I'm sure the PR fight will get even nastier.
Northrop Ad Aimed at Boeing Sparks Ire of Pentagon Official(WSJ) Northrop Grumman Corp. has resumed its attacks on rival Boeing Co. after U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates sought to ease tensions over a $40 billion Air Force tanker contract by postponing the competition until the next presidential administration.
A full-page ad by Northrop in the Washington Post Wednesday prompted a rebuke from a Pentagon official Thursday. After trading broadsides with Boeing in national and Washington-area newspapers in the U.S. over the summer, Northrop had held its fire until now.
With an eye on rising fiscal pressure at the Pentagon, the ad focused on Northrop's first batch of 68 Airbus A330-based planes being $3 billion less expensive to acquire than the same number of modified Boeing 767s, which carried a price tag of $15.4 billion. Northrop attributed the detailed pricing information to an unnamed "senior DOD official."
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