The Air Force LANTIRN Program Must Surmount Some Formidable Difficulties

The Air Force's Low Altitude Navigation and Targeting Infrared System for Night (LANTIRN), if successfully developed, would provide certain Air Force aircraft with improved navigational and targeting capabilities that would enable them to be used in night operations and under low cloud ceilings. However, the LANTIRN system has experienced considerable cost growth and major technical difficulties serious enough for the Air Force to have recently lengthened the weapon's development and flight testing schedules by more than a year.

Two major assumptions, which were the basis for the Air Force's concluding in early studies that LANTIRN was cost effective, no longer appear to be valid. It is uncertain whether the aircraft can be operated at the low altitudes envisioned by the studies without creating an excessive workload for the pilot. Second, costs assumed in the Air Force studies have more than tripled. New assessments of the system have been significantly changed to reflect the changing circumstances, and questions have been raised about continuing development in view of these problems. Conflicting congressional instructions have served to complicate Air Force efforts to develop the system. GAO found that the LANTIRN program had predictable problems from the start but only recently had the program been subjected to critical reviews normally accorded systems of this magnitude. Thus, LANTIRN skirted the initial development phases of the acquisition process where program risks might have been fully considered.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

Director: Donald E. Day Team: General Accounting Office: Mission Analysis and Systems Acquisition Division Phone: (202) 275-8408