F-35
Credit: Matt Cardy
Twenty years since the Pentagon began taking bids from defense contractors, the F-35 fighter jet — the most expensive weapon ever made — is finally ready to see active duty over the Pacific Ocean. The U.S. Marine Corps expects to deploy 16 of the stealthy high-tech warplanes early next year at Iwakuni Air Station in Japan. From there, U.S. pilots will begin testing the jets in regular noncombat operations from the Navy’s USS Wasp amphibious assault vessel in what one commanding general has described as the “school of hard knocks.”
Years of delays, management shakeups, engine and software problems — and most important — cost overruns have made this Lockheed Martin jet initiative a punching bag and pork barrel project.
As far back as 2001, the cost of the program was termed astronomical, with initial […]
Doing the math, using round numbers, 16 jets X $1T = $16 Trillion. And, this money is from “taxpayers?” I think not and believe it’s from a printing press in the privately owned Federal Reserve Bank. Also, it would make the national debt skyrocket, and Congress would never allow that to happen (without threat from the Fed) now would they!