WASHINGTON – They sound like first-rate in-flight accommodations – leather chairs, a 37-inch flat-screen monitor, bed, couch, table – all the comfort a traveling VIP could want.

But the amenities intended for top U.S. defense and military officials come with a price tag of $4.4 million, and counting.

That, plus the fact some money for the facilities has been set aside under a bill meant to fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, has exposed the already scandal-hit U.S. Air Force to charges of extravagant waste.

The Project on Government Oversight, or POGO, a Washington-based non-profit group, revealed details about the accommodations known as a Senior Leader In-Transit Conference Capsule, or SLICC, in a letter this week to Defense Secretary Robert Gates.

“In a time of war, it is critical for senior officials to visibly prioritize the needs of the men and women on the front line,” POGO told Gates.

“Yet an egregious failure of leadership has come to our attention that involves breathtaking extravagance when every dollar needs to be wisely spent in a time of war.”

Air Force officials had no immediate comment on POGO's allegations, while a spokesman for Gates said he was unaware of the letter.

The POGO letter follows the forced departure last month of the Air Force secretary and chief of staff over two high-profile scandals involving mix-ups in the U.S. nuclear arsenal.

In August 2007, the Air Force lost track of six nuclear warheads that had been mistakenly loaded onto a bomber and flown across the United States. The Pentagon also admitted in March that it had shipped nuclear fuses to Taiwan in error.

POGO said the Air Force has spent nearly $2.75 million to produce a SLICC prototype that a defense official said was still five months from being completed. That amounts to a 64 percent rise from an initial cost estimate of $1.7 million, according to the group.

'WORLD CLASS' ACCOMMODATIONS

SLICCs are two connected chambers with chairs, couch, bed and other amenities on a pallet that can be loaded onto a cargo aircraft such as a C-17 Globemaster or C-130 Hercules.

The Air Force originally referred to SLICCs as “comfort” capsules but dropped the word comfort in favor of “conference,” POGO said.

The group also found that some Air Force generals have been intimately involved with development of the SLICC and a related amenity called the Senior Leader In-Transit Pallet, or SLIP.

SLIPs provide traveling VIPs with a pallet of four leather business-class chairs with tables. The funding to produce four SLIPs is estimated at $1.7 million, up from an original cost estimate of $1.1 million, POGO said.

One general, who POGO said pressed for “world class” accommodations, rejected an initial brown-leather SLIP chair design. He demanded the leather's color be changed to Air Force blue and the original wood to cherry. The reupholstering alone cost $21,000, the group said.

The group said the Air Force has sought $16 million for SLICCs under a recently approved $184 billion funding bill for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the Bush administration's global war on terrorism.

“Meanwhile, the conventional seat pallets used to transport soldiers are in a deplorable state,” POGO Executive Director Danielle Brian wrote to Gates in the letter, dated July 17.

(Editing by Eric Beech)