Saxby Chambliss: “this amendment will prohibit any fiscal year 2005 funds from being used to terminate the C-130J multi-year procurement…”

“this amendment will prohibit any fiscal year 2005 funds from being used to terminate the C-130J multi-year procurement contract. In hearings before this body over the past several weeks Department of Defense personnel have admitted that when they made the decision to terminate this contract in December of last year that they did not have all the information needed to make that decision. Since PBD 753 was drafted in December 2004, we have learned that the cost to terminate this contract is approximately $1.6 billion. Also over the past several months we have seen the C-130J, KC-130J, as well as C-130s operated by our coalition partners in Iraq perform superbly throughout USCENTCOM. To date, C-130Js in Iraq have flown over 400 missions, with a mission capable rate of 93 percent and have performed all assigned missions successfully. KC-130Js have flown 789 hours in Iraq with mission capable rates in excess of 95 percent. Nevertheless, the Department of Defense has not yet submitted the amended budget request for this program that they discussed during hearings. That is why this amendment is necessary. I am introducing this amendment to make sure that this program, which is performing extremely well and which meets validated Air Force and Marine Corps requirements, is not prematurely cancelled and that the Department of Defense follows through with their commitment to complete the multi-year procurement contract.…”