A Lot More to Cut

 The main new contribution was canceling analternative engine program for the Air Force’s new F-35 joint strike fighter — total additional savings, $1 billion.

This year’s budget does not eliminate the Air Force’s redundant stealth fighter, the F-22. It buys four more. It does not eliminate the Navy’s costly blue water DDG-1000 destroyer. It buys three more. It makes no significant reductions in the Navy’s wholly unneeded Virginia class attack submarine. These three programs account for almost $7 billion a year in unnecessary spending.

The budget also left untouched the $2.8 billion planned for the Marine Corps’s troubled V-22 vertical takeoff aircraft, and reclaimed only a fraction of the billions that could be saved on missile defense while needed research and development proceed

Two-thirds of the largest weapons systems ran over their budgets last year, for a combined extra cost of $296 billion. These programs were, on average, almost two years behind schedule.

有人说美国的国防政策受均是企业的影响，甚至是控制。这个在任何国家都有可能，都是委托代理关系嘛，处理具体事务的人都可能被军事企业影响，除非这个军事企业也是国有的，像中国；中国国防企业的模式的忧虑是持续性的创新，说是没有竞争，但是可以跟国外买武器，落后的差距会维持吧。