Military Admits Billion-Dollar War Toy F-35 Is F**ked

[n2doc]

Officials are finally admitting the F-35 fighter has turned into a nightmare—but it’s too late to stop the $400-billion program now.
Way back in the early 2000s, the U.S. military had a dream. To develop a new "universal" jet fighter that could do, well, pretty much everything that the military asks its different fighters to do.

But the dream of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter turned into a nightmare. The program is six years behind schedule and tens of billions of dollars over budget. And now, 16 years after the JSF prototypes took off for their first flights, top officials are finally owning up to the trauma the $400-billion fighter program has inflicted on America's finances and war readiness.

In a remarkable period, beginning in February and lasting several weeks, senior officers and high-ranking bureaucrats finally publicly copped to the warplane program's fundamental failures.

But the timing of the military's mea culpa is ... interesting. For at the same time as the admissions of guilt, the F-35 was passing several bureaucratic milestones that make it more or less impossible to cancel. Too much money's already been spent. Too many well-established jobs are at stake. Too many F-35s are already rolling out of the factory.

The Pentagon can clear its conscience of the jet fighter's misdeeds because doing so is, at this late hour, consequence-free.

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http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/03/17/military-admits-billion-dollar-war-toy-f-35-is-f-ked.html

[Kelvin Mace]

1. CANCEL the program

it is just good money after bad.

Why is it we never get anyone saying, "Oh, we can't cut food stamps. The program is rolling along and too many people's lives are at stake."?

[Act_of_Reparation]

10. Because food stamp manufacturers don't finance reelection campaigns.

Fighter jet manufacturers do.

That's my guess, anyway.

[Scuba]

2. Smart leaders know that sunk costs shouldn't be considered a reason to keep on keeping on.

Kill this monstrosity.

[CentralMass]

3. Now they just need to find some smart leaders.

[Atman]

4. Designed more than 20 years ago...it's already ancient technology.

Just stop it. STOP IT! Why waist another penny, just because "too many well-established jobs are at stake? That makes no sense! No one ever once said that to a factory who was about to shut down and move all of it's production to China.

[Orrex]

5. "Billion-Dollar war toy?" If only.

Cancel this disastrous money pit now.

[Lurks Often]

6. It won't be cancelled, even though it should be

Too many politicians and too many countries have invested too much time, money and political capital into the F-35 to cancel the program.

[Andy823]

18. They should fire all those politicians nt

[Lurks Often]

19. A lot of them are Democrats

I rather doubt Sen. Blumenthal & Sen. Murphy of CT would vote to cancel the F-35 program, it would cost United Technologies (Pratt & Whitney as well as other defense related companies) jobs and money and further CT's already fragile economy.

[lpbk2713]

7. Famous aircarft in history.

The P-47 Mustang

The F-4 Phantom

The F-35 Boondoggle

[LongTomH]

12. Excuse me: The P-47 was called the Thunderbolt; The Mustang was the p-51

Both were remarkable aircraft, as my late Uncle, a former Air Force mechanic pointed out.

[lpbk2713]

13. Absolutely right.

I knew better but my memory was too groggy at the time.

[kentauros]

20. I'd like to add the F-20, even though not many were built.

The F-20 Tigershark was a superior plane killed by an inferior President. Reagan strikes again.

[2naSalit]

8. The only surprise is taht they finally admit it.

Now if they would just cancel the damned thing.

[Wounded Bear]

9. Should have watched Pentagon Wars...

great film about how projects get handled.

[Octafish]

11. Weapons programs now are like the wars themselves...Vietnam...Iraq...Afghanistan...

We can't get out and give up after all that we've sacrificed in blood and treasure for their freedom, uh, independence, uh, opening up to capital markets.

[gratuitous]

14. It will never be canceled

The manufacturer wisely spread out the contracts for the F-35 over something like 47 states. It will never be built, it will never fly, but it will never be canceled because that would mean that the Senators and Representatives of 47 states put the country's interests above that of their constituents, and that's not the way the U.S. rolls. Budget deficit hawks, who come out of hibernation whenever there's a Democrat in the White House or when someone proposes that a few million dollars in the budget be redirected to help ordinary citizens, never EVER mention the F-35, and the popular media know far better than to bring it up to them.

Ain't that America somethin' to see?

[Oneironaut]

15. Designing 101 - Complexity only when necessary.

If you try to load everything up and pave it with gold, prepare for disaster. Sometimes, simplicity is good. This seems to be a case of trying to create a god-like fighter without examining whether or not it was actually feasible. Now, they're making the classic mistake of believing that they're committed because they spent so much time and resources on a constantly creeping project. There comes a point where it's time to let a disastrous project die.

[edhopper]

16. It will be good to hear the Republicans

come out and blast this as Government waste and vote to curtail the program.








Do you really have to ask?

[KamaAina]

17. Maybe we could use them for an aerial version of demolition derby.