Obama vs. McCain: The view from Boeing

TRIMBLE: In\nthe FY09 budget, it was set in a bill that wasn't necessarily an appropriations\nbill, and some people said that that's still in play and could be changed by\nthe new administration after they come in. How much do you risk do you see\nin 09 and 10 especially, but\neven in 09, to the defense budget in the US?

CHADWICK: I'm\nnot a politician, but just from history I would surmise that while they'll come\nin, whoever the new administration is, and look at the 09 bill and the 2010 POM\n-- it's just huge. The budget is huge. So I think the change will be minimal. I\nthink there will be change, and your guess is as good as mine with what they\ndo.

You've seen\nthe current administration has left some difficult decisions for the next\nadministration, on F-22 and C-17, so we're going to wait and see as well. And we're\nprepared to engage as asked to defend our programs with our customers. I don't\nthink there will be major changes, but I think there will be some changes\nbecause they just can't get through it all. So they'll have certain programs\nthat will align with their defense strategy and that's where I think you'll see\nsome change.

Chadwick also isn't overly worried about the global financial crisis causing delays for key international arms purchases.

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I think,\nfor some of these countries that have really spent a lot of time over the last\n5 or 10 years to really strengthen their economies, -- like Brazil, like\nDenmark, like the UK, even though we're all going to be hit, like Australia -- I don't think you'll see a substantive change\nin terms of where they go from defense procurement. Some of these other\ncountries may delay them, but we don't see a huge effect.

You know,\nyou look at Japan F-X and that [delay] has nothing to do with the financial\nchallenges. They're still just working through some political change, and we\njust have to be patient and see where it goes.

Note that he didn't put India in the category of non-affected countries.