Armchair chief of staffing... I'm gonna say that the current philosophy of one design that can be "easily" modified to do anything (fighter jet, naval ship, etc

Armchair chief of staffing... I'm gonna say that the current philosophy of one design that can be "easily" modified to do anything (fighter jet, naval ship, etc...) seem to be showing its costs compared to purpose built systems. It will likely take another generational update of the military to change that philosophy back. The "make a ship that can do everything" is likely met with a gleam in the contractor's accounting department eyes as they say "we'll need to do some R&D on this since it isn't something that we've successfully done before." I believe that this is a "the ideas are overly ambitious with the tangential goal of having parts made in every congressional district" rather than being first a useful system that is needed. ... I'm also sitting in an armchair at a keyboard so take my comments with the appropriate seasoning. The general "America is lacking on its heavy manufacturing industry" is a real concern but one that I'm not sure how it can be solved without getting into significant subsidizing (see the chip production) that starts rising hackles over at the WTO. How far do you have to subsidize those industries to get them to be competitive... or do you have a government naval yard that doesn't really care about being competitive with Marinette Marine (aside: https://www.wisconsinmaritime.org https://www.wisconsinmaritime.org is quite interesting).