The Pentagon has reopened the competition on the contract for the next generation of Air Force refueling tankers originally awarded to the European defence firm EADS, US Defence Secretary Robert Gates said Wednesday, according to dpa. The Pentagon will ask EADS, along with American partner Northrop Grumman, and rival Boeing to submit revised proposals following a ruling by the congressional investigative arm, known as the GAO, that the Air Force's decision in favour of EADS was flawed, Gates said. "I've concluded that the contract cannot be awarded at present because of significant issues pointed out by the Government Accountability Office," Gates said. A new winner for the 35-billion-dollar contract to build 179 aerial refuellers will be awarded through an expedited process to be finished by December in what will be a limited competition to address GAO's concerns. "It is important to remember that this decision does not represent a return to the first step of a process that has already gone on far too long," Gates said, adding the need to replace the Air Force's aging fleet of tankers was "time critical." The Government Accountability Office upheld Boeing's formal protest by ruling June 18 that the Air Force made critical errors in awarding the contract and urged the Pentagon to rehold the competition. John Young, the undersecretary of defence for acquisition, said the Pentagon will ask the defence firms to submit new proposals by the end of the summer. GAO ruled the Air Force overlooked key aspects of the Boeing proposal that could have tilted the contract in the aerospace giant's direction, and failed to inform Boeing it was interested in a larger plane before selecting the Northrop-EADS bid in March. While the GAO decision was not binding, a failure by the Pentagon to embrace the decision could have brought fresh scrutiny from congressional lawmakers who control the defence budget. The contract was the first of three that when combined could reach a value of 100 billion dollars over 30 years. Dozens of members of Congress criticized the Air Force for shipping defence jobs abroad at a time when the US economy is struggling. Northrop Grumman and EADS had said they would build a plant in the US state of Alabama to assemble the aircraft after the parts are built in Europe. Alabama Senator Richard Shelby, whose state would benefit if EADS held onto the contract, accepted Gates' decision but pointed out that the GAO only upheld seven of Boeing's 111 complaints. "The plan the Department of Defence has come up with is an appropriate solution to remedy the minor procedural flaws the GAO found in the initial award," Shelby said. The GAO auditors found Boeing offered to meet more non-mandatory requirements than Northrop and that the Boeing version could have come at a cheaper price over the life cycle of the programme. EADS, or the European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company, is the parent company of Boeing's rival Airbus. Boeing complained that the Air Force chose the EADS version based on an Airbus 330 after being told that its 767 met the Air Force requirement. Boeing said it could have proposed its 777 instead had it been adequately told of the Air Force's needs. The Air Force sparked outrage within Congress when it handed the contract to Northrop and EADS. Lawmakers complained that jobs should not be shipped abroad at a time of a downtrodden US economy.
