![]() ![]() (The company makes missiles, missile defense systems, warships, and a host of other combat aircraft, among other products.) It sits at the top of an industry that’s more important to national security than ever: About 58% of the Pentagon budget went to private contractors in 2020, the highest share in 20 years, according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Lockheed brought in about $66 billion in revenue in 2022, virtually all of it for arms. The program is also a measure of the health of Lockheed Martin, the largest weapons company that has ever existed. The opportunity cost is measured in hundreds of billions of dollars. ![]() ![]() Taxpayers have invested heavily in the F-35 for more than 20 years, to the exclusion of other defense and domestic priorities. The F-35 is the largest program inside the Pentagon, by far, with an annual budget of about $12 billion. If the F-35 is such a boondoggle, why are so many governments clamoring to buy it? The answers to this question are vitally important to America and its allies, and to every U.S. And this came on the heels of massive new orders in 2021 from Finland and even the famously neutral Swiss. As the war in Ukraine dragged on, Greece, the Czech Republic, and Singapore all expressed interest in the F-35. Soon after Scholz’s speech, Canada announced that it wanted 88 planes. Nonetheless, Germany ended up buying nearly 40 of the jets, at a reported cost of $8 billion. “We spent $1.5 trillion on the F-35, which has never worked, and never will, and yet we still buy it,” Maher declared, concluding, to peals of laughter, “It’s the Yugo of fighter jets.” Maher’s critique was a little off: The estimated cost of developing, building, and maintaining the F-35 fleet over its anticipated life span of about 60 years is actually $1.7 trillion. Last fall, comedian Bill Maher captured the conventional thinking about the fighter during a monologue on his HBO show. The jet is 10 years behind schedule for final approval and almost 80% over budget, its production repeatedly stalled by defects and miscalculations. Almost since the F-35 program was announced in 2001, it has been the symbol of America’s dysfunctional military-industrial complex. This might seem puzzling to anyone who follows the news. ![]()
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