Secretary of Defense Robert Gates refused to budge Wednesday on his decision to cancel the new presidential helicopter program.
Gates also gave lawmakers a glimpse of a possible way to ensure President Obama will eventually fly in a new helicopter, for the first time saying the White House and the Pentagon may look at having two different types of helicopters for the president.
{mosads}One model would likely be less sophisticated and would be used to fly the president locally over short distances, such as from the White House to Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland.
The second helicopter would be the president’s “escape helicopter,” Gates said during a House Appropriations Defense subcommittee hearing. That chopper could be a modified version of combat helicopters flown by the military.
Gates announced the plans to cancel the new presidential helicopter program, also known as VH-71, in April, citing ballooning costs. The program was initially expected to cost about $6.1 billion, but more than doubled to $13 billion.
Gates on Wednesday stood firm in his decision and reiterated that the program is “a poster child of an acquisition process gone seriously wrong.”
Gates, however, admitted that the government — and, implicitly, the White House during President Bush’s term — put too many “requirements on a single type of helicopter.”
The VH-71 is based on a commercially available helicopter built by Agusta Westland, a British-Italian venture. Lockheed Martin teamed with Augusta for the contract.
Supporters of the VH-71 program have long argued that the Secret Service and Marine One squadron flying the presidential helicopter piled too many new requirements and security features onto the helicopter, causing costs to balloon.
Gates said that he will “immediately” meet with officials at the White House to go over the requirements for a new presidential helicopter.
In the meantime, the life of the old fleet of aging Sikorsky VH-3D Sea Kings and VH-60 Black Hawk helicopters will be extended. Some of those helicopters are more than 30 years old, but Gates said he is confident that they can fly another 10 years with certain upgrades.
It would cost about $1.2 billion to extend the life of the old helicopters and pay for the termination of the VH-71. The termination costs of the contract with Lockheed and Agusta are estimated at about $555 million.
However, Appropriations Defense Chairman John Murtha (D-Pa.) voiced skepticism that it would only cost $1.2 billion to upgrade the old helicopters, suggesting that he expected the cost to be much greater.
Murtha urged Gates to look at ways to make use of the technologies already developed for the VH-71.
The government already spent about $3.3 billion on the VH-71, and it remains unclear how much of that outlay can be used on another helicopter program.
Murtha unsuccessfully tried earlier this year to convince the White House to keep the new presidential program with some adjustments.
Gates told defense appropriators on Wednesday that if the White House ended up flying the new helicopters already delivered by contractors Lockheed and Agusta, it would bring the amortized costs of flying the helicopters to $1 billion apiece.
Agusta Westland has tried to convince the government to continue buying its helicopters at a fixed price of $120 million apiece. It has also worked to dispel the notion that the helicopters it has already delivered have a lifespan of only five years rather than several decades.
The VH-71 program was structured in two phases. In phase one, the contractors delivered nine helicopters with less sophisticated equipment to tide the president over until the 23 more sophisticated and better-equipped choppers were ready.
But it was those 23 helicopters that the White House started piling new requirements upon.
Agusta and its supporters have made the case that the contractors can deliver more phase-one helicopters with some adjustments to keep the cost down to the original estimates, but still be more advanced than the current fleet.
The Federal Aviation Administration certified Agusta Westland’s helicopter, the AW 101, on which the VH-71 is based, for 30 years. But the first increment of new presidential helicopters was not intended to fly for more than five years.
The Navy, which has been in charge of the new presidential helicopter program, gave those helicopters a temporary certification of five years, pending a series of Navy tests.
In general, industry sources say, the Navy sets a low bar until it subjects the aircraft to its own tests and then determines whether to add more years to the life of an aircraft. Agusta’s supporters have argued that the Navy’s initial certification does not reflect the actual capabilities of the aircraft.