Army report: Military has spent $32 billion since ’95 on abandoned weapons programs

Source: The Washington Post

The Army’s Comanche helicopter was envisioned as “the quarterback of the digital battlefield,” a technologically superior aircraft that could hide from enemies, operate at night and in bad weather, and travel farther than any other helicopter.

Gen. Richard Cody, a former vice chief of staff of the Army, called it the “most flexible, most agile” aircraft the country had ever produced.

In 2000, it ranked as the most important planned buy for the Army. Four years later, the program — which had consumed close to 20 years of work and nearly $6 billion — was abruptly shuttered.

It is one of 22 major Army weapons programs that have been canceled since 1995, ringing up a price tag of more than $32 billion for equipment that was never built. A new study commissioned by the Army, though not publicly released, condemns the service’s efforts as “unacceptable.”

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/capitalbusiness/army-report-military-has-spent-32-billion-since-97-on-abandoned-weapons-programs/2011/05/23/AGwuqjCH_singlePage.html

He said instead of each Branch chief managing acquisitions, they are managed somewhere else.

When there are schedule slips and cost overruns the service chiefs find out *after* it's too late.

He said the MRAP vehicle was designed, produced and fielded in one year, but one program that needed rework (Marines amphibious assault craft I think) wouldn't produce the weapon system until 2024. Even this four star General was incredulous.

get abandoned very rarely.