Budget plan likely to renew fierce battle over presidential helicopter

Defense Secretary Robert Gates' plan to scrap Lockheed Martin's VH-71 presidential helicopter program will split Capitol Hill along parochial lines in what is likely to become a replay of the fierce battle for the contract more than four years ago.

For Connecticut lawmakers, Gates' decision to cancel the chopper, built by Lockheed Martin Corp. and AgustaWestland, could equate to a boon -- both in prestige and profit -- for Stratford-based Sikorsky helicopters. In a series of statements, lawmakers from both sides of the aisle lauded the decision to scrap the Owego, N.Y.-based helicopter program in favor of continuing to fly the decades-old VH-3 Sikorsky choppers that ferry the president and other VIPs on short trips.

"The secretary's decision to cancel the VH-71 presidential replacement helicopter is a wise one," hailed Senate Armed Services Airland Subcommittee Chairman Joseph Lieberman, I-Conn., an influential defense authorizer. "It will create an opportunity for America's presidents to continue to be flown in Sikorsky helicopters, the most reliable aircraft in the world."

When Sikorsky lost a hard-fought competition in early 2005 to build the next presidential fleet, Connecticut lawmakers and others on Capitol Hill bemoaned the Pentagon's decision to select an Italian airframe over a home-grown offering. "That is a contract that rightfully should have gone to Stratford-based Sikorsky, and if no new version of the helicopter is built, Sikorsky will continue to benefit from maintaining the current, all-American fleet," Connecticut Gov. Jodi Rell, a Republican, said in a statement Monday.

Gates cited the program's cost growth from $6.1 billion to more than $13 billion as the primary driver behind his decision to nix the VH-71. He does plan to launch another competition for the helicopters. During a news conference at the Pentagon, the defense secretary pledged to "promptly develop options for an fiscal 2011 follow-on program."

Any new competition would almost certainly trigger a fight between the New York and Connecticut delegations, especially if either side tries to craft provisions in the fiscal 2010 defense bills to give one contract team or the other a competitive advantage.

For his part, one New York lawmaker will not be giving up easily. Democratic Rep. Maurice Hinchey, a member of the House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee whose district includes Owego, said he will continue to push for a proposal to extend the less-capable but less-expensive "Increment 1" choppers instead of pursuing the pricier, accessory-rich helicopters planned for later in the program. Canceling the contract after four years, Hinchey said, would mean the $3 billion invested in the program would be lost. Gates said that plan, which Lockheed Martin has aggressively pushed, was "neither advisable nor affordable."

But the "Increment 1" approach appears to have one powerful supporter: House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman John Murtha, D-Pa., who last month said that he favored the cost-cutting measures over canceling the helicopter program. Murtha said he has personally appealed to the White House that the helicopter fleet is too old and needs to be replaced sooner rather than later. Murtha did not mention specific programs in a statement Monday but left the door open to changes in the Obama administration's budget, which will formally go to Capitol Hill next month. "The committee will carefully review the department's recommendations in the context of the current and future threats when we receive the detailed fiscal year 2010 budget request," he said.