Washington (AFP) - The United States has given the go-ahead for its ally France to buy four Lockheed Martin C-130J military aircraft, a rival to the French-built Airbus A400M.
The US Defense Security Cooperation Agency said the contract for two C-130J transports and two KC-130J fuel tankers would come to $650 million (606 million euros).
Each plane will be fitted with AE-2100D engines from British-based firm Rolls Royce, and France will buy four spare motors along with onboard radar and radios.
"The C-130Js will provide critical transport, air drop, and resupply to thousands of French troops in support of current and future operations," the US agency said.
"The KC-130Js will provide crucial air refuelling capability to France's fighter aircraft, light transport aircraft and helicopters," it added, in a statement.
"France requests that Lockheed Martin be the sole source provider."
France was a launch customer for the Airbus A400M transport, a direct rival of Lockheed Martin's C-130J, a stretched version of the tried and tested C-130 series.
But the French military only received the first of its theoretically more modern Airbus turboprops after years of technical problems, cost overruns and accidents.
In May, an A400M crashed in Spain during a test flight, killing four, and several European and Asian customers temporarily halted testing pending an investigation.
Airbus is now delivering the plane again and seeking to build its customer base, but an order from its home country for a US rival could be seen as a bad sign.
Loren Thompson, national security academic and chief operating officer of the Lexington Institute, saw the French sale an "impressive testament" to the C-130.
The plane first went into service with the US military in the 1950s and is now an industry standard in service with air forces around the world in many variants.
Operating costs for the C-130 are low and, Thompson said, "it has the longest in service life of any military aircraft in history" with no end in sight.
"This plane may be in use for a century," he said. Thompson's Lexington Institute think tank receives funds from US defense contractors, including Lockheed Martin.
The first two C-130J will be delivered end of 2017 and early 2018 and the two tanker in 2019
The Air Force is offering four new Hercules C-130J aircraft of US tactical transport.
The Directorate General of Armaments (DGA) has ordered Friday at the Air Force of the United States (USAF) four new C-130J Hercules.
Two of the four units will have a capacity of flight refueling helicopters in accordance with the announcements that were made in April 2015 during the updating of the military program law.
This order follows the decision by the Minister of Defence, Jean-Yves Le Drian, December 15 in Ministerial Investment Committee (MIC).
On January 1, he confirmed that "the expected acquisition was confirmed by me in the last few days."
This acquisition "will strengthen our tactical airlift capabilities, which are overstretched," explained Jean-Yves Le Drian June 4 in the National Assembly.
The first two aircraft will be delivered end of 2017 and early 2018 and the two supply vessels in 2019.
These four C-130J will strengthen the middle segment of the tactical transport fleet of the Air Force, currently composed of the C-160 Transall and C-130H Hercules.
These devices are "indeed particularly stressed and tested by various external operations whose environmental conditions are straining the material," said Monday the release by the DGA.
A $ 640 million bill
"Flagship measure of updating the military program law, the acquisition was completed in a very short time," said the DGA.
It is performed as part of an acquisition procedure FMS (Foreign Military Sales). It also includes the support system, staff training and retention initial operational condition.
But this order has not been without difficulty. For the budget planned under this purchase was initially very tight: 330 million euros. In August, the DGA was therefore also launched a parallel request for information for the acquisition of 4 used C130.
As the bill was much too tight, had initially estimated the DGA to offer four new C130 produced by Lockheed Martin with the required equipment, logistics and necessary training.
The unit price of a C130 is 90 million dollars, had even specified the Delegate General for Armaments, Laurent Collet-Billon, May 21 at the National Assembly.
But it considered that the acquisition of four new C-130J would be about 800 million euros. Reportedly, the bill eventually would be approximately $ 640 million.
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