Have you ever worked on a DoD development contract?
Costs always increase, often dramatically, and the reason is requirements creep, which is usually a government issue, not a contractor issue. This is normal. It is a development contract. New things are discovered as work is done, and are incorporated into the design.
Another problem is that the length of the contract is such that procurement personnel in both the government and the contract sides turn over and are replaced during the process, which leads to a loss of institutional memory and extreme rigidity on some requirements. Just as a hypothetical, suppose there is a range specification for the aircraft. Say 1000 miles. We get six years into a contract and suddenly the engine is found to be slightly less efficient than was believed when the program started. This means the range falls to 990 miles. Well, it turns out that you can't just add a couple of gallons to the size of the fuel tank on an aircraft, and keeping the original range requirement is going to mean a major redesign and an enormous cost overrun. Sometimes the government will say that there is no practical difference between 990 miles and 1000 miles, and sometimes they will insist on meeting the original spec.
Not quite so easy to determine fault there is it?
Been working DoD acquisition for 30+ years. Requirements creep is the result of not doing it right the first time. That’s is usually the fault of the government and I agree with the constant turnover which is about every 2 - 3 years many times sooner is a major issue.. everyone wants “their” name on it somewhere so they make changes and leave.
I understand everything you’re saying and agree with 99% but doing it right the first time and you get the product you want and you get it in a reasonable time frame not 10 - 15 years or more. As new capabilities come on line you do block upgrades for those capabilities. You don’t halt everything or start over.
When an aircraft can’t meet a requirement the requirement is often changed or waived so you can meet your DT/OT or LRIP schedule, schedule drives cost and production, it’s better to meet schedule so you get funded so you can build a product that can’t meet it’s requirement and then you try to fix it... this seldom if ever works but is used over and over to get funding.
Yeah.. been there done that but retirement is just around the corner!!