On February 2nd, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates told Congress that the military needs no additional C-17 aircraft and that the production line should be shut down in 2011. His testimony drew bipartisan criticism from several senators, including Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO) and Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK). Senator McCaskill protested “we keep hearing…this is something that the military doesn’t want.… Then I go over there [to Afghanistan and Iraq], and that’s not their attitude at all.” Sen. Inhofe added that he believes America’s airlift capacity is in “dire straits,” and …
