Of all the departments, agencies and bureaus that make up the US government, none is so much like an ancient Greek city-state as the Pentagon, in that it makes budgets and it makes war.
On television scant attention is given the former -- except during the annual budget roll-out of proposed federal spending, under way in Washington this week, while the drama of armed combat holds undeniable visual appeal.
The producers of the acclaimed "Nova" documentary series on PBS [American TV's Public Broadcasting System] made a courageous decision, then, in devoting their efforts to a detailed inquiry into how the Defense Department spends hundreds of billions of dollars. The case study examines a jet-fighter program that is expected to be the most lucrative contract in military history.
Battle of the X-Planes tracks a five-year dogfight for dollars, a competition for the US$200 billion contract to build the Joint Strike Fighter, envisioned as a workhorse warplane that could be fielded in larger numbers than the more sophisticated F-22. With the F-22s greatest vulnerability its cost, the documentary argues that "the spreadsheet is mightier than the sword."
The Pentagon pushed the aerospace industry to build the Joint Strike Fighter as a one-size-fits-all warplane to replace aging jets of the Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps. The requirements? Evade radar. Include the newest electronics. Fly faster than sound. Be sturdy enough to land on a carrier deck for the Navy, yet graceful enough to hover like a helicopter and gently land straight down on unimproved runways used by frontline marines.
Two very different companies made the finals, and they offered the Pentagon two very different designs. Boeing, best known in the commercial air fleet, built its military offering with a delta-shaped wing, looking for a "signature advantage" over Lockheed Martin's more traditional fighter design. But Lockheed Martin, whose Skunk Works in the California desert has given birth to generations of famous American warplanes, created a radical new system of internal fans to meet the need for short takeoff and vertical landing.
The Pentagon announced the winner of the Joint Strike Fighter contract in October 2001. But to avoid spoiling the surprise for those outside the weapons world who didn't hear of Lockheed Martin's victory, the documentary maintains the tension with MTV-style quick cuts and the image of a general strolling along with the contract decision under lock and key.
There was no need for false drama. The program illustrates a world of vicious procurement Darwinism in which natural bureaucratic selection dealt a death blow to one of America's most famous industrial names, the McDonnell Douglas Corp, which failed to make the final cut.
Within two years it was sold to Boeing. During the fighter competition Lockheed Martin was troubled by financial management questions, and Boeing was temporarily shut down by a strike.
Nova received insider access to all the right people with all the right stuff: Pentagon program directors and corporate heavyweights, engineers, designers, computer wonks and of course swaggering test pilots.
Even in this high-tech world, superstition survives. Whenever a hand-built Lockheed Martin experimental jet makes its maiden flight, the test pilot carries away the wallets and keys of the production team, a mutual compact that the aircraft will make it up and down without ending in a fireball.
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