Originally Posted by
melmothtw
Is that not the same philosophy the USAF had for the F-15 - introduce it into service quickly but at a very baseline standard, and then rapidly spiral develop it once it's operational? The advantage being that you're not shooting for the impossible 100% solution that would prevent the aircraft ever entering service in the first place.
looks like thats what they're doing with the B21 (see other thread)
But the US has veered between early production and late production (after a lot of prototypes) ever since 1945 - RAND published a study by Lorell et al in 1998IIRC
You win some, you lose some