Time for Alternate Engine to Stop Running
December 15, 2009
by: Tom Schatz

Government WasteWatch, Winter 2009

In late June, Citizens Against Government Waste launched a major nationwide multimedia campaign to educate the public about the waste of $7.2 billion in the alternate engine for the Joint Strike Fighter.  The latest developments include a report from Reuters on November 2, 2009, that the GE-Rolls Royce alternate engine had suffered another testing failure.  It is now offline for four months, which will cost taxpayers $30 million per month and the date for “competition” with Pratt and Whitney’s primary engine will be delayed until at least 2016.
 
This was the fourth test failure in only 52 hours of testing.  Lexington Institute Chief Operating Officer Loren Thompson noted in his November 2 blog that the “normal failure rate in development of a new gas turbine engine would be on the order of one incident every 300 hours, but GE seems to be having problems every 13 hours.”
 
On November 12, Aviation Week reported that Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics Ashton Carter said that “the investment in the alternate engine has been ‘disruptive to the Joint Strike Fighter program’ because it has come out of the program’s top line.”
 
In his November 16 issue brief, “Alternate Engine Problems Prove Critics Were Right,” Thompson wrote that the alternate engine “will cumulatively cost tens of billions beyond what was necessary,” since it will require “separate sets of spare parts, separate maintenance procedures, and separate facilities...”  Thompson added that the purported “savings” that have been touted by proponents of the alternate engine “are proving wrong, and what we are getting is higher up-front costs than expected with no benefits from competition anytime soon.  So the alternate-engine program turns out to be just another big, fat subsidy for companies that couldn’t compete successfully in the marketplace.”
 
At press time, Congress was getting ready to consider the fiscal year 2010 Department of Defense Appropriations Act.  Despite the mountain of evidence that the program is a complete waste of money, along with strong White House and Pentagon opposition, it was still possible that more than $500 million could be included in final version of the bill.
 
Eliminating a large defense program is never easy, but there have been several successes in 2009, including the elimination of additional F-22 fighters.  If the final appropriations bill contains money for the alternate engine, CAGW is ready, willing and able to lead the fight against the program in the 2011 budget cycle.