Congress OKs bill banning purchases of Russian-made rocket engines - LA Times "Despite lobbying from a joint venture of Boeing Co. and Lockheed Martin Corp., the Senate voted 89-11 to approve a bill Friday that would ban the Pentagon from awarding future rocket launch contracts to firms using Russian engines." That is a big deal. No more RD-180's for ULA. I believe they bought a bunch on the off chance that this would happen. I believe this would supercede the lawsuit and make it unnecessary. "The measure has already passed the House and is now headed for the expected signature of President Obama."
The devil is in the details, no doubt, but nice to see Congress passing a bipartisan bill that actually makes sense.
Yes. They can. They have enough engines stored up for two years worth of launches from what I read. They had an order in for 28 more engines that I'm sure they will try to still get. The timing of this scandal might have pushed Congress to act: A Tiny Florida Firm Is Making A Fortune Off Russian Rocket Engines - Business Insider
Thanks for the article Grendal. For those that didn't read it, here are some sections relevant to what's being discussed here:
Here is an update. ULA has quite a few of the engines saved up for military launches. FYI, there is no ban on ULA purchasing the RD-180 for commercial launches. I fully expect ULA to have as many as needed until Vulcan is up and launching. Russia Maintains High Quality of RD-180 Rocket Engines - ULA