Rescue mission: new patrol boats: a must-win for the Coast Guard.

• Author: Rusling, Matthew
• Position: Coast Guard

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The upcoming acquisition of new high-speed patrol boats for the U.S. Coast Guard is viewed as a make-or-break effort that could help the service recover from a string of setbacks in its Deepwater modernization program.

Coast Guard officials voice optimism about the $1.5 billion project to acquire a fleet of new Sentinel-class fast patrol boats. They tout a recent reorganization of Deepwater management to ensure tight oversight of contractors and praise the decision to buy the new boats on a fixed-price contract in order to avert future cost overruns.

But the project still faces significant hurdles, including an industry protest that could set the schedule back by months or years. The Coast Guard also must prove it can endure the pressure of close congressional scrutiny as it tries to develop and deploy technically complex ships, aircraft and information systems.

Deepwater began in 1999 as a 25-year modernization program whose cost has grown from $17 billion to $24 billion.

By 2007, the future of Deepwater began to look bleak. The Coast Guard lost nearly $100 million when it contracted with Integrated Coast Guard Systems to convert several dozen 110-foot Island class cutters to 123-foot boats. The first eight vessels showed such serious workmanship flaws that the job had to be scrapped. A firestorm of criticism from Congress and a Department of Justice investigation ensued.

The Coast Guard has since instituted acquisition reforms, including the removal of Deepwater's "lead systems integrator" industry team, which was replaced by in-house management.

In September, it awarded an $88 million contract to Bollinger Shipyards Inc. to build the first Sentinel-class Fast Response Cutter. The company will manufacture 34 of these during the next six to eight years, under a $1.5 billion contract. A total of 58 will eventually be constructed. The vessel will replace the aging 110-foot Island class cutters.

It is still too early to tell whether the Sentinel marks the end of the Coast Guard's acquisition troubles, said Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md.

Cummings chairs the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee's Coast Guard and maritime transportation panel.

"It's almost like walking into a court and assuming that a judge is going to rule one way or another and then betting on it. You don't do that. You let the process play itself out," he said in an interview. "We thought in the past that everything was going fine, and then...