Due to repeated development and delivery delays, House appropriators have slashed over $400 million from the Navy and the Air Force’s weapons procurement fiscal year 2012 request for the Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missile (AMRAAM), according to their version of the FY ’12 defense spending bill.
The legislation included in the House Appropriations Committee’s defense bill cuts 161 AMRAAM missiles and $172.4 million from the Navy’s weapons procurement request, according to the report accompanying the bill. For their part, Air Force AMRAAM coffers were also cut by $262.2 million by House lawmakers, who also inserted a 218-missile reduction to the air service’s arsenal.
That funding, the report states, will be used to finance “higher priorities” in the Pentagon. AMRAAM prime contractor Raytheon [RTN] did not return requests for comment regarding the House reductions to the program.
The joint service missile program was intended to provide Air Force and Navy fighters an air-to-air missile with next-generation navigation and guidance capabilities, as well as improved “overall missile performance and effectiveness,” according to the report.
However, challenges in the weapon’s testing process have led to significant delays in getting the latest version of the missile to the field, according to the report. “Currently, missile production is experiencing a growing backlog of more than 100 missiles,” resulting in the production contract award for the AMRAAM being pushed to the right, it states.
Lawmakers, along with the services and the Pentagon, had initially expected the 2011 full-rate production contract with Raytheon to be awarded this February. However, House members noted in the report that DoD had indicated the soonest the 2011 award could be issued would be August, “making a schedule slip into fiscal year 2012 more likely.”