I read the GAO document, which is difficult to understand in a number of places without the RFP at hand. Disclaimer; I was completely out of the loop with re to any efforts at SA with re to this project.
Going back to our efforts to respond to the Army’s UTTAS RFP however, I was of course deeply involved in that effort. The GAO protest assessment shocked me. The direction in place for the team working the UTTAS RFP response was simple and direct: we will take zero deviations from the Army’s stated requirements in the RFP. Now, that was challenging as that RFP was in reality a design spec-very detailed. In the final analysis, I recall we did take 10 minor deviations-cases where one spec requirement conflicted with another so you couldn’t meet both. The Army was okay with those, and in any case they were minutiae.
But that was 50 years ago, with a completely different leadership group, both at UTC corporate and at Sikorsky.