By Marina Malenic
The Defense Department yesterday notified Congress and the General Electric [GE]-Rolls Royce [RR] industry team building the F136 alternate engine for F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) that the engine contract has been terminated.
GE and Rolls-Royce have been “instructed to preserve and deliver government property,” according to a statement released by the Pentagon.
On March 24, the Pentagon’s acquisition office directed the F-35 contracting officer to issue a stop-work order on the F136 development contract. The order was put in place pending final resolution of the extra engine’s future in congressional action on the fiscal 2011 budget (Defense Daily, March 25).
Subsequently, a defense appropriation for 2011 was passed by both houses of Congress and signed by the president on April 15. The appropriation contains no funding for the F136 engine.
Pratt & Whitney, a division of United Technologies [UTX], is manufacturing the F135 primary engine that powers all three variants of the F-35–a conventional variant for the Air Force; a short take-off and vertical landing (STOVL) variant for the Marine Corps; and a carrier variant for the Navy. Lockheed Martin [LMT] is developing the airplane.
A spokesman for GE said in response to the Pentagon announcement that the company “will take all necessary steps to ensure that the F136 assets and intellectual property are protected.”
He noted that more than $200 million in F136 hardware is located in 17 facilities, including “nine engines under various stages of assembly.”
“GE and Rolls-Royce will work closely with our congressional supporters during the 2012 budget process in pursuit of incorporating the engine into the program,” the spokesman added. “We continue to be encouraged by the bipartisan support for the engine on the merits of its performance and value. There is a significant willingness in Congress to revisit the F136 funding debate as the consequences of terminating the engine are being fully understood.”
Meanwhile, GE Chairman and CEO Jeff Immelt said in a letter to GE employees yesterday that company officials “are not giving up.”
“We will fight to bring competition to the 2012 budget debate,” Immelt wrote. “Especially in a time of unprecedented deficits, we do not believe the government should forfeit the extraordinary savings…not to mention the meaningful acquisition reform…that competing engines ensures.”
During the stop-work period imposed by the Pentagon, GE and Rolls-Royce have self-funded F136 design work, according to Immelt.
“I believe so strongly in our engine and the need for competition in defense procurement that we are discussing with our supporters in Congress how GE can help fund some of the remaining F136 development costs,” he wrote.
“Our congressional supporters recognize that eliminating our engine will saddle taxpayers with a $100 billion JSF engine monopoly,” he adds. “A monopoly for the largest defense program in the U.S. budget is bad policy. We believe that common sense will prevail and will preserve the $3 billion already invested in the F136.”