Sunday, September 11, 2011
Mi-17 Helicopter in Farah province, Afganistan (photo: Joseph A. Wilson, U.S. Army)
At first the Department of Defense was justifying its decision to buy helicopters from Russia because the immediacy of warfare in Iraq and Afghanistan demanded the use of non-competitive contracts to get the necessary equipment into the hands of Iraqi and Afghan military forces as quickly as possible.
But even today, with the two wars winding down, the Pentagon is still “buying Russian” rather than American, and that’s not sitting well with both Democrats and Republicans in Congress.
To date, contracts for Russian equipment (most of which has been Mi-17 helicopters) have cost $1 billion “and have almost all been sole-source or non-competitive contracts,” according to Sharon Weinberger of the Center for Public Integrity’s iWatch News. The deals include a non-competed $89 million contract awarded to General Dynamics Ordnance and Tactical Systems to buy three VIP Russian helicopters for Afghanistan’s president; a $322 million deal to purchase 22 helicopters for Iraq; and another $900 million buy for Russian helicopters for Afghanistan.
Half a dozen congressional members from Connecticut, home to helicopter manufacturer Sikorsky Aircraft, wrote to the Pentagon to complain about the deals.
Republican Senator Richard Shelby of Alabama also has criticized the Russian-oriented contracts. “The program appears to be an ad hoc procurement process with inadequate oversight,” he wrote to Defense Department officials. “The program is undefined, delayed, and simply not a good use of taxpayer funds.”
Shelby may be smarting from an incident earlier this year. In 2009, Alabama manufacturer Defense Technology Inc. won a $43.5 million contract to build four Mi-17 helicopters for the U.S. Navy to use Afghanistan. The Navy was supposed to hold another competition in 2011 for 21 more Mi-17s, but the Pentagon killed the plan and handed the deal to Rosoboronexport, the Russian state arms agency.
-Noel Brinkerhoff
Windfalls of War: Pentagon Buys Choppers from Russia to Equip Afghan, Iraqi Militaries (by Sharon Weinberger, iWatch News)
Russian Firm Got No-Bid Pentagon Contract After Selling Arms to Iran (by Sharon Weinberger, Wired)
Pentagon Buys Russian Helicopters to Use in Afghanistan (by Noel Brinkerhoff, AllGov)
Army Pays $322 Million for Russian Helicopters with Nothing to Show (by Noel Brinkerhoff, AllGov)
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