By Marina Malenic
Efforts to correct difficulties in the Air Force acquisition process and the service’s oversight of the U.S. nuclear arsenal are its top priorities, Gen. Norton Schwarz, the new Air Force chief of staff, said yesterday.
“Acquisition and the nuclear enterprise are priority one in terms of making things right,” Schwartz said during a press briefing at the Pentagon.
Schwartz became the beleaguered Air Force’s 19th chief of staff during a ceremony yesterday at Bolling AFB, Wash. Previous service Secretary Michael Wynne and Chief of Staff Gen. T. Michael Moseley were forced to resign in June following release of a report that faulted the Air Force for improperly handling nuclear-related components.
Acting service Secretary Michael Donley, also speaking at yesterday’s briefing, said he expects a review of the mismanaged KC-X aerial refueling tanker award and similar procurement difficulties in the coming weeks.
“I want to make sure we get all lessons learned from KC-X and previous [Government Accountability Office] decisions, and get that rolled into the next decisions,” said Donley. “We won’t be satisfied until we get through these major source selections and any protests that follow with a clean bill of health.”
The nomination of Donley as Air Force secretary–a position he has held in an acting capacity since June 21–is stalled in Congress. Boeing supporter Sen. Maria Cantwell (D- Wash.) has said she will block his confirmation vote in the full Senate over concerns related to the tanker competition (Defense Daily, Aug. 4).
Defense Secretary Robert Gates decided last month to reopen the competition for the $45 billion tanker contract under the management of the undersecretary of defense for acquisition, logistics and technology rather than the Air Force’s own acquisition office.
A month prior, the GAO had sustained Boeing‘s [BA] March 11 protest of the award to rival Northrop Grumman [NOC] and industry partner European Aeronautic Defense and Space Co. (EADS). The auditors found that the service “had made a number of significant errors that could have affected the outcome of what was a close competition” and recommended that the bidding process be reopened (Defense Daily, June 19).
The Air Force last year also reopened bidding on its Combat Search and Rescue replacement helicopter (CSAR-X) contract following contractor protests. Three companies seeking the CSAR-X development contract submitted their latest proposals in January. A winner is expected to be picked this fall. Boeing initially won that contract, for the purchase of 141 helicopters, in November 2006. Lockheed Martin [LMT] and Sikorsky [UTX] twice filed protests with the GAO, spurring the Air Force to reopen the competition.
During his confirmation hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee last month, Donley said he had “directed preparation of a strategic roadmap within 90 days for rebuilding the Air Force nuclear enterprise,” as well as “a review of acquisition lessons learned from the GAO’s sustainment of Boeing’s protest on the KC-X program.”
He said yesterday that he is prepared to begin addressing those issues in the coming months following the conclusion of the reviews.
Schwartz said he would enforce “rigorous accountability” in “all missions,” but particularly in the nuclear arena.
“It is a mission where anything less than perfection is unacceptable,” he said. “We will return to that standard.”
Donley said he expects the pending nuclear review to yield names of “other officers that will be disciplined.”
Asked whether the review would lead to changes in which organizations are responsible for stewardship of the nuclear stockpile, he declined to say.
“I won’t speculate on the organizational structure that comes out of that,” he said.