Wisconsin lawmakers fight back critics of Oshkosh truck contract

In a letter to Defense Secretary Robert Gates, the entire
Wisconsin delegation is lashing out at congressional and industry critics of a
lucrative Army truck contract recently awarded to Oshkosh Corp.

Two other companies, BAE Systems Inc. and Navistar,
separately protested the contract award with the Government Accountability
Office (GAO) in early September. GAO has until December to uphold or deny the
protests.

{mosads}The Wisconsin lawmakers are pleading with Gates to assist
them “in preserving the integrity of the defense acquisition process,” and to
prevent “inappropriate” and “undue interference” with the GAO review.

“We are concerned with the blatant efforts to affect the
outcome of this independent, quasi-judicial review by attempting to raise
protest issues through a public media campaign and through improper contact
with Department of Defense officials,” the lawmakers wrote in the letter, which
was sent to the Pentagon on Friday.

Until now, Wisconsin lawmakers have not weighed in on the
controversy surrounding the Army’s decision to award the estimated $3 billion
truck contract — also known as the Family of Medium Tactical Vehicles (FMTV)
— to Oshkosh, which is based in their state.

Their letter comes on the heels of an intense lobbying
campaign by BAE Systems Inc., which has been manufacturing the FMTV, as well as
outspoken support from BAE’s backers in Congress.

The Wisconsin delegation’s decision to jump into the fray is
likely to set up a fight with the Texas delegation. Texans in Congress have
thrown their full support behind BAE, which builds the FMTV in Sealy, Texas.

It also underlines the shifting support for the military’s
workhorse vehicles, such as trucks, from Texas to the increasingly powerful
Wisconsin delegation.

Rep. David Obey (D-Wis.) is the chairman of the House
Appropriations Committee, while Sen. Herb Kohl (D-Wis.) is a defense
appropriator. Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) is the ranking member of the House Budget
committee.

Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wis.) sits on the Senate Budget panel
as well as the Foreign Relations and Intelligence panels.

Wisconsin Reps. Tammy Baldwin (D), Ron Kind (D), Gwen Moore
(D), James Sensenbrenner Jr. (R), Tom Petri (R) and Steve Kagen (D) also threw
their support behind Oshkosh in the letter to Gates.

Apart from FMTV, Oshkosh holds the contract for the
mine-resistant all-terrain patrol vehicle and for the Army’s heavy mobility
tactical trucks. The company also has the contract for the Marine Corps’s
medium tactical vehicles.

{mosads}Oshkosh owns the proprietary designs for its heavy trucks,
making it the sole contractor for those vehicles. However, the Army owns the
designs for FMTV, making it easy for the service to compete the program and
pick the companies that can produce the vehicles. That is how Oshkosh and
Navistar competed against incumbent contractor BAE for the new FMTV contract.

Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), who represents Sealy,
recently sent Gates a letter signed by two dozen other lawmakers, mostly from
Texas, to express concern about the contract awarded to Oshkosh.

Additionally, Reps. Robert Andrews (D-N.J.) and Mike Conaway
(R-Texas), who lead the ad-hoc House Armed Services Committee sub-panel on
acquisition reform, asked the Pentagon’s acquisition chief last month to brief
them on the process and rationale behind the contract award.

Andrews told The Hill last month that BAE has business
interests in New Jersey and that the company approached him about the truck
issue.

“I am not prejudging whether this decision was right or
wrong, or whether the criteria were right or wrong,” Andrews said. “I am
interested in what the criteria were.”

In their letter to Gates, the Wisconsin lawmakers expressed
concern that “some have gone so far as requesting that the Army provide highly
confidential and sensitive source selection materials for their review.”

“We believe this is both inappropriate and a dangerous
precedent that could result in undue interference in the competitive process,”
they wrote.

The 10 lawmakers are also asking Gates to provide them with
a complete copy of all materials the Pentagon has provided other members of
Congress relating to the FMTV competition as well as the opportunity to receive
the same briefings other lawmakers and committees received from Pentagon
officials.

The stakes are high for BAE Systems; without the FMTV
contract, the company risks losing its grip on the U.S. military’s tactical
wheeled vehicle market.

Linda Hudson, BAE’s Land & Armaments president, said her
company filed the protest because it believes the Army’s evaluation of the
contract proposal was flawed.

Hudson also said that Oshkosh’s bid on the fixed-price
contract was too low to be workable.

“No one took into account our incumbency, our experience,
our qualified design. A huge mistake was made from an acquisition perspective,”
Hudson said in an interview with The Hill last month.

In its letter to Gates, the Wisconsin delegation took the
opportunity to praise Oshkosh’s capabilities and assure the defense chief that
the company has “more than enough capacity to handle the anticipated FMTV
production, as well as any surge production that might be required, with no
impact on its existing contracts.”

Compared to other defense companies with high-stakes
interests at the Pentagon, Oshkosh, which also has commercial business, does
not have a large political action committee. Still, it has contributed
consistently to some members of the Wisconsin delegation.

Obey has received $19,200 from Oshkosh since the 2000
election cycle, Petri, who sits on the Transportation and Infrastructure panel,
received $17,650, and Kagen received $10,000.

Overall, Oshkosh spent close to $120,000 on congressional
campaign contributions in the 2008 elections, according to data from the Center
for Responsive Politics.

BAE Systems, which is a much larger company than
Oshkosh, spent $1,260,266 on campaign donations