“... the defense contractors make out like the bandits that they are,...”
As with everything, the real truth is much more complicated and messy than a breezy label suggests. I spent an entire career in military contracting and even had a fifty-four million dollar project that was ruined by putting it aboard these floating turkeys. (The small helicopter they use could not safely tow my equipment so, (and with other reasons) the project was cancelled.)
In every case I dealt with that ended up being a huge drain on assets, the engineers tried to warn management and the customer about what problems they foresaw. And, in each case politics and money (pork) prevailed and political decisions, not engineering decisions, caused the projects to miserable, expensively, fail.
Virtually every military and civilian contractor I spoke with about the littoral ship knew it was a failure in the making. This was years before we had four of them. I gathered the littoral concept was backed by some admiral with a lot of pull.
I noticed as engineers and professionals rose in power and their jobs increased in scope, they still applied the solutions that had worked before, but were now outdated. I think as (some) people rise in power and prestige they become isolated and stop developing technical skills because they are now developing political skills. They also stop listening to, or are isolated from, those who have the skills and advice that would make the project a success.
*sigh* that problem is universal.
Bingo! In similar situations, I'm reminded of the old saying that "a platypus is a duck designed by a committee." If you actually want something that works, give the engineers the specs and a budget, and then keep the politicians and accountants off their backs...