6 ms·

While it might be a failure from the taxpayer's and military's point of view, it's a raving success for Congress and the contractors. The metrics for the latter

While it might be a failure from the taxpayer's and military's point of view, it's a raving success for Congress and the contractors. The metrics for the latter are jobs, grandstanding, campaign donations, kickbacks, crony benefits, and mountains of cash, plus guaranteed more mountains ongoing until it's killed. I wish this was the cynical view but it's more like reality of government procurement.

baybal2 6y ago
How much harm did those fellows do, and how much all communist spies/saboteurs/subversives/seditionists combined did?
- imglorp 6y ago
  Not exactly a new problem. > It could probably be shown by facts and figures that there is no distinctly native American criminal class except Congress. - Twain
imtringued 6y ago
This is a waste of jobs though. The only reason why you want to wastefully spend money on jobs creation is that you somehow discover new things in the process, you are building up a workforce that will work on productive things after they completed the boondoggle or you just want to hit inflation goals. I'd say the F-35 fails at all three. It's just a slightly cheaper F-22 that can be exported, the work was handed to existing companies for the sake of politics instead of creating new ones, the project is decades old and failed to hit inflation goals.
- cyberge99 6y ago
  Your presumption that F-35 is a delivery vehicle is flawed. It may be an unconventional capability codename.
mcv 6y ago
If creating jobs is so important, why not simply create those jobs in other areas? There's plenty of infrastructure in dire need of maintainance.
- gruez 6y ago
  getting a bridge fixed isn't shiny.
- lotsofpulp 6y ago
  A good portion of the voters are okay with government spending on military versus “bad” guys, with almost no limit, but the same voters balk at other government spending, decrying it for waste or corruption or inefficiency, etc. The tribe opens up their wallet anytime they feel threatened, but not to help each other, to make sure no other sub-tribe is getting a disproportionate portion of the help (and/or to maintain their own sub-tribe continuing to get a disproportionate portion of the help).
  - mcv 6y ago
    > "but the same voters balk at other government spending, decrying it for waste or corruption or inefficiency, etc." Oh, the irony.
    - BitwiseFool 6y ago
      Sadly, the candidates I trust to spend federal money wisely get trounced in every election.
    - dublin 6y ago
      Government is always inefficient, even in the rare cases where it's not utterly corrupt. As Bill Buckley famously put it, "What would happen if the Communists occupied the Sahara? Answer: Nothing—for 50 years. Then there would be a shortage of sand."
      - mcv 6y ago
Someone1234 6y ago
I'd argue that three distinct aircraft could have accomplished that goal better too (as they could be assembled in different places by different companies, with different US-based suppliers). The F-35's initial "share parts" goal was good. But feature creep and overall complexity in the project weren't controlled, and now with hindsight we would have been better off with multiple task-specific aircraft even if that meant little parts sharing.
- GekkePrutser 6y ago
  I think in particular the Marines design was too much of a stretch from the start. VTOL just makes for a totally different aircraft. The differences between the land and carrier versions are much smaller.
  - protomyth 6y ago
    Yeah. The F-4 was fine for the Navy and Air Force, but the VTOL was a step too far.
    - mgarfias 6y ago
      No, the f4 could do the job, but it wasn’t fine.
      - protomyth 6y ago
        Making more than 5,000 was probably good indicator of its value.
        mgarfias 6y ago
        Read what Boyd had to say about it. It was of value to MD and GE, but a good fighter it wasn't. Nor was it a good bomb truck. It kinda did both, but not well. The DoD of course, followed it on with the F-111 (thanks McNamara!) that tried to do everything, but the only effective thing it really did was to cause the Soviets to build the MIG-23 and waste a bunch of cash on that.
2OEH8eoCRo0 6y ago
As a US military veteran that now does software at a large defense contractor the whole culture offends me to my core. The US Govt, taxpayers, and military service members are getting hosed- especially on the software side of things.
- rsj_hn 6y ago
  Care to elaborate?
  - 2OEH8eoCRo0 6y ago
    It's difficult to separate the issues with the programs that I have worked on and the industry as a whole but I will try. I get a sense that the govt pays $10 for $1 of work. The other $9 is lost to bloated outdated process. You often see these companies avoid investing in themselves unless they can charge it to the government. This culture extends to contracts as well. If the government doesn't pay for unit tests then they aren't getting unit tested software. Known bugs don't get fixed unless the government pays for it. The government can require static analysis but then not require the findings to be fixed. It's as if these companies treat the government as an adversary. There is little to no incentive to deliver a good product- just enough to pass the requirements, check a box, and dump it on the customer. We have known about this approach to software for decades- the Defense Innovation Board has been sounding the alarm about losing ground due to outdated software processes in the defense industry: https://media.defense.gov/2019/May/01/2002126691/-1/-1/0/SWAP%20FLYER.PDF https://media.defense.gov/2019/May/01/2002126691/-1/-1/0/SWA... I really like their suggestion to make software source code a deliverable. That way the government can own the code, build from source, apply security fixes, audit, etc.
- seppin 6y ago
  With all respect, do you feel odd about benefiting personally from a system you despise?
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
jpalomaki 6y ago
As pointed out in the article, ”According to a map showing the economic impact across the country on Lockheed Martin’s F-35 Lightning II website, the only states that do not have at least one supplier for the aircraft are Hawaii and North Dakota. This gives all but two representatives and four senators more than enough incentive to not only keep greasing the wheels,[...]” https://www.f35.com/f35/about/economic-impact.html https://www.f35.com/f35/about/economic-impact.html
dd82 6y ago
This is a US government jobs program, first and foremost. Just like SLS.
xyzzy21 6y ago
Exactly. And this specifically contributed to its failure because it assured a "boil the ocean" project couldn't be "nipped in the bud" easily. It was intentional to distribute the design and manufacturing among as many Congressional districts and states as possible, but this ALSO is exactly the recipe for failure in any large project (especially an engineering project like JSF) both technically, politically and in terms of systems engineering and project management.

baybal2 6y ago

How much harm did those fellows do, and how much all communist spies/saboteurs/subversives/seditionists combined did?

imglorp 6y ago
Not exactly a new problem. > It could probably be shown by facts and figures that there is no distinctly native American criminal class except Congress. - Twain

imtringued 6y ago

This is a waste of jobs though. The only reason why you want to wastefully spend money on jobs creation is that you somehow discover new things in the process, you are building up a workforce that will work on productive things after they completed the boondoggle or you just want to hit inflation goals. I'd say the F-35 fails at all three. It's just a slightly cheaper F-22 that can be exported, the work was handed to existing companies for the sake of politics instead of creating new ones, the project is decades old and failed to hit inflation goals.

cyberge99 6y ago
Your presumption that F-35 is a delivery vehicle is flawed. It may be an unconventional capability codename.

mcv 6y ago

If creating jobs is so important, why not simply create those jobs in other areas? There's plenty of infrastructure in dire need of maintainance.

gruez 6y ago
getting a bridge fixed isn't shiny.
lotsofpulp 6y ago
A good portion of the voters are okay with government spending on military versus “bad” guys, with almost no limit, but the same voters balk at other government spending, decrying it for waste or corruption or inefficiency, etc. The tribe opens up their wallet anytime they feel threatened, but not to help each other, to make sure no other sub-tribe is getting a disproportionate portion of the help (and/or to maintain their own sub-tribe continuing to get a disproportionate portion of the help).
- mcv 6y ago
  > "but the same voters balk at other government spending, decrying it for waste or corruption or inefficiency, etc." Oh, the irony.
  - BitwiseFool 6y ago
    Sadly, the candidates I trust to spend federal money wisely get trounced in every election.
  - dublin 6y ago
    Government is always inefficient, even in the rare cases where it's not utterly corrupt. As Bill Buckley famously put it, "What would happen if the Communists occupied the Sahara? Answer: Nothing—for 50 years. Then there would be a shortage of sand."
    - mcv 6y ago

Someone1234 6y ago

I'd argue that three distinct aircraft could have accomplished that goal better too (as they could be assembled in different places by different companies, with different US-based suppliers). The F-35's initial "share parts" goal was good. But feature creep and overall complexity in the project weren't controlled, and now with hindsight we would have been better off with multiple task-specific aircraft even if that meant little parts sharing.

GekkePrutser 6y ago
I think in particular the Marines design was too much of a stretch from the start. VTOL just makes for a totally different aircraft. The differences between the land and carrier versions are much smaller.
- protomyth 6y ago
  Yeah. The F-4 was fine for the Navy and Air Force, but the VTOL was a step too far.
  - mgarfias 6y ago
    No, the f4 could do the job, but it wasn’t fine.
    - protomyth 6y ago
      Making more than 5,000 was probably good indicator of its value.
      - mgarfias 6y ago
        Read what Boyd had to say about it. It was of value to MD and GE, but a good fighter it wasn't. Nor was it a good bomb truck. It kinda did both, but not well. The DoD of course, followed it on with the F-111 (thanks McNamara!) that tried to do everything, but the only effective thing it really did was to cause the Soviets to build the MIG-23 and waste a bunch of cash on that.

2OEH8eoCRo0 6y ago

As a US military veteran that now does software at a large defense contractor the whole culture offends me to my core. The US Govt, taxpayers, and military service members are getting hosed- especially on the software side of things.

rsj_hn 6y ago
Care to elaborate?
- 2OEH8eoCRo0 6y ago
  It's difficult to separate the issues with the programs that I have worked on and the industry as a whole but I will try. I get a sense that the govt pays $10 for $1 of work. The other $9 is lost to bloated outdated process. You often see these companies avoid investing in themselves unless they can charge it to the government. This culture extends to contracts as well. If the government doesn't pay for unit tests then they aren't getting unit tested software. Known bugs don't get fixed unless the government pays for it. The government can require static analysis but then not require the findings to be fixed. It's as if these companies treat the government as an adversary. There is little to no incentive to deliver a good product- just enough to pass the requirements, check a box, and dump it on the customer. We have known about this approach to software for decades- the Defense Innovation Board has been sounding the alarm about losing ground due to outdated software processes in the defense industry: https://media.defense.gov/2019/May/01/2002126691/-1/-1/0/SWAP%20FLYER.PDF https://media.defense.gov/2019/May/01/2002126691/-1/-1/0/SWA... I really like their suggestion to make software source code a deliverable. That way the government can own the code, build from source, apply security fixes, audit, etc.
seppin 6y ago
With all respect, do you feel odd about benefiting personally from a system you despise?
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]

jpalomaki 6y ago

As pointed out in the article, ”According to a map showing the economic impact across the country on Lockheed Martin’s F-35 Lightning II website, the only states that do not have at least one supplier for the aircraft are Hawaii and North Dakota. This gives all but two representatives and four senators more than enough incentive to not only keep greasing the wheels,[...]” https://www.f35.com/f35/about/economic-impact.html https://www.f35.com/f35/about/economic-impact.html

dd82 6y ago

This is a US government jobs program, first and foremost. Just like SLS.

xyzzy21 6y ago

Exactly. And this specifically contributed to its failure because it assured a "boil the ocean" project couldn't be "nipped in the bud" easily. It was intentional to distribute the design and manufacturing among as many Congressional districts and states as possible, but this ALSO is exactly the recipe for failure in any large project (especially an engineering project like JSF) both technically, politically and in terms of systems engineering and project management.