The words "TFX" and "TPP" still raise chills in defense board rooms nearly 50 years after they were invented. And, for better or worse, both terms -- landmark policy failures of military acquisition -- will be associated with Robert McNamara, who died earlier this morning.
The failures of Tactical Fighter Experimental, or TFX, set back the cause of joint acquisition of military aircraft until the mid-1990s, when the Pentagon launched the program that became the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter.
It is difficult to fault McNamara's logic in hindsight. The air force needed a new air superiority fighter and the navy required a fleet defense fighter. Combining the two programs would save taxpayers $1 billion and might even promote inter-service cooperation, right? Well, the insistence upon a common airframe -- as opposed to a family of aircraft sharing common production and a majority of components -- doomed the project from the start. The navy canceled its version in 1968, leaving the US Air Force with the F-111, a compromised, over-weight fighter that eventually found a valuable niche as a regional bomber and radar jammer.
Total Package Procurement, or TPP, was the other disaster of McNamara's tenure. After being duped and disappointed by defence contractors throughout the 1950s, McNamara's Pentagon unleashed TPP starting with the C-5A contract award to Lockheed. It was another failure. Lockheed was required to commit up-front to the C-5A's development and production costs, plus guarantee performance and delivery dates. (Airbus agreed to supply the A400M under similar terms nearly 40 years later, with similar results.) Lockheed won the C-5A contract with a $1.9 billion bid, compared to Boeing's $2.3 billion offer. But the C-5A's costs eventually grew to $5.2 billion, threatening to bankrupt Lockheed and diverting air force funds from other needs.
The failures of Tactical Fighter Experimental, or TFX, set back the cause of joint acquisition of military aircraft until the mid-1990s, when the Pentagon launched the program that became the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter.
It is difficult to fault McNamara's logic in hindsight. The air force needed a new air superiority fighter and the navy required a fleet defense fighter. Combining the two programs would save taxpayers $1 billion and might even promote inter-service cooperation, right? Well, the insistence upon a common airframe -- as opposed to a family of aircraft sharing common production and a majority of components -- doomed the project from the start. The navy canceled its version in 1968, leaving the US Air Force with the F-111, a compromised, over-weight fighter that eventually found a valuable niche as a regional bomber and radar jammer.
Total Package Procurement, or TPP, was the other disaster of McNamara's tenure. After being duped and disappointed by defence contractors throughout the 1950s, McNamara's Pentagon unleashed TPP starting with the C-5A contract award to Lockheed. It was another failure. Lockheed was required to commit up-front to the C-5A's development and production costs, plus guarantee performance and delivery dates. (Airbus agreed to supply the A400M under similar terms nearly 40 years later, with similar results.) Lockheed won the C-5A contract with a $1.9 billion bid, compared to Boeing's $2.3 billion offer. But the C-5A's costs eventually grew to $5.2 billion, threatening to bankrupt Lockheed and diverting air force funds from other needs.
on July 7, 2009 6:52 AM | Reply
R.I.P. Bob.
One could make the point that both of McNamara's key policies were undermined/sabotaged by the military-industrial complex (which he himself was never truly a part of, having "parachuted" in from the civilian sector) rather than collapsed on their own weight.
Kurt Plummer makes a convincing argument (here) that the F-111 was in fact within the official USN specs, but the Navy sabotaged it because:
a) the USAF was selected as the program manager, which naturally was anathema to the admirals
b) it was an AAM truck and not a dogfighter, which was what the Navy really wanted but dared not say in public.
As for the TPP and the C-5 story... why was McNamara to blame for Lockheed's incompetence in managing that program? It's not like they undertook the project at gunpoint.
on July 7, 2009 11:55 AM | Reply
We love our F111s - hard to see that the F35 will have the same range even with (non-Stealth) mid-air refuelling
on July 7, 2009 12:10 PM | Reply
Hi Dimitris,
You're right on the C-5. Lockheed's management made huge mistakes in the design, and compounded their errors by launching an elaborate financial cover-up. Their actions were nothing short of scandalous, as the hearings by Senator Proxmire clearly revealed. But I really think the root of the C-5 scandal was the TPP. I say that because Lockheed became aware early on that the design of the C-5 wing was a problem. It was going to be severely overweight. Lockheed sensibly proposed that the USAF fund a thrust increase to offset the extra weight. The USAF, citing the TPP strategy, refused the $5 million thrust increase program and required Lockheed to meet the original specs. As a result, Lockheed tried a number of weight reduction strategies that ultimately backfired in a huge way. The inflexibility of the TPP process, which forced the contractor to assume all risk, was the principle cause of the C-5 scandals that followed.
I haven't seen Kurt Plummer's work, but I'll look it up. Thanks for sharing.
on July 7, 2009 5:24 PM | Reply
Lockheed is still mismanageing the C-5, namely the improvement program for the C-5B, now renamed "Super Galaxy." The costs have risen and risen on what really is a very simple program. One excuse Lockheed has given is that they underestimated the work needed to put the new engines on the wing. Sound like the good old days. How could this be true? They designed the thing.
Re the Naval F-111, the Navy had been quite clear that they wanted the F-111 to be an AAM truck. It was intended to replace the failed Douglas F6D Missleer, which was to have carried six Phoenixes under straight wings. Eventually the got their truck in the F-14.
Another of MacNamara's economy moves was choosing the F-111's TF-30 engine for the A-7A; ie two planes using the same engine saves money.
One victory for MacNamara was the cancelling of further F-105 production and standardizing the Phantom II as the fighter/bomber for the AF, Navy and Marines. I don't think anything like that has happened before or since. When it was time to replace the F-4, we fielded not one but four new fighters: F-14,-15,-16 and -18.
MacNamara also ended the Navy's nomenclature for its planes, replaceing it with the AF's system and thereby creating a single system for both services. Thus the F4H Phantom II became the F-4, the A4D Skyhawk became the A-4, the A3J Vigilante became the A-5 and so on. Under the Navy's old system, for the F4H-1 Phantom II, for example, the first letter designated the type (F for fighter), the second letter identified the manufacturer (H for McDonnell), the number in between the letters meant that the Phantom II was the fourth fighter type for the Navy McDonnell had produced (preceeded by the FH-1 Phantom, the F2H Banshee, and the F3H Demon). Note the little quirk that there was no 1 between the letters if the plane was the first of the type produced by a manufacturer. The last number, -1, identified the first varient of the plane. MacNamara could never understand this and was often confused. So he changed the sytem.
on July 7, 2009 5:32 PM | Reply
Nice stuff, Christopher.