfare. The last such study, completed in 1999, argued for an attack submarine force of at least 55 boats, and an objective of 76 boats to meet all future mission requirements.

Clark said he is waiting for the recommendation of the Joint Staff to determine the size and characteristics of the future submarine force.

“I want to apply to the submarine force the same kind of analytical rigor [to fit the requirements] that we apply to every other platform set,” he told reporters after his July 8 confirmation hearing.

The Navy also is prepared to back away from the overall fleet force structure of 375 ships, which Clark and others had defended in previous years. By the time the fiscal 2006 budget request is finished this winter, Clark plans to announce a new numerical goal for the fleet. The new number would be based on analysis of lessons from war over Iraq and elsewhere.

“Everything that we are going to invest in has got to fight its way into the investment stream,” Clark said.

Community Goes on the Offense To Save Navy Base from BRAC

Norco, a tiny California town that is home to the Corona Division of the Naval Surface Warfare Center, was spared at the 11th-hour during the last round of military base closures that hit the state especially hard in 1995. But this time around, the town is not counting on any sympathy in the 2005 Base Closure and Realignment (BRAC), which is expected to shutter roughly one-quarter of the Pentagon’s current domestic infrastructure.

So the community is mobilizing to shield the base, one of six independent warfare assessment centers in the United States, from the ax. Norco recently hired a lobbyist to influence Washington, and the Pentagon’s decision-making process in particular, focusing on the idea that Corona is the only facility that tests weapons systems from development to operational capability.

The community also claims that the base’s highly skilled civilian employees may not be willing to relocate to one of the other U.S. testing centers. California lawmakers, including Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein, ranking member on the Senate Appropriations Military Construction Subcommittee, are gearing up for a tough battle against BRAC in 2005.

Earlier this year she asked the Pentagon to consider the need to maintain long-term weapons testing facilities and operational ranges, such as the Corona facility in Norco, and stressed that they need to be near major surface and air routes and maintenance facilities.

Reporting by Sea Power Correspondent Amy Klamper. Associate Editor Hunter C. Keeter contributed to this report.