Let me come back to the C-17s. My question is for General Hillier.
Is it not true that in the department, on a certain occasion, Colonel Burt said that there were no problems with requirements? For instance, we could have had Airbus rather than Boeing, because the issue was not about capacity, tonnage, and especially not delivery. Ultimately, we could have proceeded with an invitation to tender, which could have saved some money.
In fact, I see that this is not only costing us $3.4 billion, but that in addition, we gave maintenance away entirely to the Americans. Because of the ITAR regulations, our industry cannot make any profits from research and development.
Moreover, are we not at the mercy of others with regard to maintenance? In fact, we will not have any maintenance capacity, because the Americans will be taking advantage of the second and third capacity levels.
What has changed in the requirements to make you, and by you I mean the department, absolutely want to have these cumbersome aircraft? Once again, we could have reached an agreement with NATO, with our allies—they are not strangers—who purchased three of these aircraft. We do not need them on a daily basis. Among allies, we could have worked to further our interests.