No high-level witnesses at U.S. tanker hearing

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Neither Air Force Secretary Michael Donley nor Pentagon acquisition chief Ashton Carter will testify at a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing this week on the heated U.S. refueling plane competition.

Major General Wendy Masiello, who oversees combat and mission support in the Air Force acquisition office, and Steven Shirley, executive director of the Pentagon's Cyber Crime Center, will testify about the Air Force's inadvertent release of proprietary data to the bidders, the committee said.

The Thursday hearing comes as the Air Force is moving toward awarding a contract valued at up to $50 billion to either Boeing Co or Airbus parent EADS.

It will be the Air Force's third attempt since 2001 to begin replacing its aging fleet of KC-135 refueling planes, which are now over 50 years old on average.

Senator Maria Cantwell, a Washington state Democrat and strong Boeing supporter, requested a hearing after the Air Force gave sensitive information from Boeing's bid to competitor EADS, and vice versa.

Cantwell last week said that a clerical error that gave both bidders access to each others' proprietary data last year could have far-reaching consequences for the competition.

In a letter to Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin, Cantwell outlined questions for the hearing, including what steps were taken "to ensure EADS did not gain an unfair competitive advantage" by having access to the Boeing data while the Air Force investigated the incident.

"From day one, the Air Force has attempted to gloss over the incident and minimize its potential impact on the cost adjustment phase of the source selection of the KC-X tanker competition," Cantwell said in the letter.

A spokesman for the committee declined comment on why neither Donley nor Carter would testify at the hearing.

But one Senate aide, who was not authorized to speak on the record, said that higher-ranking witnesses like Donley and Carter were not testifying at the hearing to avoid compromising the ongoing "source selection process."

Masiello and Shirley were not actively involved in the competition, and would be able to answer only procedural questions, but no specifics on the decision-making process that is now coming to a close.

Defense officials and congressional aides say they expect a contract announcement next month, but some industry officials say it may not come until March, given that the service still needs to go through certain procedural steps, including final meetings with each bidder that have not yet been scheduled.

(Reporting by Andrea Shalal-Esa; Editing by Tim Dobbyn)