Gates Seeks Help To End JSF Alternate Engine

(Indiadefense) : U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates says he will continue funding the General Electric-Rolls Royce F136 alternate engine for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program for now, but he is hoping tea party lawmakers and budget hawks in the House this week will help cancel the unrequested program congressionally.
In a Pentagon briefing to reporters on the Fiscal 2012 budget request, which the Obama administration formally rolled out Monday, Gates said that he would continue funding the program at its $28 million per month cost, despite the Pentagon’s and the White House’s wishes. But he also warned clearly that if the 2011 continuing resolution (CR) runs out before lawmakers address the issue, then he will look at all available options to end the alternate effort.
“There are some options available,” Gates says.
Officials have been trying to kill the F136 since the George W. Bush administration, but Congress has continued the project — which critics have termed an earmark. Gates told reporters he hoped lawmakers concerned with federal spending levels would recognize the F136 as soaking up roughly $3 billion in additional, unnecessary spending.
The House this week is slated to take up a free-wheeling debate on another CR for fiscal 2011, which started Oct. 1, 2010, but for which Congress has yet to appropriate new funds. The current CR runs out March 4 and lawmakers are expected to continue it for a short term while they try to hammer out new 2011 appropriations.
Earlier in the day on Capitol Hill, proponents and critics of the F136 started pressing their case with colleagues. Reps. Robert Andrews (D-N.J.) and K. Michael Conaway (R-Texas), who headed the 111th House’s unofficial defense acquisition reform panel, asked House members to support continuing the F136. Rep. Rodney Alexander (R-La.) also did the same, saying the $3 billion already invested in the F136 should not be squandered.
But Reps. Tom Rooney (R-Fla.), John Larson (D-Conn.), Lynn Westmoreland (R-Ga.) and Chellie Pingree (D-Maine) said they will hold a press conference Feb. 15 to discuss their amendment to strike funding for the “wasteful” extra engine program for the Lockheed Martin F-35. Their amendment to the next CR would strike the roughly $450 million provided for the alternate engine this fiscal year.