Russia’s involvement in Ukraine and Syria combined with aggressive moves across Europe prompted the U.S.’s Air Force’s Europe commander to call for a permanent F-22 Raptor base in Europe Wednesday, according to Defense News.
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Under the contract, the Air Force’s liability for the engineering and manufacturing development phase of the tanker program is capped at $4.9 billion; anything over is paid for directly by Boeing.
Brigadier General Duke Richardson, executive officer for Air Force tankers, said the tanker programme was doing well overall, despite earlier schedule delays.
The Air Force Association is one of five powerful defense industry entities that have joined forces to pressure lawmakers to reach a budget agreement, and avoid more CR that they say weakens their ability to deliver on national security interests. He said the program was working through testing required for a key milestone review to be completed around April that would pave the way for an initial production contract for seven jets.
The EMD aircraft, a modified 767 without a functioning boom, has been flying since the end of last year, but the first flight of a “full-up” KC-46 has been delayed several times.
Other expected bidders on the Air Force trainer contract are a clean-sheet design from Northrop Grumman Corp. And as part of its test program, the aircraft tanker will pass fuel to F-16, C-17, F/A-18, A-10, AV-8B and another KC-46A.
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“If we get into a CR situation, this will create a very large problem for this program”, Richardson warned.
