{"id":53676,"date":"2019-11-27T16:17:03","date_gmt":"2019-11-27T16:17:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/uncategorized\/2019\/11\/27\/navistars-challenge-against-us-army-over-vehicle-buys-hangs-in-the-balance\/"},"modified":"2026-08-07T23:53:19","modified_gmt":"2026-08-07T23:53:19","slug":"navistars-challenge-against-us-army-over-vehicle-buys-hangs-in-the-balance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/land\/2019\/11\/27\/navistars-challenge-against-us-army-over-vehicle-buys-hangs-in-the-balance\/","title":{"rendered":"Navistar\u2019s challenge against US Army over vehicle buys hangs in the balance"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

WASHINGTON \u2014 For over a decade, the U.S. Army has used one source \u2014 Oshkosh Defense<\/a> \u2014 to build its Family of Medium Tactical Vehicles<\/a>, choosing to sole source to the company beyond its initial five year contract rather than reopen competition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Defense company Navistar is challenging the Army\u2019s choice to forgo competition and filed a lawsuit with the U.S. Court of Federal Claims in early August.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nov. 26 was to be the day a judge would decide whether the U.S. Army violated the law by continuing to order vehicles from Oshkosh outside of the scope of the contract while avoiding competition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And while a bench trial happened, the judge hearing the case did not make a decision. It is unclear what\u2019s next or when a ruling could happen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Navistar decided to sue the Army after it was getting nowhere in its quest to get the Army to produce documents \u2014 through a protest filed with the Government Accountability Office \u2014 that would show the service\u2019s reasoning to continue to order more vehicles from Oshkosh without competition and without proper legal justification.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The company contended that the Army did not justify and improperly awarded its most recent sole source FMTV procurement to Oshkosh, and failed to provide proper notice to possible competitors in accordance with federal acquisition regulations and the Competition in Contracting Act (CICA), according to an extensive review of court documents by Defense News.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition, the Army also ignored a stop work order, which automatically went into effect when a GAO protest was filed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Navistar filed two complaints: One that claims the Army violated the law when it continued to buy Oshkosh vehicles outside of the scope of its contract without holding a competition and another that claims the Army illegally continued to work on production of those vehicles despite a required stop work order that must go into affect once a protest is filed with the GAO.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since 2009, the Army has spent over $6 billion on FMTVs from Oshkosh. FMTVs are used for a wide variety of missions to include transporting capabilities that extend from cargo to missile defense radars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Navistar contends the Army had ample time to compete for follow-on FMTV orders, and the pool was deep with companies ready to provide vehicles that met the service\u2019s requirement, but the Army never did.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A long saga<\/b><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The saga goes much further back than just the 2019 GAO protest and lawsuit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Navistar successfully protested the Army\u2019s initial award to Oshkosh back in August 26, 2009. As a result, the Army reviewed its decision, reaffirmed its selection of Oshkosh and awarded it a contract with a performance period of less than five years, set to expire at the end of 2013.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The request for proposals ahead of the original contract award estimated 23,341 vehicles to be delivered over a five-year period. Following that, it was Navistar\u2019s belief that the Army would reopen the competition to deliver more FMTVs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Through a series of justification and approvals \u2014 five of them \u2014 the Army continued to extend the contract through August 25, 2019, arguing each time that it did not have the time to conduct a new competition to meet the service\u2019s needs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In its latest J&A in September 2016, the Army justified it needed another 1,744 FMTVs at an estimated cost of $575 million for total contract duration of 10 years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Army argued that it needed to sole source FMTVs to Oshkosh because it didn\u2019t have 24 months that it would take to conduct a full competition to meet urgent requirements, while it acknowledged there were other companies to include Navistar that could build FMTVs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The service also justified the sole source award due to its plans to stop procuring the current version of the FMTV as it prepared to take delivery of a new FMTV variant, which was also competitively awarded to Oshkosh in 2018.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Navistar chose not to compete for the new variant, according to court documents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Oshkosh Defense has won a new contract to produce the next-generation variant of the Army’s Family of Tactical Wheeled Vehicles. Pictured here is an FMTV 5-ton wrecker during Operation Sustain Fury in Ogden, Utah, June 10, 2017. (Photo by Sgt. Kayla Benson\/U.S. Army)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The order in 2016 was to fulfill the Army\u2019s remaining needs between the end of the current variant and the future variant expected to be delivered in fiscal year 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Navistar again protested with the GAO the 2016 sole source award to Oshkosh for more FMTVs and ended up dropping the protest when it settled with the Army to supply some vehicles to Iraq.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Without a J&A or any other documents justifying another order of vehicles, the Army, on June 28, 2019, announced what it described as the award of a $320 million contract modification for domestic purposes and for foreign military sales for the countries of Argentina, Djibouti, Iraq, Lebanon and Romania. The order was for an estimated 1,916 vehicles and extended the performance period of the contract out to 2021, 12 years past the original contract award.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The announcement, according to Navistar, never disclosed that the Army had actually already ordered roughly 1,000 vehicles in excess of what was justified in the 2016 J&A.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Navistar again filed a protest with the GAO over the orders made without a new J&A, but withdrew its protest in favor of filing a lawsuit in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims when the GAO refused to require the Army to produce relevant documentation justifying the additional FMTVs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It wasn\u2019t until the company filed its complaint in federal court, that it was informed by the Department of Justice that the Army had never stopped work to produce the FMTVs ordered in 2019, Navistar reveals in court documents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Beyond the scope<\/b><\/p>\n\n\n\n

When the Army announced a new sole source procurement for FMTVs to Oshkosh in June, it caught Navistar by surprise because the service hadn\u2019t issued a J&A, which had been its practice after the original contract period of performance had ended, and is also required by law, the company argues in the court documents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The June announcement came on the heels of the five J&As that had included an extra 4,875 vehicles and $1.4 billion more to Oshkosh outside of the scope of the original 2009 contract and procured without competition, Navistar notes.<\/p>\n\n\n\t