Airbus's continued purchase of Russian-produced titanium, a critical metal in airplane manufacture, is one more reason why the United States Air Force (USAF) should reject Airbus participation in the USAF's tanker fleet modernization.

Last September 30, the United States Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) imposed new sanctions on Russia after it claimed to annex four Ukrainian districts.  Analysts predict that global sanctions against Russia will wipe out Russia's economic growth of the last 15 years.

Still largely unscathed from these sanctions is the Russian firm VSMPO-Avisma, the world's largest titanium producer.  Titanium and its alloys' special characteristics include lightweight, very high strength-to-weight ratios, and excellent resistance to heat and corrosion, making titanium useful for aircraft engines, airframes, and landing gear.  Accordingly, the Airbus A350XWB is 14 percent titanium by weight, while the Boeing 787 is 15 percent titanium.

While Boeing ended Russian titanium purchases in March 2022, Airbus officials the following month rejected boycotting Russian titanium.  "Sanctions on Russian titanium would hardly harm Russia, because they only account for a small part of export revenues there.  But they would massively damage the entire aerospace industry across Europe," an Airbus spokesperson said.  Concurring, Airbus CEO Guillaume Faury did not "think sanctions on imports will be appropriate," a response befitting Airbus's increased purchases of Russian titanium following Russia's seizure of Crimea in order to stockpile.

Airbus's dependency on Russian titanium doubtless influences company decisions, as Airbus relies upon Russia for half of the firm's titanium needs.  By contrast, Russia covers an estimated third of Boeing's requirements.  Boeing years ago began to diversify its titanium supply chain among the world's suppliers and producers, a process Airbus is only beginning.

Precisely to avoid such dependencies upon Russia, the American military generally discourages contractors from using Russian raw materials, yet Airbus is now offering its A330-MRTT ("multirole tanker transport") to the USAF, currently seeking to replace its aging air-to-air refueling tanker fleet, which contains KC-10 tankers (first fielded in 1981) as well as larger and more numerous KC-135s.  First entering USAF service in 1957, the KC-135 is based on Boeing's 707 commercial jetliner, a plane no longer in service.

The USAF has already purchased 179 Boeing KC-46 Pegasus tankers, a transport that first flew in 2015 and is based upon Boeing's 767 jetliner, for which parts are likely to be widely available for years to come.  In the 2011 contest for this initial tanker order, the KC-46 emerged as the "clear winner" against the A330-MRTT.  Now the USAF proposes to acquire an additional 140–160 tankers, and Airbus is trying to enter the competition again with the A330-MRTT.

Aerospace analyst Loren Thompson has analyzed the numerous reasons why a USAF shift midstream from the KC-46 to the A330-MRTT would be a bad idea.  For starters, the USAF "has spent $1.6 billion flight-testing Pegasus, and it is now certified to refuel the vast majority of combat aircraft in the joint fleet," he writes.  For the A330-MRTT, the USAF would have "to repeat this costly and protracted process."

Even if the USAF held "a competition for the next lot of tankers, the outcome isn't likely to be different from the matchup a decade ago," Thompson writes.  In "one instance where bigger isn't better," the A330-MRTT is 40 percent heavier than Pegasus and requires almost 50 percent more space on the ground while also having a bigger turning radius (150 feet versus KC-46's 129 feet).  In many "places like the Pacific, usable air bases are often severely constrained in terms of space, so a bigger plane means less tankers on the ramp, or (even worse) less room for fighters and bombers," he writes.  In the air, the A330-MRTT's size inflicts 30 percent more drag than the KC-46, causing the A330-MRTT to consume an extra 1,000 fuel gallons an hour, with a dramatic increase of "operating costs over a 30-year service life."

Moreover, the USAF "has repeatedly stated that it needs to reduce the number of aircraft types in its fleet to save money," because otherwise "economies of scale are lost," Thompson notes.  By contrast, the A330-MRTT means "adding another aircraft type to the fleet" with "new training programs for pilots and maintainers, unique stores of spare parts, construction of hangers that can house bigger aircraft, and other costs."  Additionally, the KC-46 has a "dedicated assembly line, whereas the Airbus tanker is built on a commercial assembly line and then modified at a different location," a process "likely to generate unusual engineering challenges."

Eric Peters concludes that the KC-46 would "leave the Air Force with just one made-in-America refueling platform," creating American jobs.  Meanwhile, the A330-MRTT "is made — partially — in Europe and shipped partially assembled to America.  It requires Airbus-specific parts and crews trained to work on that type of aircraft."  His Buy America argument makes particularly good sense in an era where American policymakers are increasingly worried about foreign dependencies in national security supply chains.

Airbus offers the USAF a bad deal, and the firm's flouting of sanctions against a common threat to Western security only makes matters worse.  Additional sanctions against Russia should ban its foreign business partners from contracting with the American government, including the Pentagon.  Airbus should take its Russian titanium and fly away.

Image: Defense Visual Information Distribution Service.