Northrop Grumman may not bid for the USAF Tanker contract

Northrop Grumman may have already decided not to place a bid for the next generation USAF tanker leaving the sole bidder as Boeing. The revelations come after a January 17th review of the bid process by by Pentagon acquisition chief Kenneth Krieg. NG which has partnered with EADS/Airbus says that the "metrics" or evaluation criteria as such that thier KC-30 would be non-compedative. It is unclear if NG does pull out if EADS would attempt to submit the Airbus product on thier own.

Its getting more interesting. Without a US partner the EADS deal is dead IMHO. It would be fatal for any member of congress to support such a deal and even McCain might have to back away from it as well. However, if the single bidder, Boeing would and should come under increased scrutiny from the congress as well.

The complete article can be found here:
NG Closer To Not Submitting Tanker Bid

I sense something else is cooking. If you read the last part of the article, it says that Northrop is looking to throw more of it's effort into the Next Generation Bomber/ Future Strike Aircraft competition. I wonder if the B-2's sucessor isn't already on the drawing board at Northrop Grumman's Advance Systens Division!

Tim

Yes, it is. See the bottom of the page:

www.hitechweb.genezis.eu...

Right! I though of the FSA as more of a B-52/B-1 sucessor then a B-2 sucessor. However, I can see how it might replace the B-2 one day.

Tim