Air Force may forgo cargo features in future refueling tanker.

As the Air Force moves forward with plans to replace its aerial refueling tankers, it may decide to forgo earlier plans to make the tanker a multi-mission aircraft. A budget crunch and political pressures to keep the program on schedule could jeopardize efforts to add cargo and passenger transport features to the tanker, experts noted.

The new tanker, called the KC-X, will be larger than its predecessor, the KC-135. The Air Force indicated it would consider adding new missions to the tanker, such as strategic airlift, medical evacuation and disaster assistance. But the extra features could significantly drive up costs, said the Government Accountability Office. "The inclusion of the capability ... could result in an unnecessary expenditure of at least $4.3 billion by our estimates," it said.

In the interest of getting a new tanker as quickly as possible, the Air Force might not argue with GAO, said Loren Thompson, a defense industry analyst at the Lexington Institute. "The Air Force thinks cargo capability would be nice, but it mostly wants a replacement for the KC-135."

The Air Force has made the tanker its top procurement priority, and wants to quickly retire its 45-year-old KC-135 Stratotankers, said Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne.

The Defense Department's fiscal 2008 budget includes $314.5 million for "program competition costs and the continued design and development of the KC-X aircraft system." The Air Force said it will award a contract for 179 tankers late this year.

A 2005 "mobility capabilities study" determined that Air Force needs between 520 and 640 tankers, but the service decided that it could make do with fewer, but more advanced aircraft.

Two industry teams--one led by Boeing and the other by Northrop Grumman--are vying for the award.

Paul Meyer, Northrop's vice president said that if the Air Force selected the company's proposed KC-30, the first order of 179 aircraft could handle the workload of 239 KC-135s. The Air Force signaled that it wants to buy 15 tankers a year. "We can make as few as 12 or as many as 18," Meyer said.

The Air Force asked both bidders to include a cargo mission in their tanker bids.

--BREANNE WAGNER