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WASHINGTON (AP) - A federal court upheld a 1991 decision by then-Defense Secretary Dick Cheney to cancel a $4 billion contract for the Navy's A-12 stealth fighter.
U.S. Court of Federal Claims Judge Robert H. Hodges concluded Thursday that the government acted reasonably when it terminated the deal. The Justice Department said that means companies must return more than $2.6 billion.
When conceived in 1984, the A-12 Avenger was to have been the centerpiece for the Navy's aircraft carriers through the turn of the century. But manufacturing delays kept pushing back the first test flight and the government scuttled the program two days before $553 million was due on the contract and two weeks before the start of the Gulf War.
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