[Cheap_Hessian]

I am curious, please tell me why you think Boeing's bid was clearly better? Here is the comparison:

http://militarytimes.com/static/projects/pages/080222af_tanker.pdf

[Don W]

Fly by wire still makes me nervous. I still remember watching that Airbus fly itself into the ground because the computer decided to land, though the pilot was trying to crawl back into the sky.

[Kansas58]

The Boeing tanker can use the same facilities as the current tanker.

Same hangars, same runways.

Also, the Boeing model will be made, mostly, in the United States. Though I am a “free trade” person, at heart -— the “cost” of the Boeing project must include the fact that American workers will pay American taxes!

Also, some allowance should be made for the huge European subsidies, in the Airbus plan.

[CharlesWayneCT]

I guess because in every competition where both Boeing and NGrumman bid, Boeing’s plane won.

Oh wait, the NG plane won EVERY competition, including the one here in the United States.

Boeing has only won twice. Once when they were sole-sourced and bribed the procurement official with a job, and the other when they sued and cajoled the government into re-writing the RFP to give the award to a plane with their smaller airframe.

I guess all of our allies could just be dolts. As could the fine people in our own military who determined, against political arguments, that EADS/NG was a better bid than the “all-american” Boeing bid.

I certainly don’t know which bid would have been better, or which of the previous bid was really better, I can only judge based on results, and the results clearly suggest EADS is better than Boeing —

That is, unless you absolutely need a tanker that can land at smaller airfields, and don’t care that you need to take off and land more often because you carry less fuel. Not like takeoff and landing is really dangerous in a war situation or anything.