Editorials

On Leap Day 2008, the Air Force awarded a contract to produce next-generation midair refueling tankers to joint-bidders Northrop Grumman Corp. and European Aeronautic Defence and Space Co. (EADS).

On Wednesday, the Government Accountability Office urged the Air Force to leap backward.

The GAO is suggesting the Air Force start over with the tanker bidding process, citing what it called "a number of significant errors that could have affected the outcome of what was a close competition between Boeing and Northrop Grumman."

A-ha! Cue the dramatic music at the mention of the B-word, Boeing.

The Seattle-based aircraft maker has been hopping mad since the Feb. 29 announcement. Congress members representing districts where Boeing is a big-time employer raised a ruckus.

"We should have an American tanker built by an American company with American workers. I cannot believe we would create French jobs in place of Kansas jobs," U.S. Rep. Todd Tiahrt, R-Kan., said at the time of the announcement.

In a statement released Wednesday, Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., said, "The Air Force's tanker decision was fundamentally flawed."

Finally, something to bring Republicans and Democrats together — the local prosperity that comes from huge government contracts, in this case a deal worth $35 billion.

That's not to say that European Aeronautic Defence and Space Co. didn't likely have politics in mind when, during the bidding process, it noted that it planned to build the refueling tankers in Mobile.

Mobile is situated so that not only two senators from Alabama would be rooting for the contract to come to south Alabama, but so would senators from nearby Florida and Mississippi.

However, south Alabama has more than that going for it. Alabama, with a large port, an airfield needing a tenant in Mobile, a successful economic development team in the governor's office and a track record for successfully recruiting international corporations, was a natural.

Keeping politics out of these sorts of big-dollar government contracts is virtually impossible.

Boeing has built U.S. military tankers for more than 60 years. Whether the bidding was flawed, as the GAO now reports, or was as honest as the day is long, the company and its political boosters were going to cause a stink.

If the Air Force decision had gone the other way, Northrop Grumman and EADS, the parent of Airbus, would have likely complained. So, too, would political leaders from south Alabama and elsewhere.

Frustratingly, the GAO was short on specifics, saying it was waiting to let the competitors see the details first.

The GAO's ruling carries little official weight. The Air Force is obliged to review the decision over the next 60 days. The report will be used as a blunt instrument by supporters of Boeing and those troubled by the granting of a U.S. military contract to a foreign-based company.

Free trade is a two-way street. Americans ought not expect to sell their goods overseas and yet close U.S. borders to rightful competitors. If the process appears weighted against European-based EADS, selling this country and its goods overseas will become more difficult.