WASHINGTON, Nov. 25 (UPI) -- The Pentagon is reviewing a deal to lease 20 and buy 80 air-refueling 767 jets from the Boeing Co., Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said Tuesday.
Rumsfeld said he'd asked his staff to take another look at the deal in the wake of Boeing's termination of two executives for unethical behavior
One of the executives, Darleen Druyun, had been an Air Force acquisition official who championed the $17 billion arrangement. Boeing Monday announced Druyun and Boeing vice president Michael Sears discussed her post-government employment with Boeing while she was working on that deal.
Rumsfeld said at a meeting Tuesday he asked his staff to look into the situation to see whether the deal needed to be reconsidered.
"We are the custodians of the taxpayers dollars and ought to see that," he said at a Pentagon press conference.
The arrangement would allow the U.S. Air Force to lease 20 767s and buy them at a later time. The service sought to lease then buy a full 100, citing near-term savings, although at a higher long-term cost, at a time when its aging refueling fleet of KC-135s are falling into disrepair.
