[ARC5] Re: [Milsurplus] C-405A/A vs. C-740/ART-13

[Gordon White]

In the 1930s, with pennies at stake compared to today, a lot of choices 
were worked out over a couple of  Scotches and cigars between folks like 
Hap Arnold and the president of A.R.C. (or, in other cases, GE, Collins) 
in a way that today would get them tossed into prison.  That was 
actually to the benefit of the services. On the first Command Set, the 
SCR-183 predecessors, Western Electric's bid was thrown out as 
"unresponsive" versus A.R.C.'s bid. On the other hand, the Air Corps 
went for quite a while with the, was it the Westinghouse SCR-141? (I 
forget the numbers right now) probably because of "influence" When that 
supposedly superior set - on paper it was - turned out to be the size of 
a foot locker and would not go in fighters of the day, of course the 
Army had to scramble around and adopt the Navy's ATA/ARA  as SCR-274-N 
(for Navy.)

    I have watched defense procurement in Washington for a career. It is 
certainly political. And all the added rules to keep it legit (?) have 
driven defense contracting into the stratosphere.

- Gordon White