Lockheed, Boeing warplanes boosted by House panel

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Big-dollar warplane programs run by Boeing Co (BA.N) and Lockheed Martin Corp (LMT.N) received boosts in the House of Representatives Armed Services Committee on Wednesday.

As part of its version of a 2009 defense policy bill, the panel voted to spend $3.9 billion to buy 15 Boeing C-17 cargo planes.

Neither the Bush administration nor the Senate Armed Services Committee had sought these aircraft, although the Air Force considers the C-17 a top "unfunded" requirement.

The committee also recommended an additional $523 million as a down payment on 20 more Lockheed F-22 fighters in fiscal 2010.

The Bush administration had deferred decisions on both the C-17 and F-22 production lines, leaving the next president, to be elected November 4 and take office January 20, to decide their fate.

The U.S. Army's $160 billion keystone modernization program, co-led by Boeing and SAIC Inc (SAI.N), suffered a setback.

The Democratic-controlled panel voted along party lines to cut $200 million, or 5.5 percent, of the $3.6 billion sought by President George W. Bush for the Future Combat Systems program in fiscal 2009, which starts October 1.

At issue are 14 major weapons systems linked by computer networks. The Army estimates it will cost $160 billion, while the Government Accountability Office says the price tag could grow to $200 billion.

The committee action on Future Combat Systems, or FCS, was the first to go to a roll-call vote as the House panel debated its version of the fiscal 2009 defense policy bill.

Republicans on the panel unanimously voted for a failed effort to restore $233 million to the program on the grounds that it was in danger of death by a "thousand slashes," as Republican Todd Akin of Missouri put it.

But Rep. Neil Abercrombie, the Hawaiian Democrat who chairs the panel's Air-Land subcommittee, argued the cuts did nothing to undermine the program's prospects for succeeding in a major review scheduled next year to decide on the program's fate.

The committee's Democrats, siding with Abercrombie, also voted to shift $33 million within FCS funding from long-term FCS projects to near-term ones said by Abercrombie to have a chance of being fielded by 2011.

The House panel's bill must be adopted by the full House, then reconciled with a companion measure in the Senate before it can be signed into law by the president.

In other action by the committee, U.S. Navy shipbuilding hopes received a boost. The panel voted to add as many as four ships to the Navy's plan if the Navy chooses to return to building the DDG 51 class of destroyers.

It also voted to fully fund a 10th amphibious assault ship built by Northrop Grumman (NOC.N). General Dynamics Corp (GD.N) also works on the program.

The panel adopted a Republican-backed amendment that would act as a kind of $422 million down payment to let the Navy buy "long-lead" items it would need to build an extra Virginia-class submarine in 2011, beyond its current shipbuilding plans.

(Reporting by Jim Wolf; Editing by Tim Dobbyn, Gary Hill)