[CD]

Boeing, the prime political power in Washington state pulled out all stops to grease the shorts of it's political army recently.
Tanker Ruling Shows Air Force in Disarray

I don't know a swingin' dick AF vet that worked on any MacDonald-Douglas fighter that has much use for Boeing or anything to do with them. They gobbled up the best aircraft manufacturers and dismantled them and are the bullies on the block. They claim to make their stuff in the USA but use more foreign sources than HD does. They claim unfair procurement practices yet in 2004 they were once again caught with their dick in the cookie jar Ex-Boeing CFO pleads guilty in Air Force procurement scandal (11/16/04) -- www.GovernmentExecutive.com

It ain't about the best tanker, it is about the perception of "made in the USA" that Boeing is puking up.
Never mind that the Airbus is the better bird.

One argument was that spares may be hard to procure during times of war...Wonder where Boeing gets most of it's electronics from?

I also love how the scumiticians claim how the AF procurement system is flawed and that the AF is broken and about to collapse. Better fire all them civilians running it!!!! The procurement system would be easily fixed if you just prosecuted all of the scum taking bribes and those (Boeing) paying them.

[Red Rider]

For a about 3 years I worked the procurement business while in the service - what a mess. It got better in '94, but it is still scary-friggin' political. The stories I could tell......but better over beer than the internet!

[CD]

In 1987 I worked with Teledyne and TAC (Tactical Air Command) on a project to replace aging support equipment. Whenever we had a test session with all of the competitors you could walk on the engineers, VP's, support techs, brass etc. You could hardly conduct one test item without another competitor crying foul. They didn't have the correct support info to the F16 or the A10 or the F15. Huh? Each one got exactly the same information and contact sources PRIOR to build off players being chosen! Finally, TAC closed the tests to engineers and VP's in charge of the actual program and the AF oversight (us) troops and our bosses. This was only for an under 200 million program so just imagine what it's like for new AC.

In 2004, Boeing got caught big time and now claims that were cheated on????

It is the civilians that screw up the process. Ask a SO what he wants and let them choose it and go do their job...