Aircraft

Two facts: the US Air Force knows which aircraft it prefers to buy, yet is dangerously incompetent about following its own rules for buying it.

The US Government Accountability Office found seven major flaws in the process used by the USAF that picked the Northrop Grumman/EADS North America team over Boeing for a $12.1 billion KC-X contract award to develop and build 68 tankers.

Don't believe the politicians on either side of the Atlantic who consider this a victory for protectionist sentiment or, depending on your point of view, a defeat for non-protectionist sentiment.

The protectionists didn't make the USAF's selection team misjudge its sums. Northrop's KC-30B is known to be larger and more expensive to operate than the Boeing KC-767. Somehow, the GAO found that the USAF mistakenly determined that Northrop's proposal offered the lowest cost instead of the other way round.

The protectionists didn't force the USAF to improperly increase cost estimates for Boeing's bid, even after determining that Boeing's estimates were not unrealistically low. The protectionists also didn't force the USAF to label a glaring omission in Northrop's bid as an "administrative oversight" rather than the reality that Northrop had refused to provide two years of required maintenance in its proposal.

It is evident from reading the GAO's brief that its investigation was not the product of protectionism. Rather, it is the product of an acquisition process that determined it wanted the KC-30B, even if it needed to ignore the metrics established to justify its selection.

The bitter irony in this affair is that the USAF's incompetence in selecting the aircraft it prefers regardless of its national origin has given the forces of protectionism in the USA all the ammunition they need to go on the warpath.

Where the USAF tanker competition goes from here is unclear. Protectionists will accept no result that omits the KC-767, but Northrop will have ample legal grounds on which to challenge any contract award that omits the KC-30B.

The process could grind on for years before any tankers are purchased, regardless of the USAF's legitimate need to replace its oldest tankers immediately.