Trump was on the Qatar leg of his schmoozing of the Arabs in his creaking 35-year-plane that was beginning to sag and look a bit care worn.  She had been used by many men and had been around the block many times, indeed, the world. 

Landing at Doha, he spied the Emir’s discarded palace in-the-sky.  His shrivelled heart went out to the little, well not so little, plane sitting all alone, unwanted on her apron in the baking desert heat.  If he was in Egypt, he would have cried out, “Mummy, mummy, I want! Wah, wah!”, but since he wasn’t, he tried, “Daddy, daddy, I want!”  That didn’t work either.  After all, the manchild was the big daddy now.

Shame she was looking so forlorn with her taut 13-year-old body tastefully decked out in virginal white dripping with gold highlights.  All she needed was some kohl around the cockpit windows and she would look like a houri from the back streets of Cairo.  She might be a discard from the Emir’s harem, but he was smitten.  She was also more “impressive” being 6m longer than his old hag.  He just wanted to reach out and grab her by the, ahem, undercarriage.  Perhaps he could ask the Emir what her price was, after all every man has a price as he well knew.  He said a silent prayer to Mammon, crossed his wallet and touched his favourite old relic in his nether regions for luck.  He sent his bro, Steven Witkoff, man Friday and fellow billionaire, to discuss the bride price.  The Emir was flattered and decided to make it a gift saying that she was a fine ride and had only been lightly used. 

Back home the radical left scum were making a big hoo-ha and a brouhaha about his latest houri in Doha while RFK was distracting them with his MAHA.  Melania quietly voice messaged him in her sexy guttural Slavic accent that this would be a conflict of interest and that he must watch himself.  Ha-ha, he tried but he couldn’t see past his boep.  Trump was not deterred and hardened his resolve.  He closed the deal along with many others that were sure to give all his real estate and defence sector bros permanent hard-ons.  In his defence he quoted that age old Arab dictum that you don’t look a gift camel in the mouth (as it might spit in your face). The Emir had played him like a Qatar and was looking forward to at least four more peaceful years without US interference.  It was so easy.  It was like the colonists giving useless trinkets and glass beads to the tribes.  Give him a shiny gift, stroke his ego and you’ve got him by the sensitive bits.  (Ramaphosa tried to flatter him with a huge 14kg book on SA golf courses.  It didn’t work – he doesn’t read.)

Ok, ok, like all good fairy tales or bible stories, that’s not how it actually went down.

It had its genesis way back in the Obama era.  At the time of Trump’s victory in 2016, the Air Force was well underway with the final specification of two replacement planes based on the Boeing 747-8.  From the outside the presidential plane looks very similar to the commercial one, but under the skin it is a very different beast.  A major improvement was to be an air-air refuelling capability allowing the plane to remain in the air for more than a week until the food runs out or everyone shoots each other – could make a nice murder mystery thriller come to think of it.  Eager to prove himself to be the artful dealmaker that he touted himself to be, he complained that the $4.2bn price tag was too high and that they were to be delivered before the end of his term.  His bullying led to a dramatic change.  Boeing had two completed 747-8s airframes of a bankrupt customer which it proposed to convert for a reduction in price and specification.  The major item to go was the refuelling system as it cannot be retrofitted into a completed airframe.  Trump was happy to accept that because he is only interested in superficial image and not on the intrinsic worth.  The other compromise was to use the existing power supply and aircon system which are underpowered for the task. 

Boeing miscalculated the cost of, amongst other things, replacing the 380km of in situ wires with special shielded cables and the electromagnetic radiation hardening of all existing aircraft controls and electronic boxes.  The upshot is that the planes will be barely completed before the end of Trump’s second term.  Meanwhile the Emir’s palace in-the-sky could cost up to $1bn to convert to a sub-military grade US Presidential jet and will only be available just before the end of his term anyway.  It will initially be accepted by the Dept of Defense and then donated to Trump’s presidential library.  At $270,000 per flight hour, it’s anyone’s guess who is going to fly on it, to what end and who’s going to pay for it.  Perhaps it should be called Con Air.