The biggest problem, IMHO, in acquiring a new aircraft of any kind is the lack of reality displayed by everyone involved.
First, a military acquisition project is not a Congressional Jobs project. But to gain support (aka money to spend) you need to part out the work to as many Congressional districts as possible. See the breakdown of the B-1’s sub-contractors.
Second, We have known as far back as the mid 1970’s that filling every post-Vietnam aircraft wish list would take two an a fractional companies; one for fighters, one for tankers/bombers/transports, and the fractal company to build helicopters. At that level of effort all companies involved would be economically survivable. Now every company must compete for very project so their cost overheads have exploded.
Third, the childish desire of every project manager/senior officer to put his personal mark (think a dog at a fire hydrant) on the project adds an other whole series of cost overruns.
Fourth. We have repeatedly learned that you can not have one aircraft, normally a fighter, do both the USAF and USN/USMC mission sets. The F-111A and F-111B program from the 1960s proved that point. Thinking that hardware can be replaced by software is a manifestation of this issue.
Fifth. Service desires MUST be subordinated to NATIONAL DEFENSE. I call your individual and collective attention to the USAF’s third attempt to divest itself of the A-10 and its close air support mission. Senior AF leadership continues to view the A-10 funding line as a source of money to build/fund a new fighter aircraft. You would think after getting one Chief of Staff fired for this level of stupidity in 1990 the generals would have learned.
Finally. The bloated bureaucracy of “acquisition professional” needs to totally disappear. Why? Have you ever heard of any “white’ acquisition project that was brought in on time, or at budget, or with the required capabilities? Much less any of the two, or heavens forbid all three goals being met? Yet the “acquisition professionals’ take up resources, time, money, and manpower, and get rewarded for a consistent track record of failure.
All true.
Funny that you use the fire hydrant imagery. Before I retired, I referred to the lack of focus on the mission by senior officers and that their primary focus was acquiring fiefdoms, recognition, and promotion like a pack of dogs circling a hydrant, nipping at each others asses, and marking their territories.