The U.S. and Canada missed an opportunity to deploy an upgraded NORAD radar-based air defense system before the 2001 terrorist attacks because of problems that have hindered both countries' efforts to field a tried-and-proven system for more than a decade, including escalating costs, blown deadlines, mismatched technology and mismanaged programs, according to government audits and acquisition documents.

Two years before the 9/11 attacks, the U.S. and Canadian NORAD partnership was supposed to start installing a new command-and-control (C2) system for the radars with capabilities that possibly could have been used to help stop terrorists from slamming their hijacked jetliners into the World Trade Center and Pentagon. The technology for that system would serve as the building blocks for the system the two countries eventually deployed last year - the Battle Control System-Fixed (BCS-F).

The cancellation of the earlier program in the late 1990s not only ate up about $200 million in investments by the two countries, but also caused a crack in the NORAD partnership on C2 air defense systems, according to a Canadian National Defence Headquarters audit, "Modernizing the NORAD System in Canada - National Defence," released this month.

Canadian defense officials argued the modernization program could still work.

After dropping the joint NORAD improvement project, both countries set off on separate and ultimately costly C2 modernization tracks for the radar systems. Over the past 12 years, the two countries have invested nearly half a billion dollars in trying to modernize their C2 systems and better secure North American skies, according to audits, acquisition documents and interviews with industry and military sources.

The equal partnership officially ended, says the Canadian audit report, when Canada became a customer of its former partner, agreeing to buy the U.S. Air Force airspace security solution, BCS-F. After years of equal input, Canada now has been relegated to accepting requirements based mostly on U.S. needs, the Canadian audit said.

The U.S. Air Force disagrees, saying the NORAD partnership is as "robust today as when it was founded in 1958. The NORAD agreement has never lapsed. Although that particular contract was cancelled, the current BCS-F program is in fact a Bi-National program with the BCS-F system fielded to the U.S. and Canadian NORAD air defense sectors."

Canada dropped its plan to convert a NATO-based air defense system and integrate it for its North American territory because of the same issues that forced it to abandon earlier attempts to modernize.

BCS-F represents the third attempt by Canadian National Defence to install a modernized air surveillance and control system in the sector air operations center.

But BCS-F has had its own development and fielding issues (DAILY, Jan. 5) - something that has not escaped the Canadians, who say the system needs a risk management and backup plan.

"For the current BCS-F system, a threat risk assessment is being performed as part of the Department of Defence Information Technology Security Certification and Accreditation Process," the Canadian defense audit said. "Within this certification and accreditation process, backups, redundancy, and continuity will all be addressed. The requirement for site redundancy will be further examined under the Canadian Air Defence Sector Upgrade Project."

The Canadian audit also said, "Expected benefits of any system and its estimated life cycle costs should be analyzed and included in the decision-making process. While few options may have existed for National Defence as a NORAD partner other than to accept the BCS-F system as its sector air operations center system, we nevertheless expected the department to have identified system benefits, as well as any associated risks, and to have assessed future costs. The department could not provide us with evidence that it had done this analysis."

The U.S. Air Force said, "We believe there may be a misunderstanding as to the intent of the Canadian audit report. Specifically, the audit report threat risk assessment - the Department of Defence Information Technology Security Certification and Accreditation Process - is a standard assessment that is performed against most systems like BCS-Fixed."

When Canada's air defense department bought the BCS-F system, it did not inform the government of this change in scope from being a partner to becoming a customer buying a product developed mainly from U.S. Air Force stated operational requirements, the Canadian audit pointed out. (See related story p. 3).