SEC. GATES: The Bush administration opposed this engine. The Obama administration opposes it. We have recommended for several years now against funding this engine, considering it a waste of money. And to argue that we should add another $3 billion in what we regard as waste to protect the billion and a half (dollars) that we believe already has been wasted, frankly, I don't track the logic.
Let me just say we think -- with respect to the -- to the proposal for the alternate engine, we think the proposal is based on unrealistic cost estimates. We do believe that the full-up costs for us are about $2.9 billion. This department has a long and unhappy experience with overly optimistic contractor estimates.
The proposal does provide a fixed price, but not for the engine we need. The proposed engine is based on the design they currently have on the test stand, which we are deeply concerned may not meet the performance needs of the Joint Strike Fighter. Any cost to take the design to required JSF performance levels would presumably be paid by taxpayers.
The current engine -- their current engine, the alternate engine proposal, the engine is far less mature than the JSF engine. The proposed engine is still in development, has about 200 hours of testing compared to 13,000 for the F-135. Even the immature engines in the proposal would be more expensive than the JSF engine during the critical period of the program. And finally, the GE proposal assumes receiving a guaranteed buy of over half the JSF engines for three years in order to allow them to catch up.
As I've said before, only in Washington does a proposal where everybody wins get considered a competition, where everybody is guaranteed a piece of the action at the end. Yeah, we're in favor of competition. But my idea of competition is winner takes all, and we don't have that kind of a situation here.
Q Is there a safety readiness and operational readiness concern that the alternate engine may actually boost operational readiness?
SEC. GATES: I don't think that anybody -- I haven't heard that argument by anybody.
ADM. MULLEN: I mean, I have no concern. The services have not expressed that concern. We've flown with single engines historically and done so very well.
Joint Chiefs Chairman Mike Mullen testifies before the House Armed Services Committee on February 16, 2011
ADM. MULLEN: One of the things that we do in this town is we focus on getting stuff out the door as opposed to what it costs for life cycle. And this -- and it certainly applies on aircraft carriers, but it applies actually in all three services. This is two separate lines, two separate training, two separate maintenance manuals, two separate supply sources, all those kinds of things. And they lag each other significantly. I mean, I've been doing money a long time. I cannot make sense out of this second engine. It is two to three years behind. It's not going to compete, quite frankly. We cannot afford to buy the second engine, I mean, from my perspective. And there have been multiple airplanes that are single- engine airplanes that are single source. So I don't accept it; 95 percent of the fleet is going to go down at once. It just doesn't happen. We're better than that. If -- you know, the first engine will be, I think, more than adequate to meet the needs that we have for that airplane. And if I thought any different, I would, you know, be encouraging this engine, the second engine. I just categorically can't see that it's going to make any difference. It's going to cost us a lot of money, not just to get it out at the door, but over the life of its -- over the life cycle.
Today’s House vote on the Rooney-Larson Amendment to H.R. 1 offers the first true test of Washington’s seriousness towards cutting deficits and ending earmarks. Fiscal conservatives are unanimous in supporting this Amendment, and many will be scoring it for their annual ratings of Congress:
American Action Forum’s Doug Holtz-Eakin: "Buying two engines is not real competition and does not lower costs. It is a test of the spending discipline of both parties to defeat this amendment." (2/15/2011)
National Taxpayer’s Union: “A ‘YES’ vote on the Rooney-Larson-Westmoreland-Pingree-Griffin Amendment to H.R. 1 will be significantly weighted as a pro-taxpayer vote in our annual Rating of Congress.” (2/15/2011)
Americans for Tax Reform: “The CR currently contains funding for the wasteful Joint Strike Fighter F136 alternative engine, a program the Department of Defense has routinely argued it doesn't need or want.” (2/15/2011)
Freedom Works: “The current engine for the JSF has already proven to be sufficient for our defense needs, spending over $2.5 billion on an additional engine is wasteful and unnecessary.” (2/15/2011)
American Conservative Union’s David Keene: “The three billion dollars that supporters of this program are seeking for a favored contractor through the earmark process is money that the White House and the Pentagon under both Republican and Democratic Presidents feel does not need to be spent for any valid national security or defense purpose.”
Citizen’s Against Government Waste: “The decision on funding the alternate engine will be one of many tests to determine whether the talk about cutting waste by the incoming House Republican majority is rhetoric or reality.” (12/22/2010)
Cal Thomas (USA Today): “The alternate engine for the Joint Strike Fighter is the military’s version of a Bridge To Nowhere.” (8/26/2010)
Poor General Electric. Sure, they generated $150 billion in revenue last year, squirreled away $79 billion in cash and equivalents, as well as boast $175 billion in backlog (which sure is a lot of light bulbs and dishwashers). But forget all that, not to mention the double-digit growth year on year. Instead, GE sheds crocodile tears over the “barrage of attacks” they’ve apparently suffered while trying to justify the unwanted, unnecessary and unaffordable F136 extra engine.
GE’s response has been swift, though it’s come from the rhetoric department, rather than engineering. While Pratt & Whitney’s F135 continues to power every F-35 flight and the F136 languishes on the test stand, GE has turned up the heat (they make nifty ovens too) through an ad campaign that sadly falls far short of the term self-cleaning. So let’s debunk three of the most egregious myths.
One frequent refrain of recent GE/Rolls-Royce ads concerns a so-called $100 billion monopoly. In fact, page 9 of a GAO report dated March 24, 2010 lists the figure at $60 billion, half of which is sustainment often performed at government depots. Of the remaining $40 billion, only about $20 billion covering initial engines and spares would be available for competition.
Another misleading claim is that F-35 competition will save $20 billion. The closest GAO comes to estimating savings is that “it may be reasonable to expect savings of” 10-12%. Applied to our $20 billion figure above, maximum savings would be $2.4 billion during 25 years of production. In reality, the extra cost of fielding two engines in a 50/50 split buy environment will likely negate any savings.
Last, but sadly not least, is the spurious charge about a $2.5 billion F135 cost overrun. The fact is $1.7 billion of this alleged cost growth comes from new scope directed by the government. Of the remaining $800M, approximately one third is attributed to the lift system hardware developed by Rolls-Royce as a subcontractor to Pratt & Whitney for the F-35B STOVL variant. The same Rolls-Royce who is partnered with GE on the F136! Wonder what that says about the future cost growth of the extra engine!
We could go on, but to read our previous myth debunking blogs about competition, risk and the industrial base, please click here.
Put aside the clever visuals, headlines and body copy and some basic facts remain irrefutable. First, the F135 was chosen through marketplace competition at the contractor level years ago. Second, its performance since that time has garnered all necessary government certifications. Third, two presidents representing both major parties, their secretaries of defense and senior leaders in the Pentagon have all advocated killing the F136. Fourth, one engine provider is the norm for DOD aircraft, a situation that has given GE roughly 75% of the military engine business from Apache helicopters to F/A-18 fighter jets.
Such a dominant position should allow GE to put away the handkerchief and perhaps discontinue using the “hot air fluff cycle” too.
The last Lockheed Martin F-35B Lightning II assigned to developmental flight testing departs Naval Air Station Fort Worth Joint Reserve Base on its first flight Thursday, January 27, 2011.
The F135 Engine is the ONLY engine powering the Joint Strike Fighter through all of its flight testing.
Rep. Tom Rooney (R-FL) is out with a letter to his colleagues, urging them to support cancellation of the wasteful extra engine for the Joint Strike Fighter.
*A Common Sense Approach to Trimming the Defense Budget* From: The Honorable Thomas J. Rooney Date: 1/28/2011 *Oppose Funding for the "Extra" Engine*
Dear Colleague:
At a time when our country is facing a projected $1.5 trillion deficit, it is extremely critical that we spend every taxpayer dollar wisely. In the area of defense spending, a dollar wasted is a dollar that we will not have for vital equipment to keep our country and troops safe. Unfortunately, Congressional earmarks in the Pentagon’s budget have led to wasted money and unnecessary, duplicative programs.
For example our next generation fighter jet, the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter is currently in production, and will replace many of our military’s aging aircraft. The F-35 has proven successful during flight testing with its current engine, yet Congress continues to earmark funding for a second, “alternate” engine in the defense budget year after year.
General Electric/Rolls Royce claims that with an additional $1.8 billion they will be able to field the extra engine for the F-35; the trouble is we have heard this before. In 2008 GE spokesperson Rick Kennedy stated: “…$1.1 billion still needed in U.S. funding to deliver a fully competitive unit.” Three years of defense dollars has gotten us no closer to a working engine and GE/Rolls Royce continues to ask for more earmarked spending.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates has repeatedly stated that he is opposed to the development of a second engine for the F-35. U. S. Air Force Lt. Gen. Mark Shackelford and Maj. Gen. Johnny Weida said the alternate engine is “…unnecessary, too costly, and risks diverting resources from production.” Marine Corps Brig. Gen. David Heinz stated that funding the alternate engine project would “take 50 to 80 tails out of the program.”
Spending billions on a duplicative program does not efficiently utilize our defense budget to best serve our men and women in uniform. The extra engine will not make our country any safer, but instead will take limited resources away from our troops.
I plan to oppose continued funding for this wasteful program, and I urge my colleagues to join me in calling for the program’s elimination.
Call me crazy, but I thought last November's election delivered an unambiguously clear message from voters of both parties plus highly coveted independents that the old ways of Washington, from backroom deals through wasteful earmarks, needed to be reformed once and for all. And, yes, some initially promising steps were taken beginning in the waning days of the 111th Congress.
Yet, if you look closer, it becomes apparent that the real-life home makeover of Congress has stalled following the delivery of new window dressings, especially when it comes to judicious use of the family piggy bank.
And if ever there was a prime example of wasteful spending, it's the F136 extra engine for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. Despite losing multiple down-select decisions to Pratt & Whitney's F135 (which has since powered every JSF flight, earned all necessary government certifications, and made a smooth transition to production), the F136 continues its zombie-like march, consuming billions of taxpayer dollars along the way while providing absolutely nothing in return.
Why has Congress allowed this travesty to continue unabated? Surely, voters don't want their legislators to further perpetuate monumental waste on the F136. After all, the past two presidents have tried to cancel it, plus civilian and military leadership at the Pentagon have said they don't need it, don't want it and won't use it.
Even worse, the defense bill in the last Congress did not authorize the F136, the Senate has specifically singled it out to be de-funded,and President Obama has repeatedly vowed to veto any bill that included it.
So, what keeps the F136 alive, despite being inherently duplicative and years behind the proven F135? Sadly, it comes down to politics as usual. Apparently, the Republican commitment to cut wasteful spending stops at their respective district boundaries when pie-in-the-sky promises are made. It's hard to draw any other conclusion, based on successful lobbying by General Electric of House Speaker John Boehner and others, combined with Rolls-Royce's skillful wooing of Majority Leader Eric Cantor, Rep. Mike Pence plus the House of Commons (whose interest let's remember is British jobs, not American ones).
Over the years, the F136 has become the quintessential earmark: kept alive by spending that is not authorized, nor requested by the Obama administration. Yet, it survives despite strong rhetoric from House and Senate GOP leaders who have made a big show of eschewing earmarks. If only irony wasn't so recklessly expensive.
One has to wonder if the new 112th Congress arrived for their opening night performance forgetting the lines voters so tightly scripted for them. Admittedly, these are still early days, yet this is clearly not the show for which we bought very expensive tickets. As those of us with theatre backgrounds know, today's hit can find itself cancelled well before its intended run is complete. Today's cast now just hitting the stage would be well served to remember who paved their way to stardom. Now is not the time to lose the plot.
Rep. Pete Stark criticizes colleagues who say they want to cut spending but continue to support "extra planes and engines the Pentagon doesn't even want".
Rachel Maddow and NBC's Michael Isikoff discuss what's been keeping the extra engine for the Joint Strike Fighter alive after it was targeted for cancellation by the White House and the Pentagon.
MADDOW: One of the great unanswered questions of 2011 is whether or not the new supposed anti-spending zealotry in Washington this year means that defense will be cut, too or whether defense gets to keep growing indefinitely - indefinitely, inexorably because we`re all still living in the world Ike described 50 years ago.
Michael Isikoff, NBC`s national investigative correspondent, has been looking into the new Congress and its approach to historically untouchable, uncuttable(ph) spending. Mike, thanks very much for joining us. What have you been finding?
MICHAEL ISIKOFF, NBC NATIONAL INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Rachel, what I`ve been finding is the military industrial complex that Dwight Eisenhower warned about is as awesome and as powerful as ever.
And we`ve seen some pretty dramatic examples in just the last two weeks. Secretary Gates announced that he wanted to cut some $78 billion from the Pentagon budget, unnecessary, unneeded programs.
And you would think in this current environment in which cutting discretionary spending has been identified across the board as the absolute number one priority in Washington, he would get a receptive hearing.
In fact, what he got was a ferocious pushback from members of Congress who have gotten generous campaign checks from defense contractors who would be identified for cutting and/or who have defense plants in their district which would lose jobs.
It`s the military industrial complex in full play. Two examples that really left out - one is that Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle for the Marines that you mentioned, and we`ll get to that in a moment.
Another one that`s pretty interesting is the alternate engine for the joint strike fighter brought to you by General Electric, which, of course, owns this network for at least currently, and Rolls Royce.
In both cases, and certainly in the joint strike fighter case, both the Bush administration and the Obama administration targeted this for elimination saying we don`t need two engines for the same airplane. It creates all sorts of logistical problems. It`s a waste of money.
And in fact, Congress consistently has pushed back, both getting - both because of large campaign checks and also a ferocious and awesome lobbying campaign by General Electric and Rolls Royce.
In fact, one kind of an example that I thought was kind of fun is, right now, everybody in Washington reads that "Politico" Mike Allen`s playbook every morning. Well, all last week, the week after Gates made his announcement, you would have gotten that playbook sponsored by GE and Rolls Royce plugging the alternate engine for the joint strike fighter.
Who is for the joint strike fighter? Well, let`s start with the Speaker of the House, John Boehner. He said in an interview with Brian Williams two weeks ago that cutting defense spending would be on table.
But he`s a big supporter of the alternate engine. Why? The Evendale, Ohio plant where the engine is primarily made, right outside his district. Who else? House Majority Leader Eric Cantor. He`s got a Rolls Royce plant in his district.
Who else? Mike Pence, the deficit hawk, arch-deficit hawk, got a Rolls Royce plant in his district in Indiana. Now, it`s one to be bipartisan about this.
Among those who are trumpeting pushing hard last week, writing the White House letters on this to release funding for the joint strike fighter, Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown in Ohio, trying to protect those jobs in Ohio. It`s the military industrial complex at work.
MADDOW: But Mike, you mentioned the Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle as well. We highlighted that as a stupidity test for Congress. Who is going to fight to safe this very expensive, over-budget thing that doesn`t really work, that the military doesn`t want? Do we have results yet on that stupidity test?
ISIKOFF: Yes, we do. And I`m afraid some of the very same characters, Sherrod Brown, Democratic senator from Ohio. Why? Lima, Ohio has one of the plants that the EFV is being made.
But who else? The chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, Howard McKeon, and the chairman of the subcommittee that oversees it, Aiken of Missouri, both got maxed-out contributions from the maker of the EFV, General Dynamics.
And by the way, if you were looking for any better example of the military industrial complex, take a look at General Dynamics, a company that spends millions on campaign contributions, millions on lobbying Congress. And just for fun, I looked at its board of directors the other day. And of the 10 board of directors, at least five former admirals, former generals, top Pentagon officials, the revolving door from the Pentagon and the military to the defense establishment helping to keep those defense dollars flowing.
MADDOW: Michael Isikoff, NBC`s national investigative correspondent, I`ve been looking forward to getting your report on this for a very long time since I knew it was coming. Mike, thanks a lot. I really appreciate it.
You’ve been told: P&W’s engine to power the JSF is already 2.5$ Billion over budget with more than $1 billion in overruns within the past year.
You should know: $1.78 of this alleged overrun is the result of new requirements ordered by the Pentagon because of added weight to the aircraft. Of the remaining $800M, approximately one third is attributed to the lift system hardware developed by GE’s partner Rolls Royce as a subcontractor to P&W.
Additional costs were attributed to a redesign of the third stage turbine blade in 2009. This redesign was a normal part of development and test of propulsion systems and yields a safer, more reliable engine.
Pratt & Whitney has worked very aggressively through the last year to bring down our engine costs. We have invested significantly towards achieving our cost reduction goals. The F135 is on track to meet its cost targets and the Joint Assessment Team agrees that we have an executable plan as demonstrated in our most recent contract proposal which offers a double digit percentage savings to the government. The Joint Assessment Team which evaluated cost and affordability of the F135 program validated that Pratt & Whitney’s cost reduction plan was achievable, and in the DoD response to the GAO report said “Pratt & Whitney can realistically achieve their cost goals.”
The additional funding provided to Pratt & Whitney in 2010 is to support the extension of the F-35 flight test program following the program’s restructuring.ItIS NOT related to development of the F135 engine.(Pratt defends cost-cutting measures on F-35 engine, Reuters, 3/12/10)
You’ve been told: GE Rolls-Royce F136 engine performs better and costs less.
You should know:An engine that hasn’t left the ground can’t perform better.TheF135 is in production, in the air and the only engine powering the F-35 today.
You’ve been told: Competition will fix P&W’s cost overruns.
You should know: Competition Already Determined the Winner. Competition for the JSF engine happened at the contractor level when competing airframers selected a P&W engine under government rules. This process of selecting subsystems, including the engine, as part of the overall weapon system, is standard during concept demonstration. The DoD has concluded that further competition will NOT save taxpayer dollars. No other military aircraft developed in the past three decades has been procured with multiple engine suppliers. There is no extra engine for the F-22, F/A-18, C-17 or the BlackHawk and Apache military helicopters. GE thinks the government should pick the winners and losers.Pratt & Whitney believes the marketplace should pick the winners and losers.
Against all odds, the lame-duck session marking the post-election end to the 111th Congress proved surprisingly productive with just enough bipartisanship to mark the passage of numerous high-profile bills for President Obama to sign into law.
Yet, attempts by some in Congress to push a wasteful $1.1 trillion omnibus spending bill have thankfully been turned back by Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine). These two principled New Englanders understand that rushing a bad bill with more than 6,600 earmarks and a cost of $8.6 billion was far worse than simply passing the National Defense Authorization Act, which the House finally did with just hours to spare.
Chief among the waste that needs to be cut in 2011 is nearly half a billion dollars for the GE/Rolls-Royce F136 extra engine, which is years behind Pratt & Whitney’s proven F135 now in production. Moreover, the F136 continues to suffer numerous developmental setbacks, adds no additional capability, complicates future military logistics, creates no net jobs since the number of F-35 aircraft will not change, and diverts vital funds that could support the warfighter in countless other ways. No wonder this engine has been opposed vigorously by Presidents Bush and Obama, their defense secretaries and military service chiefs, along with a coalition of third parties that spans the political spectrum from organized labor to fiscal conservatives.
As our recent ads in the Hartford, Connecticut and Portland, Maine daily newspapers note, we appreciate Sen. Lieberman and Snowe’s “vigilance and astute stewardship of the American taxpayer’s money.” Clearly, government agencies need a predictable and transparent funding stream; this is especially true for the Defense Department as they continue to wage war in southwest Asia. But in an age of unprecedented belt-tightening and voter discontent with politics as usual, a bloated omnibus bill infected with thousands of earmarks totaling billions of dollars was simply irresponsible, as would continuation of the F136 through the NDAA or other means.
As the holiday break ends and the new 112th Congress take their seats, they should seriously consider what “gifts” they bestow on themselves, our warfighters and the American taxpayers. Wasteful earmarks like half a billion dollars for the F136 extra engine aren’t just woefully out of style or even a souring lump of coal. They are the dreaded leftover fruitcake no one can swallow.
It’s an undeniable fact that the aerospace and defense industry provides some of our nation’s most vital and valued jobs. Any new aircraft that takes to the skies to move people and cargo or defend the nation is a testament to the skilled labor of love by thousands of engineers, machinists, test pilots, sales and support staff, as well as government overseers. And the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter is no exception. Thanks to a strong team at the Department of Defense, Lockheed martin, Pratt & Whitney and hundreds of suppliers, the F-35 will deliver unmatched capability for the U.S. and its allies for decades to come.
Yet, if the F136 extra engine team had their way, nearly 40 percent of the jobs to bring their underperforming, over-budget engine to market – through the discredited earmark process no less – would be outsourced to England, which isn’t a state the last time I checked my trusty desktop atlas.
That’s the simple point made in Pratt & Whitney’s latest print ad, which has garnered support from the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers District 26 and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters. Organized labor understands that high value aerospace jobs are an irreplaceable strategic asset, especially when unemployment stands at 9.8% and 15.1 million American citizens remain out of work.
Meanwhile, the Pratt & Whitney F135 engine goes from strength to strength. Over the holiday break, Initial Service Release for the F135 Short Take-Off/Vertical Landing variant was achieved as anticipated. This milestone means the propulsion system is now certified as the production configuration and cleared for flight in the Lockheed Martin F-35B stealth fighter.
We also sold our first two STOVL production propulsion systems and delivered them to Lockheed Martin in December. Of the 12 production engines delivered to date, eight have already been installed in their respective aircraft, while negotiations for an LRIP 4 contract have moved from a “cost plus” to a firm fixed price basis.
Not content to rest on our laurels, Pratt & Whitney is taking aggressive steps to work from Pentagon acquisition chief Dr. Ashton Carter’s “will cost” curve and looking for additional opportunities to lower prices, The company plans to sell the F135 at the same cost as the F-22 powering F119 by the 250th engine, which is significant since the F135 is 1,500 pounds heavier and generates 25% more thrust.
Bottom line, Pratt & Whitney’s engine is real, gaining its last ISR certification, performing at a 98% readiness level, and being installed in an increasing number of production aircraft. It simply makes no sense to cut deliveries of this proven engine in favor of the F136 that is years behind, seemingly always “just one more billion dollars” from completion, living off of wasteful earmarks, and inherently duplicative – except when it comes to the ever-present issue of American jobs. On that last topic, the F136 falls on the wrong side of the pond and as they say in Britain, that’s just not cricket.
On Sunday's This Week With Christiane Amanpour, White House economic adviser Austan Goolsbee responds to ABC's Jake Tapper's question about fat in the budget (spending discussion begins at 6:30) :
Tapper: Where specifically does President Obama want to cut spending? Where is there fat to cut from the budget?
Goolsbee: Well, as you know the President's going to release his budget. We are going to have to make in the immediate run a series of tough choices. And the President's not afraid to do that and I think you will see that in his budget.
Tapper: Give me one. One spending cut the President's willing to do.
Goolsbee: Well, last year you saw they put out $20 plus billion in terminations and reductions. The President obviously doesn't just get to dictate what those cuts would be, but you saw with the Joint Strike Fighter second engine and a series of other specific cuts.
So I totally get why having two manufacturers make two different engines for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter makes so much sense.
Oh sure, the Pentagon and all the services say they don’t want or need an extra engine that they can’t afford, but really, what do they know? Blah, Blah, Blah…
When I was at the Pentagon I sat down with then Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England back in 2008, he explained in great detail how the second engine would not actually save money, improve reliability or increase safety. But really, he was in the Bush Administration, and so was Bob Gates, who opposes the extra engine, too. Do they really know what’s best?
And sure the whole idea of the F-35 was to give every service the same basic plane, with variations, so that you could have one common supply chain and training for mechanics.
But for only an extra $2.9 Billion we the taxpayers can have two production lines, two supply chains and two sets of military maintenance personnel. What a deal! As they sang in the old Doublemint chewing gums commercials, “Double your pleasure, double your fun…”
In Pratt & Whitney’s latest print ad, entitled “Monumental Waste,” the company cleverly reminds Washington lawmakers and other key audiences that despite all the diversionary tactics employed by the GE/Rolls-Royce F136 team, their engine simply attempts to duplicate what the F135 already does, just like a mythical second Washington Monument on the National Mall. Such needless waste, at least $2.9 billion more according to the Defense Department, to stage a farcical split-buy “competition” years from now flies in the face of long-standing, bipartisan presidential and Pentagon policy, as well as basic common sense.
As James Hackett noted in a November 18tharticle in The Washington Times, “With the Congressional Budget Office forecasting a $1.3 trillion deficit next year, for the third year in a row of trillion-plus deficits, the Senate action [eliminating additional F136 funding] makes sense. We no longer can afford such costs for hypothetical future savings.”
Yet, some members of Congress, including on the House Armed Services Committee, are so bewitched by the F136 mirage that they are trying to insert – yes, you guessed it – an earmark potentially valued at $465 million into a continuing resolution. This parochial tactic is usually reserved for appropriation bills, not continuing resolutions. Moreover, doing so would betray recent post-election commitments to American taxpayers to pursue a path of fiscal prudence, most notably the abolition of wasteful earmarks.
To make matters worse, GE is seeking $25 million in new tax credits from Massachusetts in return for laying off fewer people than planned in the months to come. This cynical ploy becomes even more distasteful when you take into account the $1.8 billion in military work done at a plant in Lynn, Massachusetts. Yet the corporation still laid off 600 workers there and paid no federal income tax last year on $11 billion in profits by claiming its U.S. operations lost money overall. Undaunted, GE fights on to preserve the unaffordable and underperforming F136 extra engine. Boston Globe columnist Joan Vennochi put it succinctly on November 21 when she wrote, “In other words, GE is demanding $25 million in tax credits for a plant that makes jet engines the Pentagon doesn’t need or want.”
Thanksgiving may be over, but clearly there is at least one more turkey still hanging around. The F136 and the shameful politics that keep it alive have more than earned their just desserts.
As new, predominantly conservative members of the 112th Congress arrive in Washington and begin their freshman orientation, they might find that a prime example of wasteful earmarks in an era of nearly unprecedented economic and geopolitical challenges is closer than they thought. Numerous otherwise well-intentioned legislators from both parties are preaching fiscal restraint while at the same time supporting a further $2.9 billion through FY2015 for the unnecessary, unwanted, underperforming and unproven General Electric/Rolls-Royce F136 extra engine for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter.
Not surprisingly, a chorus of fiscal conservatives has joined two consecutive presidential administrations and the Pentagon leadership in an unambiguous call to end a multi-billion dollar gamble whose only assured outcome is the outsourcing of hundreds of aerospace jobs to the United Kingdom. We’ve highlighted some of these “voices from the right” in one of our newest print ads.
Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform was unequivocal when he urged members of Congress over the summer to “vote against any funding for the F136 engine program.” He added, “There is nothing competitive about an entrenched political subsidy for an unnecessary and unwanted product.”
Conservative syndicated columnist and radio host Cal Thomas called the F136, “The military’s version of a Bridge to Nowhere,” a reference to one of the most infamous examples of earmarks in contemporary American politics. Like that would-be bridge, the F136 would merely duplicate a proven solution (Pratt & Whitney’s F135 engine) with something far more expensive and immature.
Keeping his eye on the big picture, Pete Sepp of the National Taxpayers Union, noted, “It’s time to get out of the alternate engine morass and instead work harder to keep the whole F-35 program on-time and on-budget.” As Mr. Sepp rightly acknowledges, the F-35 and other weapon systems will only prove their value to the warfighter and taxpayer if they are fully developed and deployed. The U.S. Navy and Marine Corps have already said there is no room for a second engine on their aircraft carriers and the U.S. Air Force surely can’t relish the prospect of repeating the F-16 nightmare of supporting two different engines across the globe. Yet, that’s precisely what the myopic GE/RR F136 team would foist on America.
Last, but certainly not least, FreedomWorks President Matt Kibbe concluded, “GE typifies the large rent-seeking companies that wage battle not in the marketplace, but in the halls of Congress. Taxpayers and consumers cannot afford to fund the pet projects of politicians and corporations, especially in an economic downturn.” Kibbe’s comment rings especially true because the competition to power the JSF was waged years ago and culminated in multiple decisions in favor of the Pratt & Whitney F135 over the F136 through the widely accepted Contractor Furnished Equipment (CFE) procurement system.
Following a rancorous midterm election cycle, the time to govern will soon begin for the 112th Congress. For Capitol Hill veterans and newcomers alike, fiscal restraint at home and success on the battlefield should be of paramount importance. Taxpayers and warfighters want to believe their leaders, like their doctors, are committed above all to “First, do no harm.” Surgical removal of the unwanted F136 earmark is a necessary remedy that will alleviate acute fiscal and battlefield pain. Paging would-be budget hawks: billions of savings holding on line 136.
Senator Mark Kirk appeared on "Morning Joe" this morning and talked about the need to cut spending---including the extra engine for the Joint Strike Fighter.
A growing tidal wave of reform is poised to sweep the long-standing, lucrative earmark process out to sea. And when it comes to misguided pork barrel spending, the F136 alternative engine truly is the mother of all earmarks, as stated in a recent print advertisement.
Simply put, the General Electric/Rolls-Royce F136 would not still exist were it not for those who have consistently put parochial interests ahead of common sense. Why pay for a second engine when Pratt & Whitney’s F135 has logged more than 20,000 ground test hours and another 700 in flight? Neither the U.S. Navy nor Marine Corps have room for a second engine on their ships, while most international customers won’t buy nearly enough F-35s to split their buy. So, funding the F136 over the objections of two presidents, two secretaries of defense and top military leaders will have the unintended consequence of forcing an uncompetitive split buy on the U.S. Air Force, a service that has already experienced the logistical challenges of supporting two F-16 engines around the world while no other modern U.S. military aircraft has been saddled with a second powerplant.
Some extra engine proponents say the F136 will save money – eventually. Yet, $2 billion in earmarks have already been allocated and the Pentagon estimates another $2.9 billion will be consumed through FY2015. In fact, a second engine is likely to cost more in the long run when you take into account duplicative training, logistics, spare parts, future upgrades, extra government workers to oversee a redundant program, and the fundamental undermining of potential savings based on economies of scale.
Others argue that a second engine will create jobs. I know we’re talking about pork, but that’s just bull. The same number of airframes will be built regardless of whether there is one or two engines on offer. Continuing to fund the F136 only ensures that some of those jobs will go to Rolls-Royce in the United Kingdom, surely an unintended and unwelcome consequence in a time of dire job insecurity.
As Air Force Gen. John Michael Loh (Ret.) said in an op-ed published by The Hill on November 16, “This is not a head-to-head competition between the current Pratt & Whitney engine and the yet to be developed General Electric engine. It is a procurement directed by Congress to guarantee production for GE.”
President Obama has been consistent in his threat to veto the upcoming defense bill if it includes additional funding for the wasteful, duplicative, job-killing F136. But it shouldn’t have to come to that. If Congress is truly serious about killing earmarks, the F136 is the ideal place to start. Where else can Congress save billions in taxpayer funds without compromising national security in any way? Now that would be a completely different flavor of bacon well worth bringing home for once.
Pratt & Whitney’s F135 propulsion system powers the new advanced, single-engine tactical fighter, the F-35 Lightning II, developed by Lockheed Martin. The F-35 has unique capabilities for conventional takeoff and landing (CTOL), carrier-variant (CV), and short takeoff and vertical landing (STOVL). The same F135 engine will power all three variants. Visit http://www.f135engine.com to learn more.
