Friday, April 14, 2017

Thomas Phippen — The Story You’ve Been Hearing About The ‘Mother Of All Bombs’ Is Totally Wrong'

The actual cost of the bomb is unknown. The actual cost of the program isn’t publicly available because the Mother of All Bombs, officially known as GBU-43 or the Massive Ordnance Air Blast (MOAB), is manufactured by the military and not a private defense company.
In fact, the Air Force doesn’t even keep track of the per unit cost, nor the cost of the program as a whole, because it is not manufactured privately.
“We don’t have a cost per unit” for the MOAB, Air Force spokesperson Ann Stefanek told The Daily Caller News Foundation. “These munitions were produced in-house so we don’t have a standard procurement cost associated with them.”
The Air Force mostly used existing technologies and hardware for the first MOAB prototypes and never contracted out the full production of the bomb, so they did not need to itemize and add the cost of each weapon component, Stefanek told TheDCNF.
Many reports Thursday, including USA Today, the Washington Examiner, CNBC and others, claimed the MOAB cost $314 million to develop, citing a 2011 Los Angeles Times report.
The cost estimates in that article, however, only refer to the cost of the Air Force’s biggest bunker busting bomb, the 5,300 pound Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP), or GBU-57, which is built by private defense contractor Boeing Company.
Look ma, no accounting!

The National Interest
The Story You’ve Been Hearing About The ‘Mother Of All Bombs’ Is Totally Wrong'
Thomas Phippen

5 comments:

hog said...

if there are no contractors involved, they are probably dirt cheap to make

Tom Hickey said...

if there are no contractors involved, they are probably dirt cheap to make

1. Not if the Pentagon pays &500 for a toilet seat.

2. Trillions of dollars are unaccounted for at the Pentagon.

When accounting goes on holiday, who knows what the actual situation may be.

Six said...

All of the components had to be purchased from contractors, and perhaps the engineering. Not that the dollars really matter.

Tom Hickey said...

All of the components had to be purchased from contractors, and perhaps the engineering.|
Not that the dollars really matter.


The spokesman seems to be saying that they didn't keep track of that in their accounting.

Obviously, the figures are there on the invoices, at least on the books of the contractors.

Tom Hickey said...

BTW, I was in the military and know how supply works. Everything has a number. If the MOAB was built in house from inventory, those parts can be identified and priced. The labor time can also be figured based on man hours and pay scale. The military pay scale is public.

What the guy seems to be saying is that they didn't bother keeping track.