Bunker Mentality makes a very good presentation of why we are where we are, and in the main I accept the thrust of his argument. Let us take as an example the issue of Hercules aircraft not being fitted with ESF. 40 years after this fleet was created it has only now been so fitted, and not completely at that. Why was this when the very air force through which they were obtained (negotiations with Lockheed were, IIRC, via USAF for reasons which I do not recall but assume were IAW US law) was then fitting it as standard in its own fleet? Well financial of course, but to pick up on Bunker's point because;
a. The cost would have been in $US, a very big problem then (the K was stuffed with UK electronics to lower the dollar cost)
b. The only war the RAF then contemplated was WW3, and ESF was not going to save any transport aircraft jumped by the Red Airforce.
c. There was, and still is, a capacity cost to ESF which would have had an adverse effect on the worldwide strategic capability of the fleet then being exploited.
However, the job of the Air Staff and the responsibility of Air Officers is to continuously review capability and future requirements. I would say that by the time the J was being contemplated, let alone ordered this would have flagged up a deficiency in a fleet that was to be put more and more into a hot tactical front-line. That it was decided (for it surely was) not to fit ESF as part of the build was an abrogation of those responsibilities. Calls, both formal and informal, from the work face drawing attention to this deficiency that were effectively fobbed off merely add to that abrogation. It is that abrogation, writ large, that is at the core of this issue. It is one thing to balance the 'wish list' to resources, it is quite another to supply kit unfit for purpose merely to conform to government spending policy.